At 20.55 hours on 8 Nov 1942 the unescorted Plaudit (Master Axel Pedersen) was hit on the port side in the engine room by one torpedo from U-181 off Port Elizabeth. The explosion destroyed both port lifeboats, the chart room, the port bridge wing and the radio shack, so that no distress message could be sent. About 30 minutes after being torpedoed the U-boat fired 15-20 rounds from the deck gun until the ship sank. The most of the 38 crew members and 11 armed guards on board abandoned ship in the two starboard lifeboats and two rafts, only the armed guards at the stern gun remained on station and had to jump overboard when the ship sank. The third engineer, the cook and one armed guard were lost.
All survivors were picked up by the South African trawler HMSAS Africana (T 01) in the course of the 10 November with the help of a British patrol aircraft. Later that day they were transferred to the RAF crash boat Navigator and landed in the evening at Port Elizabeth. Some survivors were repatriated to the USA aboard the American merchant Robin Doncaster, arriving at Philadelphia on 13 December.