October 19, 1940
The SS Gracechurch steamed along at a steady ten knots, its gray hull slicing through the cold waters of the North Atlantic under a sky dimmed by cloud cover and the coming twilight. Ordinary seaman Karl Lang stood on the aft weather deck of the 7,000-ton tramp steamer, scanning the sea to the north through a pair of binoculars. No enemy planes in sight. No enemy periscopes in sight either. Nor were the convoy’s other ships visible—the Gracechurch lay in the far port column of their east-bound convoy. The other fifty ships lay mostly to the south, spread out across several miles.
“Anything to report?” The first mate’s voice boomed across the deck, loud as the man was big, with a singsong Jamaican lilt that had taken Karl an entire voyage from Gibraltar to Liverpool to fully understand.
Karl lowered his binoculars for a moment to turn to the officer. “Nothing yet, Mr. Blake.”
Mr. Blake stepped to the rails and pulled his own set of binoculars to his eyes to scan the horizon. He was black skinned, roughly forty years old, and brimming with lithe muscles. “This far east, we’re in U-boat territory.”
“The escorts will take care of them, won’t they?” For most of their journey from Halifax, they’d had only a pair of armed merchant cruisers. Today, two destroyers, three corvettes, three anti-sub trawlers, and a minesweeper had joined them.
Mr. Blake continued his scan. “That’s why we’re in convoy, but best keep a weather eye out. Word is, the U-boats hunt in packs now.”
Karl had experienced his share of being hunted by Nazis. He’d fled his home in Austria with an SS colonel in pursuit and had lost both his sisters in the process. Now the U-boats were the predators. Karl wanted to fight back—preferably on a warship—but he had been born in Austria, so the British considered him an enemy alien, unfit for any of their fighting forces. That had left him with few choices after escaping the Reich. Signing up on a tramp steamer had seemed the best of his options.
Papa would have wanted him to finish his schooling, but Karl didn’t have the money for that. And over the last eight months, he’d grown fond of the sea. The conditions were Spartan, rats were common, and the weather was fickle. Yet, despite the danger of storms and the threat of U-boats, despite the low pay, low status, and low level of comforts, Karl was seeing the world. Europe, Africa, North and South America. He’d visited ports on all those continents. He had learned how to splice rope and tie knots, how to navigate, and how to signal between ships. It wasn’t the education a well-to-do family like the Langs might seek out, but it was an education of the most fascinating kind. And even more than his family had excelled in business and academia and managing their estates and holdings, the Langs had followed their conscience. That meant opposing the Nazis, and if the only way Karl could do that now was by bringing cargo to Britain so others could do the actual fighting, so be it.
Mr. Blake lowered his binoculars. “If I were a U-boat skipper, I’d attack in the dark.”
Karl nodded. The sun had slipped below the horizon not long ago. Darkness already obscured the eastern horizon, and it would grow, covering the ocean, blanketing the convoy and any enemy ships lurking below or above the shadowy waves.
“Did you finish the lifeboat inspection?” Mr. Blake asked.
“Aye, Mr. Blake. All in order.” Karl had spent most of the afternoon ensuring the supplies were organized and stowed. Nothing had been out of place, because not a day had gone by since leaving Halifax that someone hadn’t inspected the lifeboats. Lifeboat drills were not quite as frequent as the inspections—every other day rather than every day—but the entire crew of thirty-seven knew all the procedures forward and backward.
“And did you see those funny-looking ships the navy sent?”
Karl chuckled. “The corvettes? Look more like whaling ships than warships.” They corkscrewed over waves rather than cutting through them like a proper fighting ship ought to. But at least their crews manned a vessel of war.
“As long as they can drop depth charges and hear a U-boat’s propellers. Carry on, Ecker.”
“Yes, Mr. Blake.” Karl let his eyes close for a moment, something he’d been trained to do during watch so his vision didn’t tire and lose its effectiveness, then went back to his scan.
Ecker wasn’t his real surname, but he’d lost his real passport when he’d lost his fifteen-year-old sister. Before his death, his father had prepared fake passports for all of them with the name Eckerstorfer. That was a mouthful for some of the crewmen, so Karl went by Ecker. As it wasn’t his real name anyway, he didn’t mind the dropped syllables. As long as they didn’t call him Kraut or hun, the alias didn’t matter.
The dark of the night quickly grew complete, and the temperature dropped accordingly. Karl wore his father’s wool coat and a knitted cap to keep out the chill. He’d left his own coat behind at the family’s estate of Falcon Point. If he ever got back, he doubted it would fit him. His months at sea had left him broader through the shoulders and arms. He’d grown taller as well. His sisters, Anna and Ingrid, might have changed too, but as long as they were all safe, as long as they were reunited, the little changes wouldn’t mean much.
Something white and thin, almost like a feather, appeared in his binoculars. He blinked, trying to get his eyes to focus better, and then the distant object disappeared. He had seen something, hadn’t he? Or was his imagination and the length of his watch playing tricks on his mind and eyes? Mr. Blake always said it was better to overreport than to underreport. The third mate might not agree, and it was technically the third mate’s watch, but Mr. Tanner was ill. Mr. Blake was acting officer of the watch, so Karl rang the nearest bell twice for an object sighted to the port.
Able Seaman Jake Tremblay arrived first. He was the ship master’s son, only a few years older than Karl but vastly more experienced, a fact he never let Karl forget. “Did your Kraut eyes spot something?”
Karl grimaced at the insult but held his tongue. If he had seen something, there wasn’t time to waste with bickering. “Yes, but it disappeared.”
Jake stared out to sea, his pale face and red hair shadowed in the darkness. “What did it look like?”
