1939
SEPTEMBER
1939
British
Home
Fleet submarines on patrol off southwest
Norway suffered their first casualty in
tragic circumstances. "OXLEY"
was
torpedoed in error by
"Triton" and went down off Obrestad on
the
10th.
NOVEMBER
1939
Russo-Finnish
War
- Negotiations on border changes
and control of
islands in the Gulf of Finland broke
down and Russia
invaded on the 30th. The war dragged on
to March 1940
with fatal consequences for Norway.
Merchant
Shipping
War - The first HN/ON convoys
sailed between
the Firth of Forth and Norway in
November covered by the Home Fleet. The
convoys were discontinued in April 1940.
1940
JANUARY
1940
Western
Europe
- German plans for a Western
offensive
(Operation 'Gelb') were postponed.
Planning went ahead
for the invasion of Norway
under codename 'Weserubung'.
FEBRUARY
1940
The
“Altmark” Incident - "Altmark"
was “Graf
Spee's” supply ship with Merchant Navy
prisoners
aboard. She took refuge in Jossingfiord,
within Norwegian territorial waters. On
the evening
of the 16th, destroyer “Cossack” (Capt
Vian)
went alongside with a boarding party and
after a short
struggle released the prisoners.
Russo-Finnish
War -
Britain and France plan to send aid to
Finland. This
would allow them to occupy Narvik in
northern Norway and cut back Swedish
iron ore
supplies to Germany.
MARCH
1940
Battle
of the Atlantic - There was a
lull in the Battle of
the Atlantic as U-boats were withdrawn
for the Norwegian campaign, and before
surface
raiders started operations and
long-range aircraft and
U-boats emerged from bases in France and
Norway.
Russo-Finnish
War
- Conclusion - A peace treaty on
the 13th brought
the war to a close, with Finland ceding
the disputed
territory to the Soviet Union.
Norway
-
Later in the month, and in spite of
abandoning plans to
help Finland, Britain and France decided
to disrupt
Swedish iron ore traffic to Germany by
mining Norwegian waters (Operation
'Wilfred'). Plans
were also made to land troops in Norway,
from south to north, at
Stavanger, Bergen, Trondheim and Narvik
to forestall any
German retaliation (Operation 'R4). The
entire operation
was timed for 8th April.
APRIL
1940
“U-50” on
patrol off the Shetlands in
support of the Norwegian
invasion, was sunk by destroyer “Hero”
on the
10th.
Faeroe
Islands - On
the 13th April, following the German
invasion of Norway,
an advance guard of Royal Marines was
landed on the
Faeroe Islands, northwest of the
Shetland Islands with
the eventual agreement of the Danish
Governor.
Norwegian Campaign
3rd -
The first
German troop transports sailed for
Norway.
7th -
German
covering and troop carrying warships
headed for Norway
8th -
Operation 'Wilfred' - Royal
Navy destroyers laid simulated and real
minefields at
three points off the Norwegian coast
between Stadtlandet
and Bodo. Battlecruiser “Renown” and
other
destroyers provided cover. One of the
screen,
“GLOWWORM” (Lt-Cdr
Roope) was detached to search for a man
overboard just as
8in-gunned cruiser “Admiral Hipper”
headed into
Trondheim. They met to the northwest of
the port and the
destroyer was soon sunk, but not before
she rammed and
damaged “Hipper”. + Lt-Cdr Gerard Roope
RN was posthumously
awarded the Victoria Cross.
7th-8th
- In
response to reported German movements,
units of the Home
Fleet including “Rodney”, “Valiant”,
“Repulse”, four cruisers and 14
destroyers
sailed from Scapa Flow and Rosyth.
Accompanying them was
a French cruiser and two destroyers. Two
more British
cruisers and nine destroyers left other
duties and headed
for Norwegian waters. Next day, on the
8th, they were
joined by the four troop-carrying
cruisers of Operation
'R4', but after the soldiers had
been disembarked
back in Britain. More than 20
submarines, including three
French and one Polish took up positions.
9th -
Germany invaded Denmark and Norway
(Operation
'Weserubung'):
Copenhagen was soon occupied and DENMARK
surrendered. In
Norway, troops landed at Oslo,
Kristiansand and Bergen in
the south, Trondheim in the centre and
Narvik in the
north. The southern forces and those
from Trondheim
pushed inland and joined up by the end
of the month. They
then moved north to relieve Narvik,
which was isolated by
the Allies soon after the first German
landings.
