TORPEDOED BY U-BOAT

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21156, 4 July 1940, Page 7

TORPEDOED BY U-BOAT

TERRIBLE ORDEAL OF SURVIVORS GERMAN AND ITALIAN INTERNEES ABOARD BITTER HOSTILITY STRUCK WITHOUT WARNING (Received July 4, 10.50 a.m.) LONDON, July 3 One thousand scantily-clad survivors of the Arandora Star, of 15,305 tons, which a U-boat torpedoed when it was carrying 1500 German and Italian internees to Canada, landed at a Scottish port. British soldiers were aboard guarding the internees. The ship went down with many Germans and Italians after a panic had seriously hampered the launching of lifeboats. Two soldiers said the ship was struck without warning. “ We cursed the U-boat, but the Germans and Italians cursed more. They w’ere almost ferocious in their denunciation of this type of warfare. Such was the scramble that we had no opportunity of getting into a lifeboat. “ The water was strewn with wreckage and bodies. The captain and several of the ship’s officers were standing on the bridge and decks, and several of them, it is feared, were lost. A British ship picked up many survivors. The soldiers bitterly criticised the conduct of the German prisoners, who were “big, hulking brutes, who tried to sweep the Italians aside and had to be forcibly restrained. Bitter hostility between the Germans and the Italians developed both on the liner and the rescue ship. Troops were constantly on guard to prevent fights.” No estimate is available of the casualties, but the Italians, who were mostly tradesmen in the United Kingdom, apparently were the worst sufferers. The Arandora Star was torpedoed off the west coast of Ireland. The attack was made in full daylight in the early hours of the morning. It is not known whether, in addition to the British ship which brought the survivors to port, any other ships in the vicinity at the time rescued any internees- or members of the crew.