“A line of white, as if the water were disturbed.”
Jake nodded. “Periscopes don’t have to be above water for long.”
Mr. Blake joined them then. “You see something?”
“Not sure, Mr. Blake. A thin line. White, then gone.” Karl pointed to where he’d seen it. “Maybe seven hundred yards off, two points forward of the port beam.”
“Sounds like a periscope,” Jake said.
Mr. Blake searched the area with his binoculars. He kept his expression unreadable, then handed Jake his binoculars. “See if you can find it again. Watch for torpedo tracks. I’ll tell the captain.”
Karl strained his eyes, alternating between hope that he’d see the mysterious object again and hope that it had all been his imagination. Jake wouldn’t let him forget it if he’d been wrong, but Karl would rather be ribbed for mistaking a leaping fish or a drifting piece of debris for a periscope than have an actual U-boat within sight of their convoy.
Six short blasts sounded ominously across the water, then repeated. Not from the Gracechurch. From one of the other ships, and that signal meant they had spotted a U-boat or a torpedo on their port side. Despite the chill temperature, icy perspiration pricked Karl’s skin. He was supposed to keep his eyes on his designated watch area, but the blasts drew his attention astern.
“Was that the Matheran or Bilderdijk?” Karl asked.
The British ship was behind them in the column and the Dutch ship beyond that.
A plume of fire rose in the distance. Karl turned away as the sound, a boom muted by distance, caught up with the flash. But he was too late. He’d temporarily ruined his night vision.
Jake let out a whistle. “The Matheran. Poor souls.”
Poor souls indeed. A single torpedo didn’t always sink a ship, but out on the Western Approaches, any ship torpedoed was unlikely to survive. Even if the crew managed to keep her afloat, damage would make her limp along, vulnerable in a squall and an easy target for U-boats.
If the Matheran sank, the survivors would need help, but anyone stopping long enough to pick them up was inviting the U-boat to turn one victory into two. Continuing on course while another crew battled to save their ship felt callous, but going back felt suicidal. It wasn’t Karl’s choice anyway. The convoy’s commodore or the Gracechurch’s captain would decide what to do. Most likely, the Navy escorts would look for survivors, but not until after they had chased the U-boat down and dropped depth charges on her.
Karl forced his attention back to his watch. Each time he closed his eyes, the flash of light from the Matheran formed an outline, but his vision would still spot a torpedo track or a U-boat, if it was near and on the surface.
“Looks like the fire’s out.” Jake’s voice filled with relief. “That should give them time to abandon ship in good order.”
“Have you ever done it before? Abandon ship?” They were too far away to see the Matheran’s deck, but Karl could imagine the fear and the panic, could feel a little of it, because the same menace threatened the Gracechurch.
“No, but I’ve done the drills, same as you, only for years instead of for months. No reason to panic if it comes to that. Given our cargo, we ought to have plenty of time.”
Karl wasn’t going to panic. He’d faced worse than a sinking ship before. He nodded his understanding, though he doubted Jake saw the motion. He would be watching the wreck or the ocean.
If the U-boat that had struck the Matheran stayed nearby for another shot, and if the Gracechurch became its target, Karl was as prepared as he could be. He had a bundle wrapped in waterproof cloth in the locker at the foot of his bunk with extra clothing, a few papers, a single letter, and the New Testament Papa had given him just hours before he’d been murdered. Mr. Blake had said more than once that there wasn’t much point in escaping a sinking ship if insufficient clothing meant freezing to death instead of drowning. Karl assumed his upbringing in the mountains of Upper Austria would help him fare better in the cold than someone from Jamaica, but Mr. Blake was about as tough as a man could get, so maybe not.
Karl allowed his eyes a long blink before continuing his scan. Hopefully the escorts would sink the U-boat or, at the very least, chase it off. But Mr. Blake’s words hung in his memory like sharp, threatening daggers. Hunting in packs. Karl hesitated, then asked another question of Jake. “Have you heard much about the U-boats hunting in packs?” The Halifax native might not like anyone born in Germany or Austria, but he’d been serving on ships for a long time and had a good ear for the latest scuttlebutt.
Jake nodded. “When one of them finds a convoy, they don’t attack right away. They radio all their friends and tail the convoy, waiting to strike when they can do it as a group.”
Karl glanced back toward the Matheran. A slight glow on the horizon—another burning ship?—highlighted the Matheran’s position. The wounded ship, no longer steaming at convoy speed, slowly slipped farther and farther from the Gracechurch.
Something not as dark as the rest of the water caught Karl’s gaze and grew, making its way toward the ship. “Is that what I think it is?”
Jake swore, then raised his voice to a yell. “Torpedo sighted. One point abaft the port beam.”
The next lookout took up the cry, and the fear that had been hovering like a storm cloud since the Matheran’s first signals suddenly felt like a hurricane.
“Keep an eye on it,” Jake said. “I’ve got to make sure the bridge knows.”
Even as Jake ran off, the ship shifted, a change in direction more dramatic than the routine zigzags they made while in convoy. Soon the engine thrummed with increased speed. Outrunning a torpedo wasn’t easy, but it could be done at some ranges. The alarm blared the call to action stations, the ship’s horn issued a warning to the rest of the convoy, and red Very flares shot into the sky.
Karl kept his binoculars on the wake churning toward the ship, praying the torpedo would self-destruct or turn off course, but it followed the Gracechurch, drawing ever closer.
Two sets of six blasts sounded in the distance. Another ship in the convoy was under attack. Karl held his breath and grabbed the rails as the torpedo disappeared behind the ship, out of view, and so close that there wasn’t any way it could miss.