unknown

A submarine giving the lifeboats of a ship they have sunk a short tow towards land. Was not unusual at the beginning of WW1.

U Boat towing ships boats perhaps

Is it the occasion in the last war when a U-Boat sank one of the Union-Castle ships off West Africa and there were hundreds of Italian p.o.w.'s aboard . The U-Boat surfaced to try and take a senior officer prisoner and then discovered the enormity of her sinking. Doenitz agreed to a rescue operation involving German and Italian submarines which was going quite well until a squadron of U.S.A.A.F., Mitchell bombers spotted these submarines with life-boats in tow and others on the casing and bombed them. The americans claimed not to have picked up the #En Clear' message sent by the U-Boat saying what they were trying to do. Tow them to Senegal which was Vichy of course. Can't remember the Union boat's name nor the U-Boat's number. The foregoing is what I can recollect though.

It is difficult to be 100% sure by looking at this photo.
Stumps you are refering to the LACONIA incident. The ship was torpedoed by Werner Hartenstein commanding U-156. The US pilots actions had far reaching consequences for merchantmen for the rest of the war.

Regards

Indeed, and a summary of the incident is available here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laconia_incident

Hi,
Thanks to all for your info.
Cheers.