The Viking Star, with her tall funnel, straight stem and cutaway counter stern, was distinctively a ship of the 1920s. Built in the aftermath of the First World War, a replacement for one of the many ships lost, she was a 6,213-ton refrigerated meat carrier flying the house flag of Lord Vestey’s Blue Star Line. Sadly, in the depression-plagued days of the late 1920s she had fallen on hard times. Captain E. Ashton-Irvine, who joined her as a first-trip cadet in 1927, in later years recorded his first impressions:
My first sight of the ship was really a sickener. She had been laid up for nearly a year at the buoys and had just been taken off them to bunker. She was a ship of about 8,000 [sic] tons, flush decked, with a three-tier bridge-house; number 3 hatch, or the bunkers, amidships, and the afterhouse and fidley [grating] around the funnel, which was large, had a dome top, and looked awful. Coupled with the fact that she was rusty from end to end and covered in coal dust.
I found my way up the ladder and after stumbling through feet-deep coal (and coal dust that was more like mud), I found myself in the officers’ alleyway and managed to locate the cadets’ room. My two mates were lying in all their glory – dungarees, coal dust, et al. – in the lower of the four bunks. The room was thick with smoke, both ports were open, and it looked as though they had been open for the past year, because everything was so dirty and it was impossible to tell what colour the bulkheads were. I found they were both 3-year cadets and well experienced. They both suggested I should beat it home forthwith and, frankly, I think I would have done well to have done so. I was taken to see the Mate, a hard case ‘Geordy’ who hated two things – the sea and ‘silly ass cadets’. I got small change from him. I went to meet the Captain, a very old gentleman of 71, who had shares in the company, had been an ex-sailing ship owner, and was in his dotage. He promptly forbade me to go ashore because the Tyne was full of pubs and loose women. Needless to say, I stayed on board that night, and earned the derision of my mates, who came back stoned and said they had had a fine time. I still wonder if they did. I was sent to bed after a very poor dinner, but it was all new to me and I think I put up with it and made as if I liked it, but doubted if I really did.
The next day was up at 5.00 am, got tea for the other two, shaving water and a bucket of water to bathe, scrubbed out the room and bathroom – that was really a misnomer as it was about the size of a wardrobe, 3 feet by 3 feet and 6 feet high, and there was nothing in it but cold air, of which there was plenty, so we bathed in the room which, as I said, had four bunks in it, one settee like a shelf, and nothing else. All our gear went into the spare bunk. I then went out on deck to try to clean up the mess, shovelled coal all day, had meals off the table in the pantry – and what meals! Ugh – they weren’t fit for pigs. We left the coal berth, went to get water and on the 4th April we sailed for the River Plate. What a trip! We shovelled coal all day and after it was out of one deck, we shovelled it into another deck and into the stoke hold.
Fifteen years had now gone by since that dreary episode, and the Viking Star had regained much of her self-respect. Painted overall in wartime grey, with only the merest wisp of smoke trailing from her tall funnel, she left Montevideo on 9 August 1942 bound for the UK with 4,500 tons of frozen beef and 200 tons of fertilizer. While in the River Plate her boilers had been converted to oil-burning, and she was a much cleaner and happier ship for it. In command was 43-year-old Captain James Mills, and she had a total complement of sixty, including five DEMS gunners. The latter, with the assistance of several of the ship’s crew who held gunnery certificates, manned her armament, which consisted of a 4-inch, a 12-pounder and five .303 machine guns. Both galley and pantry matched the ship’s new image, and she was known as a ‘good feeder’ by those who had sailed in her.
The Viking Star’s voyage had begun nearly two months earlier in Liverpool, where she had loaded a general cargo for Buenos Aires. Now she was to retrace her steps, taking a long dogleg across the Atlantic to Freetown, where she would join a convoy for the passage north. Meanwhile, she was to sail unescorted, the powers that be in the Admiralty considering it highly unlikely that she would meet up with the enemy on the way across to Africa.
The ocean crossing was indeed without incident; fine, warm weather, and the horizon day after day unsullied by hostile strangers. It was not until the morning of 25 August, when the Viking Star was some 250 miles south-west of Freetown, that she experienced her first contact with reality. A Sunderland flying boat displaying the reassuring red, white and blue roundels of the RAF appeared out of the clouds and began to circle the ship. The ensign and signal letter flags were hoisted and an attempt was made to contact the plane by Aldis lamp, but there was no reply. The Sunderland then flew off again, and it was assumed that all was well.
