J. E. MacDonnell - 119

by The Brave Men(lit)

  Lemp thought an attack was eminently possible, and thus he came to make contact with, though never to see, a man named Baker-Cressell.

  Joe Baker-Cresswell was born in London shortly after the death of Queen Victoria; in fact, while those of his family not otherwise engaged were watching her funeral procession from their home. Joining the Navy and later specialising in navigation, he navigated a comprehensive variety of ships from submarines to battleships. Naturally this experience did nothing to hinder him when, in 1941, he finally came to his best love - captaincy of a destroyer and commander of an Escort Group ranging the Atlantic.

  The Force was designated the 3rd Escort Group; his ship was named Bulldog. One remembers Bulldog with nostalgic clarity; she was our "chummy ship" in Alexandria; that is to mean, she normally berthed alongside our cruiser, got from us most things she had to have, sent her men on board for picture shows and other little amenities of big-ship life like that.

  She was a neatly shaped 35-knotter of two funnels, three 4.7's and on 3-inch A.A., while her class were the first destroyers to be fitted with torpedo tubes in mounts of four.

  Baker-Cresswell owned a nuggety, no-nonsense sort of face, habitually narrowed eyes (were there any other type in that cruel Atlantic?), a largish, straight nose and a mouth ready to smile. And he was keen.

  The Group learned this from the day he took it over. Whenever possible, which meant just about all the time, he experimented with new screening formations for convoys, exercised his escorts in multiple attacks on submarines, and in the grass-roots field he constantly drilled his men, from asdic operators and signalmen to gun, torpedo and, most devotely of all, depth-charge crews.

  When Lemp sighted the evidence of his targets, Baker-Cresswell had nine escorts in his Group; these comprised destroyers, corvettes and anti-submarine trawlers. In his charge he had thirty-eight merchantmen.

  All was in order. Bulldog steamed in the van with nine columns of ships behind her. Most importantly, with the coast of Greenland almost in sight, it was highly improbable that, so far west, a U-boat should attack. So much so, in fact, that at four p.m., about four hours from now, Baker-Cresswell intended to disperse the convoy and return with his Group to their base in Iceland.

  The noon `sun-sights had just been taken. Baker-Cresswell was dictating a signal for the convoy Commodore, comparing Bulldog's position with his, when the peace of the day was abruptly shattered.

  At two minutes before noon Lemp had fired his first torpedoes. They were aimed at the nearest ship, the Esmond, and they got her; two familiar geysers of white rising loftily from her starboard side.

  All hands on Bulldog's bridge stared with shocked incredulity. So far west? Then Lemp changed their disbelief to harsh certainty. He placed his next missiles fair amidships in the leading ship of Column 7 and broke her back; so effectively that with both parts of the ship sticking up from the water, her two masts were crossed.

  Esmond went first. Lieutenant-Commander Dodds, Bulldog's engineer, was on deck and saw it; saw the bow dip and the stern rise, higher, until the cargo on her decks broke its lashings and tumbled down that terrible slope into the sea, "like a child pouring toys out of a box." Then thousands of tons of ship were gone and only bubbles, huge and bursting gently, were left in evidence.

  Baker-Cresswell wasn't interested. The torpedoes must have come from the north-westward, up to starboard. His reaction was swift, and his snapped orders sliced Bulldog round to the right, at the same time increasing her speed. Following him round came Broadway, an old four-stacked ex-American destroyer.

  They moved fast, but they were beaten to it. Up there guarding the starboard wing of the convoy steamed a corvette named Aubrietia. Aubrietia? She was lucky. Amongst the names of her sister-ships were such warlike trumpeting cognomens as Potentilla, Spiraea, Myosotis and Starwort. Churchill named their type "corvette," but it's a safe bet he had nothing to do with naming the ships. But then they were Flower-class. There was even a H.M.S. Jonquil.

  What's in a name? In Aubrietia there was an experienced young lieutenant-commander named Smith, a 4-inch gun, a pom-pom, several oerlikons and many depth charges. And an asdic set whose type was the best in the world.

  It got on to a target. Not a submarine, but the torpedoes it had fired at Esmond, and while they were on their way to that unfortunate ship. Their noise made a harsh and unmistakable screech on the asdic speaker. Smith also made noises, and these had Aubrietia swinging hard to starboard and men running to the throwers and rails on her quarterdeck.

  Just after Esmond blew, Smith's asdic operator gained contact with the submarine, which of course was U-110. Almost at once contact was lost, but Smith fired a quick pattern by eye. There were ten charges in that pattern, set to explode at 100 and 225 feet, the idea being to hammer the U-boat between two anvils of force.

  Smith had no illusions about this first attack - it was like firing a shot in a dark room - but then his asdic regained contact, and held it, and Smith came in on the submarine's port quarter to let fly with another full pattern, similarly staggered in depth.

  Seeing that Bulldog and Broadway were both in contact, Smith transferred his attention from the U-boat - believing his second attack also to be unsuccessful - and headed for Esmond's survivors in the water.

  The merchantman's entire crew of officers and men had just been hauled aboard Aubrietia when her lookouts reported a startling sight on her quarter.

