sentences:  A Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club and the Military Book Club, the book tells the story of the remarkable two-and-a-half-hour sea battle fought on October 25, 1944, in which Rear Admiral Clifton A. F. Sprague's task unit, known as "Taffy 3" (7th Fleet's Task Unit 77.4.3), of "jeep carriers" and their "tin can" escorts rose to the impossible challenge of beating back an overwhelming force of Japanese battleships and cruisers under Vice Adm. Takeo Kurita.Survivors of the four U.S. ships lost in the battle—, , , and —then struggled to survive a two-day-ordeal adrift at sea awaiting rescue.A fifth ship from Taffy 3, the escort carrier , was sunk in a kamikaze attack immediately following the Japanese withdrawal.