On the Edge of Darkness (Special Force Orca Book 1)

by Anthony Molloy

  “What is she sixty five or seventy?”

  “Seventy footer and strong as an ox, mahogany and birch. The frames are only a foot apart! Although in truth I’d have preferred a B.P.B. The ‘Old girl’s’ not too bad. She was built for the Chinese originally, but then along came the war and we nicked ‘em, before they could be delivered to the Chinks.”

  “Come and have a look at my little command,” said Grant. The two friends turned aft and walked side by side back towards the darkened and silent E-boats.

  “That’s new!” Crosswall-Brown said, catching sight of the blue and white ribbon on Grant’s chest.” Super, DSO, eh? I say, they’re not giving them away with packets of cigarettes now, are they?”

  Grant smiled as he climbed down the Jacob’s ladder, “How did you find out…but it’s still an honour, they don’t give them to just anybody. You have to be a twenty-a- day man…That’s new as well.” He was pointing at a ramp welded to the ‘Nishga’s’ quarter deck

  Crosswall-Brown looked with interest at the framework. “Bit like a depth charge ramp, bit bigger I suppose?”

  “It’s one of the ‘Old Man’s’ ideas, fitted recently, while we were having a boiler clean. You’ll find him full of ideas. It’s to hold the spare fuel for your M.T.B.s as a matter of fact. The idea is you can dump it overboard in a hurry, if needs be.”

  “Wise precaution, highly inflammable stuff. So it’s just ‘out pins’ and over she goes into the hog-wash? Good idea.”

  “And then there are these,” said Grant jumping deftly across onto the E-boat’s stern, he pulled off a canvas cover. “The first on any operational boat.”

  Crosswall-Brown was looking at another metal structure; this one was mounted on a turn table. “What on earth is it?”

  “This, old boy, is the new depth charge launcher, shortly to be fitted to the fleet, the swivel bit is the ‘Old Man’s idea… that makes it even more experimental. When the launchers are eventually fitted to escorts they won’t have the swivel. They have enough room on their arse ends for one each side so there’ll be no need for the ‘Old Man’s modification. Of course it’s a different story on our cramped quarter decks. To tell you the truth I don’t think the Admiralty even know about the turntable. I think the ‘Old Man’ bribed the welding foreman with a bottle or two. With this little beauty we can drop two-hundred and ninety pounds of Amatol right in Jerry’s jolly old lap and this bugger,” he patted a depth charge fondly, “will blow a hole in any hull as long as it lands within twenty feet.”

  “How do you get on for ammo, old chap? I suppose you’re all right for Bofors’ ammo, but these other guns, hardly standard Navy issue.”

  “We keep what little two centimetre stuff we have for this chap.” Grant patted the machine gun. “The for’ard one we never bother with under normal circumstances.” He shook his head, “Jerry doesn’t bother with it either.”

  “I know why, I’ve come across them on the East Coast. These high fo’c’s’le rise up out of the water at high speed, consequently they can’t depress the gun far enough to engage surface targets. Bit of a design fault if you ask me. The earlier boats S fourteen to S twenty-five had the lower fo’c’s’le no problem. Different story with these though.”

  “Of course, I forgot I was talking to an expert. Personally, I still have it manned at low speeds or when there is a risk of attack by aircraft.”

  “My knowledge is confined to that gained by bitter experience on the wrong end of the barrel,” boasted Crosswall-Brown, a smile on his face. He pointed to the stern mounted Bofors. “No design fault there though, those blighters are terribly deadly, old man.”

  “Bit of a rum deal having our own guns turned on us.”

  “The Bofors? Not strictly ours, old boy… Swedish made, I think. Most of the E-boat’s skippers have managed to have them fitted now, captured during the first few months of the war, not always from us though... Jerry knows a good gun when he sees one.”

  * * *

  Captain’s Day Cabin, HMS Nishga.

  “Good morning gentlemen, sorry about the early start, but there is a lot to get through… lots to plan. I trust you all enjoyed your leave.”

  Barr paused while murmurs of assent and a few jibes passed around the packed day cabin. Unlike many Captains he was always glad to hear it. He saw it as an important ‘barometer’ to gauge his ship’s company’s morale, a happy ship was an efficient ship.

