Quote:
Originally Posted by jimbuna
My late father sailed on the Russian convoys and they were instructed NOT to stop for torpedoed survivors in the water.
They had only a few minutes to live in such extreme conditions.
During one such convoy a merchant altered course to help said victims and an escort threatened it with gunfire for non-compliance of an admiralty order.
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As cold as the water was in the Atlantic, it was even worse there; you'd be dead in a few minutes from exposure. Unless they were in a lifeboat there's nothing the u-boat crew could have done to help the people already in the water. When conditions permitted (like sinking a lone merchant or convoy straggler) u-boat captains would still come alongside and help the survivors till wars end (though it curtailed as the war went on).
Escorts were the only ships allowed to aid in survivor retrival in a convoy since they could easily catch back up to the rest of the convoy, and had the agility to move the boat around to help scoop the people up quickly. If a merchant got too much off course it put the whole convoy at risk in order to get the offending ship back into the formation and begin sailing again.