The Gathering Storm: The Second World War (62 page)

For this purpose I had recourse to a method of life which had been forced upon me at the Admiralty in 1914 and 1915, and which I found greatly extended my daily capacity for work. I always went to bed at least for one hour as early as possible in the afternoon and exploited to the full my happy gift of falling almost immediately into deep sleep. By this means I was able to press a day and a half’s work into one. Nature had not intended mankind to work from eight in the morning until midnight without that refreshment of blessed oblivion which, even if it only lasts twenty minutes, is sufficient to renew all the vital forces. I regretted having to send myself to bed like a child every afternoon, but I was rewarded by being able to work through the night until two or even later – sometimes much later – in the morning, and begin the new day between eight and nine o’clock. This routine I observed throughout the war, and I commend it to others if and when they find it necessary for a long spell to get the last scrap out of the human structure. The First Sea Lord, Admiral Pound, as soon as he had realised my technique, adopted it himself, except that he did not actually go to bed but dozed off in his armchair. He even carried the policy so far as often to go to sleep during the Cabinet meetings. One word about the Navy was, however, sufficient to awaken him to the fullest activity. Nothing slipped past his vigilant ear, or his comprehending mind.

Sea War Alone — The Admiralty War Plan — The U-Boat Attack — The Asdic Trawlers — Control of Merchant Shipping — The Convoy System — Blockade — Record of My First Conference — Need of
the Southern Irish Ports — The Main Fleet Base — Inadequate Precautions — “Hide-and-Seek” — My Visit to Scapa Flow — Reflection at Loch Ewe — Loss of the “Courageous” — Cruiser Policy — The First Month of the U-Boat War — A Fruitful September — Wider Naval Operations — Ardour of the Polish Navy — President Roosevelt’s Letter.

A
STONISHMENT WAS WORLD-WIDE
When Hitler’s crashing on-slaught upon Poland and the declarations of war upon Germany by Britain and France were followed only by a prolonged and oppressive pause. Mr. Chamberlain in a private letter published by his biographer described this phase as “twilight war”;
¹
and I find the expression so just and expressive that I have adopted it as the title for this Book. The French armies made no attack upon Germany. Their mobilisation completed, they remained in contact motionless along the whole front. No air action, except reconnaissance, was taken against Britain; nor was any air attack made upon France by the Germans. The French Government requested us to abstain from air attack on Germany, stating that it would provoke retaliation upon their war factories, which were unprotected. We contented ourselves with dropping pamphlets to rouse the Germans to a higher morality. This strange phase of the war on land and in the air astounded everyone. France and Britain remained impassive while Poland was in a few weeks destroyed or subjugated by the whole might of the German war machine. Hitler had no reason to complain of this.

The war at sea, on the contrary, began from the first hour with full intensity, and the Admiralty therefore became the active centre of events. On September 3, all our ships were sailing about the world on their normal business. Suddenly they were set upon by U-boats carefully posted beforehand, especially in the western approaches. At nine that very night the outward-bound passenger liner
Athenia
of 13,500 tons was torpedoed, and foundered with a loss of a hundred and twelve lives, twenty-eight of them American citizens. This outrage broke upon the world within a few hours. The German Government, to prevent any misunderstanding in the United States, immediately issued a statement that I personally had ordered a bomb to be placed on board this vessel in order by its destruction to prejudice German-American relations. This falsehood received some credence in unfriendly quarters.
²
On the fifth and sixth, the
Bosnia, Royal Sceptre,
and
Rio Claro
were sunk off the coast of Spain, the crew of the
Rio Claro
only being saved. All these were important vessels.

My first Admiralty minute was concerned with the probable scale of the U-boat menace in the immediate future:

Let me have a statement of the German U-boat forces, actual and prospective, for the next few months. Please distinguish between ocean-going and small-size U-boats. Give the estimated radius of action in days and miles in each case.

I was at once informed that the enemy had sixty U-boats and that a hundred would be ready early in 1940. A detailed answer was returned on the fifth, which should be studied.
³
The numbers of long-range endurance vessels were formidable and revealed the intentions of the enemy to work far out in the oceans as soon as possible.

* * * * *

Comprehensive plans existed at the Admiralty for multiplying our anti-submarine craft. In particular, preparations had been made to take up eighty-six of the largest and fastest trawlers and to equip them with Asdics; the conversion of many of these was already well advanced. A wartime building programme of destroyers, both large and small, and of cruisers, with many ancillary vessels, was also ready in every detail, and this came into operation automatically with the declaration of war. The previous war had proved the sovereign merits of convoy. The Admiralty had for some days assumed control of the movements of all merchant shipping, and shipmasters were required to obey orders about their routes or about joining convoy. Our weakness in escort vessels had, however, forced the Admiralty to devise a policy of evasive routing on the oceans, unless and until the enemy adopted unrestricted U-boat warfare, and to confine convoys in the first instance to the east coast of Britain. But the sinking of the
Athenia
upset these plans, and we adopted convoy in the North Atlantic forthwith.

