The Battle of the North Cape - Ice and Fire at Sea

[Music] [Music] well when we left the Shan Horst last week she'd survived the channel - gotten herself repaired and headed up to Norway after this apart from incurring some storm damage shelling a mostly defensive Spitsbergen and discovering that wartime additions had increased her draught by half a meter and consequently decreased her speed by about a knot and a half not a lot had happened to the ship by the end of 1943 and with Tirpitz out of action thanks to the actions of British mid [ __ ] submarines Scharnhorst was the largest operational unit in the kriegsmarine at left still capable of sailing out to battle the Kriegsmarine itself however was not the happiest of organizations about a year earlier at the end of 1942 the heavy cruisers lützow and admiral hipper had sailed out to attack the Arctic Convoys and in what was known as the Battle of the barren sea not accomplished much beyond getting some of their own escort shot up Hitler had gone just a little bit apoplectic at this rather embarrassing failure and it was at that point that he'd ordered the entire surface fleet scrapped and resources devoted entirely to u-boats whilst this might have pleased some officers in the kriegsmarine the others did fight as hard as they could to keep the surface fleet in the end Hitler relented although this wasn't in time enough to save some ships like Nizer now but most of the surface fleet had been kept intact largely due to the fact that because they're all in Norway getting them back to Germany to be scrapped would have been his own logistics operation which would have required even more support from the Luftwaffe and other operational arms of the German military which by the early 1943 period Germany didn't really have they were a little bit busy with other things like the massive Russian Red Army coming in in an effort to slightly blunt the Red Army's offensive efforts the Luftwaffe and the Greeks Marine who had both been going after the Arctic Convoys as much as possible however during the summertime there weren't that many Arctic Convoys and to be honest if they had been the Germans wouldn't have gone after them too much either the Allies didn't tend to send them during the summer because the daylight hours that far north were incredibly long which meant they'd be exposed to attack from the air which was the main cause of our to convoy losses for an extended period of time and as far as the Germans were concerned because of the Allies ability to deploy superior numbers of surface ships and of course aircraft from aircraft carriers and in the extended daylight hours they would have as well extended periods of time to catch any German surface ships but as autumn turned into winter and darkness got longer and longer both sides concerns somewhat alleviated albeit that obviously in the middle of winter it was absolutely freezing cold and ice tended to build up all over the place on every ship involved whether that be merchant or navy so it had its own complications that everyone valued the cover of darkness against air assault so that leads us to the end of 1943 the convoys are starting up again in earnest and Admiral Donuts asks permission to attack them by the time permission was secured the targets would be convoys JW 55 be heading for Russia and are a 55 a which was heading back home just as a quick side note the outbound convoys were all codenamed a JW and then a number and the incoming convoys were the r a's the number designation always remained the same so are a 55 a had previously been JW 55 a and JW 55 B would eventually become our a 55 B I hope you kept up with that one anyway the Luftwaffe had found JW 55 B on the 22nd of December 1943 and on Christmas Day Shawn host was ordered to intercept under the command of contr Admiral Eric Bey the escort consisting of five Narvik class destroyers the convoy itself was covered by two destroyers and three Leiter escorts in close to guard against submarine attack with a nearby force of eight home fleet destroyers as backup which was a reasonable force Bert one that the Scharnhorst and her escorts could fairly confidently deal with if it was covered by the Luftwaffe since obviously the superior firepower of Shawn Horst may have been up against ass brother significant torpedo spread from the destroyers so Luftwaffe air support would be very useful breaking up such attacks if that attack went well are a 55 a had an almost identical escort except well they had a minesweeper with them for all good that would do JW 55 B was of course the much more lucrative and valuable target since it was a convoy full of supplies heading for Russia whereas our a 55 a was mostly empty ships heading back the loss of the ships from either convoy would hurt but the loss of the war materiel in a double 55b would hurt everybody on the other side a lot more however with the German capital units in Norway having very little else to do the commander of the home fleet at this point Admiral Sir Bruce a Frazer had realized that convoy raiding was probably on the cards and had planned a trap he was pretty sure that an artic convoy of some sort would be attacked by the Germans sooner or later and with JW 55a having passed safely he was now getting pretty certain that the Germans were going to take the bait with JW 55b when the combination of intelligence reports Norwegian resistance sightings and information from the convoy itself made it clear that the convoy was being shadowed by aircraft he put to sea with the king Georgia fifth glass battleship HMS Duke of York the cruiser HMS Jamaica 3s class destroyers of the Royal Navy and the stored another s-class destroyer that had