San Demetrio (film)

Movie
German title	San Demetrio
Original title	San Demetrio London
Country of production	Great Britain
original language	English
Publishing year	1943
length	104 minutes
Rod
Director	Charles Frend
script	Charles Frend, Robert Hamer , F. Tennyson Jesse
production	Michael Balcon for Ealing Studios
music	John DH Greenwood
camera	Ernest Palmer
cut	Eily Boland
occupation
Arthur Young : Captain of the San Demetrio George Waite Walter Fitzgerald : First Engineer Charles Pollard Ralph Michael : 2nd Officer of the San Demetrio Hawkins Neville Mapp : 3rd Engineer Willey Barry Letts : Cabin Boy John Jones Michael Allen : Cadet Roy Housden Frederick Piper : Boatswain WE Fletcher Herbert Cameron : Pump Man Davis John Owers : Steward Gordon Jackson : Messboy John Jamieson Robert Beatty : "Yank" Preston Charles Victor : deckhand James McKechnie : Deckhand John Coyle : Deckhand Duncan McIntyre: Deckhand Rex Holt : Deckhand Mervyn Johns : Stoker John Boyle Lawrence O'Madden : Captain Edward Fegen , Commander HMS Jervis Bay James Donald : Artillery Officer HMS Jervis Bay James Sadler : Officer on watch HMS Jervis Bay Peter Miller Street : Ensign to the Sea HMS Jervis Bay David Horne : Judge Langton Nigel Clarke : RJE Dodds, ship manager James Knight : Captain Smith of the SS Gloucester City

San Demetrio ( English original title: San Demetrio London ) is a British fiction film from 1943, which takes the form of a docudrama about the rescue of the British motor ship San Demetrio , home port London , by its own crew during the Second World War in the North Atlantic . The German premiere probably took place in August 1945 in the British zone of occupation . It is the only British feature film that thematizes the war-related dangerous and hardships service in the merchant navy ; its US counterpart is used in the North Atlantic .

Further technical data

• First performance: December 7, 1943
• Synchro title: O Navio Mártir ( The Martyr Ship , Brazil ), Det forladte skib, "San Demetrio" ( Denmark ), Le navire en feu ( The ship in fire , France ), Naufragio ( Shipwreck , Italy ), To ploion fantasma ( Greece ) , San Demetrio (Germany, Austria , Belgium , Portugal ). The film was also shown under the original title in Finland , Sweden and the Netherlands, and presumably throughout the Empire .

action

MT SAN DEMETRIO

The end of October 1940, the tanker runs San Demetrio with the convoy HX 84 under the sole protection of the auxiliary cruiser HMS Jervis Bay from Nova Scotia to England from. It is loaded with 11,000 tons of aviation fuel , which it has bunkered in Galveston .

The convoy, consisting of 38 ships, was attacked on November 5, 1940 by the German heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer . While the auxiliary cruiser embarks on a hopeless fight with the far superior enemy in order to save so many ships in the convoy, the San Demetrio is hit several times and catches fire. Due to the danger of explosion from the bunkered petrol, the crew left the tanker in two dinghies .

While the dinghy with the captain of the San Demetrio is being picked up by another ship, the second boat is drifting in heavy seas under the command of Second Officer Hawkins. The next day the castaways discover a drifting, burning ship. As it turns out, it's the San Demetrio that, despite the damage and the fire on board, still hasn't exploded. Faced with the choice of freezing to death in bad weather or possibly blowing up on board the wreck, they decide to return to the tanker.

Here they succeed with the greatest effort to make the ship afloat again and without radio and navigation means , only by the orientation of the sun's position , Ireland reach. A London court finally awards them salvage wages.

See also

• Use in the North Atlantic

literature

• F. Tennyson Jesse : The Saga of "San Demetrio" , London (His Majesty's Office) 1942.

Web links

• San Demetrio in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Full film version on youtube.com