Home
Waters and the Atlantic: first half of 1941
References
Appendix
IX Submarine Organisation 10 March 1941
Patrolgram
6 S/M War Patrols Home waters & Atlantic - first half 1941
Map 15 S/Ms in the Atlantic - positions
on 20 Mar 1941
Map 16 The First and Second Iron
Rings - March 1941
WITH THE DECISION
TO SEND all new construction submarines to the Mediterranean,
the number of boats in Home waters began to decline. On 1st
January 1941, there were a total of twenty-two submarines
available for operations. Of these, seventeen were British;
three were from the Netherlands, one Free French and one Polish.
In addition there were twelve old British submarines with
two Netherlands and one Norwegian used for training. The main
British operational flotilla was the Second, of seven T-class
and one minelayer, stationed in the Holy Loch in the Clyde.
On the North Sea coast were the Ninth Flotilla at Dundee composed
of three Netherlands, one Free French and one Polish submarines.
Also in the North Sea was the Sixth Flotilla at Blyth consisting
of four S-class boats. Abroad but operating in the Atlantic,
were three British submarines withdrawn from the Mediterranean
and stationed at Gibraltar, and two from Home waters at Halifax,
Nova Scotia.
The threat
of invasion during the winter had declined to the extent that
it was realized that there was a possibility that it might
re-occur during the next summer but that was all. Anti-invasion
measures were therefore no longer the principal duty of our
submarines, and they were employed mostly in general offensive
patrols off the south west coast of Norway and in the Bay
of Biscay. In these two areas they were used to dispute the
command of the sea by sinking anything they could find, attention
being directed, as the situation demanded, against German
heavy warships, U-boats, blockade runners, raider supply ships
or simply against their coastal traffic. The most important
part of the coastal traffic was the iron ore trade from Bilbao
in Spain and, with the Baltic frozen, from Narvik down the
west coast of Norway. Occasionally special anti U-boat patrols
were made. The two submarines in Canada were put there to
escort Atlantic convoys against raiders and the three submarines
at Gibraltar to guard the Azores against any German attempt
to seize the islands.
On 1st January
1941, there were four submarines on patrol off Norway; Sunfish
off Fejeosen, Sealion
in Fro Havet, Sturgeon
off Stattlandet and O21 off Kors Fjord. There were
two in the Bay of Biscay; Talisman
off the Gironde and Tigris
further to the north. Finally Trident
was off Punta Delgada in the Azores. There was not very
much activity anywhere. In the Bay of Biscay during January,
Thunderbolt was positioned to intercept the iron ore
trade between Bilbao and Bayonne but the weather was so stormy
that she achieved nothing and she did no better when she was
moved north to the Gironde. Taku
had a blank patrol in the northern part of the Bay in
the second part of January, as did Tribune
who relieved Thunderbolt in the southern part. Intelligence
then indicated that Hipper might leave Brest on the
26th January and Thunderbolt was ordered to an intercepting
position off the port. She was recalled home, however, before
Hipper made a move. The normal cycle of reliefs on
patrol was followed but by some mischance, Wilk, on
her final patrol before being placed in reserve, was left
by herself off the Norwegian coast during the middle of January
and when she went home on 20th, there were no submarines left
in this area until O23 arrived off Utvaer on 24th.
In this gap of a few days, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau,
repaired after the weather damage received during their abortive
sortie at the end of December, sailed from Kiel and steamed
unchallenged up the Norwegian coast and broke out into the
Atlantic. The Admiralty knew nothing definite of this move
until after the German squadron was past our normal submarine
patrol positions when strenuous efforts were made by the Home
Fleet to intercept south of Iceland. Although the cruiser
Naiad made a brief sighting, the Germans broke contact
and were not heard of again until one of the two battle cruisers
was sighted by the battleship Ramillies escorting convoy
HX106 in mid Atlantic. The sighting, however, was at long
range and the enemy's identity was not certain. A week earlier,
on 1st February, Hipper had sailed from Brest. At the
time Snapper
had just arrived on patrol in the northern part of the Bay
of Biscay, Tribune
was also on patrol in the Bay but she was off the Gironde.
The only other submarine anywhere near was Otus
off Punta Delgada in the Azores. Snapper
saw nothing and on the night of 10th/11th February attacked
the German minesweepers M13, M2 and M25 of the
Second Flotilla south west of Ushant. She fired at least three
torpedoes all of which missed and she was counter attacked
while diving being caught in the sweep gear of one of the
enemy ships. The Second Flotilla counter attacked with 56
depth charges and Snapper
was sunk. She was lost with all hands including her Commanding
Officer, Lieutenant GV Prowse RN, four other officers and
37 men.
