SS Khedive Ismail

The SS "Khedive Ismail" was a steamship sunk with great loss of life in 1944.

The 7,513 ton steamship was launched as the "Aconcagua" by Scotts of Greenock in 1922. The "Aconcagua" passed into Egyptian ownership and was renamed after Khedive Ismail, the ruler of Egypt from 1863 until 1879. In 1940 the "Khedive Ismail" was requisitioned as a British troopship.

On 6 February 1944 Convoy KR-8 sailed from Kilindini Harbour at Mombasa, Kenya to Colombo, Ceylon. The convoy consisted of five troop transports ("Khedive Ismail", "City of Paris", "Varsova", "Ekma" & "Ellenga"), escorted by the heavy cruiser HMS "Hawkins" and the destroyers HMS "Petard" and HMS "Paladin".

In the early afternoon of Saturday 12 February 1944, the Japanese B1 type submarine I-27, commanded by Lt-Cdr Toshiaki Fukumura, attacked the convoy in the One and a Half Degree Channel, south-west of the Maldives near coordinates coord|01|25|N|72|22|E. The submarine sank the "Khedive Ismail" with two torpedoes.

The ship was carrying 1,511 personnel including 178 crew, 996 officers and men of the East African Artillery's 301st Field Regiment, 271 Royal Navy personnel, and a detachment of 19 Wrens. Also on board were 53 nursing sisters accompanied by one matron, and 9 members of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry.

As survivors floundered in the sea, "I-27" submerged and hid beneath them. While HMS "Paladin" lowered boats over her side to begin rescuing survivors, HMS "Petard" raced in to release depth charges. The destruction of an enemy submarine that might sink more ships took precedence over the lives of the survivors, and "I-27" under Commander Fukumura had a history of machine-gunning survivors of ships she had sunk, including the Liberty ship SS "Sambridge" and the "Fort Mumford". [http://www.princerupertlibrary.ca/mod.php?mod=userpage&menu=140200&page_id=71]

On "Petard"’s third run, her depth charges forced "I-27" to the surface. "Paladin" rammed the submarine, in the process causing considerable damage to herself. Finally a torpedo from "Petard" destroyed the "I-27".

No fewer than 1,297 people, including 77 women, lost their lives in the two minutes it took for the "Khedive Ismail" to sink. Only 208 men and 6 women survived. The sinking was the third worst Allied shipping disaster of World War II and the single worst loss of female service personnel in the history of the Commonwealth of Nations.

ource

"Passage to Destiny: The Story of the Tragic Loss of the SS Khedive Ismail" by Brian James Crabb [http://www.ipresent.co.uk/morebooks.htm#info4] ISBN 1 900289 10 5

External links

[http://www.combinedfleet.com/I-27.htm Career of I-27]

[http://www.stephen-stratford.co.uk/wts.htm Women's Transport Service (FANY)]