Dunkerque (ship, 1935)
 The Dunkerque
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The Dunkerque was the lead ship of the Dunkerque class , a new class of warships that, as fast battleships of the French Navy , were intended to counter the danger posed by the German armored ships of the Deutschland class . After France surrendered in World War II, the Dunkerque was the target of a British attack and was later relocated to Toulon, where it was self-destroyed by French sailors, like most of the French fleet, when German troops approached in 1942. The ship was never repaired and was scrapped after the war.
planning
The design of the Dunkerque and its sister ship Strasbourg was very innovative. The entire main artillery was concentrated in the forecastle, which was already the case with the Nelson- class battleships of the Royal Navy , but these had three 406 mm turrets , each carrying three guns, of which the effective range of the rear turret was restricted by the higher central tower. The Dunkerque , on the other hand, had two quadruple turrets that could fire unrestricted in all directions except aft. The use of two quadruplet turrets for all of the main armament was a feature unique to the late French battleships. The Richelieu and Jean Bart were also designed in this way.
However, the Dunkerque and the Strasbourg were not full-fledged battleships due to their smaller size, weaker armor and armament, which is why they are often still classified as battlecruisers abroad (in France therefore called Croiseur de bataille ). The German "answer" to these two ships were the new battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau , which were superior to them in terms of armor and speed and were roughly equivalent in terms of armament.
Mission history
Pre-war period
The Dunkerque represented France before the actual commissioning, in a naval parade from May 17th to 23rd, 1937, which was held in front of Spithead on the occasion of the coronation of George VI as King of England.
After numerous trials, she was accepted into the service of the National Navy on September 1, 1938. At first she was the flagship of the French Atlantic fleet.
With increasing political tensions between the German Reich and the Allies , the battleship was used for escort duties. The Dunkerque moved along the Spanish and Portuguese Atlantic coasts to protect friendly ships from possible attacks by German ships.
Second World War
After the outbreak of hostilities between the German Reich and Poland on September 1 and the declaration of war by the Allies on September 3, the ship returned to Brest on September 6, 1939 after a completed escort mission. While searching for a Dutch ship in distress , the Dunkerque's aircraft disappeared without a trace on September 8th.
On November 25, she sailed with the British battle cruiser Hood to the North Atlantic to search for the German warships between Scotland and Ireland.
At the beginning of December 1939 she ran from Brest to Halifax in Canada with a cargo of gold from the French National Bank . On the way back she secured a convoy .
| Reconstruction January 4 to February 12, 1940 | |||
| The Dunkerque was rebuilt taking into account the experience gained during its operations in the North Atlantic. It was painted dark gray, the anti-aircraft defenses on the forecastle, two 37 mm twin guns, were removed because they were too exposed to the elements in heavy seas. The heavy guns were also provided with protective covers for the same reason. Attempts to compensate for the loss of anti-aircraft defenses on the foredeck by adding two platforms to the base of the bridge tower, on each of which a 13.2 mm quadruple gun was positioned. To control the fire of these new weapons, a platform was welded between the armored command post and the bridge tower, on which a 2-meter range finder was placed on each port and starboard. Furthermore, the 12-meter main rangefinder on the bridge tower was replaced by one with a 14-meter base length. | |||
After the renovation, the ship was moved to Mers-el-Kébir in the Mediterranean. From there it carried out an attack on Italian facilities in Sardinia on June 13, 1940 .
Operation Catapult
At the time of the defeat of France , it was next to the Strasbourg in Mers-el-Kébir. Since the majority of the French fleet had survived the first months of the war undamaged, the British Admiralty feared that the Axis powers could seize the French fleet after the surrender of France and use it against Great Britain.
The French ships became the target of Operation Catapult of the Royal Navy . On July 3, 1940, a British force under the command of Admiral Somerville approached the French anchorage. The British sent an ultimatum to Vice-amiral d'escadre Marcel Gensoul , who had set his flag on the Dunkerque . After hours of fruitless negotiations, the British opened fire and badly damaged the battleship.
Admiral Gensoul had given his fleet the order to leave when the first British shells hit the port. Splinters of a projectile that had just missed the Strasbourg , which was already leaving , cut the Dunkerque's aft flagpole . The battleship Provence was the first to return fire and from its anchorage shot a volley directly over the superstructure of the Dunkerque .
Several 380 mm shells hit the Dunkerque as it was lifting anchor: A Hood shell hit the turret roof of the second main gun turret at a flat angle, splintering the protective armor plate and killing both the fragments of the shell and the destroyed armor the operating team in the right half of the tower. The armored intermediate bulkhead held and protected the other half of the tower from damage. Another projectile from the volley penetrated her aircraft hangar from starboard to port, but did not explode.
Since all eight guns on the forecastle were aimed inland, the main weapons of the Dunkerque could not be used. When the British fleet finally ran into the area of action, the gun turrets had to be pivoted to 140 ° to starboard in order to be able to fight them. However, the first salvo failed due to incorrect distance measurement due to the smoke over the harbor.
Three 380 mm projectiles penetrated the belt armor in quick succession, penetrated deep into the ship and, among other things, caused serious damage in one of the turbine rooms. The power supply collapsed and all guns failed. Commander Capitaine de vaisseau Seguin had the ship aground with the bow. 9 officers and 201 men were killed and others wounded in the British attacks on Dunkerque .
The Dunkerque was attacked by torpedo bombers from the carrier Ark Royal three days later . One torpedo hit the auxiliary ship Terre-Neuve , which was anchored next to the battleship , while another detonated its depth charge. The side of the ship below tower “B” of the battleship was torn open over a large area by this explosion. The Dunkerque made the water strong and sank to the shallow harbor floor. There were losses of 154 dead and wounded.
Fall purple and end
In February 1942, the battleship was able to return to Toulon for repairs and was still there when the Germans occupied the previously unoccupied part of France (“ zone libre ”) on November 27, 1942. She was sunk with her sister ship Strasbourg and most of the French fleet itself to prevent it from falling into the hands of the Germans.
In 1943, the wreckage of the Dunkerque lying on the bottom in Toulon was partially systematically exploited under the direction of fascist Italy , because the management of the Regia Marina no longer considered a repair that had previously been considered worthwhile. In view of the very serious damage, the Italians decided against lifting in this case. The material subsequently dismantled, including the aircraft catapult , therefore ended up in Italy as scrap. The remains of the Dunkerque were still being lifted in 1945, but were not scrapped until 1958.
literature
- Robert Dumas: Les cuirassés Dunkerque et Strasbourg. Marines Editions et Réalisations, Bourg-en-Bresse 1993.
- William H. Garzke Jr., Robert O. Dulin Jr .: British, Soviet, French, and Dutch Battleships of World War II . Jane's Publishing Company Ltd., London 1980, ISBN 0-7106-0078-X , pp. 33-76 (English).
- Vincent P. O'Hara: Struggle for the Middle Sea. The great Navies at War in the Mediterranean Theater, 1940-1945. US Naval Institute Press, Annapolis MD 2009, ISBN 978-1-591-14648-3 .
