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Hood vs Bismarck: Battle of the Denmark Strait (Part 4)
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- [00:02]
Al Murray
Thank you for listening to we have ways of making you talk. Sign up to our Patreon to receive bonus content, live streams and our weekly newsletter with money off books and museum visits as well. Plus early access to all live show tickets. That's patreon.com we haveways. We made ready to pick up hundreds of injured and wounded men from the grey cold sea. We could not turn out our boats. They were smashed by an earlier storm. Hanging in the davits, blankets, medical supplies, hot beverages and rum were got ready. Scrambling nets were flung over the ship's side trailing into the water. Men were lining the side ready with hand lines, eyes straining into the grayness ahead. It was only what seemed like a matter of minutes when we broke out of a mismatch into the clearance. And there it was. Wreckage of all descriptions was floating on the surface. Hammocks, broken rafts, boots, clothes, caps. Of the hundreds of men we expected to see there was no sign. An awestruck moment and a shipmate next to me exclaimed good Lord, she's gone. With all hands we nosed our way slowly amongst all the pitiful remains of books, letters, photos and other personal effects floating by. And that was Jack Taylor of HMS Elektra describing the aftermath of the Battle of the Denmark Straits. Welcome to. We have ways to make you talk with me Al Murray and James Holland where the Hood and The Bismarck episode 4 Now Jim, which means. Well the last episode was the. Was the minute by minute build up to battle.
- [01:46]
James Holland
It's so far gonna be fairly minute by minute to be fair.
- [01:48]
Al Murray
Yes, exactly. After the morning, after half past five on the morning of Saturday 24th May 1941 the epic encount between the most famous battleship in the world and the other most famous battleship in the world the Hood versus the Bismarck and accompanying supporting players. But this is the. This is a clash of Nelsonian proportion.
- [02:13]
James Holland
Well and we left, we left the last episode, didn't we? At 5:37am with Holland giving the signals. Prepare to fire. We're now two minutes further on. It's 5.39am on Saturday 24th May 1941 and we're back on the Bismarck. An Admiral Gunter Lutjens is about to have another sigh because he's very shocked to realize he's up against the Hood which means he's going to have to fight. He might have his orders to kind of avoid it but he doesn't got any choice in the matter. So he orders his two warships to alter course to maintain the range and so turns to starboard on a new course of 280 degrees. This, he hopes, will give him a bit more time to sort of go, okay, right, what's the situation here exactly? Who's attacking him? And slow down the rate of closure, which is exactly what Admiral Holland does not want to do. He wants to get in as close as possible as quickly as possible. So 5:44am On Hood, the distance is called out at 14 miles. And at 5:46am Holland turns his two ships 40 degrees again towards the enemy, that is to 300 degrees in an effort to maintain his interception. Yeah, so what this means is that although the Hood and the Prince of Wales are presenting a much narrower target, it also means they're still going to be prevented from using their rear guns.
- [03:40]
Al Murray
Although they have superior firepower, they can't use it all. So you have the paradox of the Hood being a bigger and nastier prospect in terms of its gunnery, but she can't use all of it immediately. You're fighting with your arm behind your back.
- [03:54]
James Holland
Right, so what's the thinking here?
- [03:56]
Al Murray
Well, he wants to close faster and reduce the window of opportunity, the zone of vulnerability for the plunging indirect fire from Bismarck. Because after all, he knows his decks aren't as strongly armoured as they might be. And he knows actually that even with an armoured deck, plunging fire is extremely, extremely difficult to do anything about. A battleship is extremely vulnerable to that. And he wants to get in closer and then turn to a parallel course so he can fire his broadside, bring all of his guns to bear. But, but in order to do that, there, there is this gap, isn't there.
- [04:29]
James Holland
The zone of vulnerability, until you get to the zone of invulnerability. And it's a, it's a, the zone of vulnerability is, is actually quite a small zone. I mean, you know, it's, it's not long when you're traveling at 28 knots. Yeah.
- [04:44]
Al Murray
But it's there nonetheless. I do rather like the idea of having a zone of invulnerability. Maybe that's something I should work on, is having my own personal zone of inv. But this is all to do with the thickness of side armor, the thinness of the top armor. Extreme ranges with your guns at extreme elevation, you're, you're lobbing the shells. So they drop in basically at great, great velocity as well. It's the other thing.
- [05:05]
James Holland
So they're coming down at high art, so they're, they're plunging at a kind of sort of 40 to 45 degrees. That's, that's basically the point.
