Raider Attack near Madagascar
the Freighter SS Sawokla was shelled and torpedoed by the Raider Michel near Madagascar while enroute from Ceylon to New York via Capetown, South Africa. Shelled and then torpedoed, the Sawokla went down in 8 minutes. The 39 survivors were picked-up by the Michel and taken to Singapore where they spent the remainder of the war as slave laborers on the Burmese-Thailand death railway. ... Incredibly, all 39 survivors lived through the hellish ordeal and returned home after the war.