  He pulled aside a white cloth covering an easel, as he did so the overhead lighting reflected on the untarnished gold of the new third ring on his outstretched arm. He found himself staring at it, he saw his wife sewing it on, sitting by the coal fire in their cosy parlour… with considerable mental effort he pulled his attention back to the present situation.

  “Those of you who have sailed with me before may recognise this particular chart,”…again the laughter. We are returning to our old hunting grounds on the Norwegian coast. Only this time we go there with a larger force and with larger responsibilities.

  But, I’m forgetting myself; before I go into details, I would like to take the opportunity to welcome Lieutenant Commander Crosswall-Brown and his men. Motor torpedo boats 34 and 35 are very welcome additions to our merry band.” He smiled, “I believe they are better known as the ‘Dirty Four’ and the ‘Dirty Five’,” he paused briefly before he continued. “As, I think, most of us foresaw, the war on land has taken a turn for the worse. If… or, as seems more likely, when Jerry takes Norway, he will use her ports to threaten our sea lanes all the way from the north of Scotland way out into the Atlantic and up towards Iceland. The whole of Norway could well become a giant launching pad for his U Boats, his surface ships and his aircraft. It will be vital that we get information on the movement of his forces. We want to know when his ships sail, when his aircraft take off, we want to know in what direction they are heading and in what strength.

  Collecting this information is one of three main tasks we have been entrusted with. “He flipped the chart up and secured it with a clip, underneath was a short list. “First, ‘Gathering Information’… When ‘Orca’ ceased operations on the Norwegian coast we already had an embryo network of information gatherers in Olaf…” Grant noticed Barr’s eyes dart to a prompt sheet in his left hand, “…Kristiansand and his friends. Now, while we have been enjoying all the comforts of home and hearth, he has been, out there, adding to this list of ‘friends’. He has gone about this in rather an ingenious way. Each new recruit was required to recruit one other person, that person is known only to the person who recruited him or, indeed, her. I’m sure you can see the advantages of this method of enlarging the ‘Network’. No one person will have knowledge of the whole organisation, not even Olaf himself. Now, our part in this is simple, we will be there to pass the information on to our intelligence people. In the first instant it will go to Lieutenant Grant’s E-boats who will rendezvous with Lieutenant Commander Crosswall-Brown’s M.T.B.s. They will carry the information to the intelligence services based at the ‘Flow’.” He raised a hand to silence the murmur from the men in front of him. “I know… I know, it is long winded, but it is the way Mr Kristiansand wants it. His people have no training in Morse code and he will not allow any of our agents into his organisation. It’s early days yet and I’m sure he will grow to trust us more.”

  Barr paused, “Now I come to the second of our three tasks. The whole force will harass enemy shipping along the entire length of the Norwegian coastline, wherever and whenever it is encountered… Now this is pretty much what we were doing, before we were rudely interrupted, by a spot of leave. I hope, by now, those of you who were not with us last trip have been given copies of the operational reports that we submitted at the time. You should be able to get some idea of the sort of work we were engaged in and how we went about it from them. It’s basic stuff… As Nelson put it, you can’t go far wrong if you put your ship alongside one of the enemy’s. Or as I hear Petty Officer Stone puts it. ‘When you’re in a fight, be f
irst… be fast… and be furious.”

  When the burst of laughter had died down Barr continued, “Third, and final task, is that of ‘Supply’. Jerry has complete air superiority over Norway. This means it would be unrealistic to rely on slow merchant ships to supply our troops; it’s a job for fast warships capable of completing the crossing in one night. For these ‘shopping trips’ we will be using the ‘Nishga’. Those of you brave enough to venture out onto the upper deck this morning will have noticed we are already busy loading stores. This is equipment urgently needed by a company of the 24th Guards Brigade at a place called, “he glanced at his sheet of paper, “Mosjoen.”

