Capt Kennedy of Rawalpindi

[sharpes24]

Hello everyone. I have found that my grandfather served on Rawalpindi and was fortunate enough to beone of the few survivors. We understand that he was picked up by the Altmark and left on an island somewhere. Does anyone know anything about this?
Cheryl

[RF]

The survivors picked up by the Germans were taken back to Germany. The Altmark was in the South Atlantic at the time and remained there until the beginning of January 1940, per SKL instructions to Kapitan Dau as the British and French instituted a search for that ship immediately after the Graf Spee prisoners were released at Montevideo and disclosed that ship's support to Graf Spee.

Also note that abandoning survivors to fend for themselves on a strange island without facilities constitutes a breach of the Geneva Convention on the rights of prisoners of war and survivors of sunken ships. It is unlikely the senior officers would have sanctioned such a breach; in any case the German policy was not to leave or abandon prisoners where they could be retrieved by Allied forces but to retain them in German hands on security grounds.

I think this account has been misrembered possibly by passage of time and the stress of survival.

[lwd]

Perhaps if he was sick or injured beyond the medical capabilities on board?

[RF]

I don't know. I would have thought the medical facilities on the twins would be better than on a merchant ship or naval support vessel. After Rawalpindi was sunk Marschall took his shipds far north, to the neighbourhood of Jan Mayan island, before running the British blockade back to Germany. Possibly that is where the ''island'' comes from. In any case I cannot see how this survivor would be picked up by Altmark.

[Bgile]

It's conceivable to me that they would leave them on an island and send a message a day or two later describing where they are. I have no idea whether that happened ... people's memory changes over the years.

[RF]

I don't think this is likely for one particular reason - if a message is sent to the British disclosing that island then the tactics of the Germans in hiding out in the far north is disclosed as well, compromising future surface ship operations.
Also consider the extreme cold and darkness at that time of year. Even if the British are alerted the chances of finding a man on an island are pretty near zero, and it would have been likely that after WW2 the German officer making such a decision would be facing war crimes charges.....