ST Leukos
Encyclopedia
The ST Leukos was Irish Steam
Trawler that operated off the coast of Ireland
. She was lost with all hands on March 9, 1940 while fishing
off Tory Island
when the surfaced and opened fire with its deck gun. The Leukos and her crew
of 11 were lost. As a neutral country
, Irish
ship
s, including the Leukos, were unarmed and clearly marked.
The Leukos was fishing in the company of British
trawlers and she may have positioned herself between these fleeing trawlers and the U-boat in the vain belief that her status as a neutral would be respected. Alternatively the Leukos might have attempted to ram
the U-38.
The Irish Seamen's Relatives Association holds that the Leukos did attempt to ram the U-38 as it threatened the British trawlers. They maintain that this selfless bravery should be acknowledged by the British government.
This loss remained a mystery for many years. Death certificate
s for the lost crew were not issued until 1986.
in 1914 by the John Duthie Torry Shipbuilding Co. Ltd. for the National Steam Fishing Company of Aberdeen. She was powered by a coal-fired
steam engine
. During World War I
she was requisitioned by the British Admiralty
and used as a “boom defence vessel
”; that is: she maintained the buoy
s, hawser
s and netting
of a boom defence.
Initially she fished from Aberdeen. In 1920 she was sold to Tucker, Tippet and Company and continued fishing out of Aberdeen. On 27 February 1927 she was in a collision
with ST Thomas Bartlett. Later that year she was sold to the Dublin Trawlers, Ice and Cold Storage Company with offices at 8 Cardiff Lane, Dublin. She was transferred to the Irish registry
. She was based at Hanover Quay, Ringsend
, Dublin
, Lancashire
. She called to Troon
, Scotland
for coaling and then headed for ‘the bank’, a fishing ground, north-west of Tory Island. She was scheduled to return to Dublin on 12 March 1940, but failed to return. On 21 March her empty lifeboat
was found off Scarinish
on the Island of Tiree
in the Scottish
Inner Hebrides
. On 26 March, Lloyd's of London
declared the Leukos and her crew were presumed lost.
This loss remained a mystery until 1986. There were theories: was she on a target list because of her previous role as a boom defence vessel; or was there a structural weakness caused by her collision with ST Thomas Bartlett? The general assumption was that she struck a mine
. Officially she was listed as ‘missing’.
Further details were uncovered by Peter Mulvany, grand-nephew of Patricio McCarthy, one of those lost. They were published in the Spring 1987 edition of the Journal of the Maritime Institute of Ireland
. His sources were former U-boat personnel and recently declassified intelligence
resulting from decryption of encrypted German
radio communications, known as ‘Ultra
’.
Inverliffey carrying 13,000 tons of gasolene. The blazing oil threatened to engulf the Inverliffey’s lifeboats. At some risk to the U-38, it towed the lifeboats away from the flames. They were later rescued by the American oil-tanker R.G. Stewart, which transferred them to the American freighter SS City of Joliet and landed at Antwerp, Belgium. William Trowsdale, master of the Inverliffey, had protested to the Kapitänleutnant Heinrich Liebe of the U-38 that he had attacked a neutral Irish ship. Éamon de Valera
permitted Inver Tankers, the owners of the Inverliffey, to transfer their seven tankers to the British registry at the outbreak of the war, therefore their continued flying of the Irish tricolour was questionable.
It is not known why the U-38 sank a neutral Irish trawler, leaving the five British trawlers unmolested. Nor is it known why he waited an hour. In 1988 an effort was made to ask Kapitän Liebe. He declined to speak. He died in July 1997.
Bay in Ireland on the night of 12 June. Simon was an experienced spy
. He had several successful trips to England. Not noticing grass overgrown on the rusting rail-tracks of the Tralee and Dingle Light Railway
which had closed 14 months earlier, he asked “when is the next train?” He was later arrested.
Alvis and Pelagos were armed Trawlers each having a 3-pounder gun mounted aft. Seddock might have also been armed.
Steam engine
A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid.Steam engines are external combustion engines, where the working fluid is separate from the combustion products. Non-combustion heat sources such as solar power, nuclear power or geothermal energy may be...
