Francesco Mimbelli

Francesco Mimbelli (1940)

Francesco Mimbelli (born April 16, 1903 in Livorno , † January 26, 1978 in Rome ) was an officer in the Italian Navy .

Second World War

Crete

In World War II Mimbelli commanded a torpedo boat - Squadron . During the fighting for the Greek island of Crete , he led a German troop transport convoy from aboard the torpedo boat "Lupo" . On the night of May 21-22, 1941, he was surprised by a vastly superior British cruiser formation with which he immediately took up combat. He got caught in the crossfire between the enemy units, which then shot at each other in the dark. He later returned to the convoy in his torpedo boat "Lupo", which was completely riddled with British fire, and brought his mission to an end. For this commitment, the highest Italian military order awarded him the gold medal for bravery . The awarding of the medal was justified as follows: "As the commander of a torpedo boat that was escorting a group of motor sailers with German troops to occupy the island of Crete, he collided during the night with an enemy naval formation made up of three cruisers and a few destroyers. With admirable audacity and extraordinary readiness he started the attack and in a lively scuffle hit a cruiser with two torpedoes, which sank; with a clever maneuver he therefore managed to break away from the enemy reaction and return to the base. "

A few hours later, Kapitänleutnant Giuseppe Cigala Fulgosi carried out a similar mission with his torpedo boat “Sagittario”.

Black Sea

In the spring of 1942 Mimbelli took over command of a naval unit, which was moved to the Black Sea at the German request to support the conquest of the Crimea from the seaside . The association consisted of special units, six small submarines and 14 motor torpedo boats ( MAS ) which, according to the German naval command, were considered to be particularly suitable for this task (two MAS boats fought on Lake Ladoga from August to October 1942 ). Since it was not possible to pass through the Dardanelles , the association was moved by land and then across the Danube to Constanța and then on to Yalta . From May 1942 to May 1943, the association operated against Soviet war and merchant ships, especially at Sevastopol , Balaklava , Kerch and Novorossiysk and in the Sea of ​​Azov . In June 1942, Mimbelli's association sank two Soviet submarines ( S 32 and SHCH 306 ) and a merchant ship . Towards the end of the month there were numerous skirmishes with Soviet ships in the course of the German conquest of the fortresses of Sevastopol and Balaklava. Mimbelli received a. a. a high German order. At the beginning of August 1942, motor torpedo boats ( MAS 568 , Oblt. ZS Emilio Legnani) of his squadron damaged the Soviet cruiser Molotov so badly that it was out of service for two years. The destroyer Kharkov was also damaged in this battle. On September 9, 1942, the Italian unit suffered heavy losses in a Soviet air raid on the base in Yalta. In the months that followed, the association temporarily withdrew to the west because of the Soviet winter offensive and supply problems. The Italian boats were z. Partly taken over by German crews who had been specially trained in Italy for this purpose. On May 20, the Italians officially handed the association over to the German navy , but some of their micro-submarines operated with Italian crews in the Black Sea until August 1943 and sank another Soviet submarine.

post war period

Mimbelli commanded the battleship Vittorio Veneto from May 1, 1945 to May 11, 1946 and the cruiser Giuseppe Garibaldi from October 1946 to April 1947 . Promoted to Rear Admiral in 1948 , he was in command of the 3rd Marine Division from 1951 to 1952. Then he was Italian representative at the High Command of the Allied Forces in the Mediterranean. From December 1953 to May 1956 he was in command of the Accademia Navale in Livorno. In February 1954 he was promoted to admiral. In May 1956 he was in command of the 2nd Marine Division until September 1957. From 1959 to 1961 he was fleet manager. Mimbelli ended his career as Vice Admiral in 1964 . He was buried in Livorno in the family chapel of the Misericordia cemetery

The Italian Navy named a destroyer (D 561) that was commissioned in 1992 after Francesco Mimbelli . The name of his torpedo boat, " Lupo ", was borne by a class of four frigates , which were withdrawn from the fleet in 2003 after around 25 years of active service and were acquired by the Peruvian Navy .