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Sinking the Athenia

‘What a Mess’

IN THE EARLY MORNING of 22 August 1939, the twenty-six-year-old Oberleutnant Fritz-Julius Lemp took his Type VIIA U-boat U30 to sea. His orders were to proceed to a waiting location west of Ireland and stay out of sight until further orders arrived. U30 was one of eighteen U-boats in the Atlantic with similar instructions. As soon as the Beginn-signal arrived from the SKL on 3 September, Lemp opened a sealed envelope given to him on departure and set course for his designated operational area. In the envelope was also a reminder to operate in strict accordance with the German Prize Regulations and there is no doubt that he knew what was expected of him. Lemp had been in command of U30 for almost a year and had obtained the respect of his crew and his superiors.¹ On this first day of the conflict, though, his fervour, fuelled by the adrenalin of war, would tarnish his name forever.

Moving into the patrol area, Lemp found it, somewhat to his surprise, barren. As the sun started to go down, a freshening wind could be felt. U30 had reached the southern edge of her zone and was turning north when finally an approaching ship was sighted on the horizon to starboard. Unknown to Lemp, he had stumbled across the 13,581-ton Donaldson & Black’s Atlantic liner Athenia, heading for Montreal and Quebec.² She had 1,417 people on board, 1,102 passengers and 315 crew. Of the passengers, 469 were Canadian, 311 American, some 150 European and the rest British or Irish. Most of the European passengers were refugees from the war, counting themselves lucky to be aboard. Among them thirty-four German nationals, mostly Jewish. A high proportion of the passengers were women and children.

U30 loading torpedoes before heading into the Atlantic in August 1939. (Author’s collection)

Athenia. (Author’s collection)

Numerous cancellations and delays of ships scheduled to depart Britain in late August resulted in a rush of passengers to those ships actually leaving, and Athenia was filled to capacity. Every berth in every cabin was occupied and makeshift bunks had been set up in the gangways on B deck, the gymnasium and the third-class smoking room. Still, Athenia was well equipped to handle an emergency. The twenty-six lifeboats had a capacity of over 1,800 people and there were some 1,600 lifejackets on board.³

Athenia left Glasgow at noon on 1 September and after calling at Belfast and Liverpool headed into the Atlantic in the evening of the 2nd. Captain James Cook had been ashore in Liverpool to meet with the Naval Control Service and receive the latest instructions from the Admiralty regarding the tense situation. When returning to his ship at 16:00, he brought with him new signal codes, a long list of actions to take if war was declared and specific instructions as to the route he was to follow across the Atlantic, some 30 miles further south than usual.

In the late afternoon of 3 September, Athenia was about 250 miles north-west of Inishtrahull island and about 60 miles south of Rockall, doing 15 knots. The Radio Office had disseminated the news of war having been declared and there was an uneasy mood on board. The sea was relatively smooth with only a moderate swell, and most passengers were getting ready for dinner. Captain Cook did not wish to alarm his passengers unduly, but to be on the safe side the lifeboats had quietly been made ready: canvas covers taken off, davits connected and provisions packed.

For reasons not fully explained, as she was a passenger liner and immune according to the Prize Regulations, the ship was also blacked out and zigzagging. Wooden shields covered the windows of the public spaces, curtains and canvas sheets covered doors and openings, the portholes had all been painted out and all deadlights were closed.

Onboard U30, Oberleutnant Lemp’s hunting instinct had undoubtedly been whetted by the recent Beginn-signal, but he was seriously in doubt. The approaching ship was certainly a passenger liner, but she was darkened and well outside any passenger routes. Her high, black freeboard looked sinister and Dönitz had warned him about Q-ships and armed merchant cruisers operated by the Royal Navy: a fair game under the Prize Regulations. He called his first officer, Hans-Peter Hinsch, for a second opinion, but he had little to add. Convincing himself that the approaching ship was trying to avoid his attention, Lemp decided to attack. The battle for the Atlantic was about to be opened in a dramatic way.

