Italy:
Hospital ship
Gradisca as seen by an aircraft, while looking for survivors of the Battle of Cape Matapan, 31 March 1941; she would manage to rescue 161 souls overall
The
Gradisca had been built, between 1912 and 1913, by a British shipyard for a Dutch company, and had been originally named
Gelria. Decommissioned by its owner in 1931, she was bought by the Lloyd Triestino in 1935, but after just a few months she was requisitioned (togheter with five more ships) by the Regia Marina, to be outfitted as a sick and wounded transport (not as "hospital ships" outright, because they could thus transport supplies and troops as well), for the campaign in East Africa. She would also support Italian operations in the Spanish Civil War and the invasion of Albania. Requisitioned once more in May 1940, this time as a proper hospital ship (with 760 hospital beds), she began operations in August of the same year.
In the morning of 29 March 1941 she had just reached Taranto with a load of sick and wounded from the Albanian theater, when the order was given to reach Greek waters and look for survivors of the battle that had just taken place, and that had claimed three Italian heavy cruiser and two destroyers. After hurrying to disembark the remaining men aboard, the
Gradisca sailed at 1430 h, going for Cape Matapan as fast as she could (14 knots, the faster of any Italian hospital ship). She reached those waters by the night of 30 March, and searched until the evening of 5 April, when she received orders from Supermarina to abandon further operations and make for home. Reaching Messina at 0830 h of 7 April, the hospital ship had found eight bodies, and 162 survivors (one of which would die aboard): thirteen officers, twenty-nine warrant officers, and one hundred and nineteen seamen, plus a civilian cook.
The operation would also lead to changes to equipment onboard hospital ships to better operate in such rescues, for example increasing the numbers of floodlights and improving first aid equipment.
In the end, 2303 Italian seamen were lost to the sea because of that battle; other than those rescued by the
Gradisca, 1023 had been taken on by British destroyers, while 139 more had been rescued by Greek destroyers.
