Operation Neptune

by Kenneth Edwards

  While the build-up was going steadily forward during the weeks after D-day, the Royal Navy was standing by to put to practical use yet another great achievement of British ingenuity and engineering. This was the laying of a petrol pipe line across the English Channel to the Normandy coast which would deliver petrol in bulk to the armies without having to employ a large number of tankers which were urgently required for other duties.

  The production and laying of these pipe lines—there was more than one—was an organisation in itself, and like everything else, it had a code name. This code name was PLUTO, a name drawn not from the classics or from Walt Disney, but from the initial letters of the phrase “pipe line under the ocean.”

  The idea, like so many others, had emanated from Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten when he was Chief of Combined Operations. It was early in April, 1942, after a demonstration of flame throwers, that Mr Geoffrey Lloyd, the Minister in charge of the secret Petroleum Welfare Department, asked Lord Louis Mountbatten whether his Department could do anything further to help the invasion, which was then in the early planning stage. The reply of the Chief of Combined Operations was: “Yes. Can you lay an oil pipe line across the Channel?” investigation of the problem involved began at once. At first they appeared to be insurmountable and the verdict of the experts was that the project was impossible to carry out.

  This was the situation when Mr A. C. Hartley, Chief Engineer of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, suggested that it might be possible to make a flexible armoured pipe, rather like a submarine cable without the cores, and to lay this from cable-laying ships. Here was an idea well worth pursuing, and Mr Geoffrey Lloyd at once consulted Dr Wright, Managing Director of Siemens, who agreed to manufacture a trial length of several hundred yards of this flexible pipe. Within a fortnight this trial length had been successfully laid in the Thames from a Post Office Cable-Laying Ship.

  The initiation of these trials was reported to the Prime Minister in his capacity as Minister of Defence. Mr Churchill gave orders that the trials and development were to be pressed forward with all speed and also instructed Mr Geoffrey Lloyd to inform him at once if he should encounter any difficulties which might require Mr Churchill’s personal intervention.

  The Pluto team at Dungeness, 1943.

  This flexible armoured pipe was called HAIS, a portmanteaux word composed of the initial letters of the inventor Mr Hartley, his firm Anglo-Iranian, and the manufacturers, Siemens. It was clear to all concerned that the project of laying such a pipe line across the English Channel in haste and in time of war would be one of great difficulty. Even in the leisurely days of peace it would have been a major engineering feat, but in war the time factor imposed far greater difficulties because of the strong tides and rapidly varying weather conditions in the Channel. It was obvious that the laying of the pipe line, once begun, would have to be carried through to success despite the tides and the weather and in face of any action the enemy might be able to take. There could be no half-way house between success and utter failure. -232

  HMS Holdfast was the first HAIS pipeline-laying ship. She was converted from the Dundee, Perth & London Shipping Company’s coastal passenger ship London. She was built in 1941 by Hawthorns & Co. Ltd of Leith, Scotland and was of 1,499 gross tonnage. Conversion commenced in the summer of 1942 and was completed later the same year. Other pipeline-laying ships later included Empire Ridley renamed HMS Latimer, Empire Baffin renamed HMS Sandycroft and the SS Algerian later HMS Algerian.

  The next step was to carry out large-scale trials by laying a HAIS pipe line across the Bristol Channel, where conditions of weather and tides approximated to those between the Isle of Wight and Cherbourg. To this end two 30-mile lengths of 3-inch HAIS pipe were made. At the same time a special laying ship had to be produced, since no existing cable-laying ship was large enough to carry the full length of the very heavy pipe. The Admiralty, therefore, took over the coasting steamer SS London and fitted her with special holds and gear for laying the HAIS pipe. In her new role this ship was given the name of HMS Holdfast.