Hipper
sank an independent merchant ship on 11th February and next
day attacked convoy SLS64 east of the Azores, which had no escort,
and she sank seven ships. Hipper returned to Brest arriving
on 14th February. She approached from the south in very bad
weather passing between Talisman
who was in the western part of the Bay and Tigris
off the Gironde. The situation, however, was far from clear
to the Admiralty and steps had been taken to intercept any German
units returning north about to Germany. On 8th February, Urge,
under orders for the Mediterranean, had been despatched to intercept
two large fish carriers in the Vestfjord and she was diverted
to patrol off Stattlandet. Cachalot,
Sturgeon
and Minerve, already on patrol were ordered to take up
positions ten miles off the coast. Targets were at once restricted
to warships and transports in order not to reveal the positions
of our submarines unnecessarily. Normal patrols were resumed
when Hipper attacked the convoy east of the Azores on
12th. Cachalot
then laid a minefield in the Vestfjord on 15th February.
Analysis of
the breakout of the German battle cruisers revealed that they
had sailed at the exact point when no British or Allied submarines
were on patrol. This led to a suspicion that the enemy wireless
intelligence was responsible and was revealing a great deal
about our submarine movements. Consultation with our own experts,
who were beginning to obtain much information about U-boat movements
by listening to their wireless signals, led to further restrictions
on signals made by our submarines especially those made when
returning to base.
The reason
for our failure to intercept the breakout of Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau on to the trade routes is now clear. It
was because our intelligence at the time was poor. Our cryptographers
were still baffled by the German naval cipher and its Enigma
machine; our Spitfire photo-reconnaissance aircraft were few
in numbers and of short range and our network of spies in Nazi
Germany was weak. Furthermore Coastal Command with the long
nights and bad weather was far from reliable. We had two intelligence
tools. The first was wireless traffic analysis and the second
was the British Naval Attaché in Stockholm with his agents
watching the Baltic exits. Both of these sources did report
the departure of the enemy but were not very positive and gave
very little notice. Nevertheless it was sufficient for the Home
Fleet to sail cruisers to watch the Iceland-Faeroes gap but
not enough to get any submarines to the Norwegian coast. If
submarines were to have been any use in this situation, however,
they should have provided a constant patrol off the Norwegian
coast to help the poor intelligence with their reconnaissance.
At the time of the breakout, of the twenty-two Allied operational
submarines in the Atlantic, three were at Gibraltar and two
in Canada leaving seventeen in the United Kingdom. Of these
only four were at sea, O23 had just left Dundee to relieve
Wilk, who was nearing the same base; Taku
and Thunderbolt were on patrol in the Bay of Biscay.
The remaining thirteen boats were in harbour. The two submarines
in the Bay were there for a good reason and that was the presence
of Hipper in Brest. No doubt some of the thirteen boats
had defects but Tribune,
Tuna,
Sealion,
Sunfish,
Cachalot,
Snapper
and O21 all made patrols at some time during January.
It would be easy to blame it all on the dispersion of submarines
for the Azores patrol and for escort of Atlantic convoys, but
even without these boats it seems strange that it could not
be arranged to keep at least two submarines on patrol off Norway.
The Admiralty
were, of course, very worried about the foray of Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau, which constituted the most powerful force
yet to attack the trade routes. Although the presence of Ramillies
with HX106 had saved this convoy, few other convoys were so
heavily escorted. Generally they had only an armed merchant
cruiser that was likely to be destroyed by the raiders in the
same way as the Jervis Bay. It was not only Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau that were at large. Scheer was ranging
the South Atlantic and Hipper, as we have seen, was making
raids from Brest. In addition there were no less than six armed
merchant raiders on the oceans of the world. The future seemed
more menacing with the completion of the new battleship Bismarck
before long, and Tirpitz building too. On 14th February
the Admiralty decided that, although VA(S) was not in favour
of such a move, submarines must be used to escort convoys which
had not got a battleship escort. The whole Second Submarine
Flotilla consisting of the depot ship Forth
(Captain GCP Menzies RN) with Tribune,
Talisman,
Taku,
Thunderbolt, Cachalot
and the large French Surcouf were to be sent to Halifax,
Nova Scotia to join Porpoise
and Severn
in escorting Atlantic convoys to the United Kingdom. At the
same time they decided that the Azores patrol was now relatively
of less importance and that the Eighth Submarine Flotilla forming
at Gibraltar should be reinforced with the depot ship Maidstone
(Captain GAW Voelcker RN)1
and the Netherlands submarines O21, O23
and O24, bringing it up to a strength of six boats and
that its function should be changed to the escort of convoys
to and from Gibraltar to the United Kingdom. In February 1941,
therefore, the principal duty of our submarines in the Atlantic
became the direct protection of trade against the attack of
German heavy ships.
With the withdrawal
of the Second Flotilla and the reinforcing of the Eighth for
convoy escort work, the strength of the operational submarine
force for use in the North Sea and Bay of Biscay fell to ten
boats. The old depot ship Titania
(Captain HMC Ionides RN) with the Third Submarine Flotilla was
brought round to the Holy Loch from Rosyth to replace Forth
when she sailed for Canada. The Third Flotilla then took over
the submarines operating in the Bay of Biscay and also the new
function of supervising the trials and working up of all new
construction submarines before they left for the Mediterranean:
On occasion it was possible to use these boats for operations
in the form of a working up patrol on their way to the Mediterranean.
