Sunk But Not Forgotten
Roger Paine tells the tragic tale of the RMS Laconia during World War II.
The story of RMS Laconia
IN September 1942, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean midway between the coasts of Africa and Brazil, RMS Laconia – a 20,000-ton Cunard ocean liner which had been converted to a troopship – was sunk by a German U-boat. This tragic incident was to have lasting consequences.
In command of the Laconia, which was launched in 1921, was 62-yearold Captain Rudolf Sharp. On August 12, 1942, Laconia took on board returning and wounded servicemen at Suez Bay, alongside about twenty civilians and British officials with their families fleeing the theatre of war. Then, shortly before sailing, 50 heavily guarded lorries parked alongside her on the quay. From them emerged nearly 2,000 Italian prisoners of war captured in Libya. They were hurried up the gangway by their Polish guards.
After first calling at Durban, the
ship left Cape Town on September 1. Captain Sharp faced a 7,000-mile unescorted voyage to England, plus the responsibility for the safety and well-being of 463 officers and crew, 286 military personnel, 80 civilians, 1,793 Italian prisoners of war and 103 Polish guards. In total, 2,725 people.
Keeping well away from the coast, Sharp plotted a zig-zag course by day, proceeding at full speed on a normal course under the cover of darkness.
By September 9 the Laconia had covered 2,800 miles, and there was a relaxed attitude amongst the passengers – most of whom had been on board for over a month without incident.
The German U-boat, U-156 was a Type IXC submarine built in Bremen and launched in 1941. In command since her maiden voyage was Korvettenkapitan Werner Hartenstein, a highly successful submarine commander and holder of Germany’s highest military honour, the Knight’s Cross. A thirty-two-year-old regular officer with a university education, he joined the Navy in 1928, gradually working his way up through the ranks.
On the morning of September 12, U-156 was on patrol in the Atlantic, between Liberia and Ascension Island. While heading southward on the surface, a shout from the lookout brought Hartenstein to the bridge.
His attention was fixed on the silhouette of a large ship sailing alone, south-west of their position. It did not take long for him to discover that this ship was the British liner, Laconia.
As she had been converted into a troopship at the outbreak of the war, she was armed with deck guns, depth charges and ASDIC submarine detection equipment. This made her a legitimate military target.
Hartenstein altered course to run parallel with the ship, keeping her smoke in sight but staying far enough
away until dusk had fallen.
As soon as sunset approached, Hartenstein closed in and by 10 p.m., U-156 was in position. With the ship unmistakeable in the cross-hairs of his periscope, he fired two torpedoes from a range of two miles. After a run of about three minutes both torpedoes found their target, and almost immediately the Laconia stopped dead in the water and began to list.
Hartenstein surfaced and made his way towards the stricken ship in order to try to capture the captain and the chief engineer. In the fading light, the crew of the submarine could see survivors struggling in the water, some in lifeboats, but many in the sea. The scene was one of total chaos, with burning wreckage lighting up the night sky, overcrowded lifeboats, frantic swimmers, panicked cries for help and the very real danger of sharks. As he approached the beleaguered survivors, Hartenstein was amazed to hear Italian voices. Taking on board a few survivors, he soon discovered the true situation aboard the Laconia. It was not the troopship he had imagined.
Astonished at the numbers in the water, he immediately mounted a rescue operation. Soon U-156 was crammed above and below decks with two hundred survivors, with another two hundred in tow aboard four lifeboats.
Hartenstein continued to pick up survivors from the wreckage, but he knew that many in the boats and those in the water would not survive unless rescue came soon.
He signalled the head of U-boat operations, Admiral Karl Dönitz, alerting him to the situation and requesting instructions.
The fortunate few to be taken on board the submarine could hardly believe that the enemy responsible for their condition – and a captain who spoke excellent English – was now doing his utmost to ensure their safety.
Members of the crew served them coffee and hot soup, and gave medical attention where needed. Some even surrendered their own quarters for the more exhausted cases.
Hartenstein also called for assistance from other U-boats, and broadcast a radio message in plain English providing his position and requesting aid from any nearby vessels, with a promise of a cessation of hostilities while rescue operations were underway.
U-156 stayed on the surface for the next two and a half days. A very dangerous position for a submarine.
Back in Paris, Dönitz was startled by Hartenstein’s actions, as he had previously ordered that no such rescues should take place. This time, however, he not only allowed it, but supported it, “to give them an order contrary to the laws of humanity would have destroyed it [the crew’s morale] utterly.”
To speed up the rescue operation, he ordered three more submarines to the area. U-156 was joined by U-506 and U-507, and the Italian submarine Cappellini.
With the liner’s lifeboats in tow, and with hundreds standing on each of their upper decks, the submarines set off towards the African coastline to rendezvous with Vichy French warships sent from Senegal.
On the morning of September 16, U-156 and its rescued humanity was spotted by an American B-24 Liberator aircraft from Ascension Island. The submarine displayed a Red Cross flag, but the pilot, Lieutenant James D. Harden USAAF, was apparently unaware of its significance. He notified his base of what he had spotted.
The senior officer on duty that day, Captain Robert C. Richardson III, had two choices: he could let the U-boat go, thus enabling it to sink more allied shipping later, or order the B-24 to attack. “Sink the sub!” was the order passed to Harden.
He flew back to the scene of the rescue effort and attacked with bombs and depth charges. One landed among the lifeboats in tow behind U-156, whilst others straddled the submarine.
Hartenstein felt he had no alternative but to cast adrift those lifeboats still afloat and order the survivors on his deck into the water.
The submarine immediately dived and escaped, receiving pressure damage to her hull.
Dozens of the Laconia survivors perished, although U-506 and U-507 returned to the area later, unwilling to abandon people they had helped to save.
Fortunately, the Vichy French warships from Dakar arrived the next day and picked up the remaining survivors, so the loss of life from the American action was contained.
In total, around 1,620 people from the Laconia – officers, crew, passengers and prisoners-of-war – perished. Eighty-eight percent of those who died were Italian POWS. There were around 1,100 survivors.
The actions of Captain Richardson in ordering the attack were considered by many to be a war crime, although no formal charges were ever brought.
The Laconia Incident, as it became known, was to have a profound effect on submarine warfare for the remainder of the war. Until then, it had not been unusual for German submarines to assist torpedoed survivors – providing food, water and directions to the nearest land.
Now Admiral Dönitz gave the order that henceforth all rescue operations were prohibited, and survivors were to be left in the sea.
In 1946, Dönitz stood trial at Nuremburg for war crimes. The “Laconia order” was used as a basis of indictment against him.
Dönitz was sentenced to eleven and a half years in prison, spending most of it in Berlin’s Spandau Prison.
He died on Christmas Eve, 1980, at the age of eighty-nine. His funeral was attended by thousands of old comrades including over 100 holders of the Knight’s Cross.
Werner Hartenstein and his crew were not so fortunate. Six months after the Laconia incident, on March 8, 1943, whilst on patrol east of Barbados, U-156 was depth charged by an American bomber. There were no survivors.