Frederic John Walker

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Captain Frederic John Walker

Frederic John Walker CB , DSO and three Bars (born June 3, 1896 in Plymouth , † July 9, 1944 in Seaforth near Liverpool ) was an officer in the British Royal Navy , who was known for his extraordinarily successful hunt for German submarines during the Atlantic battle .

Start of the military career

Training and first assignments

Frederic John Walker, also referred to as "Frederick" in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and some editions of the London Gazette , was born in Plymouth to Frederic Murray and Lucy Selina (née Scriven) Walker. He went to the Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth , where he also received his degree. He served first on the dreadnought HMS Ajax as a midshipman (roughly equivalent to the midshipman ) and, after his promotion to sub-lieutenant (about the equivalent to a second lieutenant for the period 1916-1917 to) destroyer HMS Mermaid and HMS Sarpedon added. At the end of the First World War he was transferred to the Queen Elizabeth- class battleship HMS Valiant . He was married to Jessica Eileen Ryder Stobart, with whom he had three sons and a daughter.

Between the world wars

In the period between the two world wars, Walker voluntarily took part in the then rather unpopular anti-submarine combat courses ("anti-submarine warfare" (ASW) is the English name for submarine hunting ). He also took courses in the 1924 newly created anti-submarine training school HMS Osprey on Portland . Walker became an expert in this specialized type of warfare. In May 1933 he was promoted to commander (equivalent to frigate captain ) and took command of the destroyer HMS Shikari . A little later, in December 1933 took Walker in command of the HMS Falmouth , a sloop of Shoreham class. She was deployed to the China Station . In April 1937, