Breakout

by John Deanne Potter

  From the point of view of the German warships, it had not been a satisfactory action. Both Fein of Gneisenau and Brinkmann of Prinz Eugen regretted they were not armed with torpedoes. If they had, they believed they would have had a good chance of finishing off the destroyers more easily than with the heaviest gunfire. But they had no warheads aboard, as Group West had ordered them to keep all explosive material to the minimum.

  The Worcester, hit seven times by heavy shells, was a smoking shambles and seemed certain to sink, the decks were slippery with blood and the bridge was spattered with brains and chunks of torn red flesh. Blood and trickling green paint from the damaged paint shop flowed round shattered bodies in oilskins about the decks. A sailor came staggering out on deck trying to hold his guts in with his hands.

  The unwounded survivors of the crew waited helplessly for German destroyers to approach and finish them off. None came. They were sweeping ahead of their battle squadron, scouting for British capital ships, which were in fact hundreds of miles away in Scapa Flow.

  As both the doctor and the sick-bay attendant were knocked out for a time, the rumour went round the ship that everyone in the sick-bay had been killed. But Dr. Jackson and his assistant dazedly picked themselves up as a sailor staggered through the door and fell unconscious. After they had lifted him into a bunk the doctor scrambled up on deck. He was still so dazed that he forgot his equipment and had to go back to grab as many dressings as he could. He stuffed two bottles of morphine into his pocket and picked up a torch, as all the lights had failed and it was becoming dark. Some slightly wounded men from "A" and "B" gun crews appeared, grinning apologetically, at the door.

  Only when he climbed on deck did he realize the battle was over. The noise had ceased, to be replaced by an eerie quiet as the ship rolled sluggishly surrounded by towering waves. He realized that he and the rest of the crew were going round shouting at each other — the sudden cessation of the bombardment having failed to register.

  The doctor crawled about the blood-stained decks shoving morphine into the wounded and dying men. After attending to a man on "B" gun, he went to a bad casualty in the wheel-house. Then he went down to the waist of the ship and worked his way along the upper deck. A lot of wounded men were lying or sitting under the pom-poms and beside the empty torpedo tubes, where Bill Wellman, miraculously unwounded, was attending to them.

  Beside the 12-pounder gun, some men were lying so still that the doctor knew he need not stop. He went on to the after-superstructure, where there were some dreadful casualties among the men of the supply and repair party.

  A leading stoker, his stomach ripped out and his arm torn off, staggered to the side to drown himself because he knew he was finished. Chief Engineer Griffiths pulled him back on to the deck and the doctor tried to operate on him, but he died a few minutes later.

  Then Griffiths saw First Officer Dick Taudevin hurrying along the deck and said to him, "This is a fine old pot mess. Why are you running about so much?" Taudevin replied, "I am trying to stop some silly buggers from jumping overboard. They think the order has been given to abandon ship."

  While Jackson was doing what he could for the wounded, Lt. Taudevin appeared at his elbow and said, "Thank heaven you are all right, Doc. We are not abandoning ship. Tell the wounded." Then he went calmly aft and, in as firm a voice as he could manage, he told those wounded who were conscious to stay under cover and sit down.

  No one has a clear recollection of what took place on those smoking, bloody decks littered with the wounded hoarsely calling for help. There was terrible confusion and one or two cases of panic. While some men with shattered legs were dragging themselves along the deck on all fours, other wounded lay moaning quietly on the slanting decks. One or two staggered to the rail and threw themselves overboard. They were either trying to save themselves from the sinking ship by reaching the floats or drown themselves deliberately, as they knew they were so badly wounded they only faced a painful lingering death.

  Amid the confusion, Chief Engineer Griffiths saw Engine Room Artificer Hayhoe shutting off the steam throttle and shouted, "What the hell are you doing?" Hayhoe replied, "There is no steam, Chief. All the boilers have gone except Number Three."

  Griffiths and Hayhoe climbed down to the damaged Number One boiler room. There were only two hatches so just the two of them went down, for if the ship suddenly began to sink a third might have no time to climb up.

