THE LONE WOLF (2025 Edition) by Michel Poulin - HTML preview

CHAPTER 23 – THE FRENCH ARE COMING!

14:07 (Berlin Time)

Monday, December 14, 1942

Krupp’s Germaniawerft Shipyard

Kiel, German Baltic Coast

‘’Here is your new child, Kapitänleutnant von Wittgenstein: the U-900. While still incomplete, it should be finished building around next mid-February. In the meantime, you will be able to start the theoretical training of your crew.’’ Ulrich von Wittgenstein, standing with Admiral Dönitz and Otto Kretschmer inside the covered construction slip of the Krupp’s Germaniawerft Shipyard in Kiel, looked gleefully at his new command, which looked very similar to the U-800.

 

‘’I am looking forward to that, Herr Admiral.’’ said Ulrich. ‘’Kapitän Kretschmer has already made the integration of my new crew much easier by offering me the services of some of his experienced noncommissioned officers and crewmembers to add some vintage quality to my crew. Too bad that he refused to give me as well the services of his cook.’’

Otto wiggled an index at Ulrich while faking an angry expression.

‘’I told you already! You can’t touch Bootsmannsmaat28 Hannig: I like his cooking too much!’’

The three officers burst out laughing together then, surprising the number of sailors and civilian workers and technicians present on the quay. As the trio was starting to walk towards the docked U-801, one of Dönitz’ aides came to them at a run while shouting.

‘’ADMIRAL! ADMIRAL! THERE ARE IMPORTANT NEWS!’’ Stopping on the spot, Dönitz waited for his aide to arrive and stop two paces from him, returning his salute while asking him.

‘’Well, what kind of news do you have for me, Leutnant Krueger? Good ones or bad ones?’’

 

28 Bootsmannsmaat: Kriegsmarine NCO rank equivalent to that of Petty Officer Second Class.

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‘’Good ones I believe, Herr Admiral. This message was just forwarded from the headquarters of Gross Admiral Raeder. It is about the French fleet in Toulon and the situation in North Africa.’’

Dönitz gave his aide a sharp look on hearing that: he and Admiral Raeder, with the precious support of Propaganda Minister Goebbels, had barely managed in November to convince the Führer, after the Allies had landed in Morocco and Algeria, not to invade the part of Southern France controlled by the Vichy government of Marshal Pétain. Their counsel to Hitler, in view of the precarious supply situation of the Allied force in French North Africa, had been to try to gamble on French national pride to push the Vichy French into actually fighting to get back their North African colonies from the British and Americans. The withdrawal of the American troops and ships from North Africa and the Mediterranean in the first week of December, made as part of an American reallocation of forces to the benefit of the Pacific Theater, had given further credit to that plan and had convinced Hitler to give Marshal Pétain carte blanche to use French military forces to expel British troops from the French African colonies. Reading quickly the message given to him by his aide made Dönitz smile with glee.

‘’Gentlemen, this is epic news indeed! The French battle fleet has just sailed out of Toulon, headed for Oran and Algiers with the mission to retake the French colonies for the Vichy government and to chase off any British ships from the Algerian and Moroccan coasts. It seems that Marshal Pétain also secured a secret understanding with President Roosevelt that American forces would respect Vichy neutrality from now on. According to Kriegsmarine intelligence, the French fleet sailed out of Toulon with one battlecruiser, six cruisers, 22 destroyers, eleven large torpedo boats and 22 submarines.’’

Ulrich von Wittgenstein couldn’t help wiggle his right hand on hearing that.

‘’Himmel, that’s quite a naval force! The British will have their hands full facing such a fleet, especially after the losses we inflicted on their Mediterranean Fleet in November.’’

‘’After the British attack on Mers-el-Kebir in 1940 and the November landings in French North Africa, I can’t blame the French for being pissed at the British.’’ added Otto Kretschmer, making Dönitz nod his head.

‘’Prime Minister Churchill indeed stabbed the French twice in the back in this war to date. Remember the way he had British troops storm aboard the French warships docked in Great Britain in 1940, at the same time his battleships were firing on French

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warships harbored in North Africa. Those kinds of things are never forgotten and rarely forgiven, especially by people as proud as the French. Let him pay now for his arrogance and strategic blunders. I am ready to cheer on for the French fleet if this means that the British fleet will get walloped in the Mediterranean. In the meantime, I will count on you, my dear Kretschmer, to continue walloping the British in the North Atlantic. You will however have to put to sea without your Brandenburg Regiment commandos or your four Japanese sailors, Kretschmer: those Japanese, along with Commander Nagaoka, have just left for Japan aboard one of our long-range Type IXD2 submarines heading towards the Indian Ocean and the Java Sea. As for your commandos, they will stay on land this time: I want you to concentrate solely on sea targets during your next patrol.’’

06:55 (Paris Time)

Wednesday, December 16, 1942

British destroyer H.M.S. JAVELIN

Cruising off Algiers, Mediterranean Sea

One of the lookouts on duty on the H.M.S. JAVELIN, a J-Class British destroyer that was part of the British Mediterranean Fleet, suddenly saw through his binoculars a faint white line on the surface of the ocean. From experience, he knew that it had to be the bow wake of a ship coming in at night. The distance was however quite long and the half-moon made for very low visibility. Still, he decided to call it to the bridge duty officer.

‘’SIR, POSSIBLE INCOMING SHIP AT OUR TWO O’CLOCK, DISTANCE UNKNOWN BUT STILL QUITE FAR!’’

The duty officer, a young ensign, came to him nearly immediately: German and Italian submarines had been infesting the waters off the Algerian coast and harassing for weeks now the ships supporting the British troops landed in Oran and Algiers. Any sighting at night was thus a matter of possible concern. The young ensign, much less experienced at night observation than the lookout, took some time to see the white wake in the distance.

‘’Aah, yes! I see it now! It is however too dark to see what kind of ship is causing that wake.’’

