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Arandora Star attacked... Nazi prisoners...
Arandora Star attacked... Nazi prisoners...
Item # 710228
July 04, 1940
THE NEW YORK TIMES, July 4, 1940
* Arandora Star attack and sinking
* Nazi prisoners (prison ship)
* German submarine U-47
The front page has a six column headline: "U-BOAT TORPEDOES PRISON SHIP, 1,068 LOST" with subheads. (see images) Photo of the Arandora Star is on page 4.
Complete with all 32 pages, rag edition in nice condition.
wikipedia notes: On July 2, 1940, having left Liverpool unescorted the day before, under the command of Edgar Wallace Moulton, she was bound for St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador and Canadian internment camps with nearly 1,500 German and Italian internees, including 86 POWs, being transported from Britain. Most were elderly Italians, who were resident in Britain. The ship was bearing no Red Cross sign, which could have shown that she was carrying prisoners, and especially civilians.
At 6.58 AM off the northwest coast of Ireland, she was struck by a torpedo from the German submarine U-47, commanded by U-Boat ace Günther Prien. It is assumed that U-47 mistook her grey wartime livery for that of an armed merchant cruiser. U-47 fired its single damaged torpedo at Arandora Star. All power was lost at once, and thirty five minutes after the torpedo impact, Arandora Star sank. Over eight hundred lives were lost.
"I could see hundreds of men cling to the ship. They were like ants and then the ship went up at one end and slid rapidly down, taking the men with her ... ... Many men had broken their necks jumping or diving into the water. Others injured themselves by landing on drifting wreckage and floating debris near the sinking ship"
At 0705 hours Malin Head radio received the distress call which it retransmitted to Land's End and to Portpatrick. Throughout August bodies were washed up on the Irish shore. The first was 71-year-old Ernesto Moruzzi, who was found near Burtonport. Four others were found on the same day, 30 July. During August 1940, 213 bodies were washed up on the Irish Coast, 35 were from the Arandora Star, there were a further 92 unidentified, most probably from the Arandora Star.
Category: The 20th Century
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