In fact, it was anything but: the flying boat had been under false colours, having been captured by the Vichy French in Dakar earlier in the war, and was acting as a spotter plane for the Germans. She regularly patrolled the approaches to Freetown on the lookout for Allied ships, radioing their position to waiting U-boats when spotted.
On this occasion her report was received by U-130, a Type IXC under the command of the experienced Korvettenkapitän Ernst Kals which had sailed from Lorient on 4 July. Kals, who had served sixteen years in surface ships of the German Navy before joining the U-boat arm in 1940, was on his fourth war patrol in U-130, with orders to create as much havoc as possible on the Freetown–UK convoy route. Already, cruising in the vicinity of the Cape Verde Islands, he had sunk five Allied ships totalling over 40,000 tons gross, after which he had moved south to explore the approaches to the convoy assembly port of Freetown. The move proved justified when at about 1600 on 25 August, with another two hours of daylight left, the Viking Star came in view. Kals dived, and waited at periscope depth for the unsuspecting ship to cross his sights.
It was not surprising that with the crossing from South America having been so untroubled, and the safety of Freetown being less than twenty-four hours away, morale was riding high aboard the Viking Star. Sixteen-year-old deck boy Clifford Maw in later life recollected:
We had left Buenos Aires with a full cargo of frozen beef, and some of us were sunning ourselves on deck in the first dog watch and talking about ‘fish’ – torpedoes – their construction and method of firing them. Two or three were in bathing costumes; there was Kelly the donkey-man in overalls and a beret, and myself wearing only a pair of rope-soled shoes and grey shorts hitched up by a sixpenny belt. The lamp trimmer in his birthday suit was splashing happily in a canvas bath on the after well deck.
I had just opened my mouth to say something when there came the muffled sound of an explosion. A couple of seconds later a louder explosion came from somewhere deep under the galley, near to where some of us were sitting. It was a real case of ‘talk of the devil’.
Chief Officer Frederick MacQuiston explained what happened next in his report to the Admiralty:
At 1645 local time on 25th August in position 6.00 N 14.00 W we were struck by a torpedo in the engine room on the port side, followed almost immediately by another torpedo which struck almost in the same position. The explosions were very loud, there was a strong smell of cordite and a tremendous column of water was thrown up over the bridge.
I was on watch at the time, the 4th Officer was on watch with me and was on the monkey island, also a lookout man was stationed in the starboard gun nest.
Immediately after the torpedoes struck, the ship listed 10–12 degrees to port. After a few moments she righted herself and remained upright. Both boats on the port side were blown to pieces by the explosion, the derricks were smashed, the hatch covers were blown off the bunker hatch, the stoke hold and the engine room and bunker hatch immediately filled with water. The W/T transmitter and aerials were destroyed by the explosion and no W/T message was sent. As we could not see the submarine and there was no point in keeping the guns manned, it was decided to abandon ship. The engines had stopped of their own accord but the ship carried her way for about 10 minutes.
Able Seaman Stan Mayes added:
I was off watch and in my cabin below deck – all lights went out and with much shouting we groped our way in the darkness to the companionway up to the boat deck and as we ran along the deck to our boat stations we were showered by debris thrown up by the explosion.
This was the nightmare they all dreaded and had rehearsed for so often, at the same time hoping it would never happen. There was no time to waste. With her engine spaces flooded, the Viking Star was settling fast. Captain Mills gave the order to abandon ship, the last order he would ever give, for he would go down with his ship.
It soon became apparent that leaving the sinking vessel would not be a straightforward operation. The Viking Star carried four 28-man lifeboats and eight large life-rafts, more than ample to accommodate her entire crew of sixty. However, both lifeboats on the port side had gone, destroyed by the exploding torpedoes, and one of the starboard boats was damaged. Darkness had descended, and in the ensuing rush to get away an element of panic crept in. Chief Officer MacQuiston explains:
We started to get the starboard boats away, but one of the sailors let go the forward fall of No. 1 boat, which was the motor boat. Fortunately, it was held by the gripes and the after fall, but when it was finally lowered the boat filled with water immediately. I think it must have been damaged by flying debris from the explosion. We attempted to bale this boat out, but the water gained too rapidly, so the occupants abandoned it and swam to No. 3 boat, where they were taken on board. We transferred the food, wireless and water breakers from this boat into No. 3. Eight life-rafts were released before the ship was abandoned.