The lookout, who had continued to scan the horizon in the meantime, suddenly stiffened.

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‘’Sir, I now see at least two more wakes behind the first one I saw. We have a group of ships coming at us.’’

‘’Damn, I wish that we had a radar on the JAVELIN.’’ said the ensign before going back inside the covered bridge of the destroyer, where he called the captain’s cabin by telephone. Less than six minutes later, the captain was up on the bridge and looking at the ships’ wakes in the distant night.

‘’Mister Reynolds, call the ship to battle stations! Have ‘A’ turret fire a star shell to our two o’clock!’’

‘’Aye, sir!’’

Four minutes later, with the gunners at their posts, a 4.7 inch illuminating shell was fired in a high trajectory in the direction of the unknown ships. It burst high in the still dark early morning sky and started floating under its parachute, throwing a dancing, ghostly light over a large patch of ocean. The captain of the JAVELIN swore when he saw that at least four ships, maybe more, were coming towards his destroyer…fast!

‘’Bloody hell! These blokes are not coming just for a morning cup of tea. I however still can’t identify them in this darkness. Mister Reynolds, signal by lamp to those newcomers: From British destroyer: identify yourselves!’’ Maybe two minutes later, a lamp signal came back from the approaching ships, signal that the captain of the JAVELIN read himself at the same time as his signals officer.

‘’From French Navy: all British ships are to leave immediately Vichy territorial waters or they will be fired upon.’’

That answer angered the captain of the destroyer to no small measure.

‘’Those Nazi puppets! They got some nerve to want to chase us away. SIGNAL OFFICER, SEND IMMEDIATE MESSAGE TO FORCE Q: VICHY FORCE OF AT LEAST FOUR WARSHIPS APPROACHING ALGIERS, ARE TELLING ALL BRITISH SHIPS TO LEAVE VICHY WATERS AND THREATEN FIRING. SEND OUR POSITION AT THE SAME TIME.’’

‘’UNDERSTOOD, SIR!’’

As the signals officer disappeared inside the covered bridge to go to his radio room, the duty ensign gave a hesitant look to his captain.

‘’What should we reply to them, sir?’’

‘’What I would really want to say to them would be unprintable, my boy.’’ said the captain, smiling to himself. ‘’Send instead the following: am now passing your request to my higher. Strongly suggest you keep your distance and wait in the meantime.’’

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‘’Uh, yes sir!’’

Less than a minute later, the French sent another lamp signal in response, which convinced the captain of the JAVELIN that blood would flow on this day.

‘’Leave Vichy waters immediately or we will fire… Hell, those frogs are quite impatient today! MISTER REYNOLDS, HAVE ALL MAIN GUNS LOADED WITH SEMI-ARMOR PIERCING ROUNDS! PREPARE THE TORPEDO TUBES!’’ Not even thirty seconds later, a star shell fired by the French ships popped up over the JAVELIN, making the British destroyer clearly visible on the surface of the sea.

‘’There goes the neighborhood, men! We won’t get out of this without a fight, I’m afraid.’’

A second French star shell soon joined the first one in the dark sky. Despite his façade of bravado, the captain of the JAVELIN was by now quite nervous and apprehensive: he was heavily outnumbered and the Vichy assault was coming at a time when the British Mediterranean Fleet was at its weakest in months, due to the heavy losses suffered during the year. In particular, there was only one British battleship left inside the Mediterranean, while not a single aircraft carrier was left operational. Also, all American warships had by now left the Mediterranean, taking with them their troopships and few surviving transport ships crammed with their army troops. As for the British ships near or around Algiers, the only sizeable force was Force ‘Q’ of Rear Admiral Harcourt, consisting of three light cruisers and two destroyers. The big question now was if the Vichy French would have the stomach to shoot at British ships.

The answer to that came four minutes later, when a flash in the distance was followed twenty seconds later by a big geyser of water 300 meters from JAVELIN’s bow. It was clearly a warning shot, but the delay between the flash and the noise of the departure shot at least gave the captain of the destroyer a rough distance to the enemy.

‘’About six miles… Too far still for torpedoes but close enough for a real slugfest. MISTER REYNOLDS, HAVE WE RECEIVED A RESPONSE FROM FORCE ‘Q’ YET?’’

‘’NEGATIVE, SIR!’’

Swearing again to himself, the captain took a few seconds to look more closely at the newcomers. What he saw was not to his liking: the French warships coming at him were the kind of ‘super-destroyers’ of which the French Navy was so fond of, with 138.6 mm caliber guns which easily outranged his own 4.7-inch guns and threw shells nearly twice as heavy. As for outrunning them, that was not a realistic option. Worse, the line of

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incoming destroyers was backed up by what appeared to be a light cruiser. He was thus badly outgunned by the French ships and would probably be pounded to dust within minutes in a gun duel. His dilemma was that there were a number of British cargo ships in port in Algiers, busy offloading badly needed supplies for the British troops there. If he withdrew away from Algiers, which would seemingly be the only reasonable option he had, then those cargo ships would be at the mercy of the Vichy warships. After the way the British Navy had slaughtered the French ships harbored in Mers-el-Kebir in 1940, causing hundreds of French casualties and sinking many of the ships in what had been nothing short of a fratricide, he however didn’t expect those Vichy warships to be tender with those British transport ships. Running back inside his bridge, he collared his signals officer as the man was emerging from the radio room.

‘’Lieutenant, signal immediately by radio and signal lamp to our ships and harbormaster in Algiers that Vichy warships are approaching with hostile intents. Our ships in Algiers should leave for safety at once. Got it?’’

‘’Yes sir!’’

The captain then grabbed an intercom handset and connected himself with his gunnery officer.

‘’Ramsay, we may need to stand and fight here, at least at first. I know that we are badly outnumbered and outgunned, but we must give time to our ships in Algiers to flee to safety. We will have to split our fire between three targets.’’ His gunnery officer was silent for a moment on the intercom before replying in a cautious tone.

