This is a riveting read about a group of Black sailors serving in the Navy, during WWII, in the only capacity the US military would allow them: loading ammunition and bombs onto Navy ships.
When the S.S. E. A. Bryan blew up on July 17, 1944, killing 320 sailors and servicemen in San Francisco Bay's Port Chicago, the men have second thoughts about returning to work under the exact same Navy officers who cared so little for making the work safe in the first place. They report to work and are willing to work, just not loading bombs in the exact same manner that got the other men killed.
They don't mutiny and the transcripts from the trial make it clear that even though that's what they're charged with, their actions never rise to the level of mutiny. All 50 men testify they never "planned to take over" from their commanding officers.
Inexplicably, in an act of rank racism, all 50 men are convicted of mutiny. Nine are sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. Despite Thurgood Marshall taking on the case in appeal, and the Navy admitting the prosecutor was overtly racist, the verdicts stand.
While they're in prison, WWII marches forward. The Navy decides to desegregate, and wants the Port Chicago 50's convictions out of the popular consciousness. It released the men from prison and returned them to active duty in early 1946, and the next month announced it was desegregating.
But the convictions still stood and hung over the rest of their lives.
This is a riveting account of blatant racism in the US Navy during World War II that defies logic and common sense.
