Suddenly, the Fortunes of War smiled on U-188. Unescorted ships frequently made radical course changes at night, to shake off any possible U-boats that were shadowing them. In this case, it was fatal for FORT BUCKINGHAM. She turned 30º to port, which brought her closer to U-188 and into a firing position. Lüdden spun his boat and fired the two stern tubes just before midnight.

One hundred seventy seven seconds later, both torpedoes hit FORT BUCKINGHAM portside and within five minutes, she was gone. As she went down, she dragged all her boats down with her and the survivors had to use the rafts instead. The Chief officer was the only officer to survive and he lost about 30 pounds while adrift, but his malaria was cleared up.

Apprentice seaman Norman Gibson had just finished a year at sea and in his cabin on the boat deck portside, he had just finished making a cup of tea. He did not take the two buns the cook left him for a nightcap, and he was to later regret this decision. He writes:

“Fast asleep in my bunk, I was shaken awake by an almighty explosion. As the noise subsided, I could hear the tremendous inrush of water filling up No. 4 hold where I had been working the previous day. All lights were extinguished, so I fumbled around my cabin and found a torch (flashlight). Putting on battle dress, shoes and a life jacket, I made my way to the starboard boat deck, my allotted boat station.

On my arrival, I met the 3rd Engineer, a man named Coverdale. Between us we cleared the lifeboat falls ready for lowering the boat. The 3rd Mate, Willoughby, was shouting across from the bridge in an attempt to prevent lifeboats from being lowered until our Captain had decided on the best course of action. At that point, we were not sinking and were able to defend ourselves. Coverdale then went back to his cabin to get a life jacket - he was never seen again. Various members of the crew now began to collect on the boat deck.

I briefly returned to my cabin and in my return, I found that the Lascar seamen had filled the lifeboat, causing it to tilt. The davit guy rope had become jammed under the rudder pintle. The solution was to cut the guy rope free, and as I had a knife, I set off with haste to the main deck to do this. When I arrived, I found the main deck under water - how could a ship sink so quickly in the space of three to four minutes!

Taffy Jones, a cool-headed gunner, and I ran to the bows in order to let down a raft. On the way, the bows began to rise up and when we reached the bridge, the deck was so steep that we could not go on. We climbed onto the bulwark and prepared to jump. As the ship slipped below the waves, we made our leap into the water. She went down vertically with tremendous rending noises. To our surprise, we were soon back on the surface, just in time to see the bow with its twelve-pounder, disappearing a few feet away from us. It was all over in less than six minutes. Fortunately, apart from the two of us, some other crew members had also been swept clear.

What went through my mind? How vast the water was! Although I had not been sucked down with the ship, I was swimming 500 miles away from land with no lifeboat. Nevertheless I was alive, survived the explosion, was not alone. I felt a feeling of euphoria, and Taffy seemed to know just what to do all the time.

Having seen a light from a raft some way off, we set about reaching it. We swam via a floating door which offered rest, and I picked up a food container on the way which was later to be a valuable supplement to our rations. Taffy and I climbed on top the raft together, and were joined by two Lascar seamen. We extinguished the light in case we were seen and shot at by the submarine, which we assumed to be Japanese.

During the night, other seamen were spotted and some swapping of survivors took place to even up the numbers between the rafts. At first light we counted five rafts in all, with a total of 51 survivors. There were 11 men on my raft. Only one officer survived, all others including the Captain having been lost.

We doubted that a radio message had been sent before the sinking. Gradually the sun rose, the sea was blue, and colored fish surrounded us. It all seemed so unreal - a beautiful and peaceful world - but with no sign of search aircraft! However, we had plenty to do and busied ourselves making the rafts ship shape. Two rafts drifted away that day and we had no further contact with them. The remaining three were tied together and protective awnings were made from canvas. We even had a mast and a semblance of a sail, bright red. We hoped it would attract attention.

No one thought about rations that first day. We were thirsty of course, but the pangs of hunger only started to develop later. We devised a lookout rotation with one person always standing, holding onto the mast and scanning the horizon. Tempers began to rise on the first day, communication with the Lascars broke down and normal instructions were not comprehended. The wind got up to about Force 3 and during the night, we had to cut the connections between the three rafts. We huddled together the best we could and as the night got colder, we shared our few clothes in order to make the best of our first night adrift.

Spirits rose at daybreak as we still hoped for a search plane. After 24 hours of fasting, hunger raised its head and we opened our provisions. An empty tin about the size of a tobacco container was used for our water rations, one tin at dawn and another at dusk. This ration was not varied, however thirsty or irritable we became.

Sharks appeared around us from time to time, causing all other fish to temporarily disappear. We always kept extremely quiet when they were around and did not dangle our feet over the side of the raft! Taffy continuously dangled a hook and line into the water in the hope of catching fish. Various lures and bait were tried - all without success.