- [05:11]
Al Murray
And they can hit the ship, miss the side armor. They can, they can get into its soft parts. Basically. This is understood by everyone. This is why Holland is doing what he's doing is because he knows about this. It's not some thing of the moment. The Abertier are keenly aware of this, which is why he's doing what he's doing.
- [05:28]
James Holland
But it's worth, I think, just, just reminding people how you go from the zone of invulnerability to the zone of vulnerability. Because as you close, so the trajectory is flatter. It's not coming in at 40, 45 degrees, it's coming in at kind of not quite horizontal but a much flatter arc. So as it hits the deck it's, it's less, it's less likely to penetrate deeply. Might even skim off it. Yeah, you know, so it's, it's a think. Think of it like a sort of skimming pebble.
- [05:55]
Al Murray
We had shells bouncing in the last episode.
- [05:57]
James Holland
Yeah, we did, didn't we? Across the bridge of the.
- [05:59]
Al Murray
Over the bridge of the Norfolk. Yeah, exactly. Over the open bridge of the Norfolk because she hadn't been modernized, had she? So it's 5:52am, the range is now 25,000 yards. That's 12 miles. And at this moment Captain Carr on the hood gives the order, open fire.
- [06:13]
James Holland
It's done with minimum amount of fuss.
- [06:15]
Al Murray
This is extremely unfussy shoot given the size of these guns, the understatement of it.
- [06:20]
James Holland
Well, you have, between the open fire and shoot orders, you have this little, little moment, you have this rather ridiculous clang of the fire gong tinkling across, which is the warning that the shooting's about to, about to happen. So there is literally just a sort of, you know, a half a second or two while everyone waits with bated breath for the guns to fire. And you know, when the guns blast, the blast of it knocks men almost senseless. Huge thick clouds of acrid cordite. Yeah, baby. And cordite burns off very dark smoke so it sort of envelops the ship and four shells, each weighing one ton, hurtle out of the muzzles at 1600 miles an hour. I mean, the whole ship rocks backwards with the recoil.
- [07:04]
Al Murray
Well, I suspect she, she slows down momentarily for a couple of knots, you know, with the, with the force of the guns firing. And then the Prince of Wales fires as well. Esmond Knight is deafened by a crash of the forward turrets. And then moments later, Bismarck replies, this is one of these things, isn't it? The sound the sound can't go any like as quickly as the sight of the guns 12 miles away. So you get this orange ripple on.
- [07:31]
James Holland
Sea on the distance you see the.
- [07:33]
Al Murray
Ripples and the sound is to follow. And it's a 50 second gap, isn't it between the shells leaving and the shells arriving. So you've got time to count, you've got time to anticipate, you've got time to want to crawl up inside yourself. I mean it's all, yeah, it's all there, isn't it? You see the orange and then you count 50 seconds and they're, and they're counting the seconds. They're literally counting the seconds.
- [07:57]
James Holland
And in the final seconds you hear it, you can hear it coming. People always say it sort of sounds like a train coming towards you or sort of ripping of fabric. It's sort of, you know, it's sort of just this sort of huge force of kinetic energy sort of hurtling towards you. A ton of steel just tearing the sky open.
- [08:15]
Al Murray
And what they're doing is they're tracking these shots, they're looking at whether, where they fall. The gunnery officer then tries to correct and he's got to calculate in motion of the ship changing range. These are complex calculations aren't they that they're engaged in. This is much more difficult than static gunnery say by an artillery battery on the, on, on land. You know this isn't like putting in a stonk. This is, this is much more complex.
- [08:39]
James Holland
It's really difficult to hit. It's really difficult to hit.
- [08:41]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [08:42]
James Holland
You know it just is. On the bridge of the Prinz Eugen, you know a petty officer sounds absolutely terrifying. He goes, he's fired. And Captain Brinkmann says keep guard ma'.
- [08:51]
Al Murray
Am.
- [08:51]
James Holland
Of course he's fired. Now let's see what comes of it. Suddenly moments later there's a sucking of air and great geysers erupt all around the Prinz Eugen. Holland is intending on firing at Bismarck but he assumes the battleship would be ahead and hasn't realized that the Prinz Eugen has taken the lead overnight because of the DIS radar on the Bismarck. And of course you know that distance is very hard to tell one from the other. You know they both got very similar superstructures and particularly German warships. They're all built on a similar design. So although they have different functions and different scales, the proportions are all kind of pretty much the same and it just, you can't really tell, you know. And it's just worth reminding that Holland's plan had been to catch Them unawares at night with the sunset hiding them and with all the advantages. But it hasn't worked out. Then they would have had 18 guns against eight but now they have 10 guns against eight and about to be reduced to nine because one of the Prince of Wales two forward gun turrets developed a defect after the first salvo.
