Disaster at Stalingrad

by Peter G. Tsouras

  As word spread of the approaching German fleet, near panic set in among many of the merchant crews. On the Troubador the crew mutinied and overwhelmed the naval armed guards. At gunpoint they forced the captain to alter course — due south towards the German ships.18

  The convoy escorts were still close in, in case of another air attack. For proper antisubmarine protection, they should have been several thousand yards farther out from the convoy. That was just the opening that the Ice Devil pack needed. A dozen U-boats moved to attack. First to be sunk were the disabled ships left in the convoy’s wake. The William Hooper disintegrated, sending a fiery shock wave over the sea as its 10,000 tons of ammunition exploded. The first of the steaming ships to be struck was the ungallant El Capitán. It fell out of line and began to sink by the stern. That exposed Pozarica, which took two torpedoes, stopped dead in the water and began to list. Broome quickly ordered his escorts farther out to drive off the U-boats. As he watched his ships swinging towards their new positions, his own ship shuddered with one torpedo hit then another. The Keppel sank so quickly hardly a man survived. The convoy was now without a commander.19

  Ten miles southwest of Bear Island, 3 July 1942

  Hamilton’s reconnaissance floatplane never saw the Fw 190 that shot it down. The admiral only knew that it had stopped transmitting. Tovey’s scouts suffered the same fate, all but one, and it was able to radio its sighting of the German fleet as still on course to Bear Island.

  The next Hamilton knew of the Germans was when his own destroyers sighted their counterparts screening Carls’s fleet. The destroyers reported the Germans as coming in three columns, each in line ahead, with Tirpitz in the centre column. Hamilton’s plan was to protect the convoy by pulling the Germans to the northwest away from Bear Island.

  The destroyers began the show. Hamilton’s ships shot forward to pierce the German screen and launch their torpedoes at the German capital ships. The German destroyer captains were just as aggressive, launching their own attacks on the British to throw off their torpedo strikes. Carls had the advantage now that Hamilton was blinded from the air. Luftwaffe reconnaissance aircraft reported that the convoy was steaming north of Bear Island while the cruiser force was southwest. He told off his port column, 2nd Battlegroup’s Lützow and Scheer, to engage the Allied cruisers while he went after the convoy with the 1st and 3rd Battlegroups.

  From the bridge of HMS London it was clear to Hamilton what the enemy was doing. Carls had thrown a spanner into his plan to pull the German fleet northwest away from the convoy. Hamilton now knew that Tovey was approaching quickly with the Home Fleet, but it would be a good four hours before he could arrive. Hamilton had no choice but to attack with such force as to compel the rest of the German ships to engage. If he had followed his orders and not engaged, he would never have lived down the shame of leaving the convoy to the mercy of the German surface ships.

  First though he had to get through Lützow and Scheer, and that problem was emphasized as strikes from their 11-inch guns began to splash around his cruisers. They outranged his 8-inch guns by several thousand yards. Although he had four ships to these two, his would have to cross this beaten zone in which the German guns could hammer them before they could reply.

  The Wolfssehanze, East Prussia, 3 July 1942

  Clouds of mosquitoes hung about the woods throughout which the buildings and huts of the Wolfsschanze were scattered. As Goring got out of the staff car that had brought him from the airstrip, a cloud of the tiny tormentors, attracted by his heavy cologne, fell upon him with more fury than his own Luftwaffe over Rotterdam or London. He fled inside Hitler’s headquarters waving his baton as if it would drive the mosquitoes away. Goring joined Hitler and soon puffed himself up as the reports came in of the Luftwaffe’s success in striking the convoy. He reminded Hitler that another strike force was now in the air and a third waiting to follow. Goring could see that Hitler was also pleased, but he was pacing back and forth nervously. ‘All well and good, Goring, but what about the enemy aircraft carriers?’

  He was prescient. While Hamilton charged, dive- and torpedo-bombers from Victorious and Wasp were taking off for a strike at the Germans. They formed up and headed out in separate formations so as to come in from different directions.