Patrols off the Norwegian coast and in the Bay were continued
from Dundee and Blyth as well as the Holy Loch while Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau were at large. Furthermore it was not known
when Hipper or Scheer might return and whether
they would make for Germany or one of the Biscay bases.
When the German
battle cruisers were evading the Home Fleet and breaking out
into the Atlantic, Porpoise
was already at Halifax. She was sent post haste after
convoy HX105 on 26th January, which had sailed twenty-four
hours earlier. The weather was so bad that she never made
contact with it and ended up in the United Kingdom independently.
On the Norwegian coast patrols continued. Sunfish
(Lieutenant GR Colvin RN) landed an agent near Lindesnes on
the 27th and went on into the Skagerrak. Off Kristiansand
on 30th she missed a tanker with four torpedoes at a range
of 4500 yards near the ice edge. The ice then forced her to
withdraw to the Lister area. Here on 2nd February she fired
a mixed salvo of four Mark
IV and Mark
VIII torpedoes at a small merchant vessel at a range of
1200 yards. The first torpedo ran on the surface and was seen
by the target, which then avoided the others, and Sunfish
was subjected to a counter attack of 13 depth charges. In
the northern area off Stattlandet there was less ice and Sealion
(Commander B Bryant DSC RN) on the 1st February fired six
torpedoes in two attacks on a convoy of two medium sized merchant
ships escorted by R-boats. The targets evaded the first attack
and although a hit was claimed in the second, the convoy went
on undamaged. On 5th February, however, Sealion
had better luck. She hit and stopped the 1150-ton Ryfylke
off Stattlandet with a torpedo at a range of 600 yards
that failed to explode. She then surfaced and sank her by
gunfire. Both O21 and Minerve patrolled off
Bergen in the first half of February without success.
In the Bay,
Talisman
had an uneventful patrol in the middle of February but Tigris
(Lieutenant Commander HF Bone DSO DSC RN) lost a merchant
ship in fog on 11th off Bayonne but sank a 504-ton coaster
next day. She then on 19th sank the French Gulvenec
of 3200 tons in a night attack about ninety miles west of
Cape Ferret2.
While Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau were busy off Newfoundland in the middle
of February, the submarines of the Second and Eighth Flotillas
had hardly begun their escort duties. On 19th February the
first two, Thunderbolt and Surcouf, sailed from
the United Kingdom for Halifax followed a week later by Taku
and Tribune.
On 20th, Tuna,
withdrawn from the Azores, escorted HG54 home from Gibraltar.
This was not a minute too soon for already the raiders were
planning to cross to the coast of Africa. Pandora
arrived at Gibraltar from the Clyde on 27th and sailed home
again with HG55 on 3rd March. Olympus
reached Gibraltar on 7th March from the United Kingdom,
and next day Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were
repulsed by the battleship Malaya escorting convoy
SL67 between the Canary Islands and the Azores. O23
arrived at Gibraltar from the United Kingdom on 10th and O21
arrived escorting convoy OG54 on 14th March. Pandora
left HG55 on 14th March too and transferred as escort
to the southbound OG55. On this same day, Olympus
left Gibraltar northbound with HG56 transferring to OG56 for
the return journey. The Gibraltar convoys were therefore well
covered during this threat by Scharnhorst and Gneisenau
although there were no submarines on patrol in the Bay. It
was however felt that cover was needed further south and on
11th March, Severn
was sailed from Halifax for Freetown. The raiders, however,
had already doubled back to refuel and return to the area
south east of Newfoundland.
Of the Second
Flotilla forming at Halifax, Surcouf (Capitaine de
Fregate Ortoli) arrived with many defects, while Thunderbolt
(Lieutenant Commander CB Crouch DSO RN) had an encounter and
was fired upon by the armed merchant cruiser Canton but
survived. Taku
(Lieutenant JFB Brown RN) never arrived at all. She had a
serious defect in her after hydroplanes early in her transatlantic
passage and had to be towed back to Londonderry by two corvettes,
arriving on 18th March. Cachalot
(Lieutenant HRB Newton RN), originally under orders for Halifax
was, in the end, kept in United Kingdom waters and the arrival
of Talisman
(Lieutenant Commander PS Francis RN) completed the flotilla.
Thunderbolt left for the United Kingdom as escort with
the armed merchant cruiser Laconia to convoy SO25 on
10th March. The Forth
had by now arrived at Halifax and thereafter the Second
Flotilla got into its stride. Porpoise
(Lieutenant Commander JG Hopkins RN) sailed on 20th March
with the armed merchant cruiser Worcestershire and
SC26; Tribune
(Lieutenant Commander RG Norfolk RN) on 27th March with Rajputana
and HX117 and Surcouf with SC27 and HX118 on 1st April.
Returning across the Atlantic, Porpoise
had encountered a U-boat at night on 7th March. The range
was 2500 yards and she was only able to get two torpedoes
away at the enemy who had already submerged and she escaped.
Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau, after refuelling, raided dispersed shipping
off Newfoundland in the middle of the month sinking a number
of ships but did not attempt to attack any of the convoys.
