ADM 199/2130

REPORT OF AN INTERVIEW WITH

SKIPPER A.E. THOMASON OF THE TRAWLER ALVIS.

CASUALTY AND STATISTICAL SECTION

TRADE DIVISION.

25th September, 1939.

Will you tell us all that happened to your ship.

About 20 minutes past one on the 18th September, a submarine fired on us broadside, and the shot fell short or the ship. The next thing I saw was the submarine on the starboard quarter. He waved his hand for us to launch a boat, and of course I stopped the ship, and we rowed from it. He had two shells all ready to put into the ship. We eventually rowed away from the ship, and he waved for us to go up on board. He said "Bring that ship alongside and hang it aft" in very good English. When we got alongside he said "Where's the Captain?" I said "Here Sir"  He then said "Come aboard here"  We went aboard to the conning tower, and he said "Help that Captain up". When I got on the conning tower he shook hands with me, und said he was very sorry he would have to sink the ship. I said very little. He said then "Have you got the ship's papers?" I said "Yes Sir, they are in the small boat"  "Go and fetch them" he answered. I went and fetched them, and he took them from me and read them. He said then "Everything in order Captain?"  I said "Yes Sir"  The Commander and one Officer spoke in German, and then he said to me "Is that the only boat you have got?"  I said "Yes, this is the only boat"  "Are you quite sure there are no more men on board that ship?"  I said "Yes I am quite sure"  He said "How many men are in that boat?"  "13 Sir"  He then said that the English should be ashamed of this, to send ships to sea with only one boat. "What is your position"  I told him N.N.W. of St Kilda's. "What is the depth of water?"  "200 fathoms"  He said "195 fathoms"  He then said that he would put a boarding party on my ship, an Officer, and three men including a wireless Operator. We got to the ship, and the first thing they did was to go on the wheel house and destroy the wireless.

They threw the transmitter over the side, and they smashed the receiving set, batteries and everything. The Wireless Operator said to the Officer "What about this sounding machine?"  The Officer replied "Don't destroy that, it will come in useful for the Captain afterwards"  The next thing the Officer said was "Strip everything"  They threw everything over the side, port trawl, and all the gear out of the fore hold, and two 550 lengths of wire.  The Officer was following me about all the time, and he asked me could he look through the ship.

He looked into everything to see if there was anything there. He was with us from 1.20 BST until 4.40, and he was taking photographs of everything he saw. At last he said "I think that will be all now. You steam full speed ahead, and don't stop anywhere, but carry on all the way home, and I hope you get home quite safely". I put four of my crew in the boat again, and rowed them back from the submarine. They all waved their hands end said good-bye, and when my ship got alongside the submarine the Commanding Officer came off the conning tower with a parcel and handed it to the Bosun.  "Give this to your Captain with my compliments, and I hope he gets home quite safely" he said. It was a bottle of gin. The Commanding Officer had no Naval uniform on.

The Commander was about 45 years of age and he was very fair. About 6 ft tall, and he just had a blue jersey on, and a pair of leather trousers, and sea boots. The Officer that boarded us hall one ring, and a star above it, also gold braid. The buttons were brass. I tried to read the tallies (ribbons) on the sailors' hats, but could not make anything out except the word UNDER. They were all armed with small revolvers. When he handed the bottle of gin, the crew came back to the ship. He gave us time to get it forward and hove it up by the fore mast, and dropped it on board. I asked for the Commander's name. He said "He regrets that he could not give me his name" and he then said "You will take notice that there is no name or number on my boat"

While the Lieutenant was on board the ship, he asked me for a souvenir. He wanted a life-buoy. So I gave him a life-buoy, and, he put his hand through it and shook hands with me. He took no food with him, as he said that he had plenty. He did not say how long they had been out, but I judge it was a week or a fortnight, by the growth on the mens's faces.  There were only two shaved and they were two officers.

After we put the crew on board, and we got the boat in, I steamed her in for St Kilda's Islands full speed, and while we were steaming he kept on top of the water for 1¼ hours broad side, and then he submerged. I ran into Kilda's 29 miles, and when I looked astern he was well on my stern submerged. Then I saw them go off to the west.  That is the last I saw of them.

The only damage done on board ship was breaking up the wireless gear, except the sounding machine, end also all my fishing gear was damaged. The catch was left.

The first I saw of the submarine was the shot which fell about 100 yards away from the sh1p. I was keeping a lookout at the time, and when I first saw the submarine he was very close to the starboard quarter.  I saw him immediately after the shot fell.

When the incident which I have described occurred, I had been at sea for a week, having left Fleetwood on the previous Monday September 11th. Our normal trip lasts a fortnight.  During the trip in question, the fishing area extended over a radius of about 40 miles from St Kilda up and down between W.N.W. and N.N.W.  I had certainly not been down anywhere in the vicinity of Donegal Bay or St Johns Point. I know the Trawler RUDYARD KIPLING well, but certainly did not sight her during this trip. I also know both the LORD MINTO and the ARLITA which are St Kilda's ships, but did not see either of them. The first trawler I met coming in after the U-boat had stopped me was the AVON WYKE.  He turned round and warned me, then followed me.

The Commander of the U-boat had no hat on, and was very fair. He had a lot of hair which was short, not cropped, with enough hair over the forehead for a parting. H was very fair complexioned, with a fresh healthy colour, and was clean shaven.  I did not notice the colour of his eyes.  He was 6 ft tall, and broad and big, but not stout. He was very pleasant and spoke very good English, with no noticeable accent. The Officer who boarded the ship was also a big man, and told me his age was 26.  He was also very fair, and clean shaven and though thin, was well built.

As the submarine sat on the surface there was a perceptible rake. She seemed to go a way to nothing aft.  The bow was very blunt, and there was no sharp stem.  The hull spread quickly from the bow in a bulbous fashion.

When I boarded the U-boat I was aft of the conning tower, and at no time went forward of it. On reaching the deck I found myself on a wooden platform screwed down, and I walked along it to the aft base of the conning tower where there were four iron steps leading up to the conning tower. At the top of these four steps which were on the aft side, there was an opening through which one could pass, so that it was not necessary to climb over the lift of the conning tower.  The platform on the aft deck reached to a point about 8 ft short of the water line. Astern there were no stanchions that were between them that is to say around the aft deck, and there was a jumping wire forward. Aft of the conning tower where I was, there was a machine gun with a long barrel of about 5 ft in length with a shoulder butt mounted on a swivel, so as to give high angle, as I thought, for A.A. use.  I did not see any drum on this gun.  The base of the gun would be about 12 ft from the conning tower. The Conning tower was cut aft with a railing round the aft portion so as to form a kind of platform. There was no shield round the lip of the conning tower, but there was a wooden rail around it.  I did not notice any flare of the lip.

The colour of the submarine was very light grey, but its sides were painted black, I mean a freeboard of about 2 ft was black.  I could see the screws aft, but there were no tunnels, and the under water parts so far as I saw were black, and she had no barnacles or growths, and she seemed to me to be quite fresh.

Through each of the two nights preceding this incident I noticed quite close to me lights low on the water with no navigation lights which I took at the time to be the deck working lights of a trawler, but that day broke and I could see 20 to 25 miles around me, and there was no vessel of any kind or any smoke to be seen.  The Commander was well aware of the fact, as he showed in conversation with me, that St Kilda was uninhabited.