  The hole in the ship's side near the engine room, although four feet long, was well above the water-line. The sea was still pouring into Number One boiler room, but there was steam in the gauges and the steering gear was undamaged. At the same time, Stoker EO. Dawson reported that Number Two boiler was also badly damaged but Number Three was intact.

  The ship's list was increasing and Griffiths knew if he did not get her underway soon she would sink. Normally the way to correct a list is to flood the opposite compartment, but they were shipping water so fast from the bow damage that the decks were only two or three feet above the waves. Any more flooding would certainly have capsized her.

  Standing waist-deep in water in the flooded engine room Griffiths had a hasty conference with Hayhoe. Ships' boilers must use the purest distilled water, and in normal times Admiralty experts constantly examine the water-carrying gear for purity. Now this had all gushed away. There was only one way they could keep the ship moving — to use salt water. But would the boilers continue to work or would salt bubbling up with the steam soon choke the pipes?

  They managed to patch up the large hole by stuffing it with hammocks and putting in their only collision mat. Griffiths then ordered a hose slung over the side and the bilge pump rapidly pumped in twenty tons of sea water.

  To lighten the ship, the crew were frantically throwing everything overboard. Lockers, sacks of potatoes — even the heavy range-finder was unscrewed — were thrown into the sea. The crew also wrapped the wounded in blankets and put them on the quarter-deck or under the break in the fb'c'sle. EO. Gordon started cutting off the rigging which hung dangling over the decks from the shattered mast.

  Campbell and Vivacious were searching for German destroyers ahead of the battleships. As his other ships vanished in the mist, Pizey decided that in the circumstances the safest course to steer was 180 degrees, which meant turning completely back on his tracks in the hope of making contact with the flotilla. Shortly after turning on to the new course, Pizey saw a ship ahead of him which he thought was the Prinz Eugen. As they drew nearer, he realized it was the Worcester, damaged and apparently stopped. She was two miles off Campbells port beam with smoke and steam pouring from her. Floating in the water near her were men clinging to floats. It was 3:57 p.m., and the Germans had just ceased firing.

  When Worcester's crew saw Campbell and Vivacious approaching, they thought they were the German destroyers they had been expecting to come and finish them off. With all their guns out of action they waited for the end. Campbell tried to reach Worcester by short-wave radio, but along with practically everything else her radio had gone. She could only signal by lamp. It was not until Campbell began shouting to her by loud hailer that Worcester's dazed crew realized she was friendly.

  When Campbell and Vivacious steamed out of the murk, the men on the Carley rafts gave the thumbs-up sign and started to paddle towards them. As they drew alongside Campbell, men swung overboard to try and pick them out of the sea.

  It was at this moment that Sq. Ldr. Cliff with his torpedo-carrying Beauforts from 42 Squadron arrived on the scene. They ran straight into the great air battle which was still raging. Luftwaffe fighters were trying to shoot down RAF bombers as they dived through flak clouds thrown up by the Gneisenau, Prinz Eugen and their escort ships. Although the Germans had broken off the action because they could no longer see the British destroyers, both sides were clearly visible from the air. They were so near to one another that some of the Beaufort pilots thought the British destroyers were escorting the German ships.

  As the Beauf
orts came down to wave height to drop their torpedoes, the heavy shells from the German ships smacked into the water between the planes.

  Through the shell bursts Cliff saw a ship which he believed to be Scharnhorst, with a column of smoke pouring from her funnel. He flew over a destroyer and came down to within 1,100 yards of the ship to release his torpedo. As he banked steeply to port he saw another destroyer. A minute later he signalled base that he had dropped his torpedo, seen it run, but could not observe the result.

  Following Cliff through this fierce barrage came Pilot Officer Birchly, who sighted two destroyers and a bigger ship which he also believed to be Scharnhorst. He flew over the destroyers to within 800 yards of the ship before dropping his torpedo.

  The third Beaufort of the flight was piloted by Pilot Officer Kerr. He too saw a large "ship," which he was sure was the Scharnhorst, with four destroyers near it. Kerr came down to eighty feet off the water to drop his torpedo. Air-Gunner Sergeant Smith fired back at the destroyers, which were sending up clouds of flak bursts towards him. Both his wireless operator, Sergeant Waller, and his gunner, Sergeant Smith, reported that the warship was "listing badly with smoke pouring from her bows."

