With a view to understand how high strain rate flyer plate impact affects the nanohardness of a coarse (10 μm) grain high density (3.978 gm.cc^-1) alumina, load controlled nanoindentation experiments were conducted with a Berkovich indenter on as received alumina (ARA) and shocked alumina fragments (SA) of obtained from a flyer plate shock impact study at 6.5 GPa. The results showed that the nanohardness of the shocked alumina (SA) samples was much lower than that of the as received alumina (ARA) samples and that the indentation size effect (ISE) was mild in the ARA but quite severe in the SA samples. Extensive additional characterization by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and a physical model based analysis of the experimental load depth data were utilized to provide a new explanation for the presence of strong indentation size effect in the shock recovered alumina.