‘’Sir, you do realize that each of these VAUQUELIN-Class destroyers outgun us? There are at least four of them, plus what looks like a LA GALISSONIÈRE-Class light cruiser. We won’t last long against that kind of firepower, not unless we get some help real quick.’’

‘’I know that, Ramsay. Do your best anyway! You can fire the moment the French will start firing directly at us.’’

‘’Understood, sir!’’ said glumly the young gunnery officer before hanging up.

To the dismay of the captain of the JAVELIN, the French warships kept coming on while holding their fire until they were within five miles, a distance at which their big 138.6mm guns would be quite accurate, while still being a bit long for JAVELIN’s torpedoes. First light had come by then and the British captain was now able to see that

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there were actually six of the big French destroyers, plus a light cruiser. The French ships then split up in two groups and veered in column to starboard, thus unmasking all their main guns. One group of four destroyers accelerated to over 35 knots and headed straight towards the port of Algiers, while two destroyers and the light cruiser formed a battle line facing the JAVELIN. A blinking light signal appeared from the bridge of the French light cruiser, which the captain of the JAVELIN read aloud.

‘’Last warning. Leave now or be sunk.’’

An old history lesson he had learned in his school years then came back to his mind and he twisted his head to look at a sailor manning the nearest signal lamp on the open bridge.

‘’Do you speak French, Able Seaman?’’

‘’I’m fair at it, sir.’’ answered the somewhat surprised signalman.

‘’Then, send back the following: TIREZ LES PREMIERS, MESSIEURS LES

FRANÇAIS29!’’

The captain chuckled as the signalman started sending his response.

‘’We might as well be polite between us before killing each other.’’ Apparently, the French took his reply at heart, with both destroyers and the light cruiser opening fire simultaneously. This time, it was no warning shot.

‘’MISTER RAMSAY, YOU HAVE MY BENEDICTION TO OPEN FIRE!’’ Lieutenant Ramsay obeyed him at once, having evidently already made his fire computations. One gun out of each of the three double 4.7inch turrets of the JAVELIN spat a shell, with the intent to verify the range to the targets. As the British shells were still flying into the air, terrifying howls announced the arrival of the first French shells. Since the two sides were firing at only half or less of their maximum range, both the British and French shells bracketed their targets on their first salvo, projecting huge water geysers as they impacted the sea around the warships. One French shell in particular fell uncomfortably close to the JAVELIN, shaking it with its underwater shockwave and making the captain clench his teeth together for a second.

‘’SIGNAL OFFICER, CALL OUR AIRFIELDS AROUND ALGIER AND ASK FOR URGENT AIR SUPPORT!’’

‘’YES SIR!’’

29Tirez les premiers, Messieurs les Français: French for ‘Shoot first, gentlemen Frenchmen’.’’ Referred to the 1759 Battle of the Plains of Abraham, outside the city of Quebec, when the French commander, Sieur de Montcalm, invited the British to fire first, which they did.

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The JAVELIN, having well-trained gunners, was the first to achieve a hit on the third salvo, one 4.7inch shell exploding against the superstructures of one of the French heavy destroyers. However, the light cruiser in the French battle line, being advantaged by its larger baseline optical rangefinders, was next to manage hits. No less than four 152mm shells, each more than twice as heavy as a 4.7inch shell, either struck directly the British destroyer or exploded in the water close to its hull, buckling hull plates and creating flooding. The aft 4.7inch twin turret of the JAVELIN was put out of action, while the amidships anti-aircraft gun mount was blown sky-high and part of the forward deck was opened like a tin can by a shell exploding in the empty crew spaces. The signals officer then shouted to the captain from the radio room.

‘’SIR, OUR AIRFIELDS ARE PRESENTLY UNDER GROUND ATTACK BY FRENCH INFANTRY AND CAN’T PROVIDE ANY SUPPORT.’’

‘’Bloody great! This leaves only Force ‘Q’ to possibly come and save our bacon.’’ Briefly looking towards the port of Algiers, some three miles away, the British captain saw with some relief that the four French destroyers which had flanked him to get to the harbor had not opened fire yet on the British cargo ships which had been at quay. Those cargo ships were in turn in the process of leaving the harbor, watched closely by the French warships. He however soon understood that the French restraint had nothing to do with mercy or magnanimity: as soon as the cargo ships had cleared the harbor’s entrance channel and were no more in position to block it if sunk, the French destroyers opened fire from near point blank at the transports, turning them rapidly into burning, sinking hulks. The captain of the JAVELIN had no time to become enraged at that, as he had plenty of problems of his own by now. With the three French warships facing him now having found the range, his poor destroyer was battered by a rain of 138.6mm and 152mm shells that quickly silenced all three of its main turrets and disabled its engines. Now dead in the water, burning and helpless, the JAVELIN was bypassed by the French warships, which went to form a picket line to the east of Algiers. One of the French destroyers however fired a salvo of three 550mm torpedoes at the JAVELIN from short range as it was speeding past it. Two of the torpedoes hit their target and exploded, making it capsize within three minutes. Only a dozen survivors managed to swim away from the doomed British destroyer. A French motor boat found and rescued those survivors an hour later, taking them as prisoners.

10:41 (Paris Time)

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Bridge of the British light cruiser H.M.S. ARGONAUT 56 nautical miles east of Algiers

‘’The latest radio report from our ground units in Algiers, sir. Unfortunately, it went up and down the separate chains of command of the Army and of the Navy before getting to us, thus the delay in receiving it.’’

Rear Admiral Harcourt, in command of Force ‘Q’, grumbled at that but didn’t reply directly to his signals officer as he took and read the message handed to him: the disjointed and often uncoordinated state of communications between the Army and the Navy had been and still was a sore point in this war. The reading of the message did nothing to brighten his day.