- [09:52]
Al Murray
Yeah. With the lads from Vickers on hand, you know, going oh no, now what?
- [09:57]
James Holland
Yeah but you're not going to change that in a minute, are you?
- [09:59]
Al Murray
No you're not.
- [10:02]
James Holland
We can sort it out but yeah, it's going to take a little while.
- [10:05]
Al Murray
Yeah. And in response to this Bismarck and Prinzor are both firing at the Hood. They're not confused about what they're doing and haven't picked the wrong, haven't picked the wrong target. And this gives them their gunnery an advantage. So not only have they even the odds for themselves but they're also, they're firing on the right, on the right ship. And the British are sailing into the wind. So the Germans have what's called the weather gauge. The British are sailing into the wind so their range finding equipment is being drenched by sea spray and interfered with small margins. So it's these margins, the margins are all coming into play here, aren't they?
- [10:46]
James Holland
And in the speed of the changing and the changing of all the courses that Bismarck has been doing and Prinz Eugen have been doing and all the excitement and the closing in and all the rest of it. Holland hasn't issued orders to Norfolk and Suffolk to engage because suddenly the moment to attack has all happened very quickly. And I think he, to be honest, I think he just forgets. Yeah, I think he forgets to do it. But anyway, you know, that's the plan. I mean I can't think of another reason but, but, but they are not.
- [11:08]
Al Murray
Part of this battle and we can never know. Of course you know there's no war diary to look at here. You can only go, only go off what seemed to happen from, from kind of here on in. Right. And Hood's second salvo lands really close to Prinz Eugen. But Brinkman orders the helmsman to steer towards them because he's reasoning they're never going to fall in the same place twice these shells. So if we steer towards where the gun, where the guns fall we'll be all right, you know. And then Prinz Eugen's second salvo is much closer to the Hood and actually hits, strikes the Hood and there's jubilation on the Prinz Eugen and there's some worry on Norfolk who spots that the Hood has been hit. On the Hood's bridge a fire is reported which is a shell burst has gone off in the 4 inch anti aircraft ammo. Things are cooking off on the Hood. The crew start putting out the fire when a second and maybe a third shell strike killing some of the crew. In the aircraft hangar there's Able Seaman Tilburn who we will come to is struck by a part of a body on the back of the legs. This is the moment that Holland's really got to make a decision isn't it? So he does.
- [12:18]
James Holland
Yeah.
- [12:19]
Al Murray
And no matter the risk he knows he's got to get into a parallel course position for parallel course so he can fire broadside. The sailing. Sailing forwards with half his gunner at his disposal isn't going to deliver the result he needs. He's got to come in alongside the Bismarck. Captain Leech has also recognized the Bismarck so realizes they've been firing at the wrong ship and fires his subsequent salvos at Bismarck at the same time. At 5:54am Lutchen's orders are turned. So he's reading the battle just as effectively as anybody back to 200 degrees. So he will come across the top of the British warships rather than allow them to draw parallels. So they're like a T. So he's basically making sure that he maintains his advantage. So he's still firing broadsides and they can't. And so a minute later 555 Holland also orders his ships to turn to port to negate that effect that Lutyens has tried to bring about. And on the bridge of the Prince of Wales Chief Yeoman reports the latest signal from Hudser to blue. Turn 20 degrees to port together. So at last everyone's going to be able to deliver a broadside on on on both. Both of these ships. The two ships begin to turn at.
- [13:30]
James Holland
This moment as they're turning to get their first broadside in that Bismarck's next salvo hurtle towards Hood for the first fifth time. The officers on the bridge of Bismarck see Hood disappear behind a you know a wall of near misses and splashes. I don't think they've hit but then one of the shells doesn't hit the water but instead plunges onto her deck between the center and the stern. So this is behind the superstructure in the middle of the back. So three quarters of the way down the length of the. Of the. Of the ship. So it's come over the top and it's plunged down just as between the kind of third and Fourth quarters of the, of the ship. And this is at its moment of vulnerability, its zone of vulnerability, not its zone of invulnerability. So it goes straight down, penetrates below the waterline, goes through several decks, explodes, which then detonates an ammunition, you know, some big shells, which causes a massive counter explosion as it strikes more ammunition stores, which triggers an almost instant and massive subsequent explosion.
