The Last Voyage of the Andrea Doria

Book excerpt: “An extensively documented account of the 1956 sinking of the Italian luxury liner . . . amazing stories of serendipitous luck, heroism, cowardice, and tragedy.” —Booklist In 1956, a stunned world watched as the famous Italian ocean liner Andrea Doria sank after being struck by a Swedish vessel off the coast of Nantucket. Unlike the tragedy of the Titanic, this sinking played out in real time across radios and televisions, the first disaster of the modern age. Audiences witnessed everything that ensued after the unthinkable collision—from the heroic rescue of passengers to the ship’s final sinking beneath the Atlantic, taking some fifty lives with her. The Andrea Doria represented the romance of travel and the glamourous side of mid-twentieth century life. Now Greg King and Penny Wilson offer a fresh look at this legendary liner and her tragic fate. They bring the fateful voyage to life in a narrative focused on her passengers: Cary Grant’s wife; Philadelphia’s flamboyant mayor; the heiress to the Marshall Field fortune; and many brave Italian emigrants who found themselves plunged into a desperate struggle to survive. The Last Voyage of the Andrea Doria follows the effect this trauma had on their lives, and brings the story up-to-date with the latest expeditions and never-before-seen photos of the wreck.