All those on watch in the Viking Star’s engine room, Third Engineer William Clark, Donkeyman Michael Gibbons and firemen Thomas Anderson, Leonard Hartley, Francis Meehan and James Spencer, were missing, probably killed when the torpedoes struck. Captain Mills was also missing, being last seen launching a life-raft on the after deck. This left Chief Officer MacQuiston in command of what remained of the Viking Star, which was one crowded lifeboat containing thirty-six men, and two life-rafts with seventeen men clinging to them. The ship herself was still afloat, but she had not long to go. Ernst Kals had brought U-130 to the surface and closed in to deliver the coup de grâce. A third torpedo completed his night’s work, breaking the Viking Star’s back, and with her bows and stern reaching for the sky and forming a grotesque V-sign, she slid under, leaving in her wake only a spreading oil slick in which bobbed a few pieces of charred wreckage.
U-130 now approached the only remaining lifeboat, and Kals questioned its occupants regarding the ship and her cargo. The answers he received were vague and grudgingly given, and when he asked if the Master or any officers were on board, he was greeted with a stony silence. Anticipating this request, all the officers in the boat had discarded their badges of rank and had merged with the crew. The boat being so crowded, there was little point in pursuing the matter further. The U-boat backed away and disappeared into the twilight.
Kals did not leave the area, and next morning torpedoed and sank the British steamer Beechwood on her way north from the Cape with a cargo of potash. Only one crew member was lost, but her master Captain Samuel Dring was taken on board U-130 as a prisoner of war. The others were picked up by the RFA fleet oiler Fortol and landed at Freetown.
U-130 had now been fifty-three days at sea and was running low on fuel and provisions. Ernst Kals, having sunk a total of 51,528 tons of Allied shipping since leaving Lorient in July, considered it was time to set course for home.
As soon as the U-boat was out of sight, Chief Officer MacQuiston, in the Viking Star’s sole surviving lifeboat, ordered the emergency W/T transmitter to be rigged. At 1815 Second Radio Officer Sloan tapped out an SOS, but this being the height of the rainy season, the atmospherics were so bad that in Sloan’s opinion it was most unlikely the message would be readable by any station, ashore or afloat. It was decided to wait until daylight before trying again.
AB Stan Mayes takes up the story again:
At dawn we hoisted sail and attempted to tow the rafts but it proved futile, so Chief Officer MacQuiston suggested we try to make land in the boat and have help sent to the rafts. This idea was not accepted by the men on the rafts and they pointed out that we had been seen by the Sunderland flying boat and our non-arrival at Freetown would prompt a search for us. We began rationing food and water. For each man – two pieces of chocolate a.m., two biscuits and Pemmican and a spoonful of condensed milk at midday, and in the evening it was two pieces of chocolate and a malted milk tablet. Water was issued three times daily – half a cupful each time.
The lifeboat was of wooden construction and was leaking badly. Having 36 men in it, we had only 14 inches of freeboard so it was being bailed out constantly. During the second night a strong wind caused a choppy sea and there was frantic bailing out as water came over the gunwales. During daytime the heat of the sun was unbearable, but during the night-time it became very cold and, as most of us were wearing very little clothing, we suffered from both extremes. Our position was a few miles north of the Equator.
At dawn on 27th August the Chief Officer decided to leave the rafts and try to sail to the land, so we took G. Patterson, Cadet from a raft onto the boat, and then I witnessed a very heroic act by AB Daintith of Liverpool. He gave up his relatively safe place in the lifeboat to an injured DEMS gunner, A. Hancock, from a semi-submerged raft, knowing he had far less chance of survival, or none at all, in the shark-infested seas. After passing water, provisions, blankets and a large yellow flag to the men on the rafts we set sail and departed. The Bosun and myself steered the boat as we both had experience, mine being four and a half years in coastal sailing barges. We had four hours on and four hours off at the tiller while others were on a rota in bailing out the leaking boat. A metal bailer and empty biscuit tins were used. We steered by the sun and stars as our lifeboat compass had been stolen in a recent port of call. We were constantly accompanied by sharks and often saw many barracudas, dugongs, large rays and myriads of small fish. With so many men in the boat there was much discomfort from lack of space.
The Viking Star had been torpedoed roughly 165 miles south-west of Freetown, not an insurmountable distance to cover even in a ship’s lifeboat, a notoriously difficult craft to handle under sail. Fortunately, the wind was from the south-west – a following wind – and with the prevailing current also setting in towards the land, MacQuiston’s boat, although substantially overloaded, was making progress at around 2 knots.