  Pilot Officer Archer in another Beaufort also saw a big ship with a large superstructure and a short funnel which he too took for the Scharnhorst. As he dropped his torpedo his plane was hit by a shell which ripped through the port engine. Another made a hole in the tail and blew the perspex off the rear turret, wounding Sergeant Betts, the gunner, in the face and arm. Shrapnel grazed the leg of radio operator, Sergeant Cain.

  But as the Beauforts pressed home their attack at nearly wave height, one of them made what might have been a tragic mistake. In the air and sea mix-up, one pilot mistook Campbell for a German ship. When Pizey saw the torpedoes drop, he thought they were aimed at the Prinz Eugen, which he knew was hidden near by in the mist. Then his alert Asdic operator reported: "Torpedo at green forty-five approaching on a steady bearing."

  To his horror, Pizey realized it was coming at him. It could not have happened at a worse moment, for nearly a dozen of his men were hanging over the side on ropes trying to rescue the Worcester ratings before they drifted away in the freezing water. He realized there was only one thing to do to save his ship and its crew — go full speed astern. It was an agonizing decision to have to make, because it meant temporarily abandoning men in these icy waters.

  As Campbell went astern her wake washed over the floats alongside and men were thrown into the sea. Some too wounded to swim managed to grab lifelines thrown to them. But some died from exposure in the very cold water.

  Before Campbell had gathered any appreciable stern way her Asdic operator reported: "Bearing growing ahead." This meant the torpedo was going across Campbells bows — and would therefore miss. Pizey recalls, "It did not take a second before I gave the order: 'Full ahead.' This stopped the ship's way and we were able to continue to pick up survivors. Some of them were floating in the water in a bad way. It was a dreadful sight. But, thank God, most of the badly wounded who had been put into the whaler and on to the Carley floats seemed all right. We were able to get them on board."

  It was not only the RAF who made mistakes in the mêlée. So did the Luftwaffe. At the same time as Pizey was dodging the RAF torpedo, the German destroyer Hermann Schoemann was firing frantically at a Dornier 217 which dropped two bombs near her. When the German bomber turned to rake her with machine-gun fire, the destroyer's flak guns tried to shoot her down.

  Then another Dornier swooped over the destroyer Z.29 with Admiral Ciliax and his staff aboard. As she approached for a bombing run, the flak gunners stood ready anxiously watching her. Just as they were about to open fire, she recognized them and swerved away. Firing off the recognition signal of five red stars, the plane vanished into the clouds.

  While both British and German ships were fighting off attacks by their own planes, Worcester was waterlogged and rolling badly. But Chief Engineer Griffiths was now confident that, if he could get the after-boiler working he could get her under way. Pizey signalled her by lamp: "Intend taking you in tow." When Douglas Ward was ordered by the bridge to find a tow rope, he reported that it had disappeared in the wreckage. Coats signalled Pizey: "Towing gear not available." Pizey replied: "Stand by. We will pass our own towing gear."

  It was still touch and go for Worcester. As she reached the end of her roll, she seemed momentarily to stand still. Coats realized that if she listed a fraction of a degree further she might turn turtle. She was also drifting so badly that Campbell had to turn and pass her bows to try and toss the towing gear aboard.

  As Campbell was about to throw the gear, Pizey saw she was moving away from him. At first he thought his helmsman had miscalculated. Just as he realized she was moving under her own power a signal flashed across: "One engine room connected up."

  Slowly Worcester began to make steam. The engine knocked and the pumps and dynamo repeatedly stopped, but somehow Griffiths and his men managed to start them again. Coats signalled Pizey: "The only way I can make steam is by using salt water, but I can make my own way home."

  At 5:18 p.m. she began to move slowly, and Coats went to the wrecked chart-room under the bridge. Most of his navigational aids had gone. The ship had taken such a battering that the gyro-compass had been smashed and the magnetic compass was unrealiable. When Campbell gave him his position and a course for home, he told Taudevin to take over as officer of the watch while he was in the chart-room helping the navigator.