  All these events happened very quickly, so let's return for a moment to Baker-Cresswell and Bulldog. He had his contact and was preparing to attack when his lookouts reported something odd. It was an area of disturbed water, like you see sometimes flowing over a shallowly submerged reef; patches of smoothness edged by swirling currents and ripples of white.

  But this `reef' was moving. Just as the last of Esmond's survivors climbed up the scrambling net, U-110 broke surface. For many of those experienced hunters it was the first time they had seen one of their hated enemies.

  And this one was very close to the convoy, and though damaged, there was nothing to make Baker-Cresswell believe that she could not still fire her torpedoes. Across the water came most hearty cheers from Esmond's people, but Baker-Cresswell had other things on his mind, which right then, at sight of that ugly black shape, was feeling peculiarly savage.

  Obeying the dictates of both his professional instinct and his feelings, he opened his mouth to shout "Standby to ram!" The words never came out. Instead, men came scrambling out of the U-boat's conning tower. To Baker-Cresswell, their object was the 4.2-inch gun just forward of the bridge. They meant to have a go, and against the big target Bulldog made, and her thin sides, they might very well make a good go of it. So he did shout, but to his coxswain and his gun crews.

  Bulldog started to swing away from her ramming course. The 3inch dual-purpose gun had already swung; it bellowed, and its first shot made a vivid red splash against the conning tower. Then everything Bulldog carried opened up, even unto a light machine-gun kept handy on the bridge for low-flying aircraft.

  Meanwhile Aubrietia's men were cursing, for the two bigger destroyers were masking the target she'd surfaced, and her own 4inch had to remain silent.

  No sooner had Bulldog bared her teeth than Baker-Cresswell realised that the U-boat's men were heading not for their gun but for the sea., In pairs, in groups, they leapt into the water. At once the thought flashed through his mind -capture.

  "Full-astern both engines!" he roared. Even though on the turn away she would have to be quick, for the U-boat loomed close ahead. But Chief Dodds had hurried below to his engineroom, and she stopped in time - less than a hundred yards from the enemy. Baker-Cresswell saw her number, U-110, painted in tall white letters on the side of the bridge, and then he issued another order.

  "Away armed boat's crew."

  And to Aubrietia he made a signal telling her to pick up the German survivors as well. If ever justice was poetic, this was the time. Captain McCafferty of Esmond and his men watc
hed with grinning satisfaction as thirty-four Germans, oil-smeared and soaked as they themselves were, climbed up the corvette's scrambling nets. Their satisfaction increased when one of the Germans spat in a petty-officer's face, and was promptly flung back into the sea; there to remain until he had apologised. Esmond's crew felt a little less frozen.

  Aubrietia got underway again and headed for Bulldog, but without Lemp. U-110's captain was last seen by his men swimming in the water. He went down, but not with his ship.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  This fact, the continued presence of the U-boat, was causing Baker-Cresswell some misgivings. She looked stable enough, rolling normally in the Atlantic waves, but surely scuttling charges would have been laid? But had there been time to set them? If so, he could be sending nine of his men to their deaths. On the other hand, this was obviously a new type of U-boat, and her examination by experts could prove of tremendous importance - even gear sent back in the whaler.

  The captain had an unpleasant decision to make. A young and eager voice, speaking suddenly beside him, helped him make it.

  "Boarding party mustered abreast the boat, sir."

  Baker-Cresswell looked at the freshly handsome face of Sub-lieutenant David Balme, alight with the sense of novelty, and he tried not to smile at sight of the big.45 Webley revolver strapped round the youngster's waist; knowing that though Bulldog's men could hit a ship eight miles away, a man standing eight yards away from that rarely used pistol would be pretty safe. Then the captain's mind returned to the urgent business in hand and he spoke crisply:

  "Get on board the U-boat as quickly as you can. I think she is completely abandoned, but there may still be one or two men left on board. Get hold of the documents first, and then everything else useful that you can take away. Never mind if you lose the whaler. I'll send over another boat."

  He forebore to mention scuttling charges. Balme would be aware of that danger, and there was small point in enlarging on it.

  "Aye aye, sir!" Balme said, and hurried down to the whaler.

  Apart from the five oarsmen, he took with him a telegraphist and a stoker, both of them taut hands who knew what to look for.

  The sea was fairly calm - here. Anywhere but in the Atlantic it would have been logged as rough. But the whaler was a seaboat, especially designed for lowering in the middle of an ocean, and Balme, like all his breed, had been well trained in the handling of small boats. He brought her alongside bows-on to the gib waves, waited his chance, and when the boat lifted he jumped and for the first time found himself on the deck of a German submarine.

  The casing was wet with spray, and slippery. Handling himself aft towards the bridge Balme drew his pistol, feeling self-conscious with the hefty thing in his hand. As he wrote to Captain Roskill, that most able historian of the Royal Navy:

  "Had anyone appeared I do not suppose I would have hit him, but the revolver gave me a sense of security for I did expect someone to come out of the conning tower."