‘’Hmmm… All British ships around Algiers now sunk, with force of six French destroyers and one light cruiser blockading the harbor. Attacks on local R.A.F. airfields now repulsed, but most aircraft destroyed or severely damaged on the ground. Continuous incidents of sniping and ambushes against our troops in and around Algiers. Supply situation becoming critical.’’

Harcourt was frowning with frustration as he gave back the message to his signals officer: Operation Torch had resulted in nothing up to now but a gigantic waste of precious, limited resources. To add to that, Great Britain now had to face what had been the second most powerful navy in the Mediterranean at the start of this war. A warning from the bridge duty officer then made his head snap around.

‘’FRENCH RECONNAISSANCE SEAPLANE AT OUR TWO O’CLOCK HIGH, ADMIRAL!’’

Going quickly to one of the windows of the bridge and raising his binoculars to his eyes, he was able to see the French seaplane nearly at once. It was however flying quite high and would be difficult to shoot down at such a distance. As for the reason of its presence overhead, it was way too clear to Harcourt: it had to be a spotting seaplane launched by a French cruiser and sent to scout along their western flank. If he was hoping to take the French by surprise, that prospect was now gone. The French seaplane didn’t leave a chance to the British gunners of Force ‘Q’ to try to shoot it down anyway, turning around and flying away while still out of range of the British gunners. Harcourt was however still confident that his force of three light cruisers and two destroyers could chase away the French squadron presently blockading Algiers.

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The British rear-admiral had to revise his opinion when his force arrived within visual sight of Algiers: instead of finding only six French warships, he was confronted by a fleet consisting of one battlecruiser, four heavy cruisers, two light cruisers and a total of twelve heavy destroyers. However, it was what he didn’t see that truly cost him heavily. Already deployed and slowly cruising underwater to the East of Algiers was a picket line of eight French submarines tasked with spotting and harassing any British ship that would approach Algiers from Malta or Egypt. The first sign that alerted Harcourt to that hidden threat was the shouted alarm by one lookout of the ARGONAUT.

‘’INCOMING TORPEDOES AT THREE O’CLOCK!’’

‘’ALL SHIPS: INCREASE SPEED AND START ZIG-ZAG COURSE! HELM, STEER HARD STARBOARD!’’

Harcourt had to take hold of a pipe in order not to lose his balance as his flagship started a tight turn to starboard. He anxiously followed with his eyes the trajectory of the four incoming torpedoes, made visible by the trails of bubbles in their wake. To his relief, all four torpedoes missed, one passing within thirty meters from the cruiser’s stern. The shout of another lookout however told Harcourt that he was still not out of trouble.

‘’SIX TORPEDOES INCOMING FROM EIGHT O’CLOCK!’’

‘’HELM, REVERSE TURN! FULL SPEED AHEAD!’’

Again, the deadly fish missed his flagship. However, not everybody in his flotilla was as lucky. After missing the ARGONAUT, two of the torpedoes continued on and struck the port flank of the light cruiser H.M.S. SIRIUS. The unlucky cruiser shuddered in the water under the impact of the two 550mm torpedoes and quickly lost speed, falling behind the rest of the British warships. With a significant hole thus created in his battle line, Harcourt had to decide if he was going to stay and fight or if he was going to withdraw in front of an overwhelmingly superior enemy force. Harcourt was no coward, but the sight of the nineteen French warships lined up and waiting for his five ships, one of which was now severely crippled, convinced him that a fight now would only result in the loss of hundreds or even thousands of his sailors. As he was ordering his small force to turn around towards Malta, two more torpedoes hit the already severely crippled SIRIUS, sealing its fate. The light cruiser capsized less than six minutes after the last two hits and sank. Thankfully, to the credit of the French admiral in charge of the Vichy fleet, Harcourt was allowed to retrieve the survivors without being fired upon again. However, that still left the British expeditionary force landed around Algiers cut off from its supply lines and at the mercy of the French fleet.

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In London, the news of the Vichy’s naval reaction to Operation Torch infuriated Prime Minister Churchill, but it also sent worrying alarm signals to the senior commanders at the Admiralty. Nobody had believed for one minute that the Vichy French would make a sortie out of Toulon, or that the Germans would even let them do it. That assumption was now turning to be a major strategic miscalculation with a high cost to it. The withdrawal of the American components of Operation Torch, which had been redirected towards the Pacific on President Roosevelt’s express orders, was quickly used by many in London to explain and excuse the failure of the operation and the reverses dealt to the British Mediterranean Fleet. As for the Germans, there was a lot of celebrating and back-patting in Berlin following the naval battles off Algiers. Hitler, overjoyed, then rewarded the Pétain government by allowing it to fully rearm the French Mediterranean Fleet and by freeing conditionally tens of thousands of French soldiers who had been held as prisoners of war in Germany since 1940. Those liberated soldiers were in turn rearmed with Germany’s permission, so that they could be reorganized into fighting units, in order to be sent to North Africa with the specific mission of grabbing back from the British control of French North Africa in the name of Vichy. By the end of January of 1943, the remnants of the British expeditionary ground forces in Algeria were forced to withdraw, leaving by ship and sailing to Malta while having to abandon its heavy equipment. That humiliation only intensified the grumblings and political

discontent in London directed at Prime Minister Churchill, whose strategic conduct of the war was becoming more and more controversial.

23:22 (Newfoundland Time)

Saturday, January 9, 1943

Bridge of the British refrigerated stores cargo ship TETELA 226 nautical miles east-northeast of St Johns’, Newfoundland

Rear Admiral Manners, Commodore of Convoy HX-222, swore under his breath as he braced himself on the bridge of his convoy flagship, the refrigerated stores cargo ship TETELA, in order not to lose his balance because of the heavy rolling and pitching of his ship. The sea was very rough tonight and an icy wind and rain instantly froze everybody who ventured out of the superstructures. Added to this was the total darkness of a moonless night. With only the five British warships of his convoy’s escort

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equipped with radar, the 34 merchant ships under his charge were going to have a hard time indeed not to lose their position in the convoy, or even to avoid collisions in the dark. Even his escort ships, which had conducted a changeover of the guard from the Canadian warships of the Western Local Escort Force, or WLEF, ten hours ago, would have a hard time in this miserable weather. Their radars and asdic sets would also be nearly useless in this storm. Manners’ one reason for consolation was that German submarines, with their very low freeboard and low conning towers, would have an even harder time if they would be sailing on the surface around this area of ocean.