German Navy
forces
included a pocket battleship, six
cruisers and 14
destroyers for the landings at the five
Norwegian ports,
with battlecruisers “Scharnhorst” and
“Gneisenau” covering the two most
northerly
landings. Thirty U-boats patrolled off
Norway and British
bases, but throughout the campaign they
suffered from
major torpedo defects.
Early in the
morning of
the 9th, battlecruiser “Renown” was in
action
with the two German battlecruisers to
the west of
Vestfiord. “Gneisenau”
was
damaged
and “Renown” slightly. The Germans
withdrew. As
“Renown” was in action, German
occupation
forces heading for Oslo came under heavy
fire from
Norwegian coastal defences. Shore-sited
guns and
torpedoes in Oslo Fiord sank heavy
cruiser
“BLUCHER”. A
Home Fleet cruiser force was detached to
attack the
German warships in Bergen, but ordered
to withdraw. They
come under continuous air attack and
destroyer “GURKHA”
was
bombed
and sunk southwest of Bergen.
That evening, German cruiser “KARLSRUHE”
left
Kristiansand
and was torpedoed by
submarine “Truant”. She was scuttled
next day.
10th -
First Battle of Narvik - The 2nd
Destroyer Flotilla (Capt.
Warburton-Lee) with “Hardy”,
“Havock”, “Hostile”,
“Hotspur” and “Hunter”, entered
Ofotfiord to attack the German ships
assigned to the
occupation of Narvik. These included 10
large destroyers.
Several transports were sunk together
with destroyers “ANTON
SCHMITT”
(AS)
and “WILHELM HEIDKAMP”
(WM)
in Narvik Bay.
Other German destroyers were
damaged, but as the British 2nd Flotilla
retired, “HARDY”
was
beached, “HUNTER” sunk and “Hotspur”
badly damaged by the remaining
German ships . + Capt Bernard
Warburton-Lee RN was
posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross.
By
the
10th, the British Home Fleet was
reinforced by battleship
“Warspite” and carrier “Furious”. On
the same day submarine “THISTLE” on
patrol off Utsira failed in an
attack on “U-4”. Shortly after she was
sunk by
the same U-boat. Fleet Air Arm Skua
dive-bomber’s of
800 and 803 Squadrons flying from the
Orkney Islands sank
German cruiser "KOENIGSBERG" at her
moorings in Bergen. She was damaged
earlier by shore batteries in the
landings. This was the
first major warship sunk by air attack.
11th -
Returning
from the Oslo landings, German pocket
battleship “Lutzow”
was torpedoed
and badly damaged by
submarine “Spearfish” in the Skagerrak.
Cruiser
“Penelope”
on her way into Narvik was damaged
running aground in
Vestfiord.
13th
- Second Battle of Narvik - Battleship
“Warspite” and
nine destroyers were sent into the
Narvik fiords to
finish off the remaining German ships.
Submarine “U-64”
was surprised and sunk
by “Warspite's” Swordfish catapult
aircraft as
it scouted ahead. The eight surviving
German destroyers
– “BERND
VON ARNIM” (BA), “DIETHER VON
ROEDER” (DR), “ERICH GIESE” (EG),
“ERICH KOELNNER” (EK), “GEORG
THIELE” (GT), “HANS LUDEMANN”
(HL),
“HERMANN KUNNE” (HK) and
“WOLFGANG ZENKER” (WZ)
were
all
destroyed or
scuttled. The British “Eskimo” and
“Cossack”
were
damaged.
By the 13th, the first
British troop convoys had left the
Scottish Clyde for
Narvik, but some ships were diverted to
Namsos. German
forces were well-established in the
south and centre of
Norway and had control of the air.
14th -
Submarine “TARPON” on patrol off
southern Norway was
sunk by German minesweeper “M-6”. German
gunnery training ship “BRUMMER”
was
torpedoed and
sunk by submarine
“Sterlet”.
14th-16th
- The
first Allied landings took place between
the 14th and
16th. In the north, British troops
occupied Harstad in
preparation for an attack on Narvik.