  With smoke pouring from her after-funnel and steam issuing from a great rent in her starboard side, Worcester began to move slowly away from Campbell. At first she made only a knot or so through the heavy seas, but gradually gathered speed. When it was clear she could proceed on her own, Pizey decided to carry out the instructions of the C-in-C Nore that all ships which had fired torpedoes were to return to Harwich to re-arm and refuel. When they left Harwich, they had enough fuel to last two or three days. Running as they had been, at full speed ahead, they now had fuel for only ten hours. Campbell went off with Vivacious at twenty knots— the maximum they could make in existing weather conditions.

  This left Worcester to make her own way home.

  XI

  "SCHARNHORST IN URGENT NEED OF HELP"

  The official RAF report that only thirty-nine found the ships is obviously an underestimate. There seems little doubt that many of the missing planes found them and were then shot down into the water.

  After wireless signals from Gneisenau telling of a battle with an "enemy cruiser and destroyers" — Captain Pizey's force — were picked up by Scharnhorst, still lagging in the rear, heavy attacks by the bombers which the RAF had now thrown into the action began to increase.

  T.13, the leading torpedo boat protecting Scharnhorst, was riddled with splinters when bombs fell all around her. Smoke poured from her hatches and she stopped. Scharnhorst and her escort steamed on leaving her to her fate. She limped towards the Hook of Holland, escorted by another torpedo boat.

  As the winter darkness fell, the RAF attack developed so fiercely that the flak guns became red hot. Sailors tried to cool them by throwing buckets of water over them, but several guns jammed and one 20-mm gun-barrel burst.

  The Prinz Eugen had her only casualty during these attacks. Curiosity killed Senior Artificer Erich Kettermann, who was below decks on repair work. He left his station and went up to the deck to see what was happening. As he opened an armour-plated door he was struck by a shell fragment and killed instantly.

  The third Beaufort Squadron, twelve aircraft of No. 86 stationed at St. Eval, Cornwall, was not yet in action. They were so late leaving Cornwall that they did not arrive at Thorney Island until 2:30 p.m. There they were told they would be fitted with torpedoes at Coltishall, although it was primarily a fighter base. This order was technically correct— only no one had checked that the Mobile Unit had not arrived. Their squadron leader spoke to Flt.-Lt. Kidd on the phone saying, "I have landed
at Coltishall and there are no torpedoes there. What the hell are people playing at?" He was ordered back to Thorney Island.

  It was not until 5 p.m. that the Beauforts arrived over Manston to find no fighters awaiting them. They circled for a few minutes then set off alone. At 5:41 p.m. they reached the reported position of the Germans given to them at Thorney Island hours before.

  This information was, of course, completely out of date, as the German ships were now fifty miles away northwards. Searching low over the misty sea, the squadron saw four German mine-sweepers who fired at them. It was now getting too dark to see anything, so they turned and headed for home. Two did not make it. It is thought that flying low in the darkness, they flew into the water.

  Apart from these planes, the Beaufort pilots who found the ships attacked with the utmost courage.

  The surviving RAF air-crews themselves had no illusions about how the battle had gone. The entry in the 217 Beaufort Squadron log for 12 February read: "Terrific flap. Gneisenau and Scharnhorst out of Brest heading towards North Sea. How they managed to get this far is one of the minor mysteries of the war. Late this evening still in a muddle."

  Bristol Beaufort

  By seven o'clock that evening, the Beauforts of 42 Squadron had landed at North Coates. The operational record book reported, "Nine aircraft led by Sq.-Ldr. Cliff took off to attack the German fleet in the Channel. Seven torpedoes launched. Pilot Officer Dewhurst failed to release his torpedo. Flt.-Lt. Pett failed to find the battleships."

  Concerning Sq.-Ldr. Cliffs attack, the 42 Squadron log reported: "The Beaufort sighted one destroyer and one large cruiser, believed to be the Scharnhorst, at 16:06. There were large columns of smoke forward of the funnel.