Convoy KMF 25A-Sinking of the SS Santa Elena
SS Santa Elena
In October 1943 the nurses were given 48 hours to pack our things and prepare to move out. They left Liverpool on the SS Santa Elena, one of 43 ships in Convoy KMF 25A bound for Naples, Italy, although thye did not know that was our destination. There were more than 1,800 soldiers and nursing sisters on the Santa Elena.
Leaving Britian and arriving at the Mediterranean was uneventful and routine for convoy duty. U-boats were active, the ship zigzagged behind the destroyers. The convoy headed through the Strait of Gibraltar on Nov. 4 with planes overhead to provide cover. But once Gibraltar disappeared, so did the aerial coverage. Steaming along the Algerian coast, the convoy followed the sea road which led to the narrow waist of the Mediterranean. Too large to pass through the Tunisian War Channel in columns of three ships each- the favored formation-the convoy was strung out in less maneuverable, seven and nine ship columns.
The convoy's vulnerability became apparent on Nov 6, as the ships having left Algiers far astern, were approaching Philippeville. Traveling at 12 knots, they reached a point not far from Cape Bougaroun. At exactly 18:00 the Luftwaffe struck. A mixed force of some nine bombers and 16 torpedo planes, coming in a low altitude.
A burst of anti-aircraft fire sounded and 10 planes came into view. Guns opened up and the air was filled with black smoke. The soldiers and nursing sisters were ordered to go below deck, but the ship was struck near the waterline by a torpedo. There was a deafening explosion that shook the ship. The engines were knocked out and power was lost. Slowly the ship began to drift and take on water.
SS Monterey
DD-641 Tillman
While they were below deck, the ship took a second hit when a bomb crashed into the deck near the stern. The initial explosion plunged the ship into darkness and produced a noticeable list. The call came to abandon ship and the nurses were put into the lifeboats. Everyone wore life preservers. Soldiers were seen jumping into the water. Many of them were clinging to the sides of the lifeboats. In several lifeboats nurses themselves took the oars and helped to row around in circles until they were rescued two or three hours later. Two boatloads, including thirty-six of the hospital's ninety-nine female staff, were taken aboard an American destroyer. (The ninety-nine included Matron Blanche Herman, her assistant, eighty-eight nursing sisters, a dietitian, three physiotherapists, a home sister, and four Red Cross workers.) The sisters in the other boats were faced with an awesome fifty-foot climb up the towering side of the S.S. Monterey, a troopship that was standing by to pick up survivors. The nurses' "hardening" training in England had not included practice with scramble nets that hung down the liner's side, swaying outward with each roll of the ship. But with dogged perserverance all made the difficult ascent to the deck of the Monterey, many using their elbows rather than their hands to haul themselves up. One sister fell into the sea from forty feet up, and was rescued by a Chinese cook who dived in from a lifeboat. A submarine alarm sent the rescue ship hurrying off to Philippeville. The transport Monterey took on board the 1,870 Canadian troops (and nurses) traveling in Santa Elena;
Relieved to be alive, they gathered together on the deck. The crew and Armed Guard returned to the ship Santa Elena the following day. The ship suffered further damage when accidentally rammed by damaged a Dutch transport Marnix Van St. Aldegonde (then under tow). The next day, Nov. 6, 1943, they watched as the Monterey attempted to tow the Santa Elena. But the ship could not stand the strain and through tears the surviors watched her sink off Phillipville Harbour, North Africa. Gone were their possessions. Gone were all of the hospital supplies, surgical equipment and beds. Four of the 133-man merchant crew perished in the abandonment, but the 44-man Armed Guard survived intact. Rough weather prevented the Monterey from docking at the African port, and she was ordered to proceed to Naples. The same heavy seas defeated attempts to transfer to the liner the nurses that were on the destroyer. They were put ashore at Philippeville, to spend a week as guests of No. 15 General Hospital at El Arrouch before taking ship to Naples. How grateful they were to the sisters of No. 15, who shared with them precious food parcels from Canada and items of clothing and cosmetics not easily replaced!
The incident was not without it's lighter moments. One nurse had insisted on using a defective alarm clock all the time we were in England. The thing had kept going off at all times of day and night and it wouldn't stop ringing even after it had been shut off. Some nursing sisters would hide the clock, hoping the nurse would finally give it up, but she didn't. When the same nurse married and left for home, she gave the clock as a gift to another nursing sister in our unit, and so the clock had made it into the Santa Elena. As the ship sank, someone called out: "There goes that bloody alarm clock!"
Eventually, the nurses arrived in Naples Harbour, disembarked and proceeded to their destination at Caserta, about 20 miles north of Naples.