The days the followed were ones of utter desolation and deprivation. The northeast monsoon was blowing almost continuously and we were never really comfortable. The sea was often awash over the raft. We collected some rainwater in the sail, but it was barely enough to wash out the salt deposited there. Our plight was pretty desperate and there was little we could do to help ourselves. Our sail was inadequate for sailing towards the coast of Africa or the Seychelles and we had no charts, compass or sextant. Our raft measured approximately 10 and a half feet with insufficient space on it for all of us to lie down at the same time.

It now became apparent that no distress signal had been sent and as we were not due in Durban for a fortnight, it seemed likely that we would not be missed for some time.

We dozed from time to time, and conversation was limited to rations time. I soon concluded that survival would depend on psychological health. I felt that I was hallucinating - dreams that I had were pleasant, however. This was how the days passed and our diligence at watch keeping tended to lapse.

On the evening of the eleventh day, we sighted a puff of smoke on the horizon. We didn’t need much to lift our spirits and we never saw more than the smoke, but as the light began to fade, we let off several rockets in the hope that they would be seen. It was a forlorn hope and to no avail, but we were desperate. We reinforced our renewed spirits by allocating ourselves a double ration of water.

Unknown to us, things were happening elsewhere. The smoke we had seen was from the SS KONGSDAL. She had found one of the two rafts which had separated from us on the first day. The ship carried on but the following message was sent around East India Command:

1st February 1944. Survivors reported to have been picked up by SS KONGSDAL 400 miles west of Kelai. Stated their ship was the SS FORT BUCKINGHAM torpedoed 20th January and four liferafts still missing. Three aircraft are to go to Kelai and carry out search for these rafts and, if found, supplies are to be dropped.

Three CATALINA aircraft were immediately dispatched from Koggala, Ceylon to Kelai to begin the search. Unfortunately tragedy befell one of the CATALINA planes, AJ 160. On taking off to search on 13 February, she had risen to about 50 feet and was unable to climb any further. She crashed into the sea where her depth charges exploded, killing the entire crew.

The search having begun, unknown to us, for we heard nothing of searching aircraft, we had some luck - maybe it was a good omen. We caught a shark and were able to light a small fire on the raft and boil it. This was the first fish caught in 13 days.

Aircraft

Yet another day dawned bright with very little wind but there was considerable swell. We were all weak and listless - suddenly one of us claimed that he heard aircraft engines! Sure enough, we all looked and spotted a distant aircraft - but had she seen us? It was 4:30 in the afternoon, and we all tried to signal the aircraft using empty ration tins to reflect the sun - we even shouted! We were reassured as the aircraft appeared to be losing height, and then it happened! CATALINA # W 8406 flew past at what seemed like only 50 feet. We saw a crew member in the port blister waving, and an Aldis lamp was flashed but we were all too elated to read what it said.

We later learned that, on sighting us, this aircraft sent the following signal on to its base:

MTB1 WQM-15 D.R. 7 26’ North 66 16’ East. Circling two rafts with red sails approx. 3 miles apart 10 - 15 people on each.

We watched spellbound at the ‘CAT’ circled and took photographs and waved. Then we were awestruck - the aircraft flew away and we saw the detonation of six depth charges. Surely there was not a U-boat lurking nearby? Apparently not, as the aircraft lowered its floats and a landing was attempted. However, because of the swell the landing had to be abandoned. Her engines opened up, height was gained, and she then flew straight at us, dropping a Thornaby Bag within an arm’s length of the raft. We lifted it aboard and found a wonderful cargo inside - water bottles, a Very pistol with cartridges, cigarettes, chocolate, biscuits and barley sugar. The CATALINA continued to fly around us until 1900 hours then flew away, back to her base at Kelai. We ate extravagantly that night.

Early on the 15th day, another CATALINA arrived overhead and dropped another Thornaby Bag but it fell wide and we did not fancy swimming for it. Unknown to us, the Norwegian tanker MV ORA was sailing within range of our position and had reached a point some 300 miles to our north. She was requested by signal to alter course and look for our rafts, reporting immediately if she picked up survivors.

The next day, our good spirits began to turn to apprehension as it was now two days since being spotted and we appeared to be no nearer rescue. We thought we heard a faint drone of engines, but saw nothing. Panic was starting to set in.

What we did not know was that a CATALINA had sighted the MV ORA and an empty raft to the north of the ORA’s track. This CATALINA then found us and circled round to lead MV ORA to our position. At 1600 hours we saw a ship coming over the horizon. It was indeed MV ORA and after 16 days adrift, we were all taken on board. We then discovered that MV ORA was bound for Australia with a cargo of aviation fuel. In the gathering dusk, the ship moved on and picked up survivors from a total of three rafts previously located by the CATALINA.

Later in the afternoon, the destroyer HMS REDOUBT rendezvoused with MV ORA and we were transferred aboard, to be taken to Bombay. Unfortunately before landing in Bombay, five of the Lascars died so the final count of survivors from the FORT BUCKINGHAM was forty-six.

There is much more to the story of U-188, but space will not permit more in this issue. More about U-188 in KTB #163 next month.

Patrol U-188: Start