Jaggers writes of torpedoing
The following is a portion of a letter written by Pvt John Jaggers, Mac Jagger's son, to his wife, Dorothy, describing the torpedoing of his ship, carrying a cargo of mules, which he was on last winter on route to India. Because of the fate of some of the ships that went before them, they were ordered to take a longer route, thinking it safer. Because of military regulations, details of the disaster could not be revealed when it happened.
"Our ship was hit at about 9:30 pm on the night of February 6, 1945. The first two pickles hit us in number 3 hold starboard side (close to mid-ship right side) They came so close together the two explosions sounded almost like one. . It was sort of a bang bang effect, like a double barrel shotgun being fired quickly. At the time Mac, myself and three others were in the vet dispensary. which fortunately was on the port side. I think we all realized what had happened and immediately made for the door. The lights of course were gone, and it was pitch black. I couldn't make any voice heard over the noise of the ship, so lost contact with the other men. Its the best thing they didn't follow me. I turned to the right after getting through the door and tried to get to the ladder going topside. The hatch covers between middle and top compartments had been blown away , and I fell into the lower compartment. Down there it was all broken bottles, oil from the storage tanks and I. Slipped, slid and grunted around there until I found a girder pointed in the right direction. It was like everything else covered with oil and climbing was a problem.
I seemed to get up three feet and slide back two. After what I imagined to be hours , I made it to the upper deck. When I could look up and see a star, it appeared so good.
Mac and the others turned left leaving the dispensary and were already on deck. I found a life belt and put it on and went around starboard side looking for Mac. I couldn't find him so went back to my raft. He was assigned to the same one but wasn't there. I went to the bridge still looking for him, and heard he had gone off in one of the lifeboats.
I found some water, a raincoat and went back to my raft. (Ididn't see Mac again until I reached shore. He was picked up four dayse me and made it here the same day the ship found us). (Mac=McCaslin) The Captain was at the raft and we stood there what little we could and waiting to see if he would order abandon ship.
About this time another torpedo hit, agasin on the staerboard side and forward of the other two salvos. When the last torpedo hit the ship broke in half right forward of the bridge. Hold 1, 2, and 3 sank immediately.
Now there was no doubt about getting off this thing. My raft was the first of our group of two that cut loose. It didn't drift away from the ship so that one could slide down a rope to it. Thinking it was free a lieutenant asked me to go down the ladder on the side of the ship and swim out to the raft and see if I could throw the line back aboard. The ladder ended half way down and I had to jump. The water was covered with oil and debris and if I didn't have the life jacket I couldn't have made the raft. I found a line attached to the ship and easily pulled where it could be loaded.
After we got men loaded and out of the water we paddle quickly away. The ship was listing badly and we thought it might turn over on us. I never paddled as hard in my life and made less time. Rafts are the most stubborn things I ever seen.
We reached a point 200 to 500 yards away from the ship and stopped to rest. We hadn't been there a few minutes when I heard a diesel motor running slowly. Knowing it was a sub and thinking it was coming along side to machine gun us, three of us jumped in the water. The others lay flat in the raft hoping not to be seen amid all the packing cases, etc floating. The sub came up and stopped about 70 feet from us. Baby was I scared. If I was frightened aboard ship, it was nothing compared to this. The sub stayed near us for a few minutes not moving. The periscope turned around several times but no one came out on deck. It moved off and we never saw it again. Of course we thought they were waiting for daylight to come back and shoot us like fish in a barrel.
Our raft was built for 8 men and that night we had 17 aboard. When it was almost morning we found another raft and tied the two together. They took one of our men leaving us with 16 which we kept until rescued seven days later. They also had 16 men.
The next morning the 7th we saw 2 more rafts about 700 yards away. To give you some idea of hard araft is to handle, we paddled all day before we reached them and tied the four rafts together. Now we had 60 men in 4 rafts. Some were injured so we kept the original 16 in our raft to make room for them. Even then there was no room to move. We sat jammed against each other , not daring to move our feet without stepping on someone. Because of our heavy load the deck (floor to you) was constantly covered with water amd each wave came over the side and on our backs. We were never day even in the calm weather.
To make our food and water last as along as possible and still sustain us each amn to two ounces of food and four ounces of water per day. This way our food would have gone to the end of 20 days and water to 25. We felt they would find us by then for we believed ourselves to be 50 miles from land. We thought our SOS might have been heard, not knowing things had been blow apart.
The first day on the raft we neither ate nor drank. We found the cover on our food supply was loose and the stuff was not in cans.such as crackers which were spoiled by salt water. It was during this day we figured our daily rations. The same morning we figured the sub would pay us a visit. This was also the same day we got the 4 rafts together. We would have liked to have gone back to the ship but it was impossible for us the paddle that far. We needed more water, food, clothing and blankets for the men, but the stern section of the ship drifted as fast as we did and it was impossible to get near it with a raft. (Mac was in a lifeboat with oars and was able to return to the ship ) We drifted away from the ship and after the fourth day didn't see it again (The rescue vessel sank the stern section as a menace to navigation).
Every one did fairly well until the fifth day on the rafts. Then the constant exposure, lack of food and water began to take effect. A few of the men weren't exactly right in the noggin. The nights were worse, for then we were colder -not that we were ever warm. I thought the Indian Ocean was tropical and how wrong I was. The night we were torpedoed the water temperature was 58 degrees. Some of the men had nothing on but shorts and three to five men had to share a blanket. Through everything ole Johnnie seemed to do okay. I didn't feel especially hungry but I would have given most anything for a big drink of water. About 9 AM of the seventh day our raft was picked up.