- [14:36]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [14:37]
James Holland
And the Germans and British alike who see this are absolutely incredulous to see this huge column of flame heap hundreds of feet up into the, into the, into the air from the, from the Hood center. It's like, it's like a. Yeah. One witness on Norfolk reckons it's four times higher than the Hood's main, main mast. Another reports that it nearly touched the sky. Esmond Knight reckoned it looked like a long, pale red tongue. And the flame is followed by a sort of mushroom shaped cloud of smoke, yellowish like the smoke from a gauss fire, someone calls it. And again, the explosion is seemingly soundless to those who see it, but suddenly, bits of hood hurtling through the air, including parts of a 15 inch gun turret. You think of the weight of that, the main mast and a main derrick. Esmond Knight thinks that the most famous ship in the world is blowing up like a huge Chinese Christmas cracker.
- [15:36]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [15:36]
James Holland
You cannot overstate the total shock. I mean, it's. Literally everyone who's watching is just going, what? Yeah. Oh, my God. What are we witnessing here?
- [15:47]
Al Murray
Yeah. On the Hood is signalman Ted Briggs. And he hears. And he's on the bridge. He hears orders to switch to emergency steering before the ship basically lurches sideways like a, like a collapsing house. And on the boat deck, we met Bob Tilburn a moment ago. Abel Seaman Bob Tilburn. He sees a man beside him killed, another's torn open by a splinter with his guts spewing out. Tilburn goes over to the side to be sick, but already the deck is level with the water. And he sees around him other people just carrying on, you know, watching dials, adjusting levers, as if it's not happening. Everyone's drilled to just carry on. After all, to witnesses, to the people seeing it from the other ships, they just don't. They literally don't believe it. The smoke clears to show Hood with a broken back and the bow on the stern pointing up towards the sky, split in the middle, and the two halves are sort of beginning to sink on their own. And the two forward turrets fire a last salvo because obviously the electronics are all fusing and go off. Or the short circuits or someone, someone shouts shoot because they're on autopilot, you know, you know in the chaos, whatever or whatever. And to the Germans it looks like a sort of final act of defiance for final shaking fist. Meanwhile, I mean Prince of Wales has to go harder starboard to avoid the wreckage.
- [17:07]
James Holland
Yes. And there's this, there's this incredible moment Al, where, where, where the two part halves of the hood are pointing upwards and the Prince of Wales goes in front of it. So it's just this totally surreal thing because it looks like the two parts of the hood are coming out of the top of, of the decks of the Prince of Wales. And it's just, you know, Ted Briggs is in the water desperately swimming away. He sees the hood pointing skyward, swims for his life, turns back and she's gone, just gone. It's all happened in minutes, Couple of minutes, yeah.
- [17:37]
Al Murray
Truly incredible. And there's a third man, midshipman Bill Dundas who's 18, who's escaped by climbing through a window on the bridge. Bob Tilburn gets away because he ditches his helmet, his duffel coat. But as he's swimming away a mast smacks down besides him, beside him and wires tangle his boot and he's dragged under and somehow he has the presence of mind to grab a knife, find his knife, cut his boot off and swim to the surface. All three find wreckage to cling to and then swim towards each other and hang onto each other.
- [18:05]
James Holland
Take a break.
- [18:05]
Al Murray
I think we have to take a break. I think we all need to cling onto the wreckage for a minute and then we'll return to the battle. We'll see in a tick. Welcome back to. We have ways of making you talk with me, Al Murray and James Holland. The Prince of Wales was steaming on hard behind the hood. It's all part of the drama here because the battle isn't over. Even as Bill, Bob and Ted hang on to the, you know, the wreckage they can grab on Steam's the battle. Bismarck fires another salvo at the Prince of Wales. Prince of Wales has fired a six salvo Bismarck and he sees that he has actually hit Bismarck. Although he straddled, he's bracketed her quite nicely but he's actually hit, hit the ship. Then a 15 inch shell goes clean through Prince of Wales's bridge and this is a mark of the fact that the ranges are closing, aren't they? So rather than it plunging, it's come in at enough of an angle to go clean through. It explodes as it exits, killing everyone. Except the captain himself and the chief yeoman of signals and the navigating officer who's wounded. The same shell almost kills Esmen Knight who had been packing his possessions away not that long ago. And he hears the shell coming like this great like sound of a rushing cyclone. And he's knocked unconscious and he wakes up, comes to with the weight of a dead man on him and screams and smell of blood. Get me out of here. He cries as loud as he could and he's pulled clear and he's been blinded in one eye in this strike. I mean this is, this is extraordinary isn't it? Because this battle it's gone down in a matter of 2, 3 minutes. This battle's only been going 12 minutes. All this drama.
