The Laconia Incident Page 12

“It was that,” Robby agreed. “I thought the bloody Americans were supposed to be on our side! What now?”

  “Now we stick together and wait.”

  * * * * *

  It was the third bomb run that took its toll of the U-156. Sea water breached the battery compartment, and several battery cells were releasing chlorine gas. While the crew was able to don gas masks and repair the damage, there were only enough gas masks for the crew, so none of those rescued, and those who were belowdecks, could remain there. All were brought up on deck. The deck again became so crowded that Hartenstein was forced to order able-bodied men into the water—first the British and the Poles, and then, finally, the Italians.

  Meanwhile, those in the surviving lifeboats fished aboard all those they could. Somehow, two lifeboats approached the spot where Robby and Jim were treading water at the same time. Each one picked up one man. And so it was that Robby Cotton and Jim McLoughlin were brought aboard different lifeboats, and became separated once again.

  Soon, all the lifeboats in the area had taken on all the passengers they could hold, but there were still dozens of survivors in the water.

  * * * * *

  “We have to clear the area, Captain,” Schumacher said to Hartenstein. “The Americans could return at any time.”

  “They very well could,” Hartenstein agreed. “But you know we cannot dive the boat until all the damage is repaired.” (Hartenstein knew where this conversation was going, and he did not like it.)

  “All the more reason to be somewhere else, should they return.” Schumacher countered, confirming Hartenstein’s assumption.

  “There are still people on deck—almost a hundred, I would guess,” Hartenstein mused aloud to his first officer. “Those likely to survive in the water are already overboard. Those still on deck could never survive in the water, and we cannot take them below because of the gas.”

  “Yes,” Schumacher agreed, following his captain’s line of reasoning. “They could not remain on deck if the boat was to leave the area at any semblance of speed. And running the engines at speed will help clear the boat of the gas.”

  “And we cannot run the diesels disconnected from propulsion, just to charge the batteries, while the batteries are still compromised,” Hartenstein said. “I am well aware of all that, Leo.”

  “Yes, Captain,” Schumacher said, cowed.

  Finally, Hartenstein said, “Very well, Leo, there’s nothing else we can do. Clear the deck. Order the rest of those poor souls into the water. Then take us up to full speed and we will head northeast on the surface, and clear the area.”

  “Yes, Sir,” Schumacher replied, and reluctantly executed his commander’s orders.

  Hartenstein went below, not having the stomach to watch being done what must be done. Thus it was that the final ninety-two people aboard U-156 were ordered overboard and into the water. Very few survived.

  * * * * *

  Once clear of the area, the crew of U-156 worked diligently to repair their stricken craft.

  After several hours, the repairs completed, Hartenstein radioed Dönitz and apprised him of the latest events. He reported that the repairs were well enough along so that the boat could return to its original mission. Dönitz ordered Hartenstein to “ . . . take no further part in the salvage mission.”

  * * * * *

  Harden had turned his aircraft to the southwest and cleared the area, more concerned about having enough fuel to make it back to Wideawake Field, than being bereft of his bomb load. Busy flying the plane, he had not observed the action directly. He had to rely on what Kellar and Perlman saw, or thought they saw, as the attack on the U-boat unfolded.

  And so it was that, on return to Ascension Island, Harden reported that the targeted submarine had been observed turning over in the water, while its surviving crew clung to wreckage, or were seen swimming toward the lifeboats. Harden and his crew were convinced that they had successfully sunk the U-boat.

  Richardson was delighted. He ordered Harden and his crew to turn in for the night, and to return to the scene of their successful action the next morning and resume the search for survivors.

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  10

  Thursday, 17 September, 1942

  At first light, the B-24 Liberator bomber hurtled down the runway at Wideawake Field, and, once airborne, set a course to the northeast.

  * * * * *

  While U-156 had cleared the area, and had resumed its patrol, the remaining three submarines, operating over the still-widening area in which the survivors had become dispersed, continued their rescue efforts.

