Commander Salvatore Todaro, beloved for his humanity by his crew and even by the enemy, was also known as the Gentleman of the seas or the Don Quijote of the seas.
He becomes famous all over the world because on October 15th, 1940 he sank the Kabalo, a Belgian trading vessel operating under British flag but, on his own risk, he rescued the 26 crew members towing the lifeboat four days long and later keeping them on the board till Azores. His answer to the official reprimand of Admiral Dönitz, commander of the joint submarine operation, was that he cannot do anything else "having to honor more than 2000 years of hystory"... And then, when he sank British vessel Shakespeare, he rescued again the wrecked crew.
Here is the Regio Sommergibile Cappellini, his submarine
![[ img ]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg335/lazer_one/SSMarcelloCappellini1941-1.png)
; and a most interesting history. IIRC, there was another famous operation involving a German sub that attempted to rescue a large number of crew fom sunk ships.