- [19:41]
James Holland
Yeah. And it's after this shell that Captain Leitch pulls away.
- [19:43]
Al Murray
Yeah. I mean that's when he might, you.
- [19:45]
James Holland
Know, this is unequal. I'm out of here.
- [19:47]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [19:47]
James Holland
So she's been hit by four of Bismarck's shells and three of Prinz Eugen's. The compass platform, the echo sounding gear, radar office, aircraft recovery crane and four secondary armament directors all been wrecked. Some splinters that have blinded Esmond Knight have also splintered a hot water tank which pours water onto survivors, scalds them to death. 115 inch and 28 inch shells have hit the ship below the waterline letting in 400 tons of waters. So after firing 18 salvos the prince of Wales makes smoke and disengage southeast. And what you do making smoke you're trying to sort of hide yourself.
- [20:23]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [20:24]
James Holland
It is now 6:13am when the crews of Bismarck and Prinz Eugen are told that the Prince of Wales has broken off action. There's much cheering and shouting and in both ships a special issue of chocolate and cigarettes is issued. But Lutchen says signaled to Prinz Eugen to report hits and casualties and the reply is none. But in fact Hood had hit the Prinz Eugen. A giant fragment of shell was found at the base of her funnel which is you know in a way that Hood was incredibly unlucky. Prinz Eugen had been incredibly fortunate.
- [20:55]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [20:56]
James Holland
And Bismarck has received three hits. So one has caused damage on the main deck. The second struck amidships in the middle and penetrating the side beneath the armored belt and destroyed one of the dynamos, put number two boiler room and two boilers out of action, wounded five men and caused flooding. And the third which is the, the worst damage has struck the port bow. So this is at the front on the left hand side just about the level of the water line penetrating two oil tanks.
- [21:29]
Al Murray
No.
- [21:30]
James Holland
And come out the starboard side without exploding. So seawater is now coming in and contaminating the oil tanks, but also knocking out suction valves and cutting off a thousand tons of oil from the engines. Topping up in Korsfjord or the Weissen, whatever that shit was called, is starting to look like a big error.
- [21:49]
Al Murray
Always oil whatever you can. You know, I've always said that, James. I mean, I remember when we first met, I asked you if you oiled regularly and you said yes, I do oil regularly. I've.
- [21:57]
James Holland
Yeah. And you and I were very well oiled yesterday.
- [22:00]
Al Murray
One thing's interesting here, isn't it, is this gunnery. This gunnery is really difficult. 18 salvos fired by the Prince of Wales.
- [22:07]
James Holland
It's.
- [22:08]
Al Murray
It's hard. This is really, really hard. And also a lot of these shells aren't going off. There's a peculiar thing, isn't it, that shells striking ships and not exploding, going on through that. The extent to which this is a crapshoot that this is. That luck is such a factor that, you know, good fortune can come your way or not. The hood is unfortunate, as you point out. You know, Prinz Eugen is fortunate and the Bismarck in a way is fortunate because you know, had that shell that went through the oil tanks gone off in the oil tanks, you'd have a very different story, wouldn't you? You've had a proper oil fire on board and that'd be much more difficult to deal with than simply losing some fuel. It's just all so bloody difficult, isn't it? All of this. It's really hard.
- [22:49]
James Holland
Yeah, but make my own mistake. But Bismarck is in big. He's got big problems.
- [22:53]
Al Murray
Yes, I know, I know. And it could be worse.
- [22:55]
James Holland
So Captain Lindemann, who is the captain of the Bismarck, wants to finish off the Prince of Wales. There's Brinkman on the Prinz Eugen. There's Linman on the. But obviously Lutchens is overall in charge. But Lutchens just wants to get away. Get out of the Denmark Straits, get into the Atlantic asap. You know, he's. He's. He struck gold by getting the hood. Let's not kind of quit while we're.
- [23:16]
Al Murray
Ahead, I think is the expression.