  He eased the clip and the chart fell back into place. “A battalion of the 24th landed at Mosjoen, a little over two hundred miles from Narvik on the 10th of May. Now, by coincidence, Jerry put men ashore at Hamnesberget… here… to the south, more or less at the same time. This has cut off our men from their mates and severed their supply line. That’s where the ‘Nishga’ comes in. After we’ve delivered the groceries we will be playing things very much by ear… the situation ashore is, to say the least, fluid. “Our side may need some help from our four point sevens or they may need more supplies; we’ll find out from them once we get there…That’s about it gentlemen… Questions please!”

  Chapter 11

  Mosjoen

  It was Sunday the 12th of May before the flotilla was fully ready and the ‘Nishga’ was able to lead the line of warships north, her boiling wake making a straight foam channel for her consorts to follow.

  The passage through the Irish Sea was uneventful and Barr took the opportunity to put ‘Orca’ through their paces. It was the first time they had all been at sea together. The set of drills and manoeuvres he had first worked on, using his son’s toys now had their first airing. He had run through them, but this was their first chance at full sea trials. On the whole Barr was pleased with Orca’s’ performance and said as much to the flotilla before the force split up, south of the Shetland Isles. The M.T.B.s hurried on towards the Shetlands, the E-boat’s turned east towards Olaf’s Inlet, and the ‘Nishga’ headed north east to commence her ‘grocery run’.

  The destroyer entered harbour at first light after a very fast passage. They anchored off Bodo after receiving re-routing orders from Scapa Flow, events, ashore, were changing rapidly. Now the whole of the 24th Guard’s brigade could only be reached from the sea.

  The Germans, with their air superiority and use of ‘Blitz’ tactics were sweeping north and already threatening Mo to the south.

  To add to an already chaotic situation the Commanding Officer Major General Mackesy had been replaced. The newly appointed CO ordered Mo to be held as long as it could be supplied by road and for Bodo to be held at all costs. The ‘Nishga’s’ cargo was quickly unloaded into barges and by late afternoon she was ready to sail.

  The bombers arrived at a little after four. The crew were already at their action steaming stations, already closed up on full alert. All guns were brought to bear and opened up on the Heinkels as they swooped into the attack. Light anti-aircraft artillery, ashore, added their fire to the barrage.

  The captain of ‘A’ turret took two men and ran for’ard to raise the anchor. In the lulls between blasts from the four point sevens, it could be heard clanking and clanging its way slowly inboard.

  As soon as the men had signalled ‘clear anchor’ the destroyer got under way and quickly began to pick up speed, turning through the wind in a tight circle, making a run for the open sea. Astern, the sky above the docks, to the south of the town, blossomed with deadly black flower-heads criss-crossed with the tracer from pom-poms and heavy machine guns. Somehow the flight of Heinkels emerged unscathed from the barrage, seemingly immune from a terrifying display of firepower. Other aircraft followed in waves, like migratory birds, they swept in, wave after wave, dropping their bombs into the smoke that soon enveloped the docks.

  As the last group of bombers came onto their target one peeled off in a graceful lazy dive to port and headed in towards the ‘Nishga’. She came in low, rapidly overhauling the speeding destroyer from astern, volleys of fire from the ship’s close range weaponry stabbed at her, tracer whipped and lashed across her nose bucking her from her line, but still she came on. She started to return the fire, her own tracer joining in a deadly dance with the destroyer’s, ripping through the sky astern of the racing warship in white-hot bursts of light.

  The pilot was good, he had positioned his aircraft for a textbook attack, one that could not possibly fail, he opened the bomb doors.

  * * *

  HMS Edward, Olaf’s Inlet.

  Lieutenant Grant edged the pointed bow of the ‘Eddy’ cautiously into the rock boom. Wilson leapt across the gap. Wyatt quickly passed a basketwork fender across to him before leaping down himself. They clambered across the uneven surface of rocks and untied the mooring wire. With the ‘Eddy’ inching ahead and the bulky fender in place, to protect her vulnerable hull, the boom was slowly, gently, pushed to one side. The two seamen held the raft in place while the ‘Ethel’ too slid quietly into the inlet.

  The rest of the forenoon was spent unloading stores at the newly constructed stone jetty, deep in the womb-like cave.

  Shortly after sunset Grant and Bushel climbed up the tunnel and set off on skis for Kristiansand’s house where, over piping hot coffee, the Norwegian supplied them with some very interesting information.