The three submarines Thunderbolt, after leaving SC25,
Talisman
on passage from the United Kingdom and Severn
(Lieutenant Commander ANG Campbell RN) on her way to Freetown,
all searched for the raiders. Only Thunderbolt was
anywhere near the track of the German ships, and she was ordered
to rejoin the escort of HX115 for as long as she could and
then to go to Iceland to fuel. Severn,
nine hundred miles to the south, was then ordered to resume
her passage to Freetown and Talisman
to Halifax.
The two battle
cruisers were not the only threat to our Atlantic convoys
in the middle of March. There were plans for both Hipper
and Scheer to break back to Germany at this time. In
mid March we had run out of submarines to relieve those on
patrol in the Bay of Biscay. Hipper was in Brest where
she had been since 15th February, and was ready for sea, so
on 12th March L27
(Lieutenant HN Edmonds RN), who was carrying out anti-submarine
exercises off Dartmouth, was sent to patrol off the port.
Hipper slipped out without being seen on 15th March
and got away into the Atlantic and back to Germany. Next day
air reconnaissance found that she had sailed and on 18th,
L27
was recalled to base. The attention of the Admiralty and C-in-C
Home Fleet was concentrated on the northern areas as Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau were expected to try to break back to
Germany before long. Scheer, unknown to our intelligence
had in fact crossed the equator on the day Hipper left
Brest, and was also on her way north. At this time we still
had a few operational submarines for the Norwegian coast.
Sunfish
had acted as a navigational beacon early in March for an amphibious
attack on the fish industry in the Lofotens but was back in
Blyth by 11th March. Sealion
(Commander B Bryant DSC RN), Undaunted
(Lieutenant JL Livesey RN) and Sturgeon
(Lieutenant Commander D St Clair-Ford RN), patrolled off Holmengra,
Utvaer and Stattlandet respectively in the middle of March.
On the 20th after transferring to the Obrestadt area, Sturgeon
sank the tanker Drafn with two torpedoes at the long
range of 4800 yards. During this period the Germans had been
busy laying mines in northern waters. A defensive field was
laid from Stavanger at the end of January, and in mid February
and early March a field was laid between Kors Fjord and the
Shetlands. In mid March they reinforced the Westwall minefield
in the middle of the North Sea.
On 15th/16th
March the battleship Rodney successfully defended the
convoy HX114 against an attack by either Scharnhorst
or Gneisenau. On 20th March an aircraft from the Ark
Royalwhich, with Force H from Gibraltar, was searching for
the German battle cruisers, sighted them six hundred miles west-north-west
of Finisterre. Coastal Command and the Home Fleet were expecting
them to break back north of the British Isles to Germany but
it soon became apparent that they were steering for the French
coast. Tigris
had left the Holy Loch on 18th March bound for the Gironde area
and her destination was altered to St Nazaire to intercept.
The new submarine Union
(Lieutenant RM Galloway RN), under orders for the Mediterranean
and on passage to Portsmouth from the Clyde, was ordered to
patrol off Brest on 20th and Unbeaten
(Lieutenant EA Woodward RN), also under orders for the Mediterranean
was sent to the Brest area too. The patrol positions of these
two were well out at sea, some sixty miles west and southwest
of the port. The German battle cruisers then virtually disappeared.
Bad weather made air reconnaissance impossible, and no further
sightings were made. In fact Scharnhorst and Gneisenau,
unknown to us arrived in Brest in the early morning of 22nd
March passing close to Union's
patrol position before she had arrived on station. Believing
the enemy to be still at sea and in a desperate attempt to intercept,
the Admiralty and VA(S) ordered the concentration in the Bay
of Biscay of every submarine they could lay their hands on.
Trident
was already in the Bay near Les Sables d'Olonne. L27
was sent to sea from Portsmouth and Torbay,
Tuna,
Taku
and L26
from the Clyde. All submarine and anti-submarine training was
stopped and Oberon,
H31,
H32, H33, H44 and H50 left Rothesay
for Falmouth. Undaunted
and Sokol from Dundee, and Sealion
with Sunfish
from Blyth were also sent post haste down the east coast. Sturgeon
was even withdrawn from patrol off Obrestadt to join the concentration.
Cachalot
had left the Clyde on 21st March to lay mines off Cape Ferret
and her orders were allowed to stand while O24 on her
way to Gibraltar was also diverted to patrol. Finally the old
Netherlands training submarines O9 and O10 joined
the others at Falmouth and were there by 26th March.
It was still
expected that the enemy would make for St Nazaire and the plan
was for Tigris,
Union,
Unbeaten
and Cachalot
to patrol some sixty miles out while another nine submarines
(Sokol, Sunfish,
Oberon,
L26,
L27, O24, Torbay, Taku
and Tuna)
patrolled a double line 240 miles out so as to catch the enemy
in daylight the day before. The other submarines would be held
in harbour at readiness as reliefs. No sooner were the submarines
in position on 27th March than air reconnaissance located Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau in Brest not St Nazaire. The failure to
intercept the enemy in time in spite of a vigorous strategic
concentration is now seen to have failed doubly. The Norwegian
coast was as a result denuded of submarine patrols and Scheer
and Hipper returned to Germany safely and unopposed.