As he was trying to see the nearest other merchant ship in his convoy, Manners’ eyes suddenly saw a brief flash of light on the horizon, forward and left of his ship. Pointing his binoculars in that direction, he saw nothing but darkness and rain. Still, he felt unease as he lowered his binoculars: could this be the explosion of a torpedo? Even though instances of German submarines attacking in absolute darkness and in such atrocious weather was unheard of, he still didn’t want to take any chances and decided to call the commander of the escort force by radio. Going to the handset and remote-control box of the TBS VHF radio that had been installed on the TETELA prior to leaving Halifax, Manners grabbed the handset and pressed the microphone switch, calling the BLACK SWAN-Class sloop HMS WOODPECKER.

‘’WOODPECKER, this is the TETELA, Admiral Manners speaking, over!’’ He had to repeat his call once before getting an answer.

‘’This is WOODPECKER! Go ahead, TETELA!’’

‘’From TETELA: we just saw a brief flash on the horizon, to our ten o’clock. Did you see it, over?’’

‘’Affirmative, TETELA. I was going to call the NESS about that. I will call you back once I have…’’

The voice on the radio was then abruptly interrupted, with nothing but static after that.

‘’WOODPECKER, this is TETELA! Can you hear me? Hello, WOODPECKER, respond, please!’’

After a number of vain attempts at reaching the leader of his five-ship escort, Manners finally decided to call another escort ship that led the starboard columns of the convoy.

‘’SWALE, this is TETELA! Do you hear me, over?’’

To his relief, the RIVER-Class frigate answered him at once, with the radio signal being of fair strength and clarity.

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‘’This is SWALE! Go ahead, TETELA!’’

‘’SWALE, this is Admiral Manners. I abruptly lost radio contact with the WOODPECKER. Can you contact him, over?’’

‘’I will try, TETELA. Wait out!’’

Manners listened on as the captain of the SWALE repeatedly tried to contact his escort commander, without success. The captain of the frigate finally radioed back to the TETELA.

‘’TETELA from SWALE: I had no luck contacting the WOODPECKER. I am going to veer to port and will go investigate, over.’’

‘’Do that, SWALE! Be careful not to collide with one of our merchant ships as you cut across the convoy, over.’’

‘’Don’t worry, TETELA: I have my radar on. I will call you back once I find the WOODPECKER, over.’’

‘’While you are at it, you better check as well on the NESS at the same time, SWALE.’’

‘’Will do, TETELA. SWALE out!’’

Still worried, Manners then hooked back the handset on its wall receptacle and went to sit in the captain’s chair, which was presently empty at this late hour. After 25 minutes of nervous waiting and with no return call yet from the SWALE, Manners got up from his chair and returned to the TBS repeater set.

‘’SWALE, this is TETELA, over!’’

There was no answer to his first call, so he repeated himself, four times, still without getting an answer. Getting truly frustrated, Manners then changed his call.

‘’To all escort ships, this is the TETELA, over!’’

To his relief, he did get an answer from the two FLOWER-Class corvettes which were part of the escort and were stationed on the flanks of the convoy, the MYOSOTIS and the BORAGE.

‘’To BORAGE and MYOSOTIS, this is Admiral Manners. The NESS, the WOODPECKER and the SWALE are not responding to my calls. Give me a situation report, over!’’

‘’TETELA, from the MYOSOTIS: I see nothing on my side of the convoy. However, I lost the NESS and the WOODPECKER on my radar in the last half hour, possibly due to the bad weather playing tricks with my set, over.’’

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‘’From the BORAGE: I can’t see the SWALE on my radar either. It may however have been masked by the ships of the central columns when it turned to p…’’ Manners felt his hair stand up on his head when the voice from the BORAGE was abruptly interrupted, like what happened with the WOODPECKER.

‘’BORAGE, say again!... BORAGE, can you hear me, over?’’ After a number of fruitless attempts at reestablishing radio contact with the corvette BORAGE, Manners switched to the corvette MYOSOTIS, now certain that something very sinister was on.

‘’MYOSOTIS, this is the TETELA! I suspect that a German submarine wolf pack may have attacked our other escort ships. I want you to race ahead of the convoy and then sweep our forward sector with your asdic set, over.’’

‘’Will do, TETELA!’’ replied the corvette commander after a slight hesitation. Hooking back his handset, Manners then passed a hand over his face, cold sweat on his forehead despite the freezing temperature outside and the poor heating system on the bridge. Normally, a warship would be able to transmit at least for a few minutes after getting hit by a torpedo. In this case, four of his escort warships were not responding to his calls and had not signaled any hostile presence near the convoy. Yet, two of them had been interrupted in mid-transmission, as if some sea monster had suddenly grabbed them and dragged them down to the bottom. How could this be possible?

Maybe nine minutes later, a brief flash of light from the port flank of the convoy attracted the attention of Manners’ eyes, who nearly ran out of the bridge to go observe with his binoculars from the open bridge wing. Strong winds and icy rain greeted him there as he started to anxiously look towards the port flank of the convoy. This time, he was able to hear the distant but unmistakable sound of a strong explosion after a few seconds of observation. Dread instantly washed over him: that was probably his last remaining escort ship being torpedoed. If that was the case, he then had 34 merchant ships left without escort warships while on the start of a long leg between Newfoundland and Iceland, and this with a group of German submarines apparently in contact with his convoy. How could German submarines even be able to engage so effectively and quickly five escort ships, and this in total darkness and during a violent storm? His dilemma was now about what to do next. He however still had to confirm the fate of the corvette MYOSOTIS. Going back inside the bridge, he then tried repeatedly to contact his corvette, without success. As he was repeating his call for the fifth time, a bright ball

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of fire suddenly rose up from the American tanker ship TEXAS SUN, located in one of the port side columns of the convoy, with the noise of an explosion reaching him five seconds later. A horrified expression came on his face as he understood that his convoy had just started going through a long night calvary.