  Dönitz’ aides had wanted the admiral to cease the rescue operation altogether, but he insisted that the operation, once begun, had to be completed. The French ships were due to arrive later that Thursday, and there were the Italian survivors (their allies after all) to consider. He sent a message to both Schacht and Würdermann that they were under orders to be on the alert for any enemy air activity. They were to transfer all non-Italians to lifeboats, and were to be prepared to dive at the first sign of danger.

  Dӧnitz also relayed the alert for enemy air activity to the Cappellini, via the Italian Royal Navy Command.

  * * * * *

  The Liberator returned to the scene of its previous day’s “victory” late that Thursday morning. Harden began to fly a grid pattern, and he, Perlman, and Kellar searched for survivors. There were, they noted, several lifeboats still afloat, and some swimmers still in the water. Harden contacted Wideawake and radioed back that they had found survivors and gave their position. Wideawake, in turn, vectored the two oncoming British rescue ships to the area. The Liberator had sufficient fuel to remain in the area, so Harden continued the search.

  Just before noon, Perlman was the first to sight U-506 cruising on the surface. He got on the intercom to Harden. “Jim,” he said, “check out our four o’clock. It’s another damned U-boat!”

  “Holy crap!” was Harden’s response.

  The crew of the Liberator couldn’t believe their luck. There was no hesitation this time. Harden immediately initiated the attack. “I’m opening the bomb bay doors, Kellar. Get ready to bag us another Nazi submarine!”

  But Würdermann’s lookouts had spotted the aircraft well before Perlman saw the U-boat, and U-506 had already cleared the deck and commenced its dive. The boat was well out of danger when the Liberator released depth charges over the place where it had been last seen. The U-boat escaped unscathed, with some 100 survivors aboard.

  Harden reported a “possible U-boat sinking” to Wideawake before turning the bomber back to the southwest and clearing the area.

  (The record shows that Harden and his crew were later decorated for having destroyed at least one enemy submarine, and probably damaging another.)

  * * * * *

  Earlier that same Thursday morning, U-156, now back on patrol in the South Atlantic, received word from Paris that Korvettenkapitӓn Werner Hartenstein had been awarded the Knights Cross of the Iron Cross.

  In the afternoon (and again a few days later), Dönitz sent a message to all U-boat commanders. It was later to become known as the Laconia Order. It read:

  1. Every attempt to save survivors of sunken ships, also the fishing up of men and putting them in lifeboats, the setting upright of overturned lifeboats, the handing over of food and water have to be discontinued. These rescues contradict the primary demands of warfare, especially the destruction of enemy ships and their crews.

  2. The orders concerning the bringing in of skippers and chief engineers stay in effect.

  3. Survivors are only to be rescued if their statement is important to the boat.

  4. Stay hard. Do not forget that the enemy did not take any regard for women and children when bombarding German towns.

  “Well, what do you think about it, Leo,” Hartenstein asked his first officer after Schumacher brought him the dispatch of Dönitz’ order in the U-boat’s tiny wardroom.

  “It’s well
deserved, Captain,” he replied.

  “Thank you, Leo, but I wasn’t referring to the Knights Cross, but to this order—you have read it, of course.”

  “Yes, Captain, I have.” Schumacher hesitated.

  “Well?”

  Finally, Schumacher said, “I think that the admiral is responding to pressure from up above, Sir. I suspect that the general staff and Der Fuehrer were very displeased with the events of this week past.”

  “Yes,” Hartenstein agreed, “I think you are correct. But if I am reading between the lines correctly, I don’t think Dönitz agrees. I think he still approves of our efforts to behave civilly, despite our almost being blown out of the water by the Americans.”

  “And why do you say that, Captain?”

  “Read the dispatch carefully, Leo, especially the last statement.”

  Schumacher reread the order. He reread: “Do not forget that the enemy did not take any regard for women and children when bombarding German towns.”

  “But it’s true, Captain, the enemy have been bombing German civilians,” he opined.