been allocated to a Norwegian destroyer crew which was fighting on with the Allies coming back the other way was the cruiser force that had covered JW 55a from a distance consisting of the heavy cruiser HMS Norfolk and the light cruisers HMS Sheffield and HMS Belfast his plan was to try and use the cover of darkness and any weather that would blow up to help close on the Scharnhorst ideally down to about 12,000 yards before opening fire since he knew that Shaun Horst was always going to be faster than Duke of York and so by opening fire at such close range hopefully not being spotted before it would mean that even if Scharnhorst chose to run it would remain in the gun range of the Duke of York for a considerable period of time thus denying her a quick escape on the way to the convoy Fraser's forces practice their strategy with the cruiser Jamaica standing in for the Scharnhorst on the Allied side of things as Christmas approached the weather had begun to get a lot worse and convoy JW 55 P had passed into the area of greatest danger the two shadowing largess corps forces were heading towards each other which was good news and to the south unknown to the Allies Shawn Horst was struggling through the same bad weather as well as heavy seas by the 26th Admiral Bay was in the same rough area as the convoys and the battle was about to begin at some point in the early morning hours Admiral Bay it becomes sure that he's overshot the convoy and he dispatches his destroyers fanning out behind him to try and reacquire the targets Admiral Fraser meanwhile orders are a 55 a north away from the upcoming battle and orders four of its fleet destroyer escort to detach and join the gathering British fleet as he knows that the Germans know where JW 55b is but he hasn't received any reports of German activity around the homeward bound convoy our 855 a and the weather is absolutely terrible and Duke of York sharp prow and low forecastle are shipping huge amounts of water across the forward decks a substantial portion of which is turning to ice almost immediately meanwhile Shawn horse high and flared Atlantic bow is allowing the ship a somewhat better ride aboard HMS Belfast a single blip appears on radar about 14 miles away and steaming slightly north of West unfortunately for the Scharnhorst by this stage in the war british radar is more powerful and therefore has a considerably longer range than their own radar sets and Shawn Horst does not see the British forces at the same time lookouts on HMS Sheffield glimpse the outline of a very large ship albeit somewhat ghostly in the snow sleet and fog after their port beam range about seven miles no prizes really for guessing what it was the signal lamps on the ship flash a message over to Vice Admiral Robert Burnett the enemy is in sight the darkness is split by a single brilliant white flare arcing through the sky as Belfast fires a star shell to illuminate the area despite the radar control for their guns as Shawn Horst has just started turning south when she spotted and firing is started the shells from Belfast and Sheffield miss Norfolk however is slightly slower off the bat when it comes to firing but this allows her to make adjustments to her guns to compensate for Scharnhorst change in direction and her 8-inch guns fire six broad sides scoring three hits one of these hits is really of no consequence another one destroys the port high angle gunnery director this normally would be a problem but in a blazing snow storm there is basically no chance of air attack so again not really much of an issue however the third hit is far more problematic smashing the Shawn horse forward radar set and rendering the ship blind in the forward arc this reduces the Shawn hosts own reply salvos to aiming for the very brief obscured flashes of gunfire that light up the night every time the British ships fire their own salvos this isn't helped by the fact that the star shells from the British light cruisers are lighting up the snow swirling around the ship making everything seem like a general white haze there's even more complications as Norfolk is using the standard Royal Navy propellant which leaves her gun flashes quite visible belfast and sheffield are using a brand new of reduced flash ammunition this makes a Norfolk's gun flashes seem much higher contrast to the two light cruisers and as a result Admiral Bay believes that he's engaged some form of battleship since the two different types of muzzle flash are so massively different in brightness on paper this might seem somewhat absurd but the heavy cruiser Norfolk was actually slightly longer than a revenge glass battleship so a large fuzzy outline with four twin turrets and apparently massive muzzle flashes was understandably potentially confusing Shaun horst has been heading south by southeast away from the British cruisers at top speed or at least what passes for top speed in this weather for about half an hour now thanks to its Atlantic bow and greater mass is actually outpacing the cruisers in a flat calm all three cruisers have a theoretical speed advantage over the Scharnhorst in this weather however the shot the cruisers are limited to about 24 knots while Shaun Horst is somewhere between 28 and 30 knots Belfast and Sheffield had already ceased firing some time ago and now Norfolk also sees his fire as the range continues to open the manoeuvre hasn't been a complete retreat by Scharnhorst though it does have a second radar mounted after however this radar only has limited arcs and part of the turn away was to allow this radar to become unmasked and therefore for Scharnhorst to get some hope of accurate firing although it hasn't scored any hits just because Sean Hostos