‘’Mother of God, please have pity on our souls!’’

11:10 (London Time) / 06:40 (Newfoundland Time) Sunday, January 10, 1943

Headquarters of the Royal Navy Western Approaches Command Liverpool, Great Britain

Vice Admiral Sir Max Horton, Commander of Western Approaches Command, was left speechless for a long moment after he finished reading the last message received from St Johns’, Newfoundland.

‘’All but one ship from Convoy HX-222 lost? But, that’s unheard of! Are we sure that ships from the convoy could not simply be having radio problems? The weather around Newfoundland is said to be atrocious after all.’’

His chief of staff, a very experienced navy captain, sadly shook his head in response.

‘’I am afraid not, sir. The sole surviving ship, the rescue ship RATHLIN, reportedly saw the ships around it torpedoed one after the other and is still roaming the area in search of survivors, unfortunately without luck up to now. It reported that the sea is very bad, with strong winds and rain and that the darkness is total. Finding survivors still not dead from hypothermia in those conditions would be a miracle.’’

‘’Yet, it somehow managed not to get torpedoed.’’ said thoughtfully Horton, a very experienced and competent officer who had previously been in charge of the Royal Navy’s submarine arm. ‘’That was probably due to a deliberate decision by the German wolf pack commander not to target it. Thank you, Captain: I will pass that news to Sir

Dudley30 myself.’’

Horton then retreated to his working office adjacent to the operations center room and sat heavily in his chair, the message from Newfoundland still in his hands. Nearly 2,000 Royal Navy sailors and civilian merchantmen had just been lost, along with over 150,000

30 Admiral Sir Dudley Pound: First Sea Lord of the Royal Navy between June 1939 and September 1943.

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tons of vitally needed supplies, and this in a single night! Such a complete destruction of a convoy had to have been done by a sizeable German wolf pack, as he doubted that even the infamous U-800 could do such mayhem alone. As an ex-submariner himself, Horton knew very well submarine tactics and limitations and had kept up to date with the intelligence file concerning the U-800. Otto Kretschmer was good but he could not be in more than one place at any time. Panicking merchant ships would probably have dispersed into the night when the amplitude of the massacre would have become evident to them, making it about impossible for a single submarine to catch them all, especially with yesterday’s bad weather. Oh, the possibility that the U-800 had been there, eliminating the escort ships in advance and signaling the position of the convoy to other submarines, was certainly in his mind. In fact, the notion that the U-800 would become the leader of a submarine wolf pack had been one of Horton’s worst fears. Now, it seemed that it had just become a reality. The big question now for him was how to deal with that.

07:13 (Newfoundland Time)

Captain’s suite, U-800

Sailing at schnorchel depth off Newfoundland

Escorted in by Herman Spielberger, Oberleutnant zur See Reinhardt Adenauer came to rigid attention one pace in front of Otto Kretschmer’s work desk. Otto’s hard expression as he stared at one of the three aspiring submarine commanders presently on the U-800 for some training at sea made evident his anger and displeasure.

‘’Oberleutnant zur See Reinhardt Adenauer, I remember clearly instructing you last night, before we started our attacks on the convoy HX-222, to simply observe the action and battle drills in the control room and not to interfere with the orders of the regular officers of this boat. I also remember that you were present when I gave a directive before going to bed not to attack the British rescue ship assigned to the convoy, or any other British ship that would have stopped to retrieve survivors. Yet, you took on you to later try to countermand the orders of Leutnant zur See Schwartz, who was the watch officer at the time, giving him the order to torpedo a ship that was detected stopping besides a sinking ship. You further tried to stop the Chief of the Boat,

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Stabsbootsmann31 Lent, from leaving the control room when he told you that he was going to wake me up. You thus deliberately ignored my directives and interfered with the operations of this boat during combat. What do you have to say in your defense?’’ Adenauer, while thoroughly intimidated by being reprimanded by such an illustrious officer, nonetheless calculated that his Nazi Party connections would get him out of trouble once back in port. He thus tried to justify himself while staying polite and respectful, even though he already knew that his justification would sound paper-thin.

‘’Herr Kapitän, that ship could have been a tanker, which are designated as high priority targets. The Führer also said at rallies and meetings with Kriegsmarine officers that we should not show mercy to enemy sailors, in order to discourage others from enlisting in the British or American navies. I was just following the spirit of the directives from our Führer.’’

Otto jumped up to his feet at once, furious on hearing that, and pointed at the Grand Cross of the Iron Cross, suspended from his neck by its black and white ribbon.

‘’You see this, Oberleutnant Adenauer? It was awarded to me on the order of the Führer himself, so don’t start pushing political arguments here! I gave clear orders and directives, which you then ignored and tried to impose yourself on my crew, even though you knew that you are on this boat strictly as an observer. You are from now on to stay out of the way of my crew and will refrain from giving any further orders. As for you eventually getting command of a submarine, forget it! After Admiral Dönitz gets the message I am going to send to him about your actions, you will be able to count yourself lucky to be put in charge of even a tugboat in the future. Dismissed!’’ With blood rushing to his brain and nearly hyperventilating, Adenauer pivoted on the spot and walked stiffly out of Otto’s small work office, escorted still by Herman Spielberger.

16:52 (London Time)

Wednesday, January 27, 1943

Prime Minister’s office, 10 Downing Street

London, England

 

31 Stabsbootsmann: Kriegsmarine senior NCO rank equivalent to that of a British or American Chief Petty Officer First Class.