  In December 1942, HMS Holdfast laid a HAIS pipe across the Bristol Channel from Swansea to Ilfracombe, the operation being carried out with the assistance of Combined Operations Headquarters. After many tests and the surmounting of various technical difficulties this pipe delivered petrol in North Devon under high pressure. Petrol consumers in the West Country were unaware that, for more than a year, their supplies had come under the sea from Swansea in a trial PLUTO. The success of this large-scale trial was most encouraging and as a result large supplies of HAIS pipe were ordered. 233*

  Meanwhile other engineers had come forward with an alternative proposal. Mr H. A. Hammick, Chief Engineer of the Iraq Petroleum Company, and Mr B. J. Ellis, Chief Oilfields Engineer of the Burmah Oil Company—both of whom were serving with the Petroleum Warfare Department—considered that lengths of 3-inch diameter steel pipe could be welded together and would have sufficient flexibility to be wound on a drum like cotton on a cotton reel, provided the drum was of sufficiently large diameter. Trials proved that 20 feet lengths of 3-inch steel pipe could be welded automatically to any required length and would be sufficiently flexible to be wound on to a drum of 30 feet or greater diameter.

  A drum of Hamel pipe form HMS Persephone.

  In order to meet this requirement the Admiralty converted a hopper barge and fitted her with a great wheel which rotated in trunnions mounted on her upper deck and on which the steel pipe was to be wound. In this guise she was one of the queerest looking craft afloat and was given the name of HMS Persephone.

  This form of welded steel pipe was given the name of HAMEL pipe, the word being formed from the first syllable of the names of the engineers who had put forward the idea—Mr Hammick and Mr Ellis.

  Trials with HMS Persephone showed that the HAMEL pipe could be wound on a big drum or wheel and that it could be laid by being paid out from the drum, which rotated as the ship steamed ahead. The idea was then further developed. Instead of fitting other ships with large drums, model tests in the National Physical Laboratory showed that it would be possible for a tug to tow an enormous bobbin, which would roll round in the water as it was towed and so pay out the pipe along the sea bed. These enormous bobbins were buoyant even with the pipe wound on them because they were hollow. They resembled oil storage tanks or small gasometers lying on their sides in the water and were 90 feet long and more than 50 feet in diameter. The actual drum on which the HAMEL pipe was wound was 60 feet long and 40 feet in diameter. When fully wound with the HAMEL pipe they weighed 1,600 tons—the weight of the average destroyer.

  These great floating bobbins were aptly called “CONUNDRUMS,” which was soon shortened to “CONUNS,” and each of them could carry 70 miles of HAMEL pipe line. While they were being produced, a special factory was set up in which the 20 feet lengths of steel pipe could be welded into 4,000-foot lengths at the rate of ten miles a day. At the same time, arrangements were made for storing 350 miles of this pipe line.

  A pump house on the English side for PLUTO.

  A camouflaged pump house for PLUTO.

  Both HAIS and HAMEL pipes were used for PLUTO, and the laying of the pipe lines under the sea was accepted as a naval responsibility, while the high pressure pumping stations on the English shore, which were cleverly camouflaged in an old fort, an amusement park, and a row of seaside bungalows, were the responsibility of the Petroleum Warfare Department.

  The routes along which PLUTO lines were laid.

  To carry out the Navy’s part in laying the pipe lines “Force Pluto” was formed under the command of Captain J. F. Hutchings, who had formerly been on the experimental staff of the submarine headquarters at Gosport. This force was composed of ships of all sizes from 10,000 ton ships to barges and motor boats and was manned by merchant navy personnel serving by agreement under the White Ensign. By the time everything was ready for the operation of laying the pipe lines, “Force Pluto” consisted of a hundred officers an
d about a thousand men. Its main base was at Southampton, with a secondary base at Tilbury. In addition to HMS Holdfast two other ships were fitted out with the specially developed cable-laying gear to enable them to lay the HAIS pipe. Two of the ships could each lay 100 miles of HAIS pipe, and the third ship could lay 30 miles. Thames barges were adapted for the handling of the inshore ends of the pipes where the water was too shallow for the ships to operate. “Force Pluto” was also provided with six of the giant “Conuns” for laying the HAMEL pipe. The winding of the pipe on to these “Conuns” was in itself a feat of engineering and seamanship.

  The PLUTO Control Room.

  A PLUTO line being unreeled across the Channel.

  The work of laying the pipe lines across the English Channel from the Isle of Wight area to the Cherbourg neighbourhood was begun some weeks after D-day, as soon as the mines had been swept from the approaches to the tip of the Cotentin Peninsula.

  On French soil the pipe lines ran for hundreds of miles, being completed by engineers close behind the advancing armies of liberation. Those pipe lines, once they had been laid across the English Channel, carried all the fuel for the armies and thus contributed very greatly to the build-up, while releasing tanker tonnage for use elsewhere. The pipe lines came as a complete surprise to the enemy, and even the majestic “Conuns” were towed, spinning, across the Channel unscathed and unmolested. The enemy must have seen them during reconnaissances over the Southampton area even if they did not see them at sea, but they were apparently unable to solve these “Conundrums” and assumed that they were some crazy English device of no real importance. They were certainly English; as the Prime Minister said: “‘Operation Pluto’ is a wholly British achievement and a feat of amphibious engineering skill of which we may well be proud.”

  Before Pluto, and even for a while during Pluto, fuel was brought in tankers. Here in rural La Cambe, Normandy, American engineers fill hundreds of jerry cans lined up in a pasture. Many GI’s have the helmet with white arc of 5th or 6th ESB sector of Omaha. This was 3820th QM Gas Supply Company.

  CHAPTER XII

  HOLDING THE EASTERN FLANK

  The Support Squadron, Eastern Flank—The “trout line”—German human torpedoes—Booby traps—Explosive motor boats—Shelling the Germans.

  By the third week in June, 1944, the whole of the eastern coast of the Cotentin Peninsula was in American hands and the capture of Cherbourg could be regarded as imminent. There thus remained no threat to the western end of the anchorages off the Normandy beaches, although danger from seaward could not be considered as eliminated so long as U-boats and other vessels could use Brest.

  The eastern end of the anchorages off the beaches was, in contrast, still extremely vulnerable. The enemy was still in force in the Franceville-Houlgate area east of the River Orne; the anchorage and “Gooseberry” shelter harbours in the SWORD area was overlooked by the Houlgate and other batteries; and the proximity of Le Havre provided a persistent threat of sea attack. Moreover, intelligence had suggested that the Germans were likely to make use of unorthodox weapons, such as midget submarines and one-man torpedoes. These they could only use against the eastern end of the anchorage.

  It was therefore decided to stiffen the defences of the eastern part of the assault area, where such sterling work had already been done by the patrols under Captain A. F. Pugsley, DSO, DSC, RN, and the light coastal forces under Commander Don Bradford, DSO, DSC, RNR. The latter is one of those men to whom war is a magnet. He had already served in South America and with the International Brigade in the Spanish Civil War, yet his hobby is the breeding of thoroughbred arabs.

  The new force for the protection of the eastern end of the anchorage was called the “Support Squadron, Eastern Flank.” It was formed on 23 June, from the support squadrons of all three of the British Assault Forces. These were no longer required in areas farther to the westward as the army had by that time advanced out of range of their guns.

  The SSEF, as it was called for short, was formed under the command of Commander K. A. Sellar, RN. It had the dual role of protecting the eastern flank of the anchorage and of bombarding the German forces east of the Orne. It consisted of seventy-six craft in addition to the Headquarters Ship HMS Locust. These craft were mostly LCG’s (Landing Craft, Gun), LCF’s (Landing Craft, Flak), LCS’s (Landing Craft, Support) and motor launches, and they were manned by a total of 240 officers and 3,200 men.

  The story of the SSEF is one of great gallantry and of tremendous endurance and keenness over a long period of constant vigilance and activity and of very real hardship. As Commander Sellar said in one of his reports: “The Squadron lived and had its being and operated in a heavily mined area, and were ultimately the only inhabitants of this area, as all the other ships were removed as a result of enemy shelling and mining. Four major attacks were made by night by the enemy, using new weapons. Although losses were suffered, these attacks were decisively beaten.”