Trawler that operated off the coast of Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
. She was lost with all hands on March 9, 1940 while fishing
Fishing
Fishing is the activity of trying to catch wild fish. Fish are normally caught in the wild. Techniques for catching fish include hand gathering, spearing, netting, angling and trapping....
off Tory Island
Tory Island
Toraigh is an inhabited island 14.5 km off the northwest coast of County Donegal, Ireland. It is also known in Irish as Oileán Thoraigh, Oileán Thoraí or Oileán Thúr Rí.-Language:The main spoken language on the island is Irish, but English is also understood...
when the surfaced and opened fire with its deck gun. The Leukos and her crew
Crew
A crew is a body or a class of people who work at a common activity, generally in a structured or hierarchical organization. A location in which a crew works is called a crewyard or a workyard...
of 11 were lost. As a neutral country
Neutral country
A neutral power in a particular war is a sovereign state which declares itself to be neutral towards the belligerents. A non-belligerent state does not need to be neutral. The rights and duties of a neutral power are defined in Sections 5 and 13 of the Hague Convention of 1907...
, Irish
Republic of Ireland
Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...
ship
Ship
Since the end of the age of sail a ship has been any large buoyant marine vessel. Ships are generally distinguished from boats based on size and cargo or passenger capacity. Ships are used on lakes, seas, and rivers for a variety of activities, such as the transport of people or goods, fishing,...
s, including the Leukos, were unarmed and clearly marked.
The Leukos was fishing in the company of British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
trawlers and she may have positioned herself between these fleeing trawlers and the U-boat in the vain belief that her status as a neutral would be respected. Alternatively the Leukos might have attempted to ram
Ramming
In warfare, ramming is a technique that was used in air, sea and land combat. The term originated from battering ram, a siege weapon used to bring down fortifications by hitting it with the force of the ram's momentum...
the U-38.
The Irish Seamen's Relatives Association holds that the Leukos did attempt to ram the U-38 as it threatened the British trawlers. They maintain that this selfless bravery should be acknowledged by the British government.
This loss remained a mystery for many years. Death certificate
Death certificate
The phrase death certificate can describe either a document issued by a medical practitioner certifying the deceased state of a person or popularly to a document issued by a person such as a registrar of vital statistics that declares the date, location and cause of a person's death as later...
s for the lost crew were not issued until 1986.
History
ST Leukos was built in AberdeenAberdeen
Aberdeen is Scotland's third most populous city, one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas and the United Kingdom's 25th most populous city, with an official population estimate of ....
in 1914 by the John Duthie Torry Shipbuilding Co. Ltd. for the National Steam Fishing Company of Aberdeen. She was powered by a coal-fired
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
steam engine
Steam engine
A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid.Steam engines are external combustion engines, where the working fluid is separate from the combustion products. Non-combustion heat sources such as solar power, nuclear power or geothermal energy may be...
. During World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
she was requisitioned by the British Admiralty
Admiralty
The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the Kingdom of England, and later in the United Kingdom, responsible for the command of the Royal Navy...
and used as a “boom defence vessel
Net laying ship
A net laying ship, also known as a net layer, net tender or boom defence vessel was a type of small auxiliary ship.A net layer's primary function was to lay and maintain steel anti-torpedo or anti-submarine nets. Nets could be laid around an individual ship at anchor, or around harbors or other...
”; that is: she maintained the buoy
Buoy
A buoy is a floating device that can have many different purposes. It can be anchored or allowed to drift. The word, of Old French or Middle Dutch origin, is now most commonly in UK English, although some orthoepists have traditionally prescribed the pronunciation...
s, hawser
Hawser
Hawser is a nautical term for a thick cable or rope used in mooring or towing a ship. A hawser passes through a hawsehole, also known as a cat hole, located on the hawse....
s and netting
Anti-submarine net
An anti-submarine net is a device placed across the mouth of a harbour or a strait for protection against submarines.-Examples of anti-submarine nets:*Lake Macquarie anti-submarine boom*Indicator net*Naval operations in the Dardanelles Campaign...
of a boom defence.
Initially she fished from Aberdeen. In 1920 she was sold to Tucker, Tippet and Company and continued fishing out of Aberdeen. On 27 February 1927 she was in a collision
Ship collision
Ship collision is the structural impact between two ships or one ship and a floating or still object such as an iceberg. Ship collisions are of particular importance in marine accidents...
with ST Thomas Bartlett. Later that year she was sold to the Dublin Trawlers, Ice and Cold Storage Company with offices at 8 Cardiff Lane, Dublin. She was transferred to the Irish registry
Flag State
The flag state of a commercial vessel is the state under whose laws the vessel is registered or licensed.The flag state has the authority and responsibility to enforce regulations over vessels registered under its flag, including those relating to inspection, certification, and issuance of safety...