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Winston Churchill didn’t like the expressions on the faces of his top naval commanders, who had come with Churchill’s military secretary, Lieutenant General Hastings Ismay, as he greeted them into his office and offered them seats.

‘’So, to what do I owe your visit, gentlemen?’’

‘’To the situation concerning our convoys in the North Atlantic, Mister Prime Minister.’’ answered the First Sea Lord, Admiral Dudley Pound, as he sat down besides Vice-admiral Sir Max Horton, Commander Western Approaches and Admiral Sir John Tovey, Commander of the Home Fleet. ‘’Another convoy from New York, the HX-224, has been savaged and nearly completely destroyed off Newfoundland last night. Part of the bad news is that, on top of having 54 merchant ships sunk, we also lost all eight warships of the escort force. This thus makes it the fourth convoy in a row to have its escort ships sunk to the last and those losses in escort ships are becoming critical.’’ His expression hardening, Churchill went to sit in a padded easy chair facing the sofa occupied by his visitors, while General Ismay kept standing beside the sofa.

‘’I suppose that we can thank again that damn U-800 for this latest disaster, Admiral?’’

‘’Only partly, Mister Prime Minister. While Vice Admiral Horton strongly suspects that the U-800 was involved with most if not all of the torpedoing of our escort ships, there are definitely other U-Boats working in concert with it. Max?’’ Max Horton took the opening offered by Pound and exposed his theories to a grim Churchill.

‘’Mister Prime Minister, I believe that the Germans have adopted since the start of the year a new tactic to hit at our convoys. Basically, the U-800, with its superior performances underwater and its heavy armament, takes the lead and locates our convoys for a wolf pack of German submarines waiting at a distance. It then trails our targeted convoy and systematically sinks the warships of the escort force while sending regular position updates by radio to the other submarines. Once the escort force is eliminated, the U-800 then calls in the other submarines for the slaughter. I regret to have to tell you that this tactic has unfortunately proved very effective for the Germans, Mister Prime Minister. As for us, our recent losses in escort ships are simply proving to be unsustainable. Yes, we and the Americans can produce escort ships relatively quickly and in sizeable numbers, but the critical factor is the training and formation of replacement crews for those ships, which takes many months at a minimum. In turn, that training can’t be shortened without hurting to an unacceptable degree the

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competence and efficiency of the crews of our escort ships, something that would only make the job of those German submarines easier. The only thing that is helping us presently is the contribution of our long-range maritime patrol aircraft, which are impeding German submarines operations…when the weather allows them to fly. Unfortunately, this Winter is proving to be exceptionally bad over the North Atlantic area, while thick fog is all too common around the Grand Banks of Newfoundland, where our convoys were decimated.’’

‘’Correct me if I’m wrong, Sir Horton, but fog cuts both ways, while I am not aware that German submarines possess radar. Such bad weather should actually help our convoys to evade submarines, no?’’

‘’I would normally answer yes to that, Mister Prime Minister, but there is a notable exception to that: the U-800. From the intelligence we have gathered on it up to now, we assess that the U-800 has a search radar, on top of having a very effective hydrophone system that can detect our convoys from dozens of miles away. Besides, it is only a matter of time before the Germans learn from the example given by the U-800 and start equipping their other submarines with radar sets. As for the hydrophone sets installed on other German submarines, we know from a U-Boat we captured in 1941 that those sets are very sensitive compared to our own sets and have much longer detection ranges than we first thought. Even without the U-800, other U-Boats still could detect and trail convoys, especially if the escort ships have been already eliminated.’’

‘’So, what are you saying exactly, Sir Horton?’’

Horton braced himself before delivering his opinion, which was bound to make Churchill furious.

‘’That, at our present loss rate in both escort ships and merchant ships, our convoy system is becoming ineffective and that it is presently only succeeding in presenting large, dense groups of targets to German submarines. We are already having a hard time finding replacement escort ships for our convoys, while the Americans have flatly stated that they are concentrating their assets in the Pacific and along their own coasts, leaving us basically alone in the North Atlantic.’’ As expected, Churchill slammed a fist on the armrest of his chair, fuming.

‘’BLOODY HELL! THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE! THERE MUST BE A WAY TO COUNTER THOSE DAMN GERMAN SUBMARINES!’’

That was when Sir John Tovey decided to jump into the conversation, using a tone of voice which told Churchill that he firmly believed in what he was saying.

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‘’Mister Prime Minister, I believe that we already are doing the best we can in the present circumstances. Please remember that we lost last Summer the ability to read

the German ENIGMA32 traffic when they changed their coding system. We still can’t

decipher the new German codes and our ULTRA33 program has been basically useless for months now. Also, Admiral Dönitz apparently changed radically his command and control habits at the same time and is now sending much fewer messages to his submarines at sea than before, something that hurt our capacity to find submarines via radio direction-finding. All that means that we can’t find out anymore where the German U-Boats are waiting for our convoys and can’t reroute our ships to avoid those submarines. As for our escort ships, the very heavy losses we suffered lately has compelled me to let go an appreciable portion of the destroyers I was using to screen my heavy units, so that they could fill the holes in our escort forces. However, I am now at the point where I can’t spare any more destroyers for our escort forces without severely endangering my heavy units when they effect sorties or go on patrol. We have now reached a breaking point, Mister Prime Minister.’’

Churchill looked in turn at his three admirals while munching furiously on his cigar.

‘’And what do you propose that we do then, gentlemen?’’

‘’That we abandon the convoy system and let our merchant ships proceed as free-runners between the Canadian coast and Great Britain, Mister Prime Minister.’’ answered Horton. ‘’We simply don’t have the escort ships needed to ensure the safety of convoys anymore, while convoys are only making it easier for German submarines to find plenty of targets for their torpedoes. Just this month, we lost over 700,000 tons of supplies, sunk to the bottom by German submarines, along with 25 escort warships and 133 merchant ships. And that is not mentioning the disastrous effect on the morale of our merchantmen that those heavy losses are causing. Under a free-runner scheme, we will still lose quite a few ships, but I believe that a good portion of them will be able to evade German submarines through sheer numbers and dispersion.’’

