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21st November 2021, 12:49 PM
#21
Re: Melrose Abbey
Cargo ship Melrose Abbey, 2,473grt, (Associated Humber Lines) loaded with a cargo of coal and bags of mail on the Tyne bound for Boston, Massachusetts sailed from Loch Ewe and joined up with the 46 ship Convoy ONS-154, which departed Liverpool on the 18th December 1942. On the 26th December, the convoy was sighted by U-664 who called up another eighteen U-boats and the attack began the following day. The Melrose Abbey was the second of thirteen Merchant ships sunk over a four day period. A couple of minutes after witnessing the first ship torpedoed on the 27th from the convoy the Melrose Abbey was hit by a torpedo from U-356, which detonated in the after end of number two hold directly below the bridge deck killing six crewmembers and blowing one DEMS gunner overboard to his death and the ship immediately began to break up. With both her bow and stern rising in the air the order to abandon ship was given. With only one damaged lifeboat and a couple of rafts available men began to jump over the rails into the freezing sea. Forty five minutes later with her back broken the ship folded in two and plunged beneath the waves in position 47’ 30N 24’ 30W. An hour later the twenty-seven survivors were plucked from the sea by the Convoy Rescue Ship Toward and after being transferred to the Canadian Corvette RCN Shediac were eventually landed at Ponta Delgada, Azores.
"Across the seas where the great waves grow, there are no fields for the poppies to grow, but its a place where Seamen sleep, died for their country, for you and for peace" (Billy McGee 2011)
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