MORE HARMLESS VICTIMS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVIII, Issue 21553, 16 January 1940, Page 9

MORE HARMLESS VICTIMS

Nazi Attacks On Shipping Campaign Against Trawlers United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright LONDON, January 13. The trawler Lucida was sunk by a mine on the north-east coast. The crew of 14 perished. A nearby trawler w finessed the sinking following a devastating explosion. During Thursday’s air raids German aeroplanes bombed and sank the small steamer Keynes in the North Sea. The crew were landed. Only the wireless operator was injured, although the aeroplanes attacked the ship twice, one securing five direct hits. The steamer Granta was mined and sunk off the east coast. Another vessel rescued the crew. Two German aeroplanes bombed and machine-gunned the steamer Petwines off the Yorkshire coast. The crew took to the boats. The captain later reported that a fire on board the vessel had been quelled and asked aid of a tug. which took the Petwines in tow. All the members of the crew are safe, in spite of the fact that 50 bombs were dropped. A German bomber sank the trawler Crozton on Thursday. Nine members of the crew drifted in an open boat for 24 hours. They were landed on the east coast. Ruthless Bombings Typical of the recent relentless German air attacks on unarmed merchantmen and helpless fishing trawlers are the stories now available in some detail of the attacks on the merchant ship Jevington Court on Tuesday and the fishing trawler Star of Scotland. About 11 a.m. on Tuesday, those on the bridge of the Jevington Court heard the sound of aircraft engines. One Dornier 17 appeared. It was flying very low and it circled round the steamer to make sure that she was defenceless. In circling again, and as it passed closer over the steamer it opened fire with machine-gun bullets, which tore up the deck planking, splintered the sides of the wheelhouse, and shattered the skylights and hatches. One bullet went through the engineroom skylight and put the dynamo out of action. Another glanced off the bridge rail and carved a long groove in the mahogany chart table. Bombs Shake Ship The machine circled again, and this time it also dropped a salvo of four bombs, but they fell wide because the Jevington Court was zig-zagging. The aircraft returned to the attack with machine-guns and bombs. The bombs fell near and their explosion shook the ship, but did no damage. In the next attack, the aircraft, still raking the deck with machine-gun fire, dropped a further two bombs. Men on the upper deck, in trying to dodge the hail of machine-gun bullets, saw these bombs falling, and were certain that they would hit the snip, but the vessel was under full helm and the bombs missed by six feet. The explosion of them, however, seemed to lift the ship. Everything movable was thrown about, and even the compasses were lifted out of their gimbals and thrown out of the binnacles. The safety valves of the boilers were lifted off their seatings, and the concussions sent up clouds of coal dust through the bunker hatches. The aircraft apparently thought that the bombs had hit and that the ship was sinking, for it disappeared to the eastwards, flying fast and high. The crew of the Jevington Court then gathered themselves together and shook the coal dust out of their eyes. They then discovered that the ship was virtually undamaged and continued the voyage. By an astonishing stroke of luck there were no casualties on the Jevington Court. Trawler and Boat Sunk This remarkable luck was not the case in the Star of Scotland. That trawler was hauling her trawl off the Shetland Islands when a German bomber appeared and machine-gunned her. The crew ran for what shelter they could find. The aircraft circled and returned to the attack, dropping three bombs. One of these hit, demolishing the wheelhouse, wrecking the steering gear, killing two of the crew, and wounding two. The crew then tried to abandon ship. They succeeded in launching a small boat under fire, and three men jumped into it, but the aircraft machinegunned the small boat, sinking it and leaving three men struggling in the water. The aircraft then made two further bombing attacks on the trawler without securing further hits, and flew off to the eastward. The trawler succeeded in picking up the three men who were clinging to the wreckage of the small boat. Then a jury steering gear was rigged and the Star of Scotland, with her wheelhouse completely smashed, with a gaping hole in her foredeck, and with the casing of her funnel and her upper works riddled by machine-gun bullets, was brought to port with her dead and wounded.