Engine Room Artificer 5th Class D/MX. 509466 Charles Edward CROWTHER
Royal Navy H.M.S.Lanka passenger on Khedive Ismail
12 Feb 1944 aged 22
Plymouth Naval Memorial, Panel 89, Column 1.
Son of Albert and Frances Crowther, of Stockport, Cheshire.
Husband of Mary Kathleen Crowther.
In the early afternoon of 12 Feb 1944 whilst south-west of the Maldives, a Japanese Type B1 submarine I-27 (Lt-Cdr Toshiaki Fukumura), attacked the convoy KR-8, which was enroute from Mombasa bound for Colombo. The Khedive Ismail 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.
The I-27 fired a spread of four torpedoes with two hits sinking the Khedive Ismail. Commander Fukumura had a history of machine-gunning survivors of ships she had sunk, including the Liberty ship S.S. Sambridge and the Fort Mumford. There were many survivors in the sea and the I-27 hid beneath them and the flotsam. H.M.S. Paladin lowered boats over the side to begin rescuing survivors but H.M.S. Petard released depth charges in an attempt to sink the submarine. On H.M.S. Petard’s third run, her depth charges forced I-27 to the surface. H.M.S. Paladin rammed the submarine, causing herself considerable damage. A torpedo from H.M.S. Petard finally destroyed the I-27.
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. Many of those who perished did so from the depth charges released from H.M.S. Petard.
SS Khedive Ismail (photo from britisharmynurses.com)
