TORPEDOED CREW

Greymouth Evening Star, 17 October 1939, Page 9

TORPEDOED CREW

HELPFUL U-BOAT CAPTAIN. LONDON, September 16. “Look out, boys. There’s a ship coming which will pick you up. So long.” These words were spoken in perfect English by the commander of a U-boat to the crew of the British steamer Olivegrove (4,060 tons) five hours after he had sunk her. Norman Martin, the Olivegrove’s Glasgow bo’sun, told this story when he arrived home this week. With the other members of the crew he had been taken to Southampton by the United States steamer, Washington (4,89 tons), which had picked up the vessel’s full crew of 33. “When we first sighted the submarine,” Mr. Martin said, “she ordered us to ‘abandon ship.’ “We lowered the boats. Seventeen got into the captain’s boat; 16 into the one in which I was. The Olivegrove sank in six minutes. "Meanwhile we had sei sail, and were going hard before the wind for the Irish coast. But the captain’s boat had stayed behind, as the U-boat commander had. said he wished to see our papers.” “About two hours later we saw the submarine coming straight at us. When it got close we saw it was towing the captain’s boat. “Soon after, the German commander hailed us to come alongside. When we had tied up beside the captain’s lifeboat, he said: ‘Are your compasses in order? Good. Your best course is to sail for the Fastnet Rock, off the Cork coast. The reading for that course is so and so.’ “The submarine then sailed away. But about five hours later, as dusk was falling, it came near once more, to tell us about a rescue ship coming. As it left us for the last time it fired rockets to draw attention to us.” William Scott, donkeyman on the British ship Regent Tiger (10,000 tons) which also was sunk, said on arriving in England: “The submarine put three shots a . little wide of our bows as a signal for us to take to the boats. The commander allowed us just under half an hour for the job.

“It was a tight squeeze, because the water was so choppy that the boats kept filling with water, and we had to bail out rapidly. We were all a bit worried in case we shouldn’t get through with it fast enough. That gave us an extra of speed, I think. “When we had all taken to the boats the commander and his crew lined the deck of the submarine watching us. As we pulled away they waved goodbye. We waved back. What else could we do?

“We hadn’t been rowing a minute when the submarine sank our ship. There was a stunning explosion, followed by a mighty blaze.”