. She was based at Hanover Quay, Ringsend
Ringsend
Ringsend is a southside inner suburb of Dublin, the capital of Ireland. It is located on the south bank of the River Liffey, about two kilometres east of the city centre, and is the southern terminus of the East Link Toll Bridge....
, Dublin
Original Account
On 9 February 1940 the Leukos sailed from Hanover Quay under Captain James Potter Thomasson, from FleetwoodFleetwood
Fleetwood is a town within the Wyre district of Lancashire, England, lying at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It had a population of 26,840 people at the 2001 Census. It forms part of the Greater Blackpool conurbation. The town was the first planned community of the Victorian era...
, Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
. She called to Troon
Troon
Troon is a town in South Ayrshire. It is situated on the west coast of Scotland, about eight miles north of Ayr and three miles northwest of Glasgow Prestwick International Airport. Lying across the Firth of Clyde, the Isle of Arran can be seen. Troon is also a port with freight and ferry services...
, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
for coaling and then headed for ‘the bank’, a fishing ground, north-west of Tory Island. She was scheduled to return to Dublin on 12 March 1940, but failed to return. On 21 March her empty lifeboat
Lifeboat (shipboard)
A lifeboat is a small, rigid or inflatable watercraft carried for emergency evacuation in the event of a disaster aboard ship. In the military, a lifeboat may be referred to as a whaleboat, dinghy, or gig. The ship's tenders of cruise ships often double as lifeboats. Recreational sailors sometimes...
was found off Scarinish
Scarinish
Scarinish is the main village on the island of Tiree, in the Scottish Inner Hebrides. The town is home to the only bank on the island , a grocery store , one hotel, a Post Office. There is also a ferry service to Oban in on the Scottish mainland....
on the Island of Tiree
Tiree
-History:Tiree is known for the 1st century BC Dùn Mòr broch, for the prehistoric carved Ringing Stone and for the birds of the Ceann a' Mhara headland....
in the Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
Inner Hebrides
Inner Hebrides
The Inner Hebrides is an archipelago off the west coast of Scotland, to the south east of the Outer Hebrides. Together these two island chains form the Hebrides, which enjoy a mild oceanic climate. There are 36 inhabited islands and a further 43 uninhabited Inner Hebrides with an area greater than...
. On 26 March, Lloyd's of London
Lloyd's of London
Lloyd's, also known as Lloyd's of London, is a British insurance and reinsurance market. It serves as a partially mutualised marketplace where multiple financial backers, underwriters, or members, whether individuals or corporations, come together to pool and spread risk...
declared the Leukos and her crew were presumed lost.
This loss remained a mystery until 1986. There were theories: was she on a target list because of her previous role as a boom defence vessel; or was there a structural weakness caused by her collision with ST Thomas Bartlett? The general assumption was that she struck a mine
Naval mine
A naval mine is a self-contained explosive device placed in water to destroy surface ships or submarines. Unlike depth charges, mines are deposited and left to wait until they are triggered by the approach of, or contact with, an enemy vessel...
. Officially she was listed as ‘missing’.
Further details were uncovered by Peter Mulvany, grand-nephew of Patricio McCarthy, one of those lost. They were published in the Spring 1987 edition of the Journal of the Maritime Institute of Ireland
Maritime Institute of Ireland
The Maritime Institute of Ireland was founded in 1941, at a time when World War II was raging and many seamen were in great peril of either being severely injured or losing their lives. Ireland, being an island nation, was dependent on the sea for all forms of movement external to the island as...
. His sources were former U-boat personnel and recently declassified intelligence
Military intelligence
Military intelligence is a military discipline that exploits a number of information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to commanders in support of their decisions....
resulting from decryption of encrypted German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
radio communications, known as ‘Ultra
Ultra
Ultra was the designation adopted by British military intelligence in June 1941 for wartime signals intelligence obtained by "breaking" high-level encrypted enemy radio and teleprinter communications at the Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park. "Ultra" eventually became the standard...
’.
Inverliffey
On 11 September 1939, U-38, on its first patrol, shelled and sunk the Irish-flagged oil tankerOil tanker
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a merchant ship designed for the bulk transport of oil. There are two basic types of oil tankers: the crude tanker and the product tanker. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crude oil from its point of extraction to refineries...
