Sinking of German Submarine U-550
Joyce departed New York 15 April for her second escort run to Northern Ireland. While screening for a straggler the following morning she was ordered to direct rescue operations for the gasoline tanker SS Pan-Pennsylvania, which was torpedoed and set aflame while taking station in the convoy. After picking up 31 survivors, including the tanker's captain, Joyce detected a submarine by sonar at 0950 and pressed home an attack. She dropped a deadly pattern of 13 depth charges which forced U-550 to the surface, bow first, some 2,000 yards to her stern. A screening escort, USS Gandy, opened fire and rammed the after section of the U-boat. Joyce, Gandy, and Peterson shelled the submarine, silenced her deck guns and forced the hapless U-550 to surrender. Joyce ordered the Germans to abandon ship, but before a boarding party could seize the captured prize, the Germans scuttled her. Only 40 minutes after Joyce had detected her, she plunged stern first beneath the waves. Joyce rescued and took prisoner 13 survivors, including the U-boat's skipper, escorted the convoy safely to Derry 26 April, and returned in convoy to the United States where she arrived New York 12 May. During the next year Joyce conducted eight more escort voyages for convoys bound from New York to Great Britain; she returned to New York from her last convoy run 13 May 1945.
Read more about this topic: USS Joyce (DE-317)
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