The immediate
reaction of the Admiralty and VA(S) was to keep the submarine
concentration in being and to use it to ensure that the enemy
did not get out of Brest again. The patrol positions were redrawn
centred on Brest and some of the submarines were relieved. By
31st March, O9, H50,
Sokol, Sealion,
Sunfish,
H32,
H34, H31, O10 and H44
were disposed on an arc 240 miles out to catch the enemy in
daylight the day after he sailed. Appreciations were made by
VA(S) and it was now clear that the patrol, nicknamed facetiously
by its participants as the 'Iron Ring', was going to be needed
for some time. VA(S) was by no means happy to wear out the elderly
training submarines in this arduous task. On 1st April, H32
had to return with her fore hydroplanes out of action, H31
had similar trouble. H50
ran short of fuel, O10 ran short of lubricating oil and
O9 had other defects. O24 had to be released to
go on to Gibraltar before her fuel ran short too. It was calculated
that by 9th April if the foul weather continued that there would
be no submarines left on patrol at all. On 4th April, the Admiralty
approved the dispersion of the concentration. The training submarines
resumed training, reinforcements went on their way to the Mediterranean
and elsewhere, and operational boats resumed their normal patrol
cycles.
On 6th April,
the Royal Air Force severely damaged Gneisenau in Brest
and she had to be dry-docked. She was further damaged a week
later and many aerial mines were laid in the port and its approaches.
Tigris
meanwhile from the Bay got back to base on 14th April after
completing two special intelligence operations and sinking the
German tanker Thorn
of 5500 tons on the night of 2nd/ 3rd April. This was in a position
seventy miles south west of St Nazaire. She first missed in
a night attack with four torpedoes at a range of 2500 yards
and again with two more torpedoes at 1500 yards. She then opened
fire with her gun and in an opposed action with the tanker's
gun, stopped and silenced her and finally finished her off with
another torpedo3.
On 14th April Urge
(Lieutenant EP Tomkinson RN) left Portsmouth for the Mediterranean
and when 270 miles west of Bordeaux on 18th April, she sighted
the 10,800-ton tanker Franco Martelli inward bound from
Pernambuco. She fired three torpedoes and sank her. The available
operational submarines in home waters then settled down to keep
two or sometimes only one on patrol in the Bay of Biscay. The
main aim of these patrols was still to intercept the German
battle cruisers should they put to sea but minor incidents continued
to occur on patrol. Tigris
failed to meet a fishing vessel at sea carrying agents due to
navigational problems and Pandora
when on passage from Gibraltar had an encounter with an Italian
U-boat leading to a gun duel but the enemy escaped by diving.
Trident,
on patrol in the southern part of the Bay, had on board a Special
Operations Executive agent who was to be landed near Les Sables
d'Olonne to bring off other agents but this mission was foiled
by rough weather.
Most of the
submarines on patrol in the Bay were from the Third Flotilla
in the Clyde but two, Sealion
and Seawolf,
were from the Sixth Flotilla at Blyth. Both were transferred
to the Fifth Flotilla at Fort Blockhouse for the summer. Their
patrols tended to be monotonous except for a number of attempts
to land agents, some of which were to try to improve intelligence
about the German heavy ships in Brest. In April, Sealion
(Commander B Bryant DSC RN) sailed with money, fuel and sealed
orders and met a fishing vessel off Concarneau. She brought
back four refugees including a French and a Polish aviator.
Sealion
found an Admiralty Fleet Order that encouraged the destruction
of fishing vessels in enemy hands, and in July sank a French
tunny fisher and picked up the crew. She sank another and
then a steam trawler and had twenty-six survivors on board.
Some of these she transferred to another trawler. VA(S) did
not agree with these attacks as they compromised the positions
of the submarines and no more took place although supplies
continued to be sent to the French Resistance.
On the Norwegian
coast only the Free French Minerve (Lieutenant de Vaisseau
PM Sonneville) was left. She patrolled the south west coast
in the middle of April and on 18th off Skudenes she fired
two torpedoes at a range of 1200 yards at a small merchant
vessel escorted by a trawler but missed ahead. Next day off
Jaederens she fired two more torpedoes at a range of 3000
yards at a large tanker escorted by a destroyer, an aircraft
and two trawlers. She broke surface on firing and was machine-gunned
by the aircraft and depth charged by the escort but claimed
a hit and to have damaged the enemy.
During April
and May, submarines of the Eighth Flotilla at Gibraltar continued
to escort convoys in case Scharnhorst and Gneisenau
should break out. On 2nd April, however, intelligence was
received that the French battle cruiser Dunkerque was
about to leave Oran and next day Otus
and Olympus
were sailed from Gibraltar to take up patrol positions off
the port. Further intelligence received on 5th indicated that
her sailing had been postponed and the submarines were withdrawn.