  For the night defence of the exposed eastern flank a line of patrols was established each night. This ran roughly six miles due north from the neighbourhood of Ouistreham and then about two miles in a north-westerly direction to its junction with the area in which Captain Pugsley’s patrols operated. This line of patrols, which was established nightly by the SSEF was in reality a double line. The main line consisted of LCG’s (Landing Craft, Gun) and LCF’s (Landing Craft, Flak) stationed 3½ cables (700 yards) apart. As far as possible the LCG’s and LCF’s alternated in this line. This line was static, in that the craft in it were anchored in their positions. There were certain disadvantages in this practice, but it was necessary because of the ever-present danger from mines and the very limited navigational facilities in these craft. Immediately behind this static line was a mobile patrol of motor launches. One of these motor launches was allocated to every two craft in the static line. In the normal course of events these motor launches lay secured astern of one of the landing craft, but as soon as there was an alarm they cast of and patrolled behind the gaps between the landing craft, ready to give chase to anything that might penetrate the static line.

  The whole of this system was called the “Trout Line” and to the westward of it lay the other craft of the SSEF ready to give immediate support if required.

  The craft had to move to their positions in the “Trout Line” just before dusk, and if they moved a few minutes too soon they were shelled by the enemy shore batteries, an occurrence which was repeated if they were a few minutes late in leaving their positions at daylight. At night on the “Trout Line” they had to be instantaneously ready for action and exceedingly wide awake. In the forenoons they had to render their reports, replenish with ammunition, and work on the care and maintenance of their craft and armament, added to which there were bombardment commitments to be discharged. The afternoons, therefore, were the only times when the crews of these craft could snatch a few hours’ sleep, and that was frequently rudely disturbed by enemy shelling of the anchorage.

  This was not a routine which was worked for a few days only, interspersed with periods in British ports. Very few of the craft forming the SSEF returned to England between D-day and the end of August, and some craft did as much as seventy-five consecutive days and nights of this work.

  The amenities, moreover, were for the most part conspicuous by their absence in that exposed eastern area. Men lived, or rather existed, for two months and more on “Compo” rations, and none of the craft had trained cooks on board. During the whole period that the SSEF worked in the SWORD area—from 24 July to 11 September—the personnel hardly ever tasted fresh provisions or fresh vegetables. As a result many men came out in boils and suffered from other unpleasant skin eruptions. Mails, too, were irregular and few and far between.

  The one occasion when the crews of the craft of the SSEF did get fresh vegetables was when Commander Sellar borrowed a DUKW and went ashore in it. He filled the DUKW up with vegetables which he bought from the local farmers, expending £90 in the process,
and then drove it round his command, distributing them to the various craft. To say that the “Vegetable DUKW” was welcome would be a great understatement. Yet when Germany finally collapsed the Admiralty had still not given official approval for the expenditure of that £90.

  So strongly did Commander Sellar feel about the lack of fresh provisions that he went so far as to quote in one of his official reports the libellous words of Pepys, when he wrote in 1650:

  “Englishmen, and more particularly seamen, love their bellies above everything else, and therefore it must be remembered in the management of the victualling of the Navy, that to make any abatement from them in the quantity or agreeableness of their victuals is to discourage and provoke them in the tenderest part, and will sooner render them disgusted with the King’s service than any one other hardship that can be put upon them.”

  The officers and men of the SSEF, although they were often “provoked,” were certainly never discouraged. On the contrary, their spirit and morale as well as their efficiency rose with their increasing moral ascendancy over the enemy and with each action in which the worst the enemy could do with all manner of so-called “secret weapons” and ingenious devices was met and decisively defeated. It was spirit such as this which drew from Rear-Admiral Rivett-Carnac, the Flag Officer commanding the British Assault Area, the remark, after a particularly determined attempt by the enemy to break into the anchorage: “All craft in Trout Line gave their usual display of alertness and excellent seamanship.”