Altered States -Volume III. Hinge of Fate

Chapter 21

“Well gentlemen,” said Vice Admiral John Cunningham, “it appears we have a battle on our hands.” He was one of two Admirals bearing that name, and framing British operations in the Med like a pair of strong bookends. His namesake, Admiral Andrew Browne Cunningham, known as “ABC” in the officer corps, was commanding operations in the Eastern Mediterranean.

A navigator by training, John Cunningham had served in the Battlecruiser Squadron aboard both Renown and Hood in that capacity, and went on to become commander of the Fleet Navigator School. So he could read a map and compass, and knew the position noted in the signal he just received was very close to his present location. But he was no stranger to battle. Before moving up in the ranks he had commanded the same ship he was on at that moment, HMS Resolution, and was glad to be back aboard with his feet planted firmly on the rolling metal decks of a good battleship.

He looked over his shoulder, seeing the distant silhouette of the aircraft carrier Glorious, which he had ordered to fall off and maneuver out of the battle zone. Vice Admiral Cunningham’s fate had been strangely entwined with that ship, and the man that now commanded the carrier, Captain Christopher Wells. It was Wells who had sent that message into his hands as Cunningham led the cruiser Devonshire south in the evacuation of Norway: “W/T from Glorious — Most Immediate — Two battlecruisers, bearing 308° — 15 miles, course 030.”

The two battlecruisers then had been the German ships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, intent on making a fiery end to the hapless carrier. At that time, Devonshire had been charged with the mission to safely transport King Haakon and the Norwegian Royal Family, and a considerable store of gold bullion as well. Cunningham knew the message would become troublesome, because he also knew he could not answer that plaintive call for help. He had every copy collected, and took charge of the ship’s log books, discretely, and he was very lucky that Glorious had somehow managed to escape on her own.

Now he had just been handed another message that was eerily similar-again from Wells aboard HMS Glorious: “W/T from Glorious — Most Immediate — Air search confirms two battleships, two cruisers, four destroyers, Bearing 015° — 20 miles, course 280.”

Two battleships, thought Cunningham, and well attended, even as I am here. He noted his old command, HMS Devonshire was in the van, followed by the Cumberland. The cruisers Australia and Delhi had been detached to keep watch on the troop convoy far to the south, but he also had five destroyers in hand, Faulknor, Foresight, Forester, Fortun e and Fury. So it was to be an even match, ship to ship, and he had every hope he would come off the better.

“Ahead two thirds and come to 310. Flag Officer will signal all ships to follow.”

“Aye sir, ahead two-thirds and coming to 310.”

“Signal all destroyers to take position ahead and prepare for torpedo runs.”

Cunningham was going to take his squadron northwest, emerging from behind the long isthmus of Dakar and hope to catch his enemy on their present course, and by so doing cross their T. Unfortunately, that would not really matter much to the French. Their bigger ships were front heavy with firepower, with sixteen 15-inch guns that would have good forward arcs of fire. Their ships were built to hunt and chase down ships like the Graf Spee and Admiral Scheer, and to be able to bring tremendous fire power on them even as they pursued.

With two twin turrets forward, and two more aft on each of the British battleships, the French would outgun the British two to one in any nose to nose face off. So Cunningham knew he had to show the French his broadside, offering them the big silhouettes of his battleships in order to even up the gun duel, and turning broadside the French would only get stronger when the after quadruple turret on Normandie could be brought into action.

In ordering ahead two thirds, Cunningham’s squadron would make only 18 knots. Full out, his battleships could give him another six knots, but he was soon to learn that the younger legs of his adversary would also pose a great challenge. The French had yet another advantage in the action that was now unfolding-speed. Cunningham was waddling up at 18 knots, like a proper English gentleman with his walking stick or cane, intending to give his foe a good poke in the belly when he got in range. For their part, every ship in the French squadron could make 30 knots or better. Led by Le Fantasque and her sister Le Terrible, their large destroyers, could run at an astounding top speed of 45 knots, and cruise easily at 40 knots for sustained periods with moderate fuel expenditure. They were, in fact, the fastest destroyers ever built in any era, and at 434 feet they were a hundred feet longer than the British destroyers, and better armed.

The large destroyer L’Audacieux was well named that day, leading on the right flank of the French formation. It began to put on speed, making a bold charge as the British formation came into sight. In its wake came the light cruiser George Leygues followed by Montcalm, fast capable ships at a little over 9100 tons full load, with three triple turrets housing 6-inch guns. They had sighted the oncoming British destroyers, which had raced up at their best speed, and a fast paced gun and torpedo duel ensued, with the experience and skill of the British destroyer captains really shining.

