U-BOAT SURVIVORS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 64, Issue 32, 17 November 1943, Page 3

U-BOAT SURVIVORS.

STO'RY OF LIBERATOR’S ATTACK

LONDON, November 15

The 'Australian commander of the corvette which picked up survivors of the U-boat which was sunk when Flying Officer L. A. Triggs won the Victoria Gross has reached England. He is Lieut.-Commander S. Darling, of Melbourne, commander of H.M.S. Clarkia.

The Clarkia was diverted from patrol off the African coast, and instructed to pick up the survivors of the Liberator, which was located by another aircraft. Just before dawn one morning the Clarkia’s searchlights found a rubber dinghy. It contained three German officers and four German ratings from the U-boat which Flying-Officer Trigg had sunk. They had spent 48 hours in the dinghy. R.I.F. aircraft dropped them food and water the previous day, thinking they were the Liberator’s crew.

The German captain told. Lieut.Commander Darling that Flying Officer Trigg attacked toward mid-day. The Liberator made two attacks and was burning around the tail. As it approached for the third attack the U-boat attacks directly hit it. The Liberator power-dived into the sea and disintegrated, but a stick of depth charges exploded around the U-boat’s hull near the batteries. Chlorine gas killed half of the crew of the U-boat, which circled for 20 minutes and then sank. Twenty-four men were left struggling in the sea. One German sighted a small packet half a mile away and began swimming toward it. He reached it half an hour after the U-boat sank and discovered it was the Liberator’s dinghy, and inflated it. Then began a tragic and horrifying ordeal. The sea was full of sharks, and only seven Germans succeeded in reaching the dinghy, two of whom were bitten by sharks. One had a large amount of flesh torn from his thigh and another had an arm laceiated, showing that he had wrenched it from a shark’s jaws.

The last man aboard the dinghy was the captain. The remainder of the crew of the U-boat were either drowned or killed by sharks. The men in the dinghy paddled round, but could not find any more of their comrades. The captain was only 26 years of age and four ratings were under 20. If was their testimony of FlyingOfficer Triggs’ determined attack on which the award of the Victoria Cross was made.