Tango Maru is a diesel cargo ship . Built in Germany in 1926 under the name Rendsburg . In 1942, confiscated by the Netherlands , renamed Toendjoek , flooded in 1942. Raised and renovated by the Japanese in 1942, renamed Tango Maru . The Tango Maru became one of the “ ships of hell ” used to transport workers from Japanese-occupied territories and prisoners of war under inhuman conditions.
| Tango Maru (1942–1944) Toendjoek (1940–1942) Rendsburg (1925–1940) | |
|---|---|
| Flag |  |
| Class and type of vessel | dry cargo ship |
| Operator | Japanese Imperial Steamship Co Nederlandsch Indische Maatschappij Voor Zeevaart NV Deutsche Australische Dampfschiffs Gesellschaft, Hamburg-Amerika Linie |
| Manufacturer | Vulcan-Werke Hamburg und Stettin Actiengesellschaft , Hamburg , Germany |
| Launched | 1925 |
| Commissioned | 1926 |
| Withdrawn from the fleet | February 25, 1944 |
| Status | sunk |
| Main characteristics | |
| Displacement | 6200 t |
| Length | 137.20 m |
| Width | 17.7 m |
| Engines | 2 Vulcan-MAN diesel engines |
| Power | 4100 l. with. |
| Speed | 13 knots |
In February 1944, it was sunk by the USS Rasher . More than 3,000 people were killed from among the Javanese workers ( Romus ) and Dutch prisoners of war aboard.
History
The Rendsburg dry cargo ship with a displacement of 6,200 tons was built in Hamburg in 1926 at the Vulcan-Werke shipyard. In May 1940, German troops invaded the Netherlands , and on November 10, 1940, Rendsburg was confiscated by the Dutch in the Dutch East Indies and renamed Toendjoek .
On March 2, 1942, before the start of the Japanese occupation , the Dutch were flooded by the Dutch in the waters of the port of Jakarta Tanjung Priok . On August 12, the ship was lifted and repaired by the Japanese fleet by the next year. Transferred to the state company Imperial Steamship Co under the name "Tango-maru" [1] .
Drowning
On February 25, 1944, the Tango-maru sailed from Surabaya to Ambon as part of a convoy, which included another cargo ship, the Ryusey-maru, two minesweepers and the Takunan-maru 5 anti-submarine ship . About 3,000 Javanese workers and several hundred prisoners of war, mostly Dutch, were stationed aboard the Tango Maru in extremely cramped conditions. The Russei Maru accommodated 6,600 people: 1,244 Japanese soldiers of various units, 2,865 Indian soldiers and 2,555 Javanese workers [2] .
The convoy was discovered the same evening by a USS Rasher submarine 25 miles north of Bali. At 19:43, taking advantage of the movement of one of the escort ships that left the Tango Maru board unprotected, Rasher fired four torpedoes, three of which hit the target. The ship sank for five minutes at [1] . An hour and a half later, the Rasher boat sank and the Rusei Maru, which sank just as rapidly. The death toll was about 3,000 at Tango Maru and 5,000 at Ryusey Maru [2] .
Notes
- ↑ 1 2 Bob Hackett, Sander Kingsepp. Transport TANGO MARU: Tabular Record of Movement Combined fleet (2013). Date of treatment July 14, 2017.
- ↑ 1 2 Williams, 2012 .
Literature
- David L. Williams. In Titanic's Shadow: The World's Worst Merchant Ship Disasters . - The History Press, 2012 .-- 192 p. - ISBN 9780752477138 .
See also
- Junyo Maru