  He climbed up the footholds in the side of the bridge, found that both the upper and lower hatches were still open, and looked straight down into the control room. No sound of human movement came up to him, but it seemed incredible that there wouldn't be someone left to start the scuttling charges. There was only one way to find out. The young officer put a ton's weight of resolve on his muscles and put his foot over the hatch coaming. This is how he felt.

  "To climb down through the conning tower of a submarine when one has hardly ever been aboard one before is difficult enough with both hands free, and to do so with a loaded revolver in one hand seemed likely to prove suicidal. So I put the revolver back into its' holster. This to me was the worst moment of the whole affair, since while I was climbing down I was presenting a perfect target to anyone below."

  But this young officer did climb down - not only towards a possible and unavoidable shattering bullet, but towards the distinct possibility of being dragged down to death in a swiftly sinking coffin blown open by carefully placed scuttling charges. And in this act he was quite alone. The bravery displayed here corresponds to that of those coolly gusty men who were lowered into the crater caused by an unexploded land-mine or bomb; it is the real courage.

  Sweating, wary, Balme jumped from the last rung of the ladder and stared about him; and found the control room quite empty, as was the whole boat.

  "All the lights were still burning, and everything was lying around just as if one had arrived at someone's house for breakfast, before they had time to make the beds. Coats were flung around, and bunks half made. There was complete silence in the U-boat except for the continual thud-thud of our own ship's depth charges." (The convoy was under threat of attack by another U-boat).

  "This was almost unpleasant sound, especially when the detonations came closer - for it made one expect the U-boat to be blown up at any moment. However, we wasted no time and started immediately looking at the gear and documents lying around. The telegraphist in the boarding party immediately went to the wireless-office, noted all the settings on the U-boats's wireless sets, and dismantled a lot of equipment.

  "Meanwhile I had a look at some of the charts, and at once noticed the heavy dark lines indicating all the searched channels (free of mines) leading into the German U -boat bases. (This was a vastly valuable discovery). Two or three of the seamen now helped me pass all the charts up through the conning tower and into the whaler, and they were soon followed by all the books.

  "One had no time to distinguish between those of greater or less importance, so we passed out the whole lot. Various pieces of moveable equipment which were obviously of technical interest were also sent up, and we also found about half a dozen sextants of superb quality - far superior to those supplied to us by the Admiralty. Of course I know nothing about the use that was later made of what we seized, but from my own personal point of view the greatest find was about ten pairs of Super Zeiss binoculars. One of them, I am afraid, was not handed in; and I still use it nearly every weekend when I am out sailing. They are the finest I have ever used, and the same standard applied to everything else we found in the U-boat.

  "For instance, those were the days when England was short of everything, and we all lacked clothing which was really suitable for work on the Atlantic convoy route; but in the U-boat we found quantities of splendid leather clothing - similar to what we later, and enviously saw American sailors wearing.

  "While inside the U-boat we lost all sense of time, but I believe the whaler made several trips backwards and forwards loaded down with documents and equipment. In due course our engineer officer came over to see if he could get machinery started, but he had no success." No success with the engines, but an extraordinary and comprehensive harvest was garnered from U-110 - Baker-Cresswell even co-opted Broadway's large American-style motorboat to help in this precious transfer. By now it was four p.m. and Balme's party had been in the U-boat for three hours - tense hours for Baker-Cresswell, loitering about such an unhealthy spot. Not only his engineer but his torpedo-gunner had been sent across, and everything of any possible value was now aboard Bulldog. The thought occurred to Baker-Cresswell that the submarine herself might also be taken home. Across to U-110 went the message.

  "Batten down and prepare to be taken in tow." This delicate and difficult operation - only a couple of men could work at a time on the submarine's narrow, wave-washed bows - was finally completed, and escorted by Broadway, Bulldog began her long haul to Iceland.

  After many adventures - one of them included contacting another U-boat, slipping the tow, chasing the enemy off and repassing the tow! Baker-Cresswell got his load up to a respectable seven knots and many safe miles from the point of her capture. It was only then that he broke wireless silence to the Admiralty with the momentous news that he had captured a German submarine and had all her logs, charts, books and moveable equipment on board.

  The signal caused a sensation. It was immediately taken to the Director of Naval Intelligence and the First Sea Lord, wh
o ordered the most stringent restrictions on the signal's distribution, confining it to a handful of specially chosen officers. Right now Bulldog carried a veritable bomb of knowledge. But if the Germans found out what she had done, then not only new boats but all of U-110's type would be changed to render the British knowledge practically worthless. But if they could be kept from finding out...

  They were.

  And U-110 kept what secrets she may have still had inside her. Bulldog was getting close to Reykjavik in Iceland when the weather worsened. By dawn it was blowing almost a full gale, with the tow yawing so wildly that it was impossible to steer a steady course. Then, as if in a last challenging and defiant gesture, the U-boat suddenly cocked her nose high in the air until her body was almost vertical. Back she slipped, and now the sea astern reached empty, while the long tow-wire started to tauten with ominous warning. So for the second, and last time, Bulldog's men knocked open the towing slip and her British wire followed the German hull to the freezing bottom.