April 29, 1942 The HMS Lady Elsa was escorting the Ashkhabad
and her crew of 47, three of which were women, on her journey
from New York to Cuba. At 09:50, HMS Lady Elsa spotted a U-Boat
that was 500 yards off the starboard side of the Ashkhabad. HMS
Lady Elsa fired one shot that caused the U-402 to dive but not
before firing a single torpedo. The torpedo hit Ashkhabad on the
starboard side just below the waterline. And although she had
no watertight doors only the rear of the ship flooded. The U-402
partially surfaced about 500 yards off of the starboard side of
the ship. The crew of the Ashkhabad, fired three shots from the
forward .30-caliber gun, but all three missed. An hour after the
attack, Captain Alexy Pavlovitch put all of his code books in
a weighted box and sank them. Then he gave the order to abandon
ship. The HMS Lady Elsa picked up all of the crew and took them
to Morehead City.
On May 3, 1942, the USS Semmes, a destroyer, came upon the Ashkhabad
and determined that she was abandoned and a navigational hazard
and fired three rounds from her 3-inch guns. The hits caused the
midship superstructure to catch fire. Seeing the fire, the HMS
St. Zeno went to the Ashkhabad. The HMS St. Zeno fired a shot
at the Ashkhabad, under the authorization of the commanding officer
of the HMS Hertfordshire, who was in command of all British armed
trawlers at Morehead City. His explanation was that he thought
the HMS St. Zeno might sink the Ashkhabad and extinguish the fire.
