The Atlantic Ocean can be an unforgiving place at the best of times. During the Second World War, combatants on both sides were at peril both from the ocean and the enemy. On 12 September 1942, the British ship RMS Laconia, which was armed, was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat 156.
Yet that was not the end of the story. What unfolded was a remarkable tale of heroism and events both remarkable and ultimately truly unfortunate for many of those involved. The U-boat surfaced, its commander hoping to capture the senior crew of the ship. The horrified crew instead saw over 2000 people in the water.
The Germans had not known that they had just destroyed a PoW ship. The survivors of the sinking were six hundred miles from the coast of Africa. There were over sixty British civilians and over 400 British and Polish troops. Their cargo had been a strange one – 1800 Italian prisoners of war. The first irony of the situation then, was that the German U-boat had imperilled many of its own allies.
The survivors faced a certain and protracted watery death.
Then, the U-Boat commander Werner Hartenstein (left), made an extraordinary decision that went beyond all protocol.
He ordered the U-boat to surface he ordered his submariners to save as many of the marooned survivors as possible.
This act of humanity would save the lives of many hundreds of people. Yet the tragedy of the Laconia was not over yet.