Otus
(Lieutenant JFB Brown RN) returned to Gibraltar but Olympus
(Lieutenant Commander HG Dymott RN) was sent on to Malta.
In discussions with the C-in-C Mediterranean about reinforcements,
he indicated his preference for the large submarines to form
a division of the Eighth Flotilla at Gibraltar to operate
in the western Mediterranean rather than to be transferred
to Alexandria. After a patrol off Naples, therefore, Olympus
returned to Gibraltar. Another duty for the Eighth Flotilla
was the escort of Force H's tanker, Cairndale, which
was positioned in the Atlantic to refuel the force during
its operations there. Pandora
(Lieutenant Commander JW Linton RN) carried out this duty
in the early part of April until she too, was required for
a Mediterranean patrol. On 8th April Severn
(Lieutenant Commander ANG Campbell RN) operating from Freetown,
fired two torpedoes at an Italian U-boat but they probably
ran under, as the range was only 250 yards. Two days later
she had another chance and fired four torpedoes at a range
of 3000 yards followed by two more at 2000 yards but missed
with all of them. Trident
(Lieutenant Commander GM Sladen DSC RN) in the southern part
of the Bay, was sent to a place called Mimizan to retrieve
personnel of the Special Operations Executive parachuted into
the Bordeaux area on 11th/12th May, but was not able to make
any contact with them.
On the other
side of the Atlantic, submarines of the Second Flotilla at
Halifax continued to escort convoys. On 1st April, Surcouf
left Halifax with SC27 and HX118 and went on to Devonport.
On 9th, Talisman
sailed with SC28 and on 19th Porpoise
escorted SC29 with the armed merchant cruiser Ranpura
and she too continued to the United Kingdom to refit. On 29th,
Thunderbolt left with SC30 and Salopian and
by this time there were only three submarines left in the
Second Flotilla. On 10th May, one of these, Tribune
with Aurania left Halifax with HX126 and on 19th this
convoy suffered a heavy night attack by U-boats in which Tribune
(Lieutenant Commander RG Norfolk RN) lost contact. The anti-submarine
escort joined next day and Tribune
did not attempt to rejoin the convoy and went on independently
in accordance with her orders to the United Kingdom. We now
know that there were no enemy surface raiders in the North
Atlantic during all this escorting. However we also know that
Bismarck and Prinz Eugen were completing their
trials and were nearly ready. There had been a false alarm
on 19th April but in general our intelligence was correct
in indicating that a sortie was imminent. In fact, submarine
escort of convoys was, to those who supported them, more important
than ever. An old battleship was strong enough to protect
a convoy against Scharnhorst and Gneisenau but
would lose a battle against the more powerful Bismarck.
By May, when
Bismarck and Prinz Eugen broke out, intelligence
had greatly improved. In March the cryptographers began to
read the German naval cipher although it took them nearly
a month to do so. Nevertheless even the stale messages showed
that Bismarck was preparing to raid the Atlantic trade
routes. By May the delay in deciphering the messages was a
matter of days. We had also been reading the Luftwaffe's ciphers
and noted that their reconnaissance aircraft were paying a
great deal of attention to the position of the ice edge. On
20th May, our Naval Attaché in Stockholm reported that
an aircraft from the Swedish cruiser Gotland had sighted
Bismarck in the Kattegat. Next day she was found by
an RAF photo-reconnaissance Spitfire in Kors Fjord near Bergen.
There was therefore plenty of information if we had wished
to use it, on which to deploy submarines to intercept Bismarck
off the Norwegian coast. P31
(Lieutenant JBdeB Kershaw RN) was sailed for the Norwegian
coast but she was too late. The two enemy warships were not
the only ships to break out at this time. Two supporting tankers
sailed from Norway for the Arctic without being detected and
four tankers and supply ships left France to take up their
positions in the Atlantic.