The British fired their first torpedoes directly into the intended paths of the oncoming French ships, and a 21 inch lance off the destroyer Fury struck George Leygues full on her port side as it swerved in an unsuccessful attempt to dodge the deadly spread. Then the British destroyers wheeled to port, running parallel to the French as they continued to launch torpedoes, their deck guns blazing away at the fast French destroyer in the lead.

George Leygues continued on for some time, her gun crews bravely firing until the list due to the flooding below the waterline became impossible to counterbalance. The light cruiser made a vain attempt to turn about, but foundered, keeling over to port and slowly sinking as the crews scrambled to abandon ship.

Hit by three 4.7 inch rounds with a fire near her forward turret, L’Audacieux swerved hard to starboard to avoid yet another run of torpedoes off the British destroyer Fortune, and put on amazing speed as one threatened her from behind, literally leaving the torpedo in her wake. The turn send her racing right across the bow of the oncoming French battleships where she sought to find and join the three other French destroyers that had led in that main column.

The last ship from the French left, the light cruiser Montcalm, ran on past the foundering wreck of George Leygues and right into the skilled 8-inch gunfire of the British heavy cruisers. Devonshire and Cumberland were out in front, and ready for action when they saw Blue Five raised by HMS Resolution, the Squadron Flagship, well behind them. Montcalm bravely ran due west for a time, trading salvos with the bigger cruisers until two good hits convinced her captain that he was overmatched and outgunned. The light cruiser made a hard turn to starboard, coming around to turn north and cross the bow of the French battleships just as L’Audacieux had done. Her fires being too serious, and threatening a forward magazine, the ship then turned northeast and was out of the fight.

The opening rounds had gone to the far more experienced and capable seamanship and gunnery of the Royal Navy, but the bell was now ringing for the main event.

Captain Marzin aboard the battleship Richelieu shook his head as he watched the demise of the screening forces to his left. As Montcalm scurried across his bow and turned away, he decided it was time to roll up his sleeves and enter the fray. He had spotted the tall, proud mainmasts of the two British battleships, still steaming almost due north, and he knew he had the speed to cross their T by turning due west. The range was over 18,000 meters, but the two heavy cruisers that had bullied the light cruiser Montcalm were much closer. He decided to see if they wanted to stay in the fight when faced with a real adversary, and ordered his big forward turrets to train on the Cumberland.

The 15-in guns of the Richelieu blasted away, the whole of her main battery deployed forward on those two quadruple turrets. The first rounds were over, but surprisingly tight in their pattern of fall. With a projectile weight of just under 2000 pounds, only the Italian 15-inch guns had more muzzle velocity, though their shell casings were not as reliable as the French rounds, and the powder bags were inconsistently packed. The British 15-inch/42 caliber guns on Resolution and Barham were proven designs in two wars, but had a much lower muzzle velocity and range than the guns on Richelieu. All told, the French would claim they had the best 15-inch gun then in service, and few might have argued with that when they saw the result of the third salvo that found the Cumberland, straddling her severely with one of the four rounds striking home amidships in a thundering roar.

The two British cruisers were now the ones outgunned, though they stayed in the fight, and Devonshire scored a hit on Richelieu’s forward deck with an 8-inch round. The superb deck armor on the French battleship, 6.7 inches thick where the shell hit near the B turret, was enough to shrug off the hit, and the blast effect from the shell barely bothered the 16.9 inch face armor on the quadruple turret. A second 15-inch shell put Cumberland’s aft Y turret out of action two minutes later, and it was only the imminent arrival of the bigger British battleships that prompted Captain Marzin to hand off his fire on the British cruisers to his secondary batteries while the bigger guns retrained to face HMS Resolution.

Now the main event was in full swing, with Vice Admiral Cunningham immediately coming thirty points to port so he could bring his two aft turrets in to the engagement. Opening salvoes from Resolution were well aimed, but long, and Barham’s first warning rounds were off the mark as well. For a short time the British enjoyed a brief advantage, double teaming against Richelieu and outgunning her two to one. In that duel it was Resolution who found the range before any other ship, and put a 15-inch round right on Richelieu’s belt armor, just below the water line, at about 15,000 meters. The round did damage, but did not fully penetrate. It was stopped by a special inner lining between the armor and inner hull, with a rubber substance the French called “Bourrage.” Should fragments penetrate the armor, this water exclusion material was designed to reduce the likelihood of flooding, a system unique to modern French battleship design.