withdrawn doesn't mean it's giving up the mission at this point having drawn away from the British cruisers the ship turns northeast and tries to circle around them taking advantage of its higher speed however the Scharnhorst is still on the cruisers radar and realizing what the Scharnhorst is trying to do they decide to cut the corner and try and meet it before it hits the convoy since they do have the advantage of being closer to the convoy in the first place and not having to travel in an arc this does however mean that the cruisers lose contact with the Scharnhorst as the range opens and they just have to hope that their calculated position will be the right one belfast norfolk and sheffield meet up with four destroyers from convoy r a 55 a that had been ordered to detach earlier in the day to help assist with the fleet action these are musketeer matchless opportune and Virago they will all play an important part in the action later on about five minutes later the combined force makes radar contact with convoy JW 55 B and the Destroyers are deployed as a screen for the cruisers as they begin escorting ahead of it for the past 25 minutes the cruisers have had sporadic radar contacts at various ranges but at this time Belfast makes a solid contact at just over 30,000 yards it's a large ship and it's coming up from the south so there's no real surprise when these ships go to stations and prepare to engage the Scharnhorst yet again Sean Horst once more appears in visual range and the British cruisers opened fire again with the opening range being 11,000 yards at the same time the four destroyers are ordered to attack with torpedoes however the weather conditions are so bad that the Destroyers speed is reduced to a point where they can't actually catch the Scharnhorst although musketeer opens fire at a very close range of 7,000 yards and keeps firing for about 15 minutes although the British cruisers and possibly the musketeer score a number of hits over the intervening 20 minutes they don't accomplish much of anything against the German battleship however about halfway through the engagement an 11 inch shell comes screaming in towards Norfolk piercing straight through the Barbet of the super firing rear turret putting the turret out of action a second shell hits amidships and disables the Norfolk's radar not only does this mean that Norfolk's now reduced main battery is incapable of engaging the Scharnhorst accurately but it also means that its ability to even see the ship has diminished quite significantly a main battery salvo also straddles the Sheffield and several splinters and fragments of shells pierced the ship causing various bits of minor damage that will come back to haunt the sheffield later in the fight however despite getting the better of this engagement the Shawn Horst does turn and retreats once more with the sea state calming although the snow and other weather conditions are still terrible that British cruisers are able to make about 28 knots and the Shawn Horst is making about the same speed so using the still operational radars on Sheffield and Belfast the cruisers maintain a watch at about 14,000 yards and begin to shadow the Scharnhorst with the destroyers following slightly behind firing on both sides ceases at around 12 41 as neither side can really make out the other in the murk and the range has increased to a point that shell splash spotting is pretty much impossible in these conditions at approximately this time Admiral Pacey me have given up on the idea of attacking the convoy with the Scharnhorst but knowing that he has a tail and he's drawing the British cruisers further away from the convoy he sends a signal to his own destroyers telling them roughly where he believes the convoy to be and ordering them to attack it hoping to draw the British cruisers and their own destroyers far enough away to give his own destroyers a straight shot at the convoy unfortunately for him the convoy position he sends it was reported incorrectly and although the German destroyers would manage to bypass the combined British forces in the area they wouldn't actually be able to find the convoy itself however the cruisers were still following him although over the next few hours both sheffield and Norfolk would have intermittent engine problems that would force them to fall back first Norfolk developing issues from splinters and other damage sustained from the 11 inch shell hits and then later on Sheffield from the fragmentary hits in theory this leaves Belfast alone against Shawn Horst but with the broken radar on Shawn Horst long-range gunnery is very difficult and inaccurate and Belfast is quite happy to sit at long range and tell everybody else where the target is using her working radar rather than close in and try and take on the Scharnhorst one on one using information supplied by the Belfast Duke of York in its escorts have been moving to cut off the Scharnhorst at this time belfast reports the duke of york and its fleet showing up on its radar at about forty thousand yards range Duke of York likewise sees belfast and orders the light cruiser to fire star shell to illuminate the area belfast does so seven minutes later and all of a sudden sean host finds itself once again illuminated by the giant flaring balls of fire in the sky as belfast rapid fires a number of salvos of star shell into the into the area Duke of York's own radar had picked up the incoming Scharnhorst at forty five thousand five hundred yards thanks to the Scharnhorst larger radar signature and the guns were tracking in for a firing solution the Duke of York's escorting destroyers were also moving to take up position for torpedo attack and the Jamaica was