  Dönitz had also taken his Führer’s anxiety on board. He had directed that U-boat Flotilla 10 screen Carls’s ships far to the west. One of these boats reported large air formations heading northeast. The flotilla commander ordered his boats to head in the direction from which the planes had come.

  Three miles northeast of Bear Island, Barents Sea, 3 July 1942

  The convoy was leaderless when the second Luftwaffe strike force attacked. There had hardly been time for command to pass to the next senior officer, captain of the British destroyer escort Offa, as the dive- and torpedo-bombers swooped in. With Palomares and Pozarica gone, a huge hole had been left in the air defences of the convoy, which the Germans were quick to exploit as the convoy’s formation began to break down.

  There were victims enough for both aircraft and U-boats though the submariners were all too often angered when a carefully lined up target was taken out by the Luftwaffe. One such was the 5,400-ton American Pan Atlantic, with its cargo of tanks, steel, nickel, aluminium, foodstuffs, two oil stills, and a great deal of cordite, which was about to take a pair of torpedoes from Kapitänleutnant Bohmann’s U-88 when a Ju 88 swooped down and hit it with two bombs. They struck the cordite hold blowing the bow off the ship. Water rushed in through the gaping hole, and down it went its stern hanging in the air, its propeller still turning as it disappeared beneath the waves. The 7,200-ton John Witherspoon, loaded with tanks and ammunition, next took a spread of four torpedoes from U-255. A 200-yard cloud of smoke rose from the ship as it seemed to drift away. The crew were barely able to escape in lifeboats before the John Witherspoon broke in half and sank.20

  By now the convoy had completely come apart with merchant ships running their engines to speeds the builders had never contemplated just to flee from the slaughter. The British Earlston fled north with its cargo of explosives and crated aluminium. Several Ju 88s followed and dropped their bombs but missed. A third put its bomb close enough to the target’s port side to rupture the hull and the engine-room steam fittings, shifting the engines from their mounts and bringing the ship to a halt. The crew abandoned ship as it settled. Just then U-334 surfaced and put a torpedo into it. The German captain watched as:

  …a pillar of smoke about 200 feet high billowed up, preceded by a blinding blue flash. The heavy naval steam launch which had been trapped in a cradle on top of No. 2 hatch was picked up bodily by the explosion and hurled a quarter of a mile across the sea. The ship broke in two, and the bows sank almost at once. The air was filled with the terrible sound of the heavy cargo — Churchill tanks, antiaircraft guns, and trucks — rearing loose in the holds, and the groaning of the ship’s members under the unintended strain.21

  The messages were crowding in to the communications sections of the Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe staffs in Berlin and at the Wolfsschanze. From U-703 came: ‘Pinpoint AC.3568. 5,476-ton River Afton sunk. Cargo aircraft and tanks. Three torpedoes.’ Hitler was grinning as his aide read off every kill. Goring’s smile faded when it was a Navy kill. It reappeared whenever a Luftwaffe kill report came in. He jumped up and clapped his chubby hands when the report of the sinking of three more ships by Ju 88s came in.

  ‘SS Pankraft blazing.’ A flight of Ju 88s attacked from 4,000 feet and left the ship a mass of flames. The 5,600-ton freighter carried a cargo of TNT and 5,000 tons of crated aircraft parts, with bombers lashed to the deck The crew abandoned ship, the captain and the chief officer the first into a lifeboat. The second officer stayed with the ship to ensure the evacuation of the rest of the crew. He was killed as the last man off the ship as a Ju 88 flew by and strafed him. When the fire reached the TNT cargo, the Pankraft blew up.

  An American merchantman, the Daniel Morgan, carrying a
cargo of food and leather, was destroyed by a combination of air and submarine attacks. Its hull was split open by Ju 88 attacks and it was finally sent to the bottom with four of its crew by the torpedoes of U-88. U-703 had fired four torpedoes at the British Empire Byron and missed but finally hit with a fifth fish which sent the cargo of army trucks on deck flying through the air. Empire Byron sank stern first, taking eighteen of its crew down too.22

  The Germans did not quite have everything their own way. The American Peter Kerr fleeing eastward threw up such an effective wall of antiaircraft fire that repeated attacks by seven He 115s were beaten off and two of them shot down. A Royal Navy corvette depth-charged U-457 as it was lining up a shot on the burning Dutch Paulus Potter. Far more embarrassing for the Germans was the attack of an unidentified Ju 88 on a German U-boat riding on the surface. An investigation would later be launched, but for want of a culprit it had to be dropped. Apparently no crew admitted to the error.