The organisation of convoy had been fully prepared, and shipowners had already been brought into regular consultation on matters of defence which affected them. Furthermore, instructions had been issued for the guidance of shipmasters in the many unfamiliar tasks which would inevitably fall upon them in war, and special signalling as well as other equipment had been provided to enable them to take their place in convoy. The men of the merchant navy faced the unknown future with determination. Not content with a passive role, they demanded weapons. The use of guns in self-defence by merchant ships has always been recognised as justifiable by international law, and the defensive arming of all sea-going merchant ships, together with the training of the crews, formed an integral part of the Admiralty plans which were at once put into effect. To force the U-boat to attack submerged and not merely by gunfire on the surface not only gave greater chance for a ship to escape, but caused the attacker to expend his precious torpedoes more lavishly and often fruitlessly. Foresight had preserved the guns of the previous war for use against U-boats, but there was a grave shortage of anti-aircraft weapons. It was very many months before adequate self-protection against air attack could be provided for merchant ships, which suffered severe losses meanwhile. We planned from these first days to equip during the first three months of war a thousand ships with at least an anti-submarine gun each. This was in fact achieved.

Besides protecting our own shipping, we had to drive German commerce off the seas and stop all imports into Germany. Blockade was enforced with full rigour. A Ministry of Economic Warfare was formed to guide the policy, whilst the Admiralty controlled its execution. Enemy shipping, as in 1914, virtually vanished almost at once from the high seas. The German ships mostly took refuge in neutral ports or, when intercepted, scuttled themselves. None the less, fifteen ships totalling seventy-five thousand tons were captured and put into service by the Allies before the end of 1939. The great German liner
Bremen,
after sheltering in the Soviet port of Murmansk, reached Germany only because she was spared by the British submarine
Salmon,
which observed rightly and punctiliously the conventions of international law.
⁴

* * * * *

I held my first Admiralty conference on the night of September 4. On account of the importance of the issues, before going to bed in the small hours I recorded its conclusions for circulation and action in my own words:

5.IX.39.

1. In this first phase, with Japan placid, and Italy neutral though indeterminate, the prime attack appears to fall on the approaches to Great Britain from the Atlantic.

2. The convoy system is being set up. By convoy system is meant only anti-submarine convoy. All question of dealing with raiding cruisers or heavy ships is excluded from this particular paper.

3. The First Sea Lord is considering movement to the western approaches of Great Britain of whatever destroyers and escort vessels can be scraped from the Eastern and Mediterranean theatres, with the object of adding, if possible, twelve to the escorts for convoys. These should be available during the period of, say, a month, until the flow of Asdic trawlers begins. A statement should be prepared showing the prospective deliveries during October of these vessels. It would seem well, at any rate in the earliest deliveries, not to wait for the arming of them with guns, but to rely upon depth-charges. Gun-arming can be reconsidered when the pressure eases.

4. The Director of the Trade Division (D.T.D.) should be able to report daily the inward movement of all British merchant ships approaching the island. For this purpose, if necessary, a room and additional staff should be provided. A chart of large size should show at each morning all vessels within two, or better still three, days’ distance from our shores. The guidance or control of each of these vessels must be foreseen and prescribed so that there is not one whose case has not been individually dealt with, as far as our resources allow. Pray let me have proposals to implement this, which should come into being within twenty-four hours, and work up later. The necessary contacts with the Board of Trade or other departments concerned should be effected and reported upon.

5. The D.T.D. should also prepare tomorrow a scheme under which every captain or master of a merchant ship from the Atlantic (including the Bay) is visited on arrival by a competent naval authority, who in the name of the D.T.D. will examine the record of the course he has steered, including zigzags. All infractions or divergences from Admiralty instructions should be pointed out, and all serious departures should be punished, examples being made of dismissal. The Admiralty assume responsibility, and the merchant skippers must be made to obey. Details of this scheme should be worked out in personnel and regulations, together with appropriate penalties.

6. For the present it would seem wise to maintain the diversion of merchant traffic from the Mediterranean to the Cape route. This would not exclude the passage of convoys for troops, to which, of course, merchant vessels which were handy might add themselves. But these convoys can only be occasional, i.e., not more than once a month or three weeks, and they must be regarded, not as part of the trade protection, but as naval operations.

7. It follows from the above that in this period, i.e., the first six weeks or two months of the war, the Red Sea will also be closed to everything except naval operations, or perhaps coastal traffic to Egypt.

8. This unpleasant situation would be eased by the deliveries of the Asdic trawlers and other reliefs. Secondly, by the determination of the attitude of Italy. We cannot be sure that the Italian uncertainty will be cleared up in the next six weeks, though we should press His Majesty’s Government to bring it to a head in a favourable sense as soon as possible. Meanwhile the heavy ships in the Mediterranean will be on the defensive, and can therefore spare some of the destroyer protection they would need if they were required to approach Italian waters.

9. The question of a breaking-out of any of the five (or seven) German ships of weight would be a major naval crisis requiring a special plan. It is impossible for the Admiralty to provide escorts for convoys of merchant ships against serious surface attack. These raids, if they occur, could only be dealt with as a naval operation by the main Fleet, which would organise the necessary hunting parties to attack the enemy, the trade being cleared out of the way so far as possible till results were obtained.