Inverliffey carrying 13,000 tons of gasolene. The blazing oil threatened to engulf the Inverliffey’s lifeboats. At some risk to the U-38, it towed the lifeboats away from the flames. They were later rescued by the American oil-tanker R.G. Stewart, which transferred them to the American freighter SS City of Joliet and landed at Antwerp, Belgium. William Trowsdale, master of the Inverliffey, had protested to the Kapitänleutnant Heinrich Liebe of the U-38 that he had attacked a neutral Irish ship. Éamon de Valera
Éamon de Valera
Éamon de Valera was one of the dominant political figures in twentieth century Ireland, serving as head of government of the Irish Free State and head of government and head of state of Ireland...
permitted Inver Tankers, the owners of the Inverliffey, to transfer their seven tankers to the British registry at the outbreak of the war, therefore their continued flying of the Irish tricolour was questionable.
Leukos
The account of the sinking of the Leukos, as recorded in the U-38 war diary, is curious. At 20:00 he surfacedHe remained, surfaced, for over an hour. At 21:13
“After surfacing 6 steamers with lights on were sighted which apparently formed a guard line with north-south course. I decided to give one of them a lesson with our gun.”
He wrote that the Leukos had not sunk!
“fired one shot on one trawler at 200m distance. Hit engine room, steamer disappeared in smoke and dust.”
He also wrote that some other trawlers were unaware of the incident
“Later it was recognised that the steamer had not sunk as presumed before. Decided not to attack again”.
“others seemed not to have noticed the gunfire.”
It is not known why the U-38 sank a neutral Irish trawler, leaving the five British trawlers unmolested. Nor is it known why he waited an hour. In 1988 an effort was made to ask Kapitän Liebe. He declined to speak. He died in July 1997.
Walter Simon
On its fifth patrol the U-38 landed Walter Simon, alias “Karl Anderson”, a Nazi agent, at DingleDingle
Dingle is a town in County Kerry, Ireland. The only town on the Dingle Peninsula, it sits on the Atlantic coast, about 49 kilometres southwest of Tralee and 71 kilometres northwest of Killarney....
Bay in Ireland on the night of 12 June. Simon was an experienced spy
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
. He had several successful trips to England. Not noticing grass overgrown on the rusting rail-tracks of the Tralee and Dingle Light Railway
Tralee and Dingle Light Railway
The Tralee and Dingle Light Railway and Tramway was a , 914 mm gauge narrow gauge railway running between Tralee and Dingle, with a branch from Castlegregory Junction to Castlegregory, in County Kerry on the west coast of Ireland. It operated between 1891 and 1953, the Castlegregory branch...
which had closed 14 months earlier, he asked “when is the next train?” He was later arrested.
Trawlers
The other trawlers were:- John Morris of Aberdeen,
- Alvis of Fleetwood
- Pelagos of Fleetwood
- Flying Admiral of Fleetwood
- Seddock of Grimbsy.
Alvis and Pelagos were armed Trawlers each having a 3-pounder gun mounted aft. Seddock might have also been armed.
Crew
- Cullen, Michael, of Ringsend, Dublin
- Donnelly, William, of Fleetwood & Blackpool, England
- Gill, Antony, of Dublin & Fleetwood, England
- Hawkins, James, of Ringsend, Dublin
- McCarthy, Patricio, of Marino, Dublin & Argentina
- McLeod, T., Fleetwood, of England & Stornoway, Scotland
- Mulligan, Thomas, of Dublin & Fleetwood
- O'Scanlon, P.J., of Cleethorpes, England
- Smith, Bernard, of Marino, Dublin
- Sumher, Robert, of Dublin & Fleetwood
- Thomasson, James Potter, of Mount St. Dublin & Fleetwood.
See also
- Irish neutrality during World War IIIrish neutrality during World War IIThe policy of Irish neutrality during World War II was adopted by Dáil Éireann at the instigation of Éamon de Valera, its Taoiseach upon the outbreak of hostilities in Europe and maintained throughout the conflict. De Valera refrained from joining either the Allies or Axis powers...
(external issues) - The Emergency (internal issues)
- Irish Mercantile Marine during World War IIIrish Mercantile Marine during World War IIThe Irish Mercantile Marine during World War II continued essential overseas trade during the conflict, a period referred to as The Long Watch by Irish mariners....