They were reinforced
by French and Polish units through into
May. Royal
Marines led British and French troops
into Namsos ready
for an attack south towards Trondheim.
The British went
ashore in the Andalsnes area to try to
hold central
Norway with the Norwegian Army. Neither
of these
operations proved possible and on the
27th April the
decision was taken to pull out of
central Norway.
15th -
As the
Harstad-bound troopships approached
their destination,
escorting destroyers “Brazen” and
“Fearless” located and sank “U-49”.
Southwest of Stavanger, “U-1” went
to the
bottom after striking a mine.
17th -
Heavy
cruiser “Suffolk” bombarded
installations at Stavanger, but on
her return was badly damaged by Ju-88
bombers and barely
made Scapa Flow with her stern awash.
18th -
Four days
after sinking the “Brummer”, “STERLET”
was
presumed
sunk in the
Skagerrak by German anti-submarine
trawlers
24th -
After four
days continuous AA duty off Andalsnes,
cruiser “Curacoa”
was
badly
damaged by bombs. Carrier
“Glorious” flew off obsolescent
Gladiator
biplanes for shore operations.
27th -
Allied plans
to attack towards Trondheim and hold
central Norway
proved impossible. The decision was
taken to pull out of
central Norway and the evacuation of
Andalsnes and Namsos
got under way.
30th -
Sloop “BITTERN”
was
sunk
by Ju-87 dive-bombers off
Namsos.
MAY
1940
Norwegian
Campaign - continued
2nd/3rd
- In three days and nights the last
10,000 British and
French troops were evacuated from Namsos
and around
Andalsnes following the failure to
attack towards
Trondheim and hold central Norway. Other
troops were
later landed further north, including at
Bodo in an
attempt to block the German advance from
Trondheim
towards Narvik. The Allies continued to
build up forces
for the attack on Narvik. + Lt-Cdr
Richard Stannard RNR,
commanding officer of HM trawler Arab of
the 15th
Anti-Submarine Striking Force, was
awarded the Victoria Cross for gallantry
under air attack
during operations off Namsos.
3rd
-
Retiring northwest from Namsos,
destroyers “AFRIDI” and the French
“BISON” were
sunk
by Ju-87 Stuka dive-bombers.
4th
-
As preparations continued in northern
Norway for the
attack on Narvik, Polish destroyer
“GROM”
was bombed
and sunk.
5th
-
Submarine “SEAL” successfully laid mines
in the southern
Kattegat on the 4th before being damaged
by a German
mine. Trying to make for neutral Sweden
on the surface,
she was attacked and captured off The
Skaw by German air
and sea patrols.
17th
-
Cruiser
“EFFINGHAM”
ran aground on an uncharted rock in
Vestfiord carrying
troops to Bodo to help block the German
advance on
Narvik. She was later torpedoed and
abandoned.
23rd
-
By now carriers “Furious” and
“Glorious” had flown ashore the first
modern
RAF fighters.
24th
-
The Allies decided to pull out of Norway
altogether, but
not before Narvik was captured and the
port installations
destroyed.
26th
-
During the attack on Narvik, AA cruiser
“CURLEW”
was
bombed
and sunk in nearby Lavang
Fjord.
28th
-
Two days after the loss of sister ship
“Curlew”, “Cairo”
was badly
damaged off the town of Narvik
just as French and Polish troops
completed its capture.
The Norwegian Campaign shortly drew to a
close.
Britain -
Following
a 10th May House of Commons debate on
the Norwegian
campaign, Prime Minister Neville
Chamberlain resigned and
Winston Churchill assumed leadership.
Albert V. Alexander
succeeded him as First Lord of the
Admiralty. The planned
attack on Narvik would still go ahead,
but that same day
the German Blitzkrieg on Holland,
Belgium and France was
launched.
JUNE
1940
Battle
of the Atlantic -
The Allied loss of Norway
brought German warships and U-boats many
hundreds of
miles closer to the Atlantic convoy
routes and in time
within close range of the Russian
convoys that followed
the June 1941 German invasion. Britain's
blockade line
from the Orkneys to southern Norway was
simply
outflanked. Within a matter of days the
first U-boats
were sailing from the Norwegian port of
Bergen.