  Seven miles southwest of Bear Island, 3 July 1942

  Hamilton was happily ignorant of the disaster that had fallen on the convoy as he attacked the German fleet. Perhaps if had known what little help he could have offered, he would have cancelled his attack and pulled back to screen for Tovey’s Home Fleet. The point was moot. The enemy was there, and he had to gain time for the battleships to arrive. He thought of Nelson’s instruction to his captains before Trafalgar. ‘Our country will, I believe, sooner forgive an officer for attacking an enemy than for letting it alone.’23

  The cost of that decision came home when shells from the 11-inch guns of the Lützow straddled the London. He would not be within range for another ten minutes. The next German salvo struck a few yards to port sending huge geysers of red water from the sighting dye to drench the ship. Hamilton could see the water spouts from Scheer’s salvoes perilously close to the nearby Norfolk. The Americans, he could see, were keeping up smartly. Although the German guns were heavier, their two cruisers had only twelve of them. His own four cruisers disposed of thirty-four 8-inch guns. His ships would actually be delivering a much greater weight of metal than the Germans when they closed the distance. He was counting on that as well as the fact that the big-gunned German cruisers were weakly armoured compared to the American cruisers.24

  His three destroyers had raced ahead to throw themselves at the enemy, veering only to launch spreads of torpedoes. The two Germans had to steer nimbly to dodge them, throwing off their gunfire. Still the cruisers had not yet closed the range. Their guncrews sweated under their hoods counting their own heartbeats as they strained for the moment when they could feed their guns.

  The Germans were too good not to get the range. They turned hard to port crossing Hamilton’s ‘T’, presenting all their gun turrets to only the forward turrets of Hamilton’s cruisers. He saw Wichita stagger from a direct hit by two shells, but it kept on going despite the flames licking from its superstructure. Aboard the American ship, damage control parties were fighting the blaze. The damage could have been worse. One of the enemy shells had struck the 6-inch armour belt and failed to penetrate but some hull plates had been sprung.25

  The grim look on Hamilton’s bridge turned bright when an observer pointed to a torpedo hit on Lützow. The German ship slowed and fell out of line, though its fire did not slacken. Seemingly in revenge for that injury, one of its secondary-gun shells smashed into the destroyer USS Rowan, followed by another two until the smaller ship was a shattered, burning hulk.

  By this time, Hamilton had turned his ships to port to parallel the Germans; they were finally in range. He had directed the Americans to take on Lützow while the British cruisers dealt with Scheer. The guns on all his ships seemed to go off at once so eager had the guncrews been. Thirty-four 8-inch shells converged on the two German ships. Most missed but two struck the Lützow just above the damage done by the British torpedo, penetrated the thin 3-inch armour belt:

  [and] exploded inside a magazine containing cans of oil, smoke dispensers, incendiary bombs, aircraft bombs for the cruiser’s reconnaissance floatplanes and depth charges. The bulkheads on that deck were blown out and the burning oil developed into an intense fire.

  The shells had also cut the electricity supply needed to work the ship’s main guns. The turrets were now stuck in their last firing position.26

  Scheer’s gunners were also eagerly working their guns and poured shells into Norfolk, but amazingly most simply went through and through its thin armour without exploding, but one tore into the aft turret just as the powder bags were coming up the ammunition hoist. The explosion blew the turret out of its well and over the side. Norfolk staggered out of line and fell behind as its crew fought the fires set by the giant puncture wounds to their ship. London pressed on, duelling with Scheer, neither landing a crippling punch.

