Birch+S

Stanley Birch

Killed on active service, aged 19, on board the SS Kheldive Ismail on 12 February 1944.

**The Story of the Tragic Loss of the SS //Khedive Ismail//** **by Brian James Crabb** ||
 * **PASSAGE TO DESTINY**


 * This book tells the untold story of the loss of the troopship SS //Khedive Ismail// in Convoy KR8 in February 1944. No less than 1,297 people lost their lives in the space of the two minutes it took to sink the ship, including seventy-seven women (the single worst loss of female service personnel in the history of the British Commonwealth). Carrying 1,511 personnel from the Army and the Royal and Merchant Navies, the //Khedive Ismail// sank on Saturday 12 February 1944, torpedoed by Japanese submarine //I-27// in the Indian Ocean. Only 208 men and 6 women survived the ordeal.

The submarine was depth-charged to the surface by the destroyers //Paladin// and //Petard//, and the book includes an account of their difficult but successful attempt to sink her, a campaign which forced the Navy to depth-charge the submarine through some of the survivors. This compelling read draws on many eye-witness accounts and previously unpublished. Admiralty papers, many of which were not released for forty years because of their sensitivity, for the sinking of the //Khedive Ismail// was Britain's third worst Allied shipping disaster of the Second World War. The book includes several appendices, including the names of the entire ship’s complement, and includes a generous fifty-three illustrations. **ISBN 1 900289 10 5** || Back to Alvaston Memorial