Submerged, Lemp took U30 across the bow of the oncoming ship and turned around for a clean shot from ahead. Eventually, U30 was in a perfect location, around 1,600 metres away from the course of the liner. Orders for two torpedoes were given, followed by ‘Torpedo Los’ – ‘Torpedoes Away’. Only one torpedo left its tube, though. The second made a jolt but remained stuck with its engine running – a potentially dangerous situation. Lemp took U30 down to get rid of it as soon as possible. Onboard Athenia several people later claimed to have seen the U-boat on the surface, some holding that shots had been fired at the liner.⁴

The firing of the torpedoes would have lightened the boat and it is not impossible that she broke surface for a while before the tanks were filled, taking her down. That shots were fired from U30 is virtually unthinkable, though. Manning the gun and bringing up ammunition was a deliberate procedure not easily undertaken and highly unlikely, all the more so with a stuck torpedo in one of the tubes.

The torpedo came loose through pumping compressed air into the tube and it exploded at some distance from the boat.⁵ About half an hour later, U30 surfaced. The moon was up and a brisk wind rippled the sea. Athenia could be sighted at a distance, mast lights on and listing with her stern low in the water.

The radio operator, Georg Högel, picked up a distress signal in plain language: ‘Athenia torpedoed 56.42N, 14.05W, 1,400 passengers on board’.⁶ According to Hinsch, Lemp stuttered: ‘What a mess! Why was she blacked out?’⁷

It was a horrendous mistake. Lemp had not taken the time that he should have done in order to identify correctly the ship he had attacked. The shock of realising the mistake he had made must have been enormous, evaporating all adrenalin in his system in an instant.

Maschinenobergefreiter Adolf Schmidt, later to be wounded and landed at Iceland, from where he ended up in Allied captivity, wrote an affidavit read at Nuremberg. In this he stated he was one of a few crewmembers who had been called to the tower by Lemp:

Apart from myself, Oberleutnant Hinsch was in the tower when I saw the ship after the attack. I observed that the ship was listing [and] saw much commotion onboard the torpedoed ship. [. . .] I believe one or two torpedoes were fired which did not explode, but I heard the explosion of the torpedo that hit the liner. Oberleutnant Lemp did not surface until after nightfall.⁸

There was little need for U30 to conceal her location now that Athenia was transmitting, but Lemp must have been shocked into passivity as he failed to render any assistance to the survivors or make any radio signal either to Germany or to potential rescuers. It appears that he just wanted to get away, and U30 left the scene. Lemp remained silent until 12 September, when he briefly informed FdU that the weather was poor. Not once did he notify anybody of the attack on Athenia until back in Germany.⁹

Wrecked Lifeboats

The torpedo struck Athenia on the port side aft around 19:30. Several of those on duty in the engine and boiler areas were killed. Pieces of metal and wood rained over the tourist deck, killing some and wounding several. Below decks, in the third-class quarters and aft dining rooms, there was absolute carnage. Cabins were smashed, corridors filled with debris and, below, water started pouring in. Some were trapped in their cabins and drowned as the water rose. At least one of the stairways collapsed, hampering escape, and when the lights went out, a wave of panic rushed through the ship. Many tried to reach cabins where children had been tucked away for the night. Others waded through dark, water-filled corridors, trying to find a way out.