4th-8th
- Norwegian Campaign - It's Conclusion
...... Following the capture of
Narvik,
Allied forces totalling 25,000 men were
evacuated in four
days from northern Norway, by which time
King Haakon VII
and his Government were on their way to
Britain aboard
heavy cruiser “Devonshire”.
8th
-
At the end of the evacuation, fleet
carrier “GLORIOUS” and escorting
destroyers “ACASTA” and “ARDENT” sailed
for
Britain independently of the
other withdrawing forces. West of
Lofoten Islands they
met the 11in gun battlecruisers
“Scharnhorst”
and “Gneisenau” sailing to attack
suspected
Allied shipping off Harstad. The British
ships were soon
overwhelmed and sunk, but not before
“Acasta”
hit “Scharnhorst” with a torpedo. Few of
the Royal
Navy crews survived.
Allied
submarines working
with the Royal Navy continued to play a
part in
operations off Norway and had their
share of losses. On
the last day of the campaign the Polish
“ORZEL” on passage to her patrol area
and
made famous after escaping from invaded
Poland, was
presumed mined. Another Allied boat was
lost twelve days
later.
9th-20th
..... and Immediate
Aftermath - The surviving
Norwegian troops
surrendered to the German Army and the
Norwegian Campaign
was over. NORWAY and
its people were not liberated until
after the German
surrender in May 1945. During that time,
many Norwegians
escape to fight with the Allies,
resistance movements
grew in effectiveness, and large German
forces were held
down there at Hitler’s command in case
the Allies
invaded. Naval losses on both sides were
heavy, and in
the case of the Germans included damage
to battlecruiser
"Scharnhorst" (followed shortly by
"Gneisenau") and pocket battleship
"Lutzow".
|
Warship
types
|
Royal
Navy
|
Allied
Navies
|
German
Navy
|
| Carriers
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
| Cruisers
|
2
|
-
|
3
|
| Destroyers
|
7
|
2
|
10
|
| Submarines
|
4
|
1
|
4
|
|
Totals
|
14
|
3
|
17
|
13th -
Five days after the sinking of
“Glorious”,
aircraft from “Ark Royal” attacked the
damaged
“Scharnhorst” in Trondheim but to little
effect.
20th -
Dutch
submarine “O-13” also on passage to her
Norwegian patrol area
was torpedoed in error by Polish “Wilk”.
More
recent research suggests she was more
likely sunk 13 June
1940 in a German minefield in 56-55N,
-03-40E.
20th -
As the
damaged battlecruiser “Scharnhorst”
headed for
Germany, “Gneisenau” feinted towards
Iceland. West of Trondheim
she was torpedoed and damaged by British
submarine
“Clyde”. Both battlecruisers were out of
action
during the critical phases of the Battle
for Britain
until the end of the year.
German
Warships -
By now, of the 23 surface ships of
destroyer size and
above that took part in the invasion of
Norway, 17 had
been sunk or damaged.
JULY
1940
British
Home
Fleet submarines carried out patrols off
the coast of
southwest Norway, but with heavy losses
in July. Late on
the 5th, "SHARK"
was
badly
damaged by German aircraft and
next morning on the 6th scuttled off
Skudenses.
As
the
damaged "Gneisenau" made for Germany
from
Norway, submarine "Swordfish" carried
out an
attack on the 26th and sank escorting
torpedo boat "LUCHS".
AUGUST
1940
Submarine
"NARWHAL"
was
paid
off on the 1st. After leaving
the English east coast Humber Estuary on
22nd July for a
minelaying mission off Norway, she
failed to return.
OCTOBER
1940
Battle
of the Atlantic - Focke-Wulf
Kondor bombers continued
to range the waters off Ireland. The
Luftwaffe's
long-range aircraft were now flying from
bases in Norway as well as France.
1941
MARCH 1941
Lofoten
Islands Raid - A successful
Combined
Operations commando raid was carried out
on the Lofoten
Islands, off northwest Norway with
installations
destroyed and shipping sunk. Escort was
provided by
destroyers and cover by units of the
Home Fleet. In the
raid, spare rotors for German Enigma
coding machines were
found - another piece in the British
Ultra code-breaking
puzzle.
APRIL
1941
German
Aircraft Attacks - In April 1941,
aircraft sank 116
ships of 323,000 tons, the highest rate
for any month of
the whole war. This were partly due to
the long-range
aircraft operating off Ireland from
bases in France and Norway.
