WALTER D. MEYER

On the eighth or March, the SS Harry Luckenbach sailed from New York en route to the United Kingdom in convoy HX-229. Kings Point Cadet Walter D. Meyer was aboard. Assigned station # 111 in the convoy, the ship was so exposed that the master, Ralph McKinnon, had nervously steamed a zigzag course out in front of the convoy until ordered to return to his station. The U-91 (Walkerling) fired two torpedoes that struck the firefighter’s starboard side amidships in the machinery spaces. Eyewitnesses in the convoy observed a huge explosion and much smoke. In rough seas, some of the nine officers, forty-five men, and twenty-six armed guards fired distress rockets as they cleared the ship in three lifeboats. The ship sank in three minutes; however, and few managed to survive the sinking and the rough seas. As many as four escort vessels spotted some of the men in the boats. The corvette Anemone (K-48) was ordered to find the lifeboats, and the corvette Pennywort (K-111) had come across then but could not pick up the men because she already had one hundred eight survivors on board. The other escorts never located any of the men, and all hands including Meyer perished.