Richelieu’s fire control systems also proved to be very good that day, and Resolution suffered a good hit aft, and another on her side armor, which was just a little tapered off and thinning at that point to only 152mm. The ship was penetrated, with the shells close enough to the aft magazine that the resulting fire there forced Cunningham to order it flooded, limiting Y turret to only ready ammo on hand.

Then came the thundering roar of all twelve 15-inch guns of the Normandie. The ship had been trailing about 2000 meters behind Richelieu, and had now completed its turn to bring all three of its quadruple turrets to bear on Barham. The barrage was only short 200 meters, a frothing comb of tall white geysers surging up from the sea in tight patterns of four. Barham answered with her eight 15-inch guns and the duel was on.

For the next ten minutes the battleships ran on a mostly westerly course, parallel to one another and firing for all they were worth. On her fourth salvo the aft turret of Normandie was lucky enough to put two of her four 15-inch rounds into Barham. One fell amidships, just behind the ship’s single funnel, where it smashed the cranes and catapult for seaplane launches. The second fell right on the armored roof of the X turret, and blasted clean through the thinner 5 inch armor there, with a tremendous secondary explosion when rounds and powder bags being lifted from the magazine below went off.

The turret was nearly ripped from its housing, badly askew, the barbette exposed and blackened by the raging fire. Both barrels were canted down onto the deck, and every man within thirty yards of the hit was dead in an instant.

Vice Admiral Cunningham heard the bellowing explosion, and turned his field glasses aft, seeing the tall column of think black smoke rising above Barham.

“That doesn’t look good,” he said quietly to Captain Oliver Bevir, who had been with the ship since late 1939.

“Hell of a good knock from the look of it,” said Bevir, but the roar of Resolution’s guns pulled his attention back to the fate of his own ship. He could see that the Richelieu had put on speed, and though he had ordered all ahead full battle speed, Resolution was laboring to make 22 knots full out, and the French bettered that by eight knots. The range had closed to under 10,000 meters but the French ships were pulling ahead, and they might soon get into a very good position to turn fifteen or twenty points to port and cross the British T.

It was then that the inexperience and undue ardor of the French fast destroyers on that flank caused a bit of a faux pas that spared the British heavy ships further damage for the moment. The three destroyers led by Le Fantasque came cutting across the bow of Richelieu again, running at their amazing top speed that was approaching 45 knots. Le Terrible and Le Malin followed, and behind them L’Audacieux had joined this group, which was now attempting to make a high speed torpedo attack.

Devonshire and Cumberland had both wisely come to port, crossing ahead of the British battleships and then turning south away from the torpedoes in a big hook. The bigger battleships labored on for some minutes as Cunningham gaped at the speed of the French ships, their long sleek hulls gleaming behind frothing bows. Amazingly, the destroyers had begun to make smoke as they made their approach, which obscured the whole region between the bigger ships and imposed a halt on that main gun action.

“Damn impudent!” said Cunningham, then he quickly ordered a fifteen turn to port, getting Resolution on a heading to avoid the first spread of enemy torpedoes. Barham, however, was unable to follow suit. The fire aft from the severe hit she had taken was threatening several boiler rooms, and her speed had fallen off to 17 knots. The French destroyers had broken up the fight just when their battleships were getting the better of it, but now they paid for that ill timed maneuver by getting a hit. A 21.7 inch torpedo struck home, shaking the old battleship Barham yet again.

Cunningham saw the hit amidships, a worried expression on his face now, replacing the cool confidence he had displayed for the first time. “I think we’d better hear from Captain Cooke about that,” he said in a low voice, and Captain Bevir gave a discrete order to have a signal sent requesting Barham’s status.

When next sighted, the French battleships had unaccountably turned ten points to starboard, and to Cunningham’s eye they appeared to be breaking off. He led his squadron into yet another fifteen point turn to port, running about 210 for a time, and then thought the better of his situation and came around to 150 on course away from the French battleships. Devonshire and Cumberland saw the maneuver and matched it smartly, and it appeared the action was concluding, though they continued to fire at a pair of French heavy cruisers, Foch and Algiere, that had been behind the line of the bigger battleships.

Admiral Plancon saw the British turn, half angered, and half impressed by the brave charge of the four destroyers, and so he ordered Richelieu to come thirty points to port, intending to continue the battle at longer range. Now one other advantage of the new 15-inch guns on the French battleships came into play-their tremendous range. They could elevate to fling their big rounds out an astounding 45,000 yards in testing, though no one thought they would ever hit anything at such a range. After Cunningham’s final turn the range had opened to about 18,000 meters again, but when the French gunners re-sighted the British battleships they began to pour it on again from all twenty 15-inch guns.

And they were getting hits.