BATTLE OF THE DENMARK STRAIT

The 'Battle of the Denmark Strait' was a World War II naval conflict between ships of the British Royal Navy and the German ''Kriegsmarine''.
The British battleship ''Prince of Wales'' and the battlecruiser ''Hood'' fought the German battleship ''Bismarck'' and the heavy cruiser ''Prinz Eugen'', both of which were attempting to break out into the North Atlantic to destroy Allied merchant shipping.
Less than ten minutes after the British opened fire, a shell from ''Bismarck'' struck ''Hood'' near her ammunition magazines. The ''Hood'' exploded, and sank within 3 minutes with the loss of all but three of her crew.
''Prince of Wales'' continued to exchange fire with ''Bismarck'' but suffered serious malfunctions in her main armament. This, combined with the effects of the battle, left most of her main guns unusable and she broke off the engagement.
''Bismarck'', damaged but still very much operational, declined to chase ''Prince of Wales'' and instead headed for the Atlantic along with ''Prinz Eugen''.

Contents

Background

The battle begins

Sinking of the ''Hood''

''Prince of Wales'' alone

Aftermath

Bibliography

References

See also

External links

Background

On May 18, 1941 the new ''Bismarck'' was prepared, after extensive trials, for her first voyage against enemy shipping. She was accompanied by ''Prinz Eugen'', a new cruiser also on her first mission of the war; "Operation ''Rheinübung''". ''Bismarck'' and her sister ship ''Tirpitz'', each heavier than any battleship in the British fleet, were perhaps the strongest battleships in service at this time.
Admiral Lütjens, the German fleet commander, intended to break out into the Atlantic through the Denmark Strait between Greenland and Iceland and attack Allied convoy traffic in the North Atlantic.
Earlier raids by German capital ships such as the battleships ''Scharnhorst'' and ''Gneisenau'' had done enough damage to cause the British to use some of their older battleships such as the ''Revenge'' class as convoy escorts. Although old and slow, these ships were well armed with guns, more powerful than most of the guns of the German heavy cruisers and pocket battleships. The ''Bismarck'' and ''Prinz Eugen'', though, could risk attacking a convoy escorted by one of these battleships: the ''Bismarck'' could engage and attempt to destroy the escorting battleship, leaving the ''Prinz Eugen'' to chase down and sink the fleeing merchant ships.
The two ships were expected to try to break westward through the Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) gap. Royal Navy ships and
aircraft were watching their likely route. On the evening of May 23, 1941 they were spotted by the heavy cruisers ''Norfolk'' and ''Suffolk'', patrolling the Denmark Strait under the command of Rear-Admiral Wake-Walker.
With the help of the ''Suffolk's'' newly-installed radar set, the cruisers shadowed the German ships through the night, reporting on their movements. The next morning the German ships were intercepted in the Strait between Iceland and Greenland by a force of British ships. These were the battleship ''Prince of Wales'' and the battlecruiser ''Hood'', along with a screen under the command of Vice-Admiral Lancelot Holland on the ''Hood''.
''Prince of Wales'' was a newly commissioned ''King George V'' class battleship, of much the same size and power as ''Bismarck''. She had not yet been properly "shaken down," and her crew was green. She still had mechanical problems, especially with her main armament, and had sailed with shipyard workers still aboard working on her. When ''Bismarck'' and ''Prinz Eugen'' first sighted her in the Denmark Strait, they identified her as ''King George V'', as they believed ''Prince of Wales'' could not yet have put to sea.
''Hood'', from her commissioning in 1918, for 20 years had been the largest warship afloat. Between the wars, more than any other ship she had represented British naval power in the eyes of Britain and the world. But her armour was less comprehensive than a battleship's. She had been designed in 1916, and then hastily and incompletely redesigned while still under construction, after three similarly designed British battlecruisers exploded in the Battle of Jutland that same year. Even so, ''Hood's'' firepower, guns, were the equivalent of any battleship afloat, and she had been partially modernised in many areas over the years. She was a much more powerful cruiser than ''Prinz Eugen''.
Admiral Holland ordered his squadron into action at approximately 0537. The rough seas in the Strait kept the destroyers' role to a minimum. The cruisers ''Norfolk'' and ''Suffolk'' would be too far behind the German force to reach the battle.

