Général Bonaparte (ship, 1923)
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The Général Bonaparte was a French mail and passenger ship that operated between Nice and Ajaccio in Corsica . It was torpedoed and sunk on May 19, 1943 about 40 nautical miles from Nice by the British submarine Sportsman .
Construction and technical data
The ship was built in 1923 at the Chantiers et Ateliers de Provence shipyard in Port-de-Bouc , France , for the shipping company Compagnie Fraissinet . It was 96.12 m long and 13.63 m wide, had a 7.44 m draft and was measured at 2,796 GRT. It had a triple expansion steam engine with 434 nominal horsepower .
The sinking
After the Italian occupation of Corsica in November 1942 , a total of 18 French passenger and cargo ships were authorized or commissioned to maintain shipping connections to Corsica , according to an ordinance of the Vichy government . On May 19, 1943, the Général Bonaparte , under Captain Guillaume Quéré, left the port of Ajaccio with 199 passengers, a crew of 68 men and about 350 tons of cargo. At 2.30 p.m., about 40 nautical miles from Nice, the captain noticed two torpedo runways approaching the ship and ordered the ship to be abandoned immediately. Seconds later, the ship was shaken by a torpedo explosion in the stern . The British submarine Sportsman , under Lieutenant Richard Gatehouse, had mistaken the ship for a troop transport . Two boats and a number of life rafts were still left to water before the ship is at the position 43 ° 1 ' N , 7 ° 40' O sank. 137 people were killed, including Captain Quéré. The two German torpedo boats TA 11 and TA 10 - the former French boats L'Iphigénie and La Pomone - which were under the command of Corvette Captain Konrad Loerke on the voyage from La Spezia to Toulon , hurried up and took, despite the presence of the enemy U Boats, a total of 148 survivors on board and brought them to Toulon.
Aftermath
On July 13, 1948, the birthday of Captain Guillaume Quéré, a new mail and passenger ship of the shipping company was christened Commandant Quéré in his memory .
After the end of the war, Corvette Captain Loerke was wanted as a war criminal because he was accused of torpedoing the Général Bonaparte . However, his true role in the disaster was testified by the survivors. On February 19, 1959, Loerke, meanwhile a frigate captain and German naval attaché in France, was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Legion of Honor in Paris by Admiral Henri Nomy , the French Admiral's Chief of Staff, for his rescue act during the war .
Web links
- Photos by Général Bonaparte
- http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/5340/cimg1468om6.jpg
- http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/4803/cimg1466cw3.jpg
- http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/8291/cimg1467ia3.jpg
- http://www.frenchlines.com/navires/image.php?source=navire&navire=G%E9n%E9ral+Bonaparte+%28Fraissinet%29
- http://www.cpa-corse.com/bateau-avion/bateaux-cpa8.html
Footnotes
- ↑ Paquebot Commandant Quere, at French Lines ( Memento of the original from March 10, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ France honors Memel naval officer, in Das Ostpreußenblatt , vol. 10, episode 15, April 11, 1959 (p. 4) (PDF file; 9.42 MB)
- ↑ Marin allemand décoré de la légion d'honneur ; with photos