MAY
1941
Hunt
for the "Bismarck" - On the 18th
new German 15in
battleship "Bismarck" and heavy cruiser
"Prinz Eugen" sailed from Gdynia in the
Baltic
for the Atlantic. On the evening of the
21st they were
sighted in a fiord south of Bergen,
Norway. Next day they were reported at
sea. Within a matter of days British
battlecruiser
"Hood" as well as "Bismarck" had been
destroyed
JUNE
1941
Pocket
battleship
"Lutzow" attempted to break out into the
Atlantic.
Attacked on the 13th off the Norwegian
coast by an RAF Beaufort, she was hit by
one torpedo and only just made it back
to Germany.
Russian
Convoys (map above) - The
invasion of Russia soon led to
the introduction of the Russian or
Arctic convoys with
their dreadful conditions and after some
months had
elapsed, high losses in men and ships.
However, the Royal
Navy's presence in the Arctic was first
made known in
August when submarines started
operating, with some
success, against German shipping
supporting the Axis
attack from Norway
towards Murmansk. The port was never
captured. Conditions
with the Russian convoys were at the
very least
difficult. Both summer and winter routes
were close to
good German bases in Norway from which
U-boats, aircraft
and surface ships could operate.
DECEMBER
1941
Lofoten
& Vaagso Raids - Separate
commando raids took
place in northern
Norway
on
the Lofoten Islands and further south on
Vaagso Island.
The aim was to destroy installations and
sank and capture
shipping. The first force was led by
cruiser
“Arethusa” with limited results. The
second
with cruiser “Kenya” was more
successful.
1942
FEBRUARY
1942
German
Surface
Warships - Pocket battleship
"Admiral
Scheer" and heavy cruiser
"Prinz
Eugen"
sailed to
join
"Tirpitz" in Norway. Off Trondheim on
the 23rd, submarine
"Trident" torpedoed and heavily damaged
"Prinz
Eugen"
MARCH
1942
German
Surface
Warships
-
By
now German battleship "Tirpitz",
the ship that dictated Royal Navy
policies in northern
waters for so long, had been joined in
Norway by pocket battleship "Admiral
Scheer".
MAY
1942
German
Surface
Warships - In addition to aircraft
and
U-boats, the Germans now had "Tirpitz",
"Admiral Scheer", "Lutzow",
"Hipper" and nearly a dozen big
destroyers at
Narvik and Trondheim, Norway. With by
now continuous daylight throughout
the journey, the Admiralty pressed for
the Russian
convoys to be discontinued until the
days shorten. For
political reasons they went ahead.
JULY
1942
Destruction
of Russian Convoy PQ17 - The
British Admiralty believed the
Germans were concentrating their heavy
ships in northern Norway. In fact pocket
battleship
"Lutzow" had run aground off Narvik, but
this
still left battleship "Tirpitz", pocket
battleship "Admiral Scheer" and heavy
cruiser
"Admiral Hipper" - all formidable
adversaries,
which reached Altenfiord on the 3rd.
Sailing on the 5th,
they did not took part in any of the
convoy sinkings.
SEPTEMBER
1942
Russian
Convoy PQ18 and Return QP14 -
Submarines patrolled off the
Norwegian Lofoten Islands and northern
Norway.
OCTOBER
1942
Attack
on "Tirpitz" - The German
battleship posed such
a threat to Russian convoys and held
down so much of Home
Fleet's strength that almost any
measures to immobilise
her were justified. One gallant attempt
was made in
October 1942 when a small Norwegian
fishing vessel "Arthur",
penetrated to within a few miles of the
battleship in
Trondheimfiord with Chariot human
torpedoes slung underneath. Just short
of the
target they broke away and the operation
failed.
DECEMBER
1942
Battle
of the Barents Sea & Russian
Convoys JW51A and JW51B - By now
"Tirpitz", pocket
battleship "Lutzow", heavy cruiser
"Admiral Hipper", light cruisers
"Koln" and "Nurnberg" and a number of
5in and 5.9in gun destroyers were in
Norwegian waters. The Admiralty assumed
they
were for attacks on Russian convoys. In
fact, they were
in Norway because of Hitler's invasion
fears.