Bismarck
and Prinz Eugen had sailed from Gdynia on 18th May and
passing out of the Skagerrak fuelled in Kors Fjord south of
Bergen. At the time, submarine patrols close to the Norwegian
coast had already been discontinued due to lack of darkness
in which to re-charge their batteries. Only Minerve was
on patrol and she was some thirty miles from the coast just
south of the latitude of Stattlandet. Here she was quite well
placed to intercept but she saw nothing. The two ships left
Bergen by Fejoesen late on 21st where we often had a submarine
on close patrol in winter but at this time of year the billet
was empty. The German ships probably passed inshore of Minerve
in the prevailing bad visibility. Fortunately the Home Fleet
was ready but the weather prevented any contact until the cruisers
Norfolk and Suffolk sighted the two German ships
in the Denmark Strait. All available submarines were then somewhat
tardily brought to short notice and on 25th May, Sealion,
Seawolf,
Sturgeon,
Tigris,
Pandora
and H44
were dispatched to patrol off Brest. It is not the purpose of
this history to follow the details of the pursuit and destruction
of Bismarck except to draw attention to the part played
by our submarines in the action. She threatened five convoys
in the Atlantic. One of these, HX127 had the battleship Ramillies
as escort but this was scarcely sufficient. Of the three submarines
of the Second Flotilla at Halifax when Bismarck broke
out, Tribune
was nearing the United Kingdom after escorting HX126; Talisman
had left Halifax on 19th May escorting SC32 with the armed merchant
cruiser Laconia and remained with the convoy during the
action between Bismarck and the Home Fleet. Thunderbolt
on 25th when Bismarck was reported north west of Iceland
was ordered to sea from Halifax to patrol the Newfoundland Banks
to give general cover to the Atlantic convoy routes. Far to
the south, Severn
from Gibraltar escorted the fleet tanker Cairndale as
Force H came north to hunt for Bismarck. On 26th May
she was ordered to guard the Straits of Gibraltar in case Bismarck
made for the Mediterranean. After the sinking of Bismarck
on 27th May, the hunt continued for Prinz Eugen. She
finally entered Brest from the south while the two submarines
still on patrol in the Bay, Sealion
and Sturgeon
were off La Pallice. On 30th May, Sealion
(Commander B Bryant DSC RN) sighted a U-boat on the surface
by day. She was in a good position and hoped to fire at about
a thousand yards range. Unfortunately she lost trim and the
periscope was dipped before the sights came on. She turned to
catch up and fired six torpedoes from the quarter at a range
of 1500 yards but the U-boat saw the tracks and avoided them.
The destruction
of Bismarck and the arrival of Prinz Eugen at
Brest, in fact, although we did not know it at the time, marked
the end of the German Navy's attack with heavy warships on trade
in the Atlantic. The counter measures to this campaign had been
the main pre-occupation of our submarines in Home waters for
the first five months of 1941. In this period they had not sighted,
let alone attacked, any of the German main units. In attempting
to analyse the causes of this failure, we must, of course, first
note the decision to concentrate our main submarine strength
in the Mediterranean. This reduced the number of operational
submarines at home to cope with the German heavy ships whether
working from their bases in Germany, Norway or the Bay of Biscay.
At the beginning of 1941, however, there were twenty-three operational
submarines on the Home Station while there were only sixteen
in the Mediterranean, two of which were refitting in Malta dockyard.
By the end of May, the strength in the Mediterranean was only
fifteen boats while the number on the Home Station, including
those in Canada, was seventeen. It cannot therefore really be
claimed that the reinforcement of the Mediterranean was to blame
and we must look again into how the submarines at home were
used. The withdrawal of nine of our best and most powerful submarines
in February and March from offensive patrols for use as convoy
escorts is obviously one for discussion.
There is no
doubt at the time that VA(S) and indeed practically all submarine
officers were opposed to the use of submarines to escort convoys
as a protection against attack by heavy German warships. They
gave way to the wishes of the Admiralty as a contribution to
the defence of trade, which was the Navy's main strategic purpose.
The principal objection by submarine officers was the danger
of being mistaken for a U-boat and being attacked by our own
forces or rammed by a ship of the convoy. This objection was
mirrored by the escort in whose minds the presence of a British
submarine caused doubt when counter attacking U-boats. In addition
to the feeling by submarine officers that convoy escort was
a misuse of their vessels, which were essentially, in their
view, for offence, was the heavy wear and tear of machinery
in long ocean passages. These views are supported by the Official
Naval Historian4 who
concludes that submarines would have been better employed on
offensive patrols. He points out that no convoys escorted by
submarines were attacked and deduces from this fact that this
was therefore a misuse of submarines. The French Navy had always
been a protagonist for submarine escort of convoys and they
believed that what they called the 'scarecrow' or deterrent
effect was of great importance. It is now known that, at this
time, the Germans were obtaining a great deal of information
about our convoys, their sailing times and their composition,
from wireless intelligence. It seems highly likely that they
knew which convoys had submarine escorts. The fact that no convoys
with submarine escorts were attacked should therefore be taken
as a victory rather than a defeat. This, however, does not alter
the dislike of submarine officers for escort work and they did
not fancy a role as 'scarecrows'. It must be admitted, however,
that submarine offensive patrols against the German main units
were no more successful. The sortie of Scharnhorst and
Gneisenau in January happened when no submarine was on
patrol off the coast of Norway at all which seems strange when
the Home Fleet had sufficient intelligence of the move to be
ready and for Naiad to have sighted the enemy. The subsequent
strenuous efforts to form the 'iron ring' to intercept the German
battle cruisers returning to Brest and in which no less than
twenty three boats were mustered, shows that there were plenty
of submarines available. The suggestion in the 'War at Sea'
however, that a submarine escort was likely to be ineffective
even if the convoy was attacked by a surface raider, is not
supported. If the convoy was properly handled and not dispersed
too soon, the presence of a powerful submarine such as one of
the T-class in ambush was a very serious threat. Only one hit
out of ten torpedoes was needed to save the convoy and probably
lead to the ultimate destruction of the raider by other forces.
