laconia myth

[redoktobor]

they say that the laconia carried 3.5m in silver. in 1917 the liner sank off of fastnet.can anybody give more info. every place i go to try to find any logistics on this wreck return my questions with the answer of location unknown.therefore salvage unknown? can a copy of a manifest be secured?and does anyone have something to add.

 

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[old man]

Laconia SS was a Cunard Liner of 18,099grt. built in 1911 by Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson. On the outbreak of WW1 Laconia SS was turned into an Armed Merchant Cruiser in 1914 and based at Simonstown in the South Atlantic, from which she patrolled the South Atlantic and Indian Ocean until April 1915. She was then used as a headquarters ship for the operations to capture Tanga and the colony of German East Africa. Four months later she returned to the patrolling of the South Atlantic. She was handed back to Cunard in July 1916 and on September 9th resumed service.. On the 25th February 1917 she was torpedoed by the German sumarine U-50 six miles (11 km) NW x W of the Fastnet while returning from the United States to England with 75 passengers (34 first class and 41 second class) and a crew of 217 under the command of Captain Irvine. The first torpedo struck the liner on the starboard side just abaft the engine room, but did not sink her. Twenty minutes later a second torpedo exploded in the engine room, again on the starboard side, and the vessel sank at 10:20pm. Twelve people were killed, six crew and six passengers, including two American citizens,

 

[allen_idaho]

It was reported in the New York Times of February 27, 1917 that the Laconia carried 1000 bars of silver, a large quantity of specie, all worth an estimated $2 million at the time.

 

[allen_idaho]

I should also add that the log from German Sub U-50 placed the Laconia about 160 miles Northwest by West of Fastnet at roughly location 52.00N, 13.40W .