- [23:17]
James Holland
But you know, from that, that hit at the port bow, they're now 2 to 3 degrees and a list to port of 9 degrees. And it means that the starboard prop is. The right hand propeller is starting to come out of the water and. And oil is still gushing into the sea. So a Reduction of speed is, is reduced not very, by very much. Only 28 knots. Right at that moment it's not quite clear how bad the situation is. It's not good but, but can the problems be caulked up? You know, can they be made good? Who knows at this stage? But you know you've got a problem on your hands. So Prinz Eugen is once more taking the lead and divers and engineers try to stop the damage on Bismarck. And after great difficulty made worse by the speed of travel, the divers do manage to make temporary repairs and pump out water. So the bows rise once more and it comes back onto a kind of. It stops listing but with one boiler room out and that's from the second shell. Max speed reduced, a trail of oil and loss of fuel. Bismarck can't, can't carry out the mission. That's over. Yeah, it's not going to engaging any merchant vessels now. What it really needs to do is head back with all speed to port for very urgent repairs. And their one functioning battleship is effectively now out of action. Yeah, and it can't go back to Germany because that would mean going back through the Denmark Straits which is canalizing it. So that's not going to happen. But it can go to San Nazair which is 600 miles further south than the distance they would have to go to go back to Trondheim. For example. In Norway it means further distance but you've got the safety valve of heading through wider, wider seas by going southwards into the Atlantic. But you've got a big problem.
- [24:57]
Al Murray
Yeah. So in a way, looking at this purely in terms of the Hood going down, it's so dramatic, it's so symbolic. But actually it's not a slam dunk win for the Kriegsmarine at all because actually their main battleship is lame now and vulnerable and their options have been written out of the story, haven't they? He has no choice now, Lutchens. You know, he could dither before he could decide which, which side of Iceland to sail through. He could, he could make some decisions. He had some agency, but he doesn't anymore. That's because actually, although he's destroyed the Hood, Prince of Wales and Hood have done for him is the truth.
- [25:38]
James Holland
Well put him in an extremely vulnerable position.
- [25:40]
Al Murray
Basically he's having to put his head into the noose anyway. The noose is deftly tightening around his neck now.
- [25:45]
James Holland
It's a bit like a bullfight. You know, you have the guys on the horses first with the little spears to sort of stab the bull and kind of, you know, make it weaker so that then the toreador can come in and finish it.
- [25:55]
Al Murray
Yeah. Yes. Our toreador is going to be a string bag, though, isn't it? That's the thing. Now we've three survivors. I mean, it's absolutely incredible that only three men make it. And they're on their makeshift rafts. Ted Briggs, Bill Dundas, Bob Tilburn. At the moment, Lutyens makes his mind up there and they're so soaking, they're freezing cold. Don't forget where we are. Briggs is starting to get hypotherbic and he's really struggling to hold on to the others. Eventually, they can't hang on any longer and they begin to drift apart. Briggs feels sleep over coming in, which is, you know, the hypothermia, isn't it, and urges the other two to sing and start singing, Roll out the Barrel and yelling at the other two to join him. I mean, dear God. I mean, this is desperate stuff. A Sunderland flying boat, because there are. There are aircraft. Watching this battle while it occurs is the other thing spotting the shot, just keeping keeping tabs on what's going on. Sunderland flies over, but doesn't spot them. Dundas suggests that they should tell the stories of how they managed to escape the Hood. But neither Briggs nor Tilburn have got the energy to keep going. Dundas tries singing again, but at this point, Briggs feels a sleepy mist come over him.
- [27:01]
James Holland
That's not good, is it?
- [27:02]
Al Murray
That is not good. Yeah. Well, we started the episode with Elektra, didn't we? Yeah. So meanwhile.
- [27:06]
James Holland
So Meanwhile, HMS Electra, which is one of the destroyers, surges forward to pick up survivors. You remember, they'd been up to the north a little bit, sweeping in case Bismarck's turned around or something. You know, they're expecting to find hundreds, but they see no one. And that's that, as you say, that's that quote from the. From the beginning, from one of the crew on the Electra. And it's now well after 9:00am, you know, so three hours since this happened and suddenly they hear shouts and it's Dundas. So, you know, Briggs and Tilburn have a lot to thank. Midshipman Dundas is aged only 18 four, I think, and they see the three men part but. But, but still clinging to their floats, and only Dundas has managed to sit up enough to be seen. So now all three men, you know, they sort of delve deep into their inner soul and strength and kind of managed to get some last bit of energy. And as Elektra Reaches Ted Briggs, a rope is thrown down to him and someone shouts down to him warning him to grab it and not let go. And he says, you bet your bloody life I won't. And all three are successfully pulled aboard and wrapped up in blankets and given rum. And you know, the Electra and the other destroyers continue searching for a while but they find nothing. And with a heavy heart we turned away as we could do no more noted Jack Taylor who was on the electorate and who was the person whose quote we started this episode with. So in all 1415 men including Admiral Lancelot Holland were killed. So that's 94 officers and 1321 ratings, you know. And it was and will remain the single worst loss of life for the Royal Navy in the war. 9am Just after 9 the search is called off and destroyers return to Iceland. And by this time Bismarck and Prinz Eugen are already 100 miles to the south. The Prince of Wales, Norfolk and Suffolk still doggedly in pursuit.
- [28:59]
Al Murray
It is absolutely staggering, isn't it that this thing that when ships go down you lose so many people. That's two battalions isn't it? Basically the loss of the Hood is announced. I mean it's interesting this, the news comes out pretty much straight away because there's no hiding. This is there because the Germans are going to crow about it. So there's an admiral to communique at 9 o' clock that evening. So 12 hours later at the end of the day, British naval forces intercepted early this morning off the coast of Greenland. German naval forces including the battleship Bismarck. The enemy were attacked and during the ensuing action HMS Hood, Captain R. Carr CBE RN, wearing the flag of Vice Admiral L.E. holland CB received an unlucky hit in the magazine and blew up. The Bismarck has received damage. The pursuit of the enemy continues. It is feared there will be few survivors from HMS Hood given everything we were talking about at the start of the last episode about what Hood represents, how she is a symbol as much as she is a battlefield.
- [29:54]
James Holland
It's devastating and it's devastating out of, to a degree that's out of all proportion to the loss of a single warship. I mean, I mean it feels like a piece of Britain has been ripped asunder. You know, it's just been, you know, people just cannot believe it. And it's not just in Britain, you know, it's in the Dominions. It's around, around her empire, you know, around the Commonwealth. It is, it is jaw dropping news. Yeah that, that a ship, you know, all those people that have seen it, they just can't believe what has happened. You know that sort of feeling you get when there's a terrible disaster, like a Malaysian Airlines flight disappears into the sea or something gets shot down and you just have that real shock, don't you? Yeah, it's kind of like that. And of course, the situation is made considerably worse by the fact that, you know, it's not going very well on Crete either.
- [30:44]
Al Murray
Yeah. And it's a year on from Dunkirk really. It's as if the bad news just hasn't stopped. It's a year since, since Dunkirk. Salvation of the bef. It's a disaster. Right. It must have felt like unrelenting bad news. And this is the kind of. For the navy now, you know, the army's been losing. The air Force has hung on in there.
- [31:05]
James Holland
Well, yeah, it's kind of one thing, isn't it, losing the army. Because that's the army and you know, we're always small, but the Navy, that's our pride. That's what, that's what we do really.
- [31:12]
Al Murray
Well, well, you remember when we talked about the Blitz, how we talked about, you know, the attack on London is like this blow to imperial prestige because London is the imperial center. It's of that category this, isn't it? It's in that bracket in terms of prestige and damage. And you know, that's a tough thing for the Admiralty admit to, admit, isn't it? You can imagine it was a very gray day there. We've, we've talked a lot about Nelson, you know, the ghost of Nelson. Obi Wan Kenobi, like, what would Nelson do? This is really why Holland got himself into this situation, isn't it? He chased battle in the way he did.
- [31:44]
James Holland
Yes. I mean, he's in this really good. He's in this really, really advantageous position. And then they lose contact with Bismarck and that, that's what absolutely froze everything. But his job absolutely is to engage the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen. That, that's his mission.
- [31:58]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [31:59]
James Holland
You know, and it is very much part of the DNA in the Royal Navy that to be aggressive and that you take, you take the shot and yes, it's a risk. Trafalgar is a risk. You know, the Battle of the Nile is a risk. Cape St. Vincent is a, is a, is a risk. But that's, that's factored in and they know they've got the, they've got the capacity to be able to lose, to take the risk. Because it's not going to be the end of the navy if they lose one of their ships. It's going to be a tragedy for all on board.
- [32:28]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [32:28]
James Holland
And that risk is sort of parceled in. And although the situation changes, he's trusting to superior gunnery and to the fact that the time. He's in the zone of vulnerability, you know, exposed to plunging shots. Yeah. You're weighing it all up, you know. You know, what's. What are the percentages of that happening? It's probably less than 5%.
- [32:48]
Al Murray
Yeah.
- [32:49]
James Holland
Steve Prince might. Might say I'm being a bit generous, but okay, you know, maybe 10%. But I mean, you know, those are still pretty good odds, you know. And the fact that it plunges where it plunges and detonates ammunition stores, that's just. That's just the rub of the green, you know, that's just. That's just unlucky. It might easily not have done in the same way that, you know, the shot didn't penetrate Prinz Eugen. It's just so. I think one shouldn't be too critical of Holland. That's my point. You know, he has received quite a lot of criticism. You know, why did he do this? He didn't have to all rest of it. But, you know, that is their job, you know, that's. That's what they're supposed to do.