1943
FEBRUARY
1943
"U"-class
submarine
"UREDD" of the Royal Norwegian Navy was
sunk off Norway on the
24th.
APRIL
1943
Submarine
"Tuna"
on Norwegian Arctic patrol sank "U-644"
northwest of Narvik, Norway on the 7th.
JUNE
1943
Northern
Transit Area -
In the waters through which
Norwegian-based U-boats had to sail for
their patrol
areas, two submarines were sunk.
Submarine
"Truculent" on anti-U-boat patrol
between
Norway and Iceland sank "U-308" north of
the Faeroe Islands on the
4th. A RAF Fortress accounted for
"U-417" in the same northern transit
area
on the 11th.
JULY
1943
After
six
months effort the bombing campaign
against U-boat bases
claimed its first success on the 24th
when "U-622"
was badly damaged in a
USAAF raid on Trondheim, Norway and paid
off.
SEPTEMBER
1943
Attack
on "Tirpitz" - Now it was the turn
of midget submarines to attack
battleship
"Tirpitz". These were the
X-craft
each
with two 2-ton saddle charges.
Six left for northern Norway towed by
'S' or 'T' class submarines. Two
were lost on passage, but on the 20th
off Altenfiord,
"X-5", "X-6" and "X-7" set
out to attack "Tirpitz" and "X-10"
for the "Scharnhorst". "X-5" was
lost and
"X-10" was unable to attack, but "X-6"
(Lt Cameron) and "X-7" (Lt Place)
penetrated the defences
to reach "Tirpitz" laying in Kaafiord at
the
far end of Altenfiord. Both dropped
their charges under
or near the battleship before they sank
and some of their
crews escaped. "Tirpitz" managed to
shift her position slightly, but
not enough to avoid damage when the
charges went up. She
was out of action for six months. Lt
Donald Cameron RNR
and Lt Basil Place RN were awarded the
Victoria Cross.
OCTOBER
1943
Attacks
on Shipping - Covered by
battleships
"Anson" and "Duke of York" and other
units of the Home Fleet, US carrier
"Ranger"
launched air attacks against shipping
off Bodo, northern Norway on the 4th.
Four ships were sunk
and others damaged.
1944
FEBRUARY
1944
Norway
- Norwegian resistance fighters sank a
cargo
of heavy water bound for Germany for
nuclear research.
MARCH
1944
British
submarine
"SYRTIS"
was
lost on Norwegian patrol. After sinking
a small ship
off Bodo a few days before, she was sunk
in the
minefields flanking the port on the
28th.
APRIL
1944
Attack
on "Tirpitz"- The damage inflicted
by midget
submarines on "Tirpitz" in September
1943 was
nearly repaired and the Admiralty
decided to launch a Fleet Air Arm
attack. On the 30th March, Adm
Fraser left Scapa Flow with battleships
"Duke of
York" and "Anson", fleet carriers
"Victorious" and the old "Furious",
escort carriers "Emperor", "Fencer",
"Pursuer" and "Searcher", cruisers
and destroyers, split into two forces,
and headed north,
partly to cover Russian Convoy JW58. By
the 2nd
the two forces had joined up 120 miles
off Altenfiord and
early next morning on the 3rd,
two waves each of
20 Barracuda bombers with fighter cover
surprised "Tirpitz" at anchor. A total
of 14 hits were
made, but the damage was not serious.
However, the
battleship was out of action for another
three months.
Home Fleet was back in Scapa on the 6th.
A similar
operation was attempted later in the
month, but bad
weather prevented any attacks. Instead,
a German convoy
was found in the area and three ships
sunk. The weather
again saved "Tirpitz" from two sorties
in May
1944, but the fleet and escort carrier
aircraft did
manage to sink several more merchant
ships at these and
other times during the month.
Norwegian
submarine "Ula" working
with the Home Fleet flotillas and on
patrol off
Stavanger, SW Norway sank "U-974" on the
19th.
MAY
1944
Russian
Convoys - Return Russian convoy
RA59 was
attacked by U-boats to the northwest of
Norway. One ship
was lost, but in return the Swordfish of
842 Squadron
from "Fencer" sank three with depth
charges - "U-277" on the 1st and "U-674"
and "U-959" next day.