On the bridge, Third Officer Colin Porteous felt the ship reel violently to starboard when the torpedo struck, before staggering slowly back, settling by the stern with a slight list to port. Instinctively, he rang the telegraph to stop the engines and slammed down the control, closing the watertight doors. Shortly after, while Porteous was sounding the emergency stations alarm, Captain Cook arrived, taking command of his doomed ship. After verifying that all watertight doors were closed, Chief Radio Officer Don was instructed to send emergency signals in plain language. A limited number of ships were in the vicinity, reacting to Athenia’s distress signal. The first acknowledgement came from the Norwegian freighter Knute Nelson. She was some 40 miles away and estimated to arrive within three hours. Later, the Swedish yacht Southern Cross also answered, as well as the American City of Flint. These were further away, though, and would take longer to arrive.¹⁰

Athenia sinking. (Author’s collection)

Chief Officer Barnet Copland raced aft to find out what had happened and the extent of the damage. The water was high in No. 5 hold, rising fast in No. 6, and the edge of the poop deck was awash. Athenia was inevitably going down, but Copland assessed it would take some time and it should be possible to get the boats away, saving most of those not already dead. Captain Cook decided to abandon ship, and ordered his crew to the boat stations.¹¹ Most remained disciplined, seeing to it that the boats were set to sea in an organised manner, contributing to the relatively low loss of life. Within half an hour, more than half of the survivors were off the liner. Due to the list, the boats to port went down easily, while those to starboard scraped down the side with some difficulty. Still, they all reached the water.

‘Women and children first!’ was the convention of the day and this was strictly observed, giving a disproportionate number of women and children on board the early boats. For reasons difficult to appreciate today, many young children, some even toddlers, were separated from their parents and put into the nearest boat about to be lowered. This resulted in numerous scenes of anguish and added despair through the days to come. During the early confusion, some of the first boats were lowered before they were full, passengers later having to climb down ladders or lifelines before they cast off. During this, some fell into the oily sea, a few to drown, the majority to be pulled into a boat, shocked and miserable.

Light was fading quickly and in order to facilitate the lowering of the boats, Captain Cook instructed Chief Electrician Bennett to get the emergency dynamo working and, less than ten minutes after the torpedo had struck, a searchlight on the bridge as well as arc lights in the mastheads illuminated the decks of the liner. All twenty-six lifeboats got safely away. Some stayed close, others drifted into the darkness. Most of the passengers succumbed to seasickness or slumped into a misery of indifference for the rest of the night.

The last of the lifeboats, No. 7A, cast off at around 21:30. By this time, the list of Athenia had increased to about twelve degrees. Those remaining on board, Cook, Copland and a dozen of the crew and passengers, gathered on the foredeck. By 23:00, Cook decided it was time for them to go, and No. 5 motor boat was called back after having made room by transferring a number of those initially embarked on it to other boats that were less crowded. Before he left his office, Radio Operator Don locked the transmission key so that it sent a steady signal for the approaching ships to home in on. In London, the Admiralty received a signal from Malin Head coast guard radio at 22:30, informing briefly that Athenia was sending SSS signals, signifying she was under attack by a U-boat. Some twenty-five minutes later, another signal confirmed that she was sinking and had 1,400 persons on board. Urgent messages were forwarded to all naval units in the area with orders to assist.¹²

The sinking Athenia seen from Knute Nelson. (Author’s collection)

Knute Nelson arrived at around midnight. Master Carl Johan Anderssen could see flares lit in several of the lifeboats as he approached and observed that they were quite full. His ship was in ballast and riding high in the water, so it would be a challenge to get the survivors safely on board. There was no time to lose and the Norwegian freighter hove-to, turning her side athwart the weather to make shelter for the lifeboats behind her hull. To keep her in this position, Captain Anderssen kept the two propellers turning slowly, giving his ship a slight headway. One of the first lifeboats to come alongside was No. 5, the motor boat carrying Captain Cook and Third Officer Porteous.¹³ An undoubtedly relieved Cook climbed on board and was immediately invited to the bridge by Captain Anderssen to tell him what had happened and to provide assistance with the rescue operation. Other lifeboats approached, being rowed by whoever could hold an oar. Rope ladders were thrown over the side and a bosun’s chair was rigged to hoist those who could not climb themselves. One by one the survivors were brought to safety.

