Salvatore Todaro with U-Boat-Section

Salvatore Tòdaro (1908 - 1942) was an Italian naval officer and submarine commander.During World War II, as a corvette captain, he commanded the submarine Capellini, in which he sailed through the Straits of Gibraltar and operated from Bordeaux in the Atlantic. On 15 October 1940, he sank the Belgian merchant ship Kabalo, which was flying the British flag. He initially towed the 26 shipwrecked crew members towards the Azores for four days and four nights. After repeated problems, he took the 26 castaways on board and brought them ashore. A few days later, several European newspapers reported on the incident, and Todaro received nicknames such as "Don Quixote" or "Gentleman of the Seas". A month later, Todaro sank the British merchant ship Shakespeare and again took on the shipwrecked crew.
In late 1941, his boat was badly damaged in a battle with the British auxiliary cruiser Eumaeus, several crew members died. Todaro sank the British ship with his on-board gun, but was pursued by British warships for days afterwards and only escaped because he laid his boat on the seabed. Only with luck did he return to Bordeaux, where, however, he remained incapacitated for several months. Although his rescue operations in the Atlantic were repeatedly criticised by the Germans, he was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. Todaro had himself transferred to the special forces of the navy, with whom he fought in the Black Sea and Tunisia. In the port of La Galite, he died in an enemy air attack.
After World War II, the Italian Navy named a corvette (1966-1994) and the submarine Todaro (2004) after him. - Wikipedia -