The battle begins

''Hood'' opened fire at 0552 at a distance of approximately , about . Holland had ordered firing on the lead ship, ''Prinz Eugen'', believing from its position that she was ''Bismarck''. Holland soon amended his order and directed both ships to engage the rear ship, ''Bismarck''. ''Prince of Wales'' had already correctly targeted ''Bismarck'', whereas ''Hood'' is believed to have continued to target ''Prinz Eugen'' for some time.
Holland ordered his ships to close with the enemy. Since ''Hood's'' deck armour was weak in places, Holland wanted to reduce the range as quickly as possible, since at a shorter range the trajectory of ''Bismarck's'' shells would be flatter and they would be more likely to hit the sides of the ship rather than the decking, or to glance off the top deck.
''Prince of Wales'' struck her target first. She would ultimately hit ''Bismarck'' three times. One shot struck the commander's boat and put the seaplane catapult amidships out of action. The second shell passed through the bow from one side to another. The third struck the hull underwater. These last two caused minor damage and flooding. More importantly, the damage to the bow cut access to the forward fuel tanks' 1,000 tons of fuel oil. It also caused ''Bismarck'' to trail a visible oil slick.
Lutjens held fire until 0555, when both German ships targeted ''Hood''. A shell hit ''Hood's'' boat deck, starting a sizable fire in the ready-use 4 inch ammunition stored there, but this fire did not spread to other areas of the ship or cause the later explosion. Although unconfirmed, it is possible that Hood was struck again at the base of her bridge and in her foretop radar director.

Sinking of the ''Hood''

At 0600, Vice-Admiral Holland ordered his force to turn once again to port to ensure that the main guns on both ''Hood'' and ''Prince of Wales'' could bear on the enemy. During the execution of that turn, a salvo from ''Bismarck'' was seen by men from ''Prince of Wales'' to straddle ''Hood'' abreast her mainmast. It is believed that at least one 380 mm (15 inch) shell struck somewhere between the mainmast and "X" turret astern of it. ''Hood'' was hit amidships by at least one shell from ''Bismarck'' at a distance of about .
This was immediately followed by a huge pillar of flame that shot upward like a giant blowtorch, in the vicinity of the mainmast. This was followed by an explosion that destroyed a large portion of the ship from amidships clear to the rear of "Y" turret. The ship broke into two. The stern broke away and sank. The bow, pointed upward and pivoting about, followed shortly thereafter. Splinters rained down on the ''Prince of Wales'' half a mile away. The ''Hood'' sank in about three minutes, taking 1,415 men, including Vice-Admiral Holland, with her. Only three of her crew (Ted Briggs, Bob Tilburn and Bill Dundas) survived to be rescued two hours later by the destroyer ''Electra''.

The British Admiralty later concluded that the most likely explanation for the loss of the ''Hood'' was a penetration of her magazines by a single 380 mm shell from ''Bismarck,'' causing the subsequent catastrophic explosion. Recent research by submersible craft suggests that the initial explosion was in the after 4-inch magazine and that it spread to the 15-inch magazines via the ammunition trunks.
It has been suggested from examination of the wreckage, found in 2001, that the magazine explosion in the the 4-inch armament near the mainmast caused the vertical blast of flame seen there, and this in turn ignited the magazines of the aft guns that caused the explosion that wrecked the stern. This explosion might have traveled through the starboard fuel tanks, igniting the fuel oil there, setting off the forward magazines and completing the destruction of the ship. While this is possible, it is also possible that the forward magazines did not blow up. The forward part of the ship might have been damaged by hydrodynamic forces during the sinking.

''Prince of Wales'' alone

''Prince of Wales'' found herself steering towards the sinking ''Hood''. Her commanding officer, Captain John C. Leach, ordered an emergency avoidance turn away from ''Hood's wreckage. This violent change of course disrupted her aim and put her in a position that made it easier for the Germans to target her. She resumed her previous course, but was now under the concentrated fire of both German ships.
''Prince of Wales'' was struck four times by ''Bismarck'' and three times by ''Prinz Eugen''. One of these shells passed through her upper superstructure, killing or wounding several crewmen in the Compass Platform and Air Defense Platform. Pieces of another shell struck her radar office aft killing crewmen within. A 203 mm shell from ''Prinz Eugen'' found its way to the propelling charge/round manipulation chamber below the aft 5.25" gun turrets, and a 380 mm shell from ''Bismarck'' hit underwater below the armour belt, and penetrated about into the ship's hull, about below the waterline, but was stopped by the armoured, anti-torpedo, bulkhead. Fortunately for ''Prince of Wales'', neither shell exploded, but the Prince of Wales did suffer the loss of some fuel oil, and minor flooding. Contrary to some mistaken opinion, the 380 mm shell that struck Prince of Wales below the waterline, did not endanger her magazines, as it came to rest abreast an auxiliary machinery room.^[1]
By this time, with serious gunnery malfunctions that had put most of the main guns out of action, Captain Leach ordered the ship to make smoke and withdraw from the battle. ''Prince of Wales'' turned away just after 0604, firing from her rear turret under local control. The salvos were ragged and are believed to have fallen short. She retired from the battle around 0610. 13 of her crew were killed and 9 wounded as a result of the battle.^[2]
Between 0619 and 0625, ''Suffolk'' fired six salvoes in the direction of ''Bismarck'', having mistaken for ''Bismarck'' a radar range coming in from an aircraft. She was actually out of gun range of both ''Bismarck'' and ''Prinz Eugen'' at the time.^[3]

Aftermath

''Prince of Wales'' and the cruisers ''Norfolk'' and ''Suffolk'' continued to shadow the German ships, but they slipped away from their pursuers. Shortly afterwards, ''Bismarck'' and ''Prinz Eugen'' separated and escaped into the Atlantic.

The damage to ''Bismarck's'' forward fuel tanks, combined with a missed opportunity to refuel at Bergen earlier in the voyage, left less than 3,000 tons of fuel remaining, not enough to operate effectively against the Atlantic convoys. ''Bismarck'' headed for Saint-Nazaire for repairs.
''Prinz Eugen'', undamaged, went further south into the Atlantic where she refueled from a tanker at sea. She suffered engine troubles, abandoned her commerce raiding mission without having sunk any merchant ships, and returned to Brest.
The British public were shocked that their most emblematic warship and more than 1,400 of her crew had been destroyed so suddenly. The Admiralty mobilised every available warship in the Atlantic to hunt down and destroy the ''Bismarck''. The Royal Navy forces pursued and brought ''Bismarck'' to battle and the German battleship sank on the morning of the 27 May.
Later, moves were made to court-martial ''Prince of Wales's'' captain, John Leach, and Frederick Wake-Walker, the Admiral commanding ''Suffolk'' and ''Norfolk''. The view was taken that they were wrong not to have continued the battle with ''Bismarck'' after ''Hood'' had sunk. John Tovey, Commander-in-Chief of the Home Fleet, was appalled at this criticism. A row ensued between Tovey and his superior, Admiral Sir Dudley Pound. Tovey stated that the two officers had acted correctly, not endangering their ships needlessly and ensuring that the German ships were tracked. Furthermore, ''Prince of Wales's'' main guns had repeatedly malfunctioned and she could not have matched the ''Bismarck''. Tovey threatened to resign his position and appear at any court-martial as 'defendant's friend' and defense witness. No more was heard of the proposal.
A British board of enquiry quickly investigated the cause of ''Hood's'' explosion and produced a report. After criticism that the initial enquiry did not record all the available evidence, a second board of enquiry more extensively investigated ''Hood's'' loss, and examined the vulnerabilities of other large British warships still in service in light of the probable causes of the explosion. It, like the first enquiry, concluded that a 380 mm shell from ''Bismarck'' caused the explosion of ''Hood's'' aft ammunition magazines. This led to refitting some older British warships with increased protection for their ammunition magazines and some other related improvements.

Bibliography

★ Simon Adams, ''World War II''. Dorling Kindersley Publishing, 2000. ISBN 0-78946-990-1

★ Dewar, A.D. Admiralty report BR 1736: ''The Chase and Sinking of the “Bismarck”''. Naval Staff History (Second World War) Battle Summary No. 5, March 1950. Reproduced in facsimile in Grove, Eric (ed.), ''German Capital Ships and Raiders in World War II. Volume I: From “Graf Spee” to “Bismarck”, 1939-1941''. Frank Cass Publishers 2002. ISBN 0-71465-208-3

★ Garzke and Dulin ''Battleships'', USNI, 1980. ISBN 0-87021-100-5

★ Ludovic Kennedy ''Pursuit: The Chase and Sinking of the "Bismarck"'', Cassell Military Paperbacks, 2004. ISBN 0-30435-526-7.

★ Storia Militare, ''La battaglia dello Stretto di Danimarca'', 2005

★ B.B. Schofield ''Loss of the Bismarck'', Ian Allen Ltd. 1972.

★ VE Tarrant, ''King George V Class Battleships'', Arms and Armour Press, 1991. ISBN 1-85409-524-2.

References

1. 'Battleships' by Garzke and Dulin, p.181
2. Tarrant, p.58
3. Dewar, p.8

See also

★ Rheinübung Sortie of the ''Bismarck'' and ''Prinz Eugen''

External links

★ HMS Hood Association: Battle of the Denmark Strait Documentation Resource

★ The Battleship Bismarck

★ The Heavy Cruiser Prinz Eugen