  “Yes, they have. But the Admiral also knows that we Germans were the first to initiate such action. It was our Luftwaffe that bombed English civilian populations beginning in 1940, and continued to do so, right up until our Panzers rolled into Russia, and our aircraft were needed for ground support. And weren’t they our Zeppelins that first bombarded London in the last war?”

  Schumacher looked pensive. “You’re saying . . .”

  “I’m saying that Dönitz is subtly reminding us that it is we who first breached the standards of civilized warfare, and that it is no wonder that now the enemy responds in kind. I think he is saying that our past barbarities are no justification for further barbarities.” He paused, then continued. “No, Leo, I think that the admiral issued this order only because Raeder and Der Fuehrer ordered him to do so, and this last bit is his way of showing his disagreement without getting stood up against the wall!”

  Schumacher raised his eyebrows and tilted his head, but said nothing. Perhaps the captain’s analysis is on target—but then again, perhaps not.

  * * * * *

  Later that same Thursday afternoon, the French ships arrived in the area where the Laconia had gone down, and there rendezvoused with the U-506, U-507, and the Cappellini. First, the cruiser Gloire relieved the submarines of their passengers (the Cappellini, however, retained all the British officers it had aboard).

  Afterward, the Gloire, along with the two sloops, the Dumont-d’Urville, and the Annamite, began searching the area for the lifeboats the submarine commanders had said were still out there, scattered about the area.

  The lifeboat that held Marco Scarpetti and Stanislaw Kominsky was the second one that the Gloire encountered. As with their first encounter, this boat contained British, Italian, and Polish survivors.

  Once aboard their ships, the French first served the survivors a thin gruel, and attended to those who needed medical attention. The British and the Poles were then separated from the Italians.

  Aboard the Gloire, Marco at once protested, pointing out to the Vichy lieutenant de vaisseau (lieutenant) in charge, in excellent, if accented, French. “My name is Marco Scarpetti, I am a sergeant in the Royal Italian Army. This Pole, Stanislaw, is my friend. He was kind to me and the other Italians, and has never hurt anyone. And the lieutenant,” he pointed out the RAF first lieutenant who had taken charge, organizing and supervising the survivors, and rationing their meager supply of food and water, “the lieutenant organized us in the lifeboat, and kept us alive.”

  “You speak French!” the Vichy lieutenant replied.

  “Yes, Sir,” Marco answered, “and English as well. But I was telling you—”

  “I know, I heard you. The Pole is your friend, and the Brit saved all your lives. But what do you think we plan to do to them? We French are not barbarians! Still, they are on the other side—they will be treated well and fairly, but they will be kept confined while here aboard the Gloire, and in Dakar, they will be transferred to internment camps to wait out the war. We can do no more and no less.”

  “And we Italians, Lieutenant?”

  “Are on the right side in this wretched war. You have the freedom of the ship as long as you stay out of the way of the crew.”

  “And I can visit Stanislaw?”

  “As I said, you have the freedom of the ship. Tell me your name again, Sergeant?”

  “Scarpetti, Marco, Lieutenant.”

  “Is you English as good as your French, Scarpetti?”

  “Better, Sir!”

  The Frenchman looked askance at the diminutive Italian. As if anything can be better than French! Finally, he shrugged and said, “Very well. Stay by me, Sergeant, if you will. You will be of great service as an interpreter.”

  “Avec plaisir, Monsieur.”

  * * * * *

  Later on, that same Thursday, the Gloire came upon the lifeboat that held the Logans and Tom Buckingham. The lifeboat’s passengers were down to a cup of water a day, and a bit of biscuit. If baby Helen had not been breastfeeding, she would never have survived.

  The French were solicitous of Violet Logan and her baby, and, by extension, of Donald as well, despite the remnants of his RAF uniform. They were far less solicitous of Laconia’s third officer, until Marco spoke up for him.