‘’I would agree with Vice Admiral Horton on that, Mister Prime Minister.’’ added Sir John Tovey. ‘’Right now, with our convoys being systematically decimated during the last few weeks and with tanker ships being especially targeted by German submarines, our strategic reserves of fuel in Great Britain have lowered to alarming levels. Another

32 Enigma: Name of the encryption machine used by the Germans during WW2 to encode high level radio traffic.

33 Ultra: Name of top secret British program dedicated to deciphering the German Enigma traffic.

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month or so of such a massacre and the country will face possible starvation, while both my ships and the aircraft fleets of the R.A.F. will run out of fuel to operate at other than minimal levels. If we ever get to that point, Mister Prime Minister, then we will basically be forced to negotiate peace with the Germans, or see our nation starve in the dark of Winter.’’

Churchill was left speechless for a moment as he digested those words.

‘’Surely, things can’t be that bad, Admiral Tovey.’’

‘’They are, Mister Prime Minister. The only reason we have been able to stay in the fight this long was because of the massive logistical and military aid provided to us by the United States. Now that the Americans have their hands full in the Pacific and decided to shift their priorities and assets away from the North Atlantic, we have to find a way to continue fighting without relying on massive supplies and fuel shipments from the United States. Personally, I believe that no such way exists, Mister Prime Minister. Only a very few tanker ships from the Middle East have been able to run the gauntlet of German submarines picketing the western side of the Strait of Gibraltar, while a lone tanker ship from the United States managed to arrive intact this month. We simply can’t fight without massive amounts of fuel and we are just not getting that needed fuel anymore. It is as simple as that.’’

Churchill lowered his head in discouragement.

‘’I can’t believe that we have arrived at that point, Admiral. Can’t we send our tanker ships from the Middle East around Africa, to avoid the submarines blockading the Strait of Gibraltar?’’

‘’We could, but it won’t work, Mister Prime Minister.’’ answered Dudley Pound. ‘’Apart from the fact that such a detour will add weeks of travel for our merchant ships and cost a lot more fuel, the German submarine picket line is deployed in a way that also covers the northward approaches from South Africa. As for using a mid-Atlantic route from the Cape of Good Hope, most of our merchant ships don’t have the autonomy for such a long detour. It is basically the same problem that we are encountering in going around the Cape Horn, down in the South Atlantic.’’

Faced with such arguments, Churchill tried a last delaying tactic.

‘’I see! However, I want to first contact President Roosevelt, to see if he can recommit more of the American Navy to the protection of our convoys. If that fails, then we will discuss this subject again. Thank you for coming, gentlemen.’’

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Not convinced that Churchill had accepted or even understood their arguments, the three admirals got up from their sofa and left the office after a last handshake with the Prime Minister.

22:19 (Paris Time)

Wednesday, February 3, 1943

Keroman I submarine bunker complex

Lorient, coast of Brittany

France

Otto Kretschmer crossed onto the quay of the submarine pen the moment that a gangway had been put in place, going to meet the rear admiral commanding the Keroman I complex. Stopping in front of him and saluting him, Otto then spoke in an urgent tone, going straight to the point.

‘’I am going to stay in Lorient only long enough to replenish my submarine in torpedoes, fuel and fresh foodstuff, Herr Admiral. I thus request your help into speeding up that process as much as possible.’’

The rear admiral, who knew better than pissing off needlessly Admiral Dönitz’ favorite submarine commander, nodded his head at once.

‘’My men will assist you to the utmost, Kapitän Kretschmer. Just provide a list of your needs to me and I will make sure that they are fulfilled at once. While you are here, you will be pleased to learn that a bag of personal mail is here for you and your crew. I will have it delivered within the hour.’’

‘’Thank you, Herr Admiral!’’

‘’So, how fruitful was your last patrol, Kretschmer?’’

‘’Quite fruitful, Herr Admiral. The U-801, U-172, U-130 and U-155 did a great job in supporting and backing up my U-800. Together, we sank over 150 ships…and we are not finished yet! I need to go back on station off Newfoundland as quickly as possible, so that I can help the pack to continue hunting down the convoys off the Canadian coast and the Grand Banks.’’

‘’Over 150 ships sunk!? Then I will be most pleased to help you return quickly to sea, Kapitän Kretschmer.’’

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23:40 (Paris Time)

Crew quarters of the U-800

At quay inside the Keroman I submarine bunker complex

Dieter Hannig sat down wearily on his bunk, a pair of letters in his hands. Since it would take a few hours for the personnel of the base to assemble and bring to quayside the supplies and torpedoes needed by the U-800, Kretschmer had told his crew to go rest for a few hours before starting the exhausting job of bringing those supplies and torpedoes inside the submarine. At the same time, he had the bag of mail destined for his U-800 opened and its content distributed, to the joy of the crew. Hannig now had two letters sent from his family in Munich. Opening the first one and eagerly reading it, he saw that it had been sent by his mother and that it told him how things were in Munich and how the family restaurant was doing. Once he had finished that letter, he put it aside and opened the second one. That letter had been written by his father and had been sent two weeks after the one sent by his mother. Reading it, Hannig suddenly had tears coming out of his eyes, while his hands started shaking. The boat’s baker and assistant cook, Gustav Bouhler, who used the bunk above Hannig’s bunk, noticed that and spoke up, worry in his voice.

‘’Is everything okay, Dieter?’’

With a big lump in his throat, Hannig was not able to speak at first and shook his head.

‘’N…no! My younger brother, Klaus: he was killed in Russia three weeks ago.’’ Bouhler did not dare ask more questions then, as Dieter broke out crying quietly, the letter from his father still in his hands.