GERMAN SHIPS SUNK BY BRITISH SUBS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 84, Issue 96, 26 April 1940, Page 5

GERMAN SHIPS SUNK BY BRITISH SUBS

STORY OF OPERATION'S NEAR NORWAY [ British Official Wireless. ] Received April 25, 6.5 p.m. RUGBY, April 24. The homecoming of several Eritku submarines recently engaged in operations off Norway enables further de tails of their successful activities against the German naval and suppry ships to be told. The Trident, a sister ship of the Thetis, sank a 9000-ton German tanker which formed part of the German advance forces in the Nazi attack on Norway. The Trident had no sooner reached her area of operations than she sighted the German tanker. "Our first torpedo struck her and she began to sink rapidly," said one of the crew. "Our commander watched the captain of the German ship until the briage of his vessel submerged and he had to throw himself into the sea. We picked him up and brought him on board.”

It is believed that between them three other submarines which have now returned, the Sea Lion, Snapper, and Sunfish, sank between 35,900 and 40,000 tons of enemy snipping, including transports bearing troops and war material. The Sunfish- alone is reported to have sunk 17,000 tens of enemy .ships. The Snapper landed four German prisoners from the Hamburg tanker Moonsund, which she sank and which carried 400 tons of aero petrol—enough to fly 200 German bombers to England and back. The Snapper was depth-charged on numerous occasions and also bombed from the air. The latter three submarines are sirter-ships of the Salmon and Spearfish, which themselves have fine records to thr|r credit.