SAHRA Maritime and Underwater Cultural Heritage
March 8:
“This day in our shipwreck and aeronautical wreck history”
1796: Gothenburg, this Swedish East Indiaman wrecked at Green Point in the Western Cape.
1848: Harriet, this sailing schooner wrecked on the lee bank of the Breede River in the Western Cape whilst leaving the river.
1943: U-160 terrorised South African waters by attacking transport convoys that were delivering supplies for the war effort, claiming in total six ships and causing damage to two more over the course of nine days.
The James B Stephens (1943) after the attack
On this day, U-160 attacked the James B Stephens, an American liberty ship that was travelling unescorted about 240 km north-east of Durban in KwaZulu-Natal. The first torpedo struck on the port side with the explosion setting the fuel oil on fire and the ship settling rapidly by the bow. The 63 that were on board abandoned ship in four lifeboats and three rafts. The coup de grâce also struck on the port side, breaking the ship in two. This explosion overturned a lifeboat and caused three men to be ejected from one of the other lifeboats. All were picked up by the two remaining lifeboats, except for one guard who could not swim and did not have a life jacket on. Three days later, on the 11th of March, an aircraft spotted the boats and directed the HMS Norwich City to pick up the 19 survivors.
The image of U-160 captured from U-177 in April 1943. U-160 was sunk in June 1943 off the Azores islands in the North Atlantic by American aircrafts
On the 12th of March, the HMS Nigeria picked up a further 30 survivors. On the 14th of March, 6 days after the attack, the last survivors were spotted less than 2 km from Durban by aircraft. A SAAF crash boat was sent to pick them up. As for the fate of the ship, both sections remained afloat and burned into the morning of the 9th. An allied warship scuttled the stern section by gunfire and attempts were made to tow the fore section to Durban, but it sank under tow in heavy seas.
2009: Monie Marine, this South African fishing vessel collided with the Maritime Master and sank off Cape Recife in the Eastern Cape. The crew of 16 made it safely onto the then Department of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries inshore patrol vessel, the Lillian Ngoyi.
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