The failure
to intercept Bismarck with offensive patrols was even
less understandable. As has been pointed out, intelligence
of her impending sortie was enough for the Home Fleet to be
ready to intercept yet only one weak submarine was on patrol
off the Norwegian coast. Seven submarines were sent to patrol
off Brest a few days later and undoubtedly more could have
been found for Norway. Furthermore Bismarck put in
to Bergen, the northern and southern approaches to which were
frequent patrol billets for our submarines and it is strange
that they were not occupied. It is true that inshore patrols
off Norway had been discontinued for the summer but surely
such an important target justified the sending of submarines
close in to the coast. If several of the ten torpedo salvo
T-class had been there instead of in the western Atlantic
with convoys the chances of success against Bismarck
would have been very greatly increased. In the various movements
in and out of Brest by Hipper and Prinz Eugen,
bad intelligence seems to have indicated that they were going
to La Pallice or St Nazaire instead of Brest and this was
the main reason that they were not intercepted.
There is no
doubt that if the Mediterranean had not been reinforced or
if submarines had not been diverted to escort convoys, there
would have been a greater chance to intercept the German ships
as they broke out, but there is also no doubt that the submarines
we had seemed often to be in the wrong place at the wrong
time and that their strategic handling must be open to question.
It would be nice to be able to blame it all on the enemy being
able to read our wireless traffic and although this may have
helped on occasion, such a theory does not stand up as a full
explanation of our failure. There is little doubt that if
we had concentrated all our operational submarines in Home
waters on sustained patrols off Brest and the south west coast
of Norway with the aim of intercepting German heavy units,
and had ignored the coastal traffic and anti U-boat patrols,
we would have done better.
With so few
targets, submarine activity on patrol over the period of this
chapter, was low. During the first half of 1941, submarines
in home waters made only fifteen torpedo attacks expending
49 torpedoes. Four of these attacks were on U-boats using
16 torpedoes and all missed. The rest were on merchant vessels
and sank six ships of 24,643 tons and damaged another of 4500
tons. Two of these were tankers, a type of which the Germans
were short and which caused them anxiety. Submarine casualties
were also low, and only one of our submarines, Snapper,
was lost in home waters during this period5.With
so few results, only one decoration was awarded and that was
a Distinguished Service Cross in the Birthday Honours of 1941,
for Lieutenant Commander JFB Brown RN, who had commanded Taku
up until April.
During the
first six months of 1941, eight new submarines entered service
and so total strength rose. These were Torbay,
the last of the pre-war boats and Thrasher,
Union,
Sokol, Umpire,
P31,
P32
and P33.
Sokol (ex-Urchin)
was manned by the Polish Navy in place of Wilk, which,
because of her poor mechanical condition, had been placed
in reserve. The Mediterranean was now becoming the largest
operational theatre in numbers of operational submarines as
well as in importance. Although operations continued on the
Home station, its main function was fast becoming that of
supporting the Mediterranean with new and refitted submarines.
This included the training of new submarine crews and supervising
the building, trials and working up of new construction submarines
as well as the overseeing of refits. The administration of
the crews standing by new submarines was the responsibility
of Captain(S) Fifth Submarine Flotilla at Fort Blockhouse
in Gosport. He was also responsible for the shore training
of Commanding Officers, Officers and Men. Sea training of
individual officers and men was the responsibility of Captain(S)
Seventh Submarine Flotilla at Rothesay in the Clyde, a duty
he combined with the provision of submarines for the anti-submarine
training of asdic operators and the escorts of the Western
Approaches. With the gradual reduction in the number of operational
submarines in home waters, Commander(S) Sixth Submarine Flotilla
at Blyth was able to help with training duties. Captain(S)
Third Submarine Flotilla in the Holy Loch, was responsible
for some of the operational submarines but also supervised
the trials and working up of all new and refitted submarines.
We have already
noted that twelve T-class submarines ordered before the war
had been laid down at the outbreak6.All
of these except Torbay
were completed during 1940. Of the seven T-class and twelve
U-class ordered in the Emergency War Programme, eight U- class
had been completed before the end of 19407.
Up to the
middle of 1941, another fifty-seven submarines had been ordered
and were in various stages of construction. These consisted
of nine T-class, twenty-one S-class, twenty-two U-class and
five new minelayers of the Cachalot
class. The building yards were the same as those used before
the war. By far the largest was at Vickers Armstrongs of Barrow
where thirty-eight submarines of the T, S and U-classes were
under construction. Fourteen boats of the T and S-classes
were building at Cammell Lairds of Birkenhead and twelve of
the T and S-classes and five minelayers8
at Scotts of Greenock. Finally Chatham Dockyard had
two U- class and two S-class in hand.
It had been
decided, after the first nineteen boats of the Emergency War
Programme, not to name submarines in future. They would be known
by their pennant numbers which all began with the letter P.
The first boat of the U-class of the second batch building at
Vickers was originally to have been named Ullswater and
this was changed to P31
and succeeding boats followed in sequence omitting numbers
with a zero in them. The first of the new S-class building was
numbered at first P61 but this was later changed to P2119.
The first of the next batch of the T-class was numbered P311
and the first of the new minelayers P411.