  London’s chief engineer came to the bridge and reported to Hamilton that he was worried because the hull plates had been loosened and rivets popped from the stress of action. ‘I’m worried, sir, that we are taking on too much water.’ Just then one of the ratings shouted to look up. Flying over them in the direction that Tirpitz had taken were the torpedo- and dive-bombers of the Victorious and Wasp.27

  Five miles northeast of Bear Island, 3 July 1942

  Carls and his command staff aboard Hipper stood transfixed by the shattered detritus of the convoy — burning and sinking ships that had been left behind in the wake of the fleeing survivors that were still being harried by the Luftwaffe and U-boats. Debris, lifeboats, burning oil drifted between the dying ships. Already the admiral’s force had taken a prize, the SS Troubador sailing towards them as they sailed around Bear Island, flying every white bedsheet on the ship instead of its colours. A destroyer had stopped it and put a prize crew aboard, and now it steamed back towards Narvik.

  The rest of the Allied vessels were within his grasp. His ships could take prizes where aircraft and submarines could not. At that moment he was reminded by the Luftwaffe liaison officer that Priller’s planes were about to reach the limit of their fuel and had to turn back. Carls was not overly concerned at this point, sure that his force was beyond reach of any carrier-based aircraft. Priller’s group had already turned back before it reached the point of no return. The admiral was almost immediately corrected by the arrival of a message from Scheer that a large flight of enemy aircraft were heading in his direction.

  Priller’s only reaction as his radio crackled with the news was to tap his fuel gauge and laugh, ‘At last, something worth killing!’ as he turned his group back to intercept the enemy. He was calculating how many minutes of fuel his planes would have — ten at the most, ten minutes of combat time, to destroy or drive away whatever was making for the ships and then race back to the Norwegian airfields, gliding the last on fumes, no doubt. Right now they had to climb in order to drop down on the enemy like so many falcons among pigeons.

  He followed a bearing based on Scheer’s signal, and within two minutes located the incoming flight. Chugging along incredibly slowly were 28 Albacores and 14 Sea Hurricanes with the latter flying cover above the torpedo-bombers. It was going to be very one-sided, Priller thought. The Fw 190 had long since outclassed the Hurricane, and the Albacore was just so much flying poultry, a biplane in 1942! Priller led the attack, leaping down upon them from 2,500 feet and coming up behind the last aircraft in the formation. Like all successful pilots he knew that the secret of success was to get as close to the enemy as possible, virtually ramming distance. He almost flew into the Hurricane before firing and saw large pieces of it fly off as it shuddered and started to burn. Priller pulled up and over the dying plane and right up to another, fired and saw the pilot’s canopy shatter before the aircraft spiralled down. He was now coming through the Albacores, who were still unaware of the Germans. Death was upon them.

  He pulled up and climbed again to rejoin the fight. The British formation was scattered everywhere by now with Fw 190s chasing the Albacores and duelling with the Hurricanes. It did not last long. He h
ad to call off his pilots lest they use too much fuel for the return to base. That was the only thing that saved the handful of British planes, three Hurricanes and five Albacores. HMS Victorious was now an almost useless ship with the sad remnants of its three squadrons fleeing home.

  Priller’s group flew away elated at their glorious last-minute victory. They had no idea that the first strike group from the Wasp was approaching Bear Island on a different course than the ill-fated British. Priller did pass II./JG 26 commanded by Hauptmann Connie Meyer on its way to fly cover for the surface ships. Galland’s little brother, Wilhelm-Ferdinand commanded one of its Staffeln and was an ace twice over. Priller was surprised to hear another Galland voice over the radio. ‘You just can’t help yourself, hey, Pips, can you?’ It was Adolf Galland congratulating him on his victory. Priller was not surprised that his old boss was back in the air. Sitting at Kirkenes must have been an agony for him.

  Priller keyed in the radio, ‘Well, if it isn’t the General der Jagdflieger himself. I’m surprised your staff job hasn’t fattened your behind too much to fit into a cockpit!’

  ‘Ach, Pips, du Schwein, you haven’t changed a bit, and if you keep shooting down the British like this, no one will care. I just hope you left something for poor Meyer and his boys.’

  ‘Enough to go around, alte Junge, Two carriers, remember, there are two carriers out there.’ He looked at his watch again and only then realized to his surprise that it was near midnight, yet the sun flooded through his cockpit canopy with an afternoon’s lazy brightness.28