Zigzagging at 10 knots, the Athenia was steaming 250 miles west of Inishtrahull, Donegal, when she was torpedoed without warning by the German submarine U-30, commanded by Lieutenant Fritz Lemp. The Perilous Atlantic CrossingĪt 7:45 that fateful Sunday evening, the 13,000-ton liner Athenia of the Donaldson Atlantic Line was on course from Belfast, Ireland, to Montreal, Canada, with 1,418 passengers-men, women, and children. Their war began less than nine hours after Great Britain and France declared war on Nazi Germany on September 3, 1939, following the invasion of Poland. The unsung heroes who plied the world’s sea-lanes under the Red Ensign, nicknamed the “Red Duster,” were on the front lines from beginning to end. None of the Allied services engaged in World War II was in action longer or suffered a higher percentage of casualties than the British Merchant Navy.
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