One boat approaching Knute Nelson was the overcrowded No. 5A. She had some way to row and those manning the oars were largely passengers, so progress was slow. At 04:00, when she was finally nearing the freighter, several empty boats were tied to the railings and boat No. 12 was still being emptied. The Norwegian crew shouted and motioned for them to stay out and wait their turn. But No. 5A lifeboat, which carried around ninety persons, largely women and children, ended up astern of boat No. 12, very close to the blades of the slowly turning propellers, with tops extended out of the water. Just then, a lookout on the bridge of Knute Nelson reported a lifeboat sinking ahead. Neither Captain Anderssen nor Captain Cook could see it, but when the report was repeated with some urgency, Captain Cook rang the engine telegraph for full ahead just in case. The freighter’s propellers reacted immediately, churning the water under the stern to white foam. Tragically, lifeboat No. 5A’s hawser became taut and snapped under the strain, the still-packed boat falling back into the now fast-revolving starboard propeller. In spite of frantic shouts from the deck to stop the engines, it was too late. The lifeboat was drawn into the propeller and cut to pieces. Those who were not killed instantly were flung into the water, drifting into the darkness as Knute Nelson drew away in spite of some Norwegian sailors sliding down the lifelines to rescue people in the water before it was too late. Eventually, fewer than a dozen of the people from lifeboat 5A were picked up, some after several hours of clinging to pieces of the wreckage.¹⁴

Two and a half hours after Knute Nelson, the Southern Cross arrived and started to take survivors on board, into her world of luxury. It must have been strange for the wet, cold and miserable rescuees to be welcomed on board the white, clean-scrubbed yacht, brilliantly lit, and offered hot drinks and warm clothes of every possible size and form. Unfortunately, an accident also occurred at Southern Cross. The elegant yacht rode gently in the Atlantic swell, but her small size made the stern come close to the water every time a wave rolled underneath her hull. No. 8 lifeboat ventured too close while waiting for her turn to be emptied and one particularly large swell sent the stern crashing down on her, throwing more than fifty persons, including many children, into the water. The Southern Cross did not have a large crew, but some of the sailors jumped into a couple of the empty lifeboats and managed to pick up around forty of the unfortunate men and women from No. 8 lifeboat. The Polish refugee Isaac Stotland and his wife were in one of the other boats waiting their turn while their two children, both under ten years of age, were onboard No. 8 lifeboat. Seeing the boat with their children being forced down, Stotland jumped into the water and swam towards the overturned wreckage. He pulled a dozen children to safety, but neither of his own was among them, both being lost.

Just before dawn, the two British destroyers Electra and Escort arrived.¹⁵ While the former started patrolling the area for U-boats, Escort picked up the survivors still in the water and thereafter those in the boats, including those clinging to the remains of No. 5A lifeboat. Later, when the destroyer Fame also arrived, she took over the search while Electra assisted Escort to rescue the remaining survivors from the boats.

The Polish refugee Isaac Stotland and his wife were rescued, but lost both their children when No. 8 lifeboat was crushed under the stern of Southern Cross. (Author’s collection)

The last boat to be taken care of was No. 14A lifeboat, with 105 people on board. This was the boat that Chief Officer Copland had transferred to and, coming on board the Electra, he climbed the bridge of the destroyer to be welcomed by Lieutenant Commander Buss. He also met the nurse of Athenia and, going through the list of survivors, they discovered that it was likely that a woman had been left in the sickbay of the liner. She had fallen down a ladder before the attack, suffering a concussion, and nobody could ascertain that she had been evacuated. Copland convinced Lieutenant Commander Buss he needed to go back and, with Electra moving close to the sinking liner, a boat was manned by sailors from the destroyer. Copland and two volunteers re-entered the sinking ship, found the woman in the sickbay and brought her on board the destroyer.¹⁶ Within minutes of their return to the destroyer, at 10:40, Athenia’s stern slipped beneath the surface, her bow rose towards the sky and she slipped quietly under.