In later life, Clifford Maw recalled the conclusion of the perilous boat journey:
Short commons, seasickness, work, dangerous moments, spells of boredom, hopes raised, only to be shattered – such formed our lot over four days and nights on the ocean. Time and time again someone jumped up to point out ‘a sail’ that proved to be no more than a wisp of cloud on the horizon or a shadow on the sea. So when Kelly yelled out one drizzly night, ‘Look! There’s land, fellows!’ he was told brusquely to ‘Pipe down and stop rocking the boat!’ But he was right, and we raised a hoarse cheer when doubts were dispelled. None of us was feeling too strong and I had taken my belt in to the last notch. But we kept rowing against the ebb tide until caught by the heel in a breaking crest of sea. The First Mate ordered, ‘Ship the oars!’ and the boat rushed forward amid surf with foam creaming over the stern and gunwales.
Another giant roller struck us and our boat was hurled up and over, flinging us all into the sea. It looked like ‘curtains’ for me. My kapok life-jacket had been soaked frequently and had lost its buoyancy. Instead of keeping me afloat it dragged me down and I was lucky to find myself lying on the beach and Chippy, the carpenter, who had rescued me, bending over and applying first aid with ham-fisted vigour. The other chaps were ashore and had hitched the sea anchor to a thorny bush to hold the overturned lifeboat fast, then rigged a sail for a windbreak, and we all waited in this rough shelter for the dawn.
The lifeboat had been thrown ashore on a remote sandy beach at the entrance to the Sherbro River, close to the border between Sierra Leone and Liberia. Shortly before dawn, the survivors were found by a local fisherman, who took them to a nearby village where, largely through the efforts of a young Creole girl who had trained as a missionary in Freetown and spoke passable English, they were made welcome and given a meal. Their hunger assuaged, they lay down in one of the huts, and slept the sleep of the just.
Stan Mayes later wrote:
Emerging from the huts later on we found every piece of our boat had been carried from the shore and was in the village. We were asked if we wanted any part of it but of course we did not. Later, we left the village and began walking through the jungle in single file with natives escorting us, and they were making sure the way was clear of snakes and animals. After a few hours we stopped at another village and stayed overnight. Our escort returned to their own village but the missionary stayed with us. Here we were given a meal and again slept in mud huts. Next morning we left and again we were escorted and accompanied by the missionary and later that day we arrived at a creek and stayed overnight in a village. A native was sent ahead to Bonthe to inform the District Commissioner of our presence, and next morning we were taken through swamps in canoes to deeper waters where a large launch was waiting for us. After thanking the missionary and the escorts we left, and three hours later we arrived at Bonthe Shebar – nowadays known as Sherbro. We were all accommodated in the homes of Swiss and French traders.
While in Bonthe Shebar, where there was a Government radio station, Chief Officer MacQuiston sent a message to the Admiralty in Freetown informing them of the loss of the Viking Star and the approximate position of the two life-rafts. Freetown despatched a Sunderland, an armed trawler and an MTB to search for the rafts, but they had no success.
In charge of the survivors on the two missing life-rafts was Third Officer John Rigiani. The rafts were of substantial wooden construction, 8ft by 8ft, buoyancy being provided by empty 40-gallon drums, around which the frame was built. They were designed to float either way up and had food, water and distress flares on board. Unfortunately, one of the two rafts had been damaged on launching, had lost most of its buoyancy and was completely waterlogged. The seven men on board this raft had little comfort, for they were virtually sitting in the sea. It was only due to the superb seamanship and leadership shown by John Rigiani that they survived the stormy seas to reach land. After ten days at sea they were cast ashore on a Liberian beach some 150 miles south-east of Freetown. They eventually arrived in Freetown, where they were reunited with the rest of the Viking Star’s survivors. There they learned that telegrams had already been sent to their next of kin informing them that the Viking Star was missing and all her crew lost. They were written off with their ship as ‘Voyage Not Completed’.
Stan Mayes has the last word:
I was an Able Seaman on Viking Star and my pay was £22.12s 6d per month. £10.12s 6d paid by the shipowner and £12 War Risk Money paid by the Ministry of Shipping. From the day your ship was sunk all wages for the crew were stopped, as in my case, and were only paid again on my arrival in the UK, when I reported myself alive at Tilbury Shipping Office (shipowners regarded us as unemployed – without a ship). My wages from Blue Star were backdated to the date of sinking and to the day of arrival in Liverpool. The War Risk Money paid by the Government ceased with the loss of the ship. The next of kin of seamen who lost their lives received no payments.