Battleship Bismarck (38 page)

*
The destroyer
Piorun
left the building ways in Great Britain in May 1940 and was later transferred to the Polish government-in-exile in London. She served in the British fleet, but under the Polish flag and with a Polish crew.

29    The Last Night on Board the Bismarck

For about an hour and a half after the air attack, the battle zone close around the
Bismarck
was deserted. Then, somewhere before 2300 we saw destroyers. Alarm bells sounded and, as usual, our 38-centimeter and 15-centimeter turrets were ready for action in seconds. “Permission to fire.” Salvos of both calibers went off towards the nearest of the destroyers—the
Piorun
, as I learned later. Our guns must have been very well laid at the start, for the enemy turned away and got out of range.

We did not know how many destroyers there were around us. The pitch-blackness of the night and frequent rain squalls made it impossible for us to make out silhouettes, so we couldn’t tell whether we were seeing a few destroyers over and over again or whether there was a great number of them. The only thing clear to us was that we could expect endless torpedo attacks. Everything was going to depend on extreme vigilance and the flawless functioning of our range finders. Fortunately for us, however, the attacks were not synchronized, that is, they did not come from different directions at the same time, which would have made our defense much more difficult. The wind and seas, which gave even the
Bismarck
trouble, probably handicapped the destroyers even more. With seas breaking over them and spray as high as the bridge—conditions that I experienced many times in German destroyers—they would often be compelled to reduce speed just when for tactical reasons they wanted to run at high speed.

Our range finders worked to perfection. From 8,000 meters down to 3,000 we tracked the destroyers. Tension in my station rose as the incoming ranges went down, 7,000 meters . . . 6,500 . . . 4,000. . . . In
spite of the darkness, I could see through my director our shadowy attackers coming nearer and nearer, twisting to attack—each time, I thought, “Now the torpedoes are hissing out of the tubes”—then drawing off. They dared not stay near us for long because of the speed with which our gunnery found its targets. This, in spite of the fact that our fire control had to contend with occasional heavy rolling of the ship caused by seas coming in off our beam and with the even greater disadvantage of our inability to maneuver. Her jammed rudders made the
Bismarck
swing some eighty points between northwest and northeast. Changes in target bearing, always rapid at short range, were accelerated, not only by the swinging of the ship but also by the use of our propellers for steering, so that an oncoming destroyer might change from one side of the ship to the other during the same attack. This meant that Albrecht in the forward station had to keep switching between the port and starboard 15-centimeter turrets. The darkness, made worse by drifting rain squalls and clouds of un-dissipated powder smoke, made observation difficult for him as well as for Schneider in the foretop. As I waited at the ready in case I was needed on any battery, I saw shells bursting over enemy ships but I could never be sure that the flames indicated a hit. At times like this there is always the danger of “seeing” what one wants to see.

If the men in the engine rooms thought their turbines had reached peak performance during the two air attacks, they now learned better. They found out how those turbines could really perform. They went without pause from “Full speed ahead” to “Full speed astern.” Scarcely was the forward throttle closed when two men wrenched open the reverse throttle. Looking back, it doesn’t seem possible that our engines survived the strain.

The men, sweat oozing from every pore, had hardly a dry stitch on their bodies. A sweatband around the head, a slice of lemon in the right corner of the mouth, a cigar or pipe in the left—they looked comical and their mood matched their appearance.

At around 0100, a destroyer attack having just ended, the starboard turbine was ordered to “Stop,” while the center and port turbines were ordered “Ahead.” Therefore, the throttle of the starboard turbine was closed, shutting off the propelling steam. Even so, the turbine should have been turning at an idling speed, but it was not. The order came to start it just to see if it would turn. The second mate opened the throttle to supply steam for “Forward”: first two, then three, four, and five times atmospheric pressure. Nothing happened! The turbine remained frozen in position. Even at ten, twenty, and thirty atmospheres of pressure it refused to budge. The engine-control
station was advised of the situation. “Try everything!” was the reply, which meant “Get steam to it, by hook or crook.” Steam pressure was increased to forty, fifty, fifty-eight atmospheres. One nozzle opened and injected steam against the rotors, stressing the turbine unevenly and dangerously—with steam pressure at fifty-eight times atmospheric pressure at 400 degrees centigrade. More steam! Then, the nozzle on the other side also began to register pressure: five, ten, twenty atmospheres. When it reached thirty, the turbine suddenly began to rotate: it did not break and it did not turn into “blade salad.” From that time until the moment the ship went down the next morning, it kept on turning.

The seas were so heavy that we were not surprised by the long lulls between attacks. We supposed the destroyers were either trying to get in position to attack or were satisfied just to keep contact with us. In any case, we welcomed the lulls as moments in which, for however short a time, we could rest. Then, we would have totally illogical flashes of hope that despite everything we were going to escape. To St. Nazaire? On our enforced course to the northwest? But the destroyers always came back, and the noise of our guns brought us back to the immutable present. And so the cycle went, hour after hour: we sighted the enemy; he attacked; our guns went into action; awareness of our inability to maneuver made us afraid that we’d be hit; once again, we had been lucky; the enemy was lost to sight; hope returned.

Around 0100 something new was added. A star shell fired by a destroyer suddenly burst in the sky—the thought flashed through my mind that it was the handwriting on the wall. It exploded high in the air and a flare suspended from a parachute slowly floated down, illuminating a wide expanse of water. We thought it was too far off to do the enemy much good in calculating our exact position. But gradually, as more star shells were fired at long intervals, the range closed, until one of them came very near and seemed to be saying, “There’s no escape!” Although others followed and lit up the scene for attacks, in the darkness between them, contact was lost—or did I imagine that? After one particularly long lull, we saw a flare coming down almost directly onto us. “Fire on the bow!” and men hurried to put it out.
*
For a moment, as it burned furiously, we were certain that it was revealing our position.

After the sinking of the
Bismarck
, I learned from Captain Benjamin C. S. Martin, commanding officer of the heavy cruiser
Dorsetshire
, that the periodic firing of star shells after 0230 was ordered by Tovey, who was worried that the positions worked out in his battleships might differ greatly from those plotted in the destroyers. Tovey’s hope was that this means of reconnaissance would provide continuous information on the
Bismarck’s
position.

Nevertheless, the firing of the shells died out around 0300. The destroyers that were firing them had to come within fairly close range of the
Bismarck
for the shells to be of any help, and when they did so they were promptly taken under fire. Captain Vian later wrote Tovey that, as he saw it, his duty was, “Firstly to deliver to you at all costs the enemy, at the time you wished. Secondly to try to sink or stop the enemy with torpedoes in the night if I thought the attack should not involve the destroyers in heavy losses.”
*
In view of the
Bismarck’s
obviously hopeless situation, he certainly must have considered that to continue firing star shells would unnecessarily endanger his destroyers.

We were happy that darkness again prevailed and contact was broken. Or so it seemed, because when I looked through my director I did not see any destroyers. The coming of dawn seemed like a succession of curtains being opened, each of which instantaneously disclosed a more distant view. A little before 0600 it was light enough for me to see that the destroyers were back in position around us. Seeming quite suddenly to discover that they were dangerously near the
Bismarck
, they withdrew at high speed to a more salubrious distance. The last we saw of them, they were disappearing into the still numerous rain squalls.

It was announced over the loudspeakers that we had sunk one destroyer and set two on fire, but this turned out to be understandable wishful thinking, a phenomenon common to all sides in time of war. No one on either side knew it at the time, but the truth of the matter is that, as of about 0700, there had not been any torpedo hits on the
Bismarck
nor, despite many straddling salvos and near misses, any direct hits on the destroyers. In the crow’s nest of the
Zulu
, Midshipman B. J. Hennessy, who had made out the
Bismarck
at the same time as the
Piorun
, saw our first salvo go into the water between the
Maori
and the
Cossack.
Later the
Zulu
was straddled by shell bursts from the
Bismarck
and numerous splinters struck her, wounding the
gunnery officer, Lieutenant Galbraith, and damaging his director. Now and again Hennessy heard our “overs” whistling overhead and marvelled at our “unbelievably” good shooting. The destroyer skippers boldly pressed their attacks through heavy German fire, while the torpedo officers tried to compensate for the violent rolling and pitching of their ships as well as the blinding effects of the
Bismarck’s
fire. The repeated flashes of the guns, probably, led both sides to assume that they were achieving results that never occurred. The British could have hardly been successful in any event, because the destroyers’ torpedo officers overestimated the
Bismarck’s
speed and aimed accordingly. Yet at the time no one knew that they had not hurt the enemy.
*

I was no longer concerned with the destroyers. They had managed to keep us under surveillance throughout the night, fired a lot of torpedoes at us, and surely reported our position to Tovey that morning. Our thoughts and our attention were now concentrated on the British battleships. Their hour had come, and I expected them to appear at any moment.

At 1954 on the twenty-sixth Group West radioed Lütjens that the
U-48
was near him and had been ordered to proceed at full speed to operate against the
Sheffield.
Lütjens sent the following sequence of radio signals to Group West:

2054:   “Attack by carrier aircraft.”

2105:   “Have torpedo hit aft.”

2115:   “Torpedo hit amidships.”

2115:   “Ship no longer steerable.”

2140:   To the Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine and Group West: “Ship unable to maneuver. We will fight to the last round. Long live the Führer.”

That last signal was sent only about half an hour after the hit that jammed our rudder and long before we had tried every means of repairing the damage. Of course, the content of the message proved correct, but I cannot help wondering what made Lütjens send such a premature and certainly, for the fleet staff and the radiomen, depressing message.

At 2205 Group West informed Lütjens that the eight U-boats in the area had been ordered to close the
Bismarck.
Half an hour later he signaled, “Am surrounded by
Renown
and light forces.”

In fact, the
Renown
did not participate in the destroyer action, and I do not remember seeing a ship of her size that night. Either Lütjens was laboring under an optical illusion or his B-Dienst team misidentified the
Renown.

During the night the ship’s command tried to keep the crew informed on the most important things that were going on. Information was relayed by loudspeaker and telephone as often as possible. The preceding signals were read out shortly after midnight, and later the following exchange of messages was announced:

2303   Group West to Fleet: “Complete aerial reconnaissance on 27 May between 46° and 48°30’ north and sector from Brest northwest. Earliest possible start 0430, bombers 0630.”