PARTLY EXPLAINED.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 216, 10 August 1940, Page 7

PARTLY EXPLAINED.

NAZI SHIPPING CLAIMS. • METHOD OF COMPILATION. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, Aug. 8. A partial explanation of grosslyexaggerated German claims . relating to shipping sunk by submarines is thought to be offered by statements made by captured members of the crew of Ul3, which was sunk by British naval forces. According to these prisoners the Ul3 sank 22,000 tons of shipping on one cruise in April. Comparing these dates of alleged sinking with the days on which ships were actually sunk, it seems that U-boat commanders claim a hit each time a torpedo is fired and sometimes when it is not. . Thus members of the crew claimed to have sunk a destroyer in the Fair Island channel (north-east of the Orkneys) on April 17, and Zeesen, broadcasting in English to America on April 25, stated: “On April 17 a German submarine sank, off the Slietlands, one destroyer of the Tribal class.” In fact there was no attack on any warship in that vicinity on or about that date. The next- claim made by the crew is well-founded, in that they said that on the same day the Ul3 sank a merch.int vessel: On April 17 the Swainby, a vessel of about 5000 tons, was sunk without warning by torpedo During the night of April 25-26, the crew stated two torpedoes had been fired. If this is true both must have missed their targets,, because there is no record of any ship being that night. On April 28 a tanker is claimed to have been sunk. On that day the tanker Scottish American was struck by a torpedo but not. sunk. She was brought safely to port Thus on this cruise, in which 22,000 tons are claimed, only 5000 were actually sunk. Tt is interesting to note that the figure claimed is approximately jn the same proportion to that sunk as is the German figure for the total tonnage claimed to the total tonnage actually sunk.