  The Germans were amassing a convoy of small boats in a bay only an hour along the coast. It was thought that they were loading supplies possibly for a large party of German infantry who had landed from the sea at Hamnesberget a hundred and seventy miles to the north. Coincidentally these were the very men threatening the 24th at Mo. The very same people the ‘Nishga’ had been dispatched to help.

  * * *

  HMS Nishga, Bodo Harbour.

  Commander Barr stood feet astride, watching the Heinkel as she sped in seventy feet above the ‘Nishga’s’ bubbling wake. He waited quietly, one hand on the array of voice pipes.

  He lifted the lid on one, “Ready ‘Guns’? You know the drill?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He flipped the cover closed and bent over another. “Ready Coxswain, just as we practised!”

  “Aye, Aye, sir.”

  All the while his eyes had not left the approaching aircraft, close enough now to see the bomb doors opening, he fancied he could see the pilot’s faces…Whites of their eyes…Time… “Hard astarboard!”

  “Hard astarboard….thirty five degrees of starboard wheel on, sir.”

  At thirty knots the destroyer leant over to a seemingly impossible angle as she cut to starboard, taking the corner in a racing-horse-turn throwing a wave of green water tumbling away to port.

  With deadly accuracy the stick of bombs fell from the screaming aircraft, black dots, diving like cormorants. They dropped right on target. Right where the destroyer should have been, right where, with any other captain, she probably would have been. Broadside on to the turning destroyer and at point blank range the Heinkel took the full blast from the stern mounted Pom Pom. She was quite literally torn to shreds. She flew into the stream of rapid fire intact; the madly jerking barrels of the gun spewed the forty millimetre shells casings out like popcorn, viciously ripping into her frail frame. She flew out the other side in bits, great chunks of metal fell into the churning sea. When her fuel tanks flew into the line of fire an explosion ripped through the remains of the aircraft. In seconds she was no longer an aircraft, just a mass of blazing debris plummeting into the quenching sea.

  The warship continued her turn, completing the full circle she sped out of the harbour entrance.

  * * *

  0200 hrs, Tuesday, 14th May, 1940. Vikjord, Norway.

  The two E-boats lay offshore of their target bobbing and dancing in the long westerly swell. The sea reflected black and silver, as clouds tumbled across the white face of the moon.

  Inshore the darkness hung h
eavy with fog, its skirts moving slowly to a fitful breeze. It had been seven hours since Kristiansand and the marines had been put ashore, bobbing into the night in their rubber dinghy.

  The weather forecast had predicted a westerly wind, increasing to force five by dawn. Ideal conditions for what Grant had in mind.

  A little after two the inflatable was spotted returning with part of the reconnaissance party. By a quarter past, Kristiansand and Blake were onboard and being debriefed. Their news was good. Nothing had changed ashore all was exactly as Kristiansand’s spies had reported. At the southern end of the fjord the Germans had moored some fifteen assorted barges and coasters, along with their escorts. To the west, near the entrance to the fjord and a half- mile from the convoy, there was an oil storage facility. It was close to here that the ‘Nishga’s’ landing party had left Bushel and Stilson lying up, awaiting zero hour.

  Grant paused, looking from face to face. “So that, in a nutshell, is the plan. This will be no picnic. We will need to go in bloody fast and out… even faster. Jerry has chosen the site well. In fact he couldn’t have chosen a better place to assemble a convoy. Steep sided, well concealed, impossible to spot from the sea and difficult to bomb from the air. The passage in is narrow, made even narrower by German minelayers a week before they began assembling the convoy. We can only pray the wind does what it is supposed to do and holds steady, otherwise our ace in the hole could prove to be a joker.” He rose to his feet, “Now if there are no more questions…. Good, then we’ve time for a few hours rest before the off…” He held out a hand towards the door, “Gentlemen.”

  * * *

  Grant lay on his bunk unable to sleep, thinking of the coming operation, going over and over the plan in his mind. If one thing worried him above all others it was the minefield, probably because of his experiences on the Belfast. He tried to tell himself it would not be like that. He’d read somewhere that it was difficult to find a hero at two in the morning. Whoever wrote that could well have added that the same went for optimists.