Liner Sinks With Colours Flying

Manawatu Times, Volume 65, Issue 187, 9 August 1940, Page 8

Liner Sinks With Colours Flying

U-Boat Attack Off The Irish West Coast

25 PERSONS MISSING United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. LONDON, Aug. T. It is officially announced that the 9337-ton British ship Accra wa* sunk off the west coast of Eire in a submarine attack against a convoy. She went down stern first with her colours flying, a member of the crew having hoisted the Red Ensign. The Accra sank on July 26. Nineteen people are missing. Some lives were lost when a lifeboat overturned in the choppy sea. Over 450 survivors were landed today at a north-west English port. It is understood that there were no children aboard. Five nurses and two stewardesses, the only women aboard, all survived. It is believed tbat the U-boat fired a cluster of torpedoes from long range. The liner sank half an hour after being struck. No-one saw the submarine, though it is believed that the naval escort later sank it. One torpedo struck the Accra amidships and blew some of her engineers along the propellor tunnel. They crawled back and helped in lowering the lifeboats. One steward, who was serving lunch when the torpedo exploded, has now survived three torpedoings. Captain tfohn Joseph Smith said that the members of the crew might have been queuing up passengers for the cinema, so coolly did they superintend the lowering of the lifeboats. The famous blockade-runner Captain “Potato” Jones commanded one of the rescue ships. A smokescreen protected the survivors during the rescue. Twenty-nine out of the 32 members 3f the crew of a Greek ship torpedoed off North-West Donegal have been landed at Donegal. The Admiralty announces that his Majesty’s minesweeping trawler River Clyde has been sunk by a mine. It is officially announced that casualties on the minesweeping trawler Marsona, which was sunk by an enemy mine early this week, were one offlcei killed and one presumed killed, and ten ratings presumed killed and six wounded. The casualties on the naval trawlei Cape Finisterre, which was sunk after an attack by four enemy bombers lasl Friday, were one officer and eigh4 ratings wounded and one rating killed