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N0KFQ > TODAY 12.09.12 18:40l 41 Lines 1866 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 28208_KB0WSA
Read: GUEST
Subj: Today in History - Sep 12
Path: IZ3LSV<ED1ZAC<IW0QNL<IK6ZDE<VE2PKT<ZL2BAU<GB7YKS<XE1FH<N0KFQ<KB0WSA
Sent: 120912/1629Z 28208@KB0WSA.MO.USA.NA BPQK1.4.52
Sep 12, 1942:
The Laconia is sunk
On this day in 1942, a German U-boat sinks a British troop ship,
the Laconia, killing more than 1,400 men. The commander of the
German sub, Capt. Werner Hartenstein, realizing that Italians
POWs were among the passengers, strove to aid in their rescue.
The Laconia, a former Cunard White Star ship put to use to
transport troops, including prisoners of war, was in the South
Atlantic bound for England when it encountered U-156, a German
sub. The sub attacked, sinking the troop ship and imperiling the
lives of more than 2,200 passengers. But as Hartenstein, the sub
commander, was to learn from survivors he began taking onboard,
among those passengers were 1,500 Italians POWs. Realizing that
he had just endangered the lives of so many of his fellow Axis
members, he put out a call to an Italian submarine and two other
German U-boats in the area to help rescue the survivors.
In the meantime, one French and two British warships sped to the
scene to aid in the rescue. The German subs immediately informed
the Allied ships that they had surfaced for humanitarian reasons.
The Allies assumed it was a trap. Suddenly, an American B-24
bomber, the Liberator, flying from its South Atlantic base on
Ascension Island, saw the German sub and bombed it_despite the
fact that Hartenstein had draped a Red Cross flag prominently on
the hull of the surfaced sub. The U-156, damaged by the air
attack, immediately submerged. Admiral Karl Donitz, supreme
commander of the German U-boat forces, had been monitoring the
rescue efforts. He ordered that "all attempts to rescue the crews
of sunken ships...cease forthwith." Consequently, more than 1,400
of the Laconia's passengers, which included Polish guards and
British crewmen, drowned.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ KB0WSA.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: n0kfq@winlink.org
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