  “If it were not for Mr. Buckingham,” Marco explained to the French lieutenant, “life aboard the Laconia would have been far more odious. It was Mr. Buckingham who insured we Italians received sufficient food and water, and got medical treatment when we needed it. He made sure we had adequate sanitation. If a bunk was available in the ship’s sick bay, he gave it to an Italian. If it was not for him, fewer of us would have survived.”

  “Be that as it may,” the lieutenant responded, “and as I said before, he will be treated honorably, but he is still technically the enemy.”

  “Je comprends,” Buckingham volunteered. “I understand.”

  ”Ah, you speak French,” the lieutenant noted in that same language. “Then you must know I have no choice. While the Vichy government is technically independent and neutral, we still answer to our German conquerors.” The latter he said with a hint of sadness.

  “Encore, je comprends,” Buckingham replied, in French. “I am, at least, alive, and once more with a solid deck under my feet. For that, Monsieur, I am most grateful.”

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  11

  Friday, 18 September, 1942, to Monday, 16 November

  Over the next several days, beginning that Friday, 18 September, the Vichy cruiser Gloire, and the two sloops, continued rescuing those in lifeboats, and those few they found in the water who had managed to still stay alive.

  But there was only so much the French could do, either for Buckingham, or for the others Marco had spoken for. The women and children were indeed treated very well, allotted accommodations in a section of the crew’s quarters. The men among the English and the Poles, in contrast, were kept under guard in conditions no better than those the Italians had endured aboard the Laconia. Still, given the circumstances, even the men under guard would have admitted that the French treated them quite civilly.

  * * * * *

  On Saturday, 19 September, U-156 approached and attacked the British freighter, Quebec City, sinking her with a single torpedo. Of her 45 crew members, 41 managed to get into two lifeboats and row away from their ship before she sank. It was just before four o’clock in the afternoon, when the Quebec City went down. The day was bright and sunny, with only a few billowy clouds. The gunmetal sea was calm, with only gentle swells.

  The men in the lifeboats sighted a circling submarine’s periscope and were quite frightened when the boat surfaced, some of its crew scrambling on deck to man its guns. Other crew members appeared, brandishing machine guns, still others manned the bridge as lookouts, scanning the skies and the horizon for any possible threat. Finally, Korvettenkapitӓn Werner Hartenstein appear
ed on the bridge. The Quebec City’s Captain, William Thomas, described him only as a tall military figure with silver braid on his cap.

  The men in the lifeboats were surprised when, in perfect English, Hartenstein instructed them to bring their lifeboats alongside. Once the boats were tied alongside, Hartenstein asked if the captain was aboard. Thomas stood up. “Captain William Thomas, Sir, late of the Quebec City, at your service.”

  “Ah, Captain Thomas, I am genuinely sorry to have sunk your fine ship. But such are the fortunes of war. Tell me, Sir, what did the Quebec City carry, and where were you headed?”

  “To Freeport, Sir, with a cargo of Egyptian cotton.”

  “I see.” Hartenstein paused. “I sincerely wish I could be of more assistance in assuring the survival of you and your crew, Captain, and I would have happily towed your boats closed to land if I could—but I cannot. We were only recently attacked from the air by an American bomber while doing that very thing.”

  “Really, Sir?” Thomas said, registering his surprise.

  “Most assuredly, Captain. While perhaps I cannot take you in tow, I can at least point you in the proper direction. As I see it, you have two alternatives. The closest land hereabouts is Ascension Island, about eight hundred miles south-southeast. The African coast is farther, some twelve hundred miles east. Your choice.”

  Captain Thomas considered his options for a minute. “Our chances of finding a tiny island with just a compass are slim, Captain. As I see it, our best choice is the African coast.”

  “I agree, Captain. Come aboard and you can look at the map—perhaps plan your voyage.”

  Thomas boarded the submarine and did just that. Later, the two lifeboats were left on their own, as the submarine sailed off to the northwest on the surface. Before leaving them, Hartenstein apologized for being unable to give them any food, but did give them some tins of water.