- [33:28]
Al Murray
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's a calculated risk that didn't work out. It's the. Is the thing. Because sometimes they don't. Right. This is it. I mean, it's. It's a shocking. Absolutely shocking of the loss of life on Hood. But again, everyone. Everyone knows that that's the deal. Right. Don't they, actually? I mean, they could have cut further south and then turned more bow to bow. And they. They were trying to do that. And it was literally at the very moment when he was turning to port, echoing what Lutchins was doing.
- [33:56]
James Holland
The parallel.
- [33:56]
Al Murray
Yeah, that. Yeah. To get parallel that they were struck. You know, it's just. It's just. It's terrible.
- [34:02]
James Holland
But is that margin. It's that moment where we're actually. He's. He's sort of got the worst of both worlds because he can't bring their broadsides to bear. And nor are they presenting at that moment the minimum lateral target. You know, so it's just. And also, the two ships are only sort of about 800 yards apart, which is not very. You know, it's obviously. What's that? Sort of half a mile?
- [34:18]
Al Murray
Half a mile?
- [34:19]
James Holland
Yeah. This is sort of standard practice in the Admiralty fighting instructions, but in this situation offers, you know, Just for this moment doesn't offer a great advantage. You know the thinking behind it is if you're two ships close together you're effectively become one giant fighting machine. But, but obviously once Hood's been sunk it ensures that because they're close, Bismarck and Prinz Eugen can almost immediately shift to the Prince of Wales.
- [34:39]
Al Murray
They've got his range, they know where he is.
- [34:41]
James Holland
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah because it's almost the same position. Yeah but obviously they do that with near fatal consequences. But, but while Hood is unlucky, Prince of Wales is lucky and gets away with it. Yeah, we touched on the, the response around the world but, but needless to say the Germans absolutely crying. I mean, you know, yeah, Goebbels goes into full kind of PR mode on this one, sort of milking it for all it's worth. But again you're kind of slightly in danger of being hoisted by your own petard if you do that too hard. I mean the Germans are guilty time and time again of kind of over regging their aces and you know, their triumphs and then when they come a cropper it's all a bit kind of red faces all round, isn't it? You know.
- [35:21]
Al Murray
But the Bismarck is lame, limping on to try to get to dry dock and repair in France. And don't forget Force H is heading in that direction, isn't it? You know we dispatched Force H earlier.
- [35:36]
James Holland
And the KGV King George V with Tovey. That's coming into play, coming to play.
- [35:40]
Al Murray
And of course there's no guarantee that they're going to catch her but she is, she's lame. She's staggering on range of options and choices are being very, very much diminished.
- [35:51]
James Holland
Her range, yeah has been cut down because she didn't. Didn't oil.
- [35:55]
Al Murray
She didn't oil. Always oil. The moral of the story is always oil when you get the opportunity. Anyway, thanks everyone for listening. Join us in the second part of this series with the pursuit of the Bismarck into the Atlantic. I gotta say Jim, I'm really, really loving this run of Navy, Navy stories. Even though, even though I think, I think it's been very man manful of us to grasp a tragic story of, of Royal Naval defeat at the same time and do some bad news, do some bad news for the British which I mean every time I think about.
- [36:27]
James Holland
The Hood I'm just, I'm filled with a sense of regret. Oh God, it's just, it's been hard. But I tell you what I am excited about. I'm excited about writing this book I'm gonna be doing on the Atlantic with all this.
- [36:41]
Al Murray
Yeah. And well, and also, what fun. Also, join us for the second part of the series when you're gonna find out exactly with Bismarck gets its Just desserts.
- [36:48]
James Holland
And then we're gonna do a wash up episode, aren't we? We can talk about the belle of the Hood.
- [36:51]
Al Murray
Well, thanks for listening, everyone. Don't forget to become a Patreon where you can get all this ad free with extra stuff and officer class, of course, on the Apple podcast channel. We've mentioned the Ludovic Kennedy book a couple of times in this episode or in this series. If you do join the Patreon, then I've read the chapter relevant to the episode we've just done and it's the most fantastic, gripping prose that I read basically in one, in one breath because that's the only way to approach the text. And that's on the Patreon for you to listen to to get the eyewitness eyeballs on the event. Thanks for listening, everyone. Cheerio.
- [37:27]
James Holland
Cheerio.
- [37:30]
Al Murray
Sam.