Battle
of the Atlantic - RAF Coastal
Command and one of its
Norwegian squadrons were particularly
successful between the 16th and 27th
against the U-boats
passing through the Northern Transit
Area off south and
west Norway. In the space of 12 days,
"U-240", "U-241", "U-476", "U-675",
"U-990" and "U-292" were sunk.
JUNE
1944
Battle
of the Atlantic - U-boats
continued to suffer badly
at the hands of the aircraft of the
Northern Transit Area
patrol. Throughout the month, seven were
sunk and one
severely damaged by RAF, RCAF and
Norwegian aircraft.
AUGUST
1944
As
most of
the U-boats evacuate the French Biscay
bases and headed
for Norway, frigate "Louis" on
patrol off St Nazaire sank "U-445" on
the 24th.
SEPTEMBER
1944
Attack
on "Tirpitz" - Now it was RAF
Bomber Command's turn to hit at
battleship
"Tirpitz" in
Altenfiord in the far north of Norway.
Flying in difficult conditions
from Russian bases near Archangel on the
15th, the
Lancasters managed to get one hit in
spite of the usual
smokescreens. Partly because of the
damage, the
battleship was moved south to Tromso.
OCTOBER
1944
Outward
bound
from Norway, "U-1006" was located by the
patrolling 6th EG
south of the Faeroes and sunk by
Canadian frigate
"Annan" on the 16th.
During
Home
Fleet operations against German shipping
off Norway, aircraft of 1771 Squadron
from
fleet carrier "Implacable" drove
"U-1060" ashore near Namsos on the 27th.
She was finished off two days later by
aircraft of Nos
311 (Czech) and 502 Squadrons RAF.
Earlier in the month
four more U-boats were lost in RAF raids
on Bergen and
another three by accident in Norwegian
waters.
Eastern
Front - In the Arctic, the
Russians started a
series of attacks and amphibious hops
which by the end of
the month had driven the Germans back
from the Murmansk
area just over the border into Norway.
The Russians, now joined by
Norwegian troops, came to a halt.
NOVEMBER
1944
Destruction
of "Tirpitz" - The damaged
"TIRPITZ"
was finally destroyed
on the 12th as she lay at anchor off
Tromso, Norway. Lancasters of Nos 9 and
617
(Dambuster) Squadrons, RAF Bomber
Command using 12,000lb bombs put paid to
the ship that had tied down the Home
Fleet for so long.
After several hits and near misses by
bombs weighing over
5 tons each, she turned turtle trapping
nearly 1,000 men
inside
On
passage
out to the North Atlantic, "U-322"
was
sunk
west of the Shetlands on the
25th by a Norwegian Sunderland
flying boat of No 330 Squadron and
patrolling frigate
"Ascension".
DECEMBER
1944
In
Norwegian waters one U-boat was lost in
a
RAF raid and another by collision off
the Lofoten
Islands.
1945
FEBRUARY
1945
Submarine
"Venturer"
on patrol off Bergen, Norway torpedoed
and sank "U-864" on the 9th. Two more
U-boats were
lost off Norway, one by accident and the
other mined.
APRIL
1945
Home
Fleet
submarines gained another success when
"Tapir"
sank outward-bound "U-486" off Bergen,
Norway on the 12th.
MAY
1945
End
of the U-boats - Right to the end
of the war there
was no let-up in the struggle against
the U-boats,
especially faced with the threat from
the new and
dangerous Types XXI and XXIII. Between
the 2nd and 6th,
23 U-boats of all types were destroyed
by the Typhoons,
Beaufighters, Mosquitoes and Liberators
of the RAF and
Allied Tactical Air Forces. As the
German fighter
defences crumbled, Allied aircraft
roamed the Kattegat
and nearby waters catching many of the
U-boats in the
Baltic or sailing for Norway.
4th
-
A Royal Navy task force consisting of
escort carriers
"Queen", "Searcher" and
"Trumpeter" with cruisers and destroyers
and
under the command of Vice-Adm R. R.
McGrigor returning
from Murmansk, launched strikes against
shipping off Norway, and "U-711" was
sunk near Narvik.
7th
-
West of Bergen, a RAF Catalina of No 210
Squadron on
Northern Transit Area patrol destroyed
"U-320", the very last U-boat casualty.
