On 12th September 1942, at 8.10pm, the Laconia was hit by a torpedo on her starboard side while sailing off the coast of Ascension Island. Immediately she listed to starboard, taking on water; then a second torpedo struck. The captain, Rudolph Sharp, ordered the ship to be abandoned and ensured that his crew knew that the women, children and injured aboard the Laconia should be placed into the lifeboats first.

Over three thousand passengers, including some 1,800 Italian prisoners of war, were faced with explosions, chaos and a rapidly sinking ship. Many of the lifeboats had been destroyed by the detonation of the torpedoes and too few lifeboats remained for those who survived the initial attack.

An hour later she had sunk, leaving a small flotilla of lifeboats on the surface of the sea, and many hundreds struggling in shark infested water, with little chance of salvation. At this point the U-boat which fired the two torpedoes, the U-156, surfaced. A further two U-boats came to assist, along with the Italian submarine Capellini. Survivors were crowded into the small hulls of the submarines, others lined her deck, and further survivors were in lifeboats alongside the submarines.

Despite displaying a large Red Cross flag, an American Liberator bomber attacked the submarines forcing them to dive to safety. The lifeboats that were alongside the submarines were cast adrift and the survivors on the decks of the submarines were left in the water to an uncertain fate.

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