Of the 1,417 aboard, 1,305 were rescued while 112 perished – ninety-three passengers and nineteen crew. Twenty-eight of the dead were American citizens. Southern Cross had picked up over 350 survivors, Knute Nelson around 450, Electra 200, Escort 300. The Norwegian freighter headed for Galway, the destroyers for Greenock on the Clyde.¹⁷

By 09:00, the American freighter City of Flint arrived at the scene. Few remained to be rescued, but in spite of the choppy sea a boat was lowered to pick up stragglers from some of the lifeboats bobbing around and to check that the others were empty. Thereafter 236 rescuees were transferred from the Southern Cross as she was not equipped to handle such a large number of additional people. Those rescued by Southern Cross and not wishing to continue to the USA, including all Athenia’s crewmembers, were taken on board the other ships. Ascertaining that there were no further people to be rescued from the now-empty lifeboats, Captain Gainard bid the Swedish yacht goodbye and set course for Halifax, where he arrived on 13 September. Southern Cross continued towards South America.¹⁸

Within twenty-four hours, news of the sinking echoed around the world. It had been the first day of the war and already it appeared that Germany had broken all the rules and introduced unrestricted submarine warfare. This was a propaganda gift to the British, who used it to its full extent and all merchant ships were encouraged to start reporting any U-boat on sight. On a practical note, the sinking of Athenia instantly removed any doubts in the Admiralty regarding the institution of the convoy system and instructions were issued forthwith towards its swift establishment.

In Germany, the news of the sinking of Athenia was received with disbelief and astonishment. The fear that the significant loss of American lives would draw the USA into the war was real, and an immediate statement from the OKW that ‘no German submarine was in the area at the time’ was issued in the early morning of the 4th, before any proper investigation had been carried out. Dönitz first learned of the sinking through the BBC in the morning of the 4th. It came as a surprise to him as the SKL was in the dark as to what had happened; the orders to follow the Prize Regulations to the letter were repeated by signal to all U-boats at 11:00. Hitler’s orders had been clear and it was difficult to believe they had been breached.¹⁹

Athenia survivors being landed at Glasgow by Knute Nelson. (Author’s collection)

Having reviewed the patrol zones of the U-boats in the Atlantic, Dönitz at midday concluded correctly that in all likelihood it had been Lemp in U30 that had sunk Athenia. By then, the US Embassy in Berlin had been informed by the German Foreign Office that no German U-boat had been involved in the sinking. Later, Raeder repeated the same statement to the American naval attaché: probably acting in good faith. The Propaganda Ministry of Josef Göbbels went one further and held that as no U-boats had been in the area, it must have been a British torpedo that had sunk the liner. Hitler was furious and another signal was sent from the SKL just before midnight: ‘By order of the Führer, no attacks are to be carried out on passenger liners, not even when in convoy.’²⁰

Dönitz was waiting in the docks to hear Lemp’s account first-hand when he eventually returned to Wilhelmshaven on the 27th. He and his crew were sworn to absolute secrecy. They were not ever to mention anything at all to do with the incident. The war diary of Dönitz makes no mention of the incident and Lemp was ordered to falsify the war diary (Kriegstagebuch – KTB) of U30 by rewriting two complete pages.²¹ A court martial for Lemp was considered but decided against, as Dönitz was satisfied that he had ‘acted in good faith’. In all likelihood there was also a significant wish to avoid the public attention that a court martial would have created. Lemp had sunk three ships (including the Athenia), captured two British airmen, demonstrated control under attack and brought his boat home in spite of severe battle damage. To punish him for a mistaken identity would send the wrong signal to the rest of the U-boat force and Dönitz decided it would be best to sweep the whole thing under the carpet. It was never acknowledged during the war that the Athenia had been sunk by a U-boat.²²

In Washington, President Roosevelt had already announced that his government was preparing ‘a declaration of American neutrality’ and, though serious, the Athenia affair would not change that.