trailing Duke of York in the distance in keeping with his plan Frazer let Shawn Horst close in closer and closer rather than opening fire Shawn Horst believes that it's only under harassing fire from the Belfast as his forward radar remember is broken and it can't see what its heading into at this point however Duke of York opens fire with its own star shell the 14 inch star shell being significantly bigger and brighter than Belfast six inch it illuminates a Scharnhorst that was apparently not expecting anything of the sort with its main batteries trained fore-and-aft in the travel position Duke of York's next salvo however is far from a harmless star shell thanks to its radar and the guidance supplied by its fire control systems the first armor-piercing salvo unleashed by Duke of York scores direct hits on the Scharnhorst these hits hurt the Scharnhorst badly disabling both forward turrets the ship swings around to the north as Jamaica also opens fire hits from either Duke of York or Jamaica wipe out the aircraft hangar as the ship makes the turn only to run into Belfast and Norfolk coming the other way and so Scharnhorst ramps up her engines up to full speed and tries to head east Duke of York makes to follow changing course slightly just in case Shan horses fired its torpedoes in the course of its turn by this time Shawn host is fully committed to her eastern course we're the Duke of York and Jamaica raining salvos down as Shawn horse piles on every pound of steam pressure in an attempt to escape a Belfast and Norfolk Chuck a few shells from the north just in case that will help meanwhile Duke of York's escorting destroyers savage sameiras scorpion and stored are slowly creeping up on the Scharnhorst their relative speed of closure very slight due to partly the weather and due to partly the fact that Shawn host is almost as fast as they are Scharnhorst also begins to return fire unleashing a broadside which surprises the British since they believe the forward turrets were knocked out it seems to be that turret Bruno the super firing forward main turret has been brought back into action at least somewhat intermittently as it occasionally fires but not at the rate of turret Caesar the rear mounted turret the ship is swinging back and forth on its course turning to unleash a two turret broadside when it can and then turning to place its Stern directly at the Duke of York to present the smallest possible target she doesn't score any direct hits but there are a number of near misses and a couple of eleven inch shells take out the radio lines and wire connecting at the radar and fire control systems the radar systems are on all sides not really having much luck in this engagement with three sets on three separate ships and now knocked out by otherwise relatively nondamaging hits however on Duke of York a brave or possibly suicidal leftenant climbs the mast in the freezing night and all the snow and splices the wires back together by hand bringing Duke of York's radar back online at this point things are beginning to look a little bit better for Scharnhorst her speed means the range is opening and Jamaica has already ceased fire as Shaun horse has drawn beyond the effective range of its guns additionally her own salvos although initially somewhat sporadic and inaccurate are getting faster and more accurate as time goes on and finally she was still managing to keep ahead of the incoming destroyers so there weren't any torpedoes in the water to worry about either but it's also around this time that everything changes one of Duke of York's 14-inch shells come screaming in at long-range punches clean through the ship's armor and knocks out a boiler room this temporarily drops the ship's speed to ten knots although frantic repairs will quickly get the ship back up to 22 knots but at this point thanks to the temporary slowdown and the fact that they are only restricted to 22 knots it's fairly clear the Shawn host is not going to outrun its attackers anymore and the destroyers have begun closing in fast acknowledging the inevitable admiral Bay sends his last radio signal back to Germany we will fight on until the last shell is fired destroyers Savage and Sam Hertz are closing in for a torpedo attack when they come under a relatively heavy barrage from the Scharnhorst secondary battery although they're forced to take evasive action neither is hit and the barrage is nowhere near as intense as they thought it might be based on testimony from the Shawn horse crew later on it appears that quite a number of the lighter secondary battery crews were told to take cover during the main engagement with Duke of York and this order was never rescinded leading to confusion as some of the crews try to get back out into action but obviously their guns are not firing for this initial part of the engagement unfortunately interning to engage Savitch and Samer 'it's the ship has exposed itself to attack by scorpion and stored Sean horse takes evasive action turning parallel to the torpedos tracks but still takes one hit out of the eight torpedoes fired her bad luck doesn't end there however since turning to this position has put her right in the sights of savage and Sam hurts coming out from under her secondary battery fire who launched their own volley this is far more damaging landing three hits on the port side of Scharnhorst in exchange for the Sam rats finally being hit by several guns from the Scharnhorst secondary battery all the Destroyers also engage in a furious cannonade with the Scharnhorst trying to suppress the same secondary weapons one of these torpedoes impacts adjacent to a boiler room flooding it and damaging one of the propeller shafts which immediately drops the Sean horse top speed back down to ten knots once again German damage repair crews go into frantic repair mode and once again the ship speed rises back up to between 20 and 22 knots however it would appear the damage inflicted was too much for the crews as from this point onward Shawn horse speed gradually begins to drop down again throughout the rest of the engagement during the destroyer attack Duke of York and Jamaica have turned bow in and closed the range as quickly as possible now as it dies away the two ships re opened fire at a range of just over ten thousand yards to the North Norfolk and Belfast show up with Sheffield trailing well behind them Norfolk's radar is still out so after two salvos she checks her fire due to difficulty in assessing the range properly meanwhile Belfast happily hammers away with its six inch battery with all three firing ships are still having radar guidance and with the range having closed to near point blank the Scharnhorst is turned into a charnel-house of fire and explosions within five minutes despite this what's left of her main armament and her rapidly diminishing secondary battery continue to engage Duke of York and Jamaica as best they can Jamaica and Belfast plus the four destroyers from convoy are a 55 a close-in and fire a couple of dozen or torpedoes in her general direction at this point sporadic ammunition explosions and spreading fires aboard the ship are basically destroying any remaining combat capacity she has left the cruisers claimed at least three hits between them and the destroyers up to 7 although the post battle assessment considers that a total of five hits is probably the most accurate the reports around this time are somewhat confused by the fact that Shaun Horst had taken on a heavy list to starboard and most of the crew were in the middle of preparations to abandon ship although one of the survivors did confirm to the British that three hits in quick succession were scored on this broadside indicating hits from us the same salvo of torpedoes from a single ship having fired the torpedoes on one side Belfast has hauled around to fire the torpedoes on the other side only to find that all she conceived Scharnhorst is a conglomeration of smoke mists snow and steam lit red and orange by a glow of a burning ship somewhere inside Belfast therefore holds fire by the accounts per crew at this time Shaun Horst goes under with her propellers still turning moments thereafter there is some sort of significant explosion as the ship heads for the bottom that's both felt and heard aboard all the British ships although the actual sinking itself is unseen by those British ships due to the smoke and glow of the fires unfortunately in her death throes Shaun horse takes most of the 1968 men aboard and down with her a few hundred have made it off the ship but there in freezing Arctic water and with poor visibility by the time the British ships close it in with nets and ropes to rescue survivors only 36 have survived none of the survivors are officers with the most senior prisoner being the equivalent of an acting petty officer you [Music] several notable observations were made from this action firstly the Norwegian destroyer stored had shown a remarkable and somewhat understandable antipathy towards the Scharnhorst sailing to within 1,500 yards blasting away at the ship with its 420 millimeter guns all the way in and all the way out firing her torpedo at point-blank range secondly the battle was a clear demonstration of the need for radar in any ship engagement in theory Scharnhorst should have been able to deal with any or all of her opponents until she met up with Duke of York including the entire Cruiser Group only the Duke of York itself posed an existential threat to the German ship but the loss of her forward radar right at the start of the engagement had flipped the tables on her forcing a retreat from the cruisers and when they stayed at long range using their own radar and then hindering her ability to counterbattery the destroyers it also left her completely blind to Duke of York's approach and at the same time information passed by radar had allowed Duke of York to half [ __ ] the Scharnhorst in its opening salvo a far cry from previous engagements when many early salvos were needed at a dial in the range this would be the second to last battleship fight in history and the Battle of surrogate rate the last battleship fight likewise would show the immense value of gunnery radar and finally of course as a noteworthy observation there was the stand of the Scharnhorst itself boxed in trapped and outnumbered she had nevertheless done as Bay had said and fought to the last she'll later in the evening Admiral Fraser briefed his officers with the sentence that also ends the five minute guide to the Scharnhorst gentlemen the battle against Sean Horst has ended in victory for us I hope that if any of you I ever called upon to lead a ship into action against an opponent many times superior you will command your ship as gallantly as Scharnhorst was commanded today that's it for this video thanks for watching if you have a comment or suggestion for a ship to review let us know in the comments below don't forget to comment on the pinned post for drydock questions

Channel: Drachinifel

Views: 1,144,711

Keywords: Scharnhorst, Battle of the North Cape, wows, world of warships, HMS Belfast, HMS Sheffield, HMS Norfolk, HMS Duke of York, HMS Jamaica, Stoord, JW-55B, Arctic Convoys, World War 2, Kriegsmarine, Narvik class, HMS Scorpion, HMS Matchless, Naval Radar, Admiral Bey, Admiral Fraser

Id: KbRMEPPbSyg

Length: 35min 5sec (2105 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 16 2019