Within weeks of Pearl Harbor, German U-boats arrived off the Delaware
coast and attacked numerous ships along the vital shipping lanes to
Philadelphia and Wilmington. On February 28, 1942, two German torpedoes
hit the destroyer Jacob Jones, which was carrying more than one hundred
American sailors. It sank in less than an hour. A center for military
activity, Lewes became a refuge for many survivors from such attacks.
The dunes along Cape Henlopen hid the massive artillery batteries of
Fort Miles. Residents of the beachfront communities rallied amid the
blackout regulations and air raid drills with rationing and scrap
drives. Spotters watched for enemy warships in concrete towers that
still line the coast. Author Michael Morgan tells the remarkable story
of a coast at war.