Japanese Atrocity Report

WED 29 MAR 1944
Pacific
Motor gunboat PGM-8 is damaged when she runs aground off Kundu Kundu Island.

Submarine Haddo (SS-255) damages Japanese army cargo ship Nichian Maru in South China Sea, 17°42'N, 109°57'E.

Submarine Tunny (SS-282) damages Japanese battleship Musashi off Palau, 07°30'N, 134°30'E.

Indian Ocean
U.S. freighter Richard Hovey is torpedoed by Japanese submarine I-26 at 16°40'N, 64°30'E, and abandoned. I-26 then surfaces and after shelling the ship and setting her afire (Richard Hovey sinks subsequently), fires upon the lifeboats and rafts, killing one Armed Guard sailor. The Japanese submarine then rams and sinks one of the boats before taking four POWs and clearing the area (see 2 and 14 April). [More on the Hovey & her crew here.]

Mediterranean
Destroyer John D. Ford (DD-228) is damaged when accidentally rammed by British armed trawler HMS Kingston Agate while departing Gibraltar, British Crown Colony.

Destroyers Ericsson (DD-440) and Kearny (DD-432), along with submarine chasers PC-626, PC-556, and PC-558, and four British destroyers - HMS Laforey, HMS Tumult, HMS Hambledon, and HMS Blencathra - begin submarine hunt 30 miles northeast of Palermo, Sicily. Their efforts culminate in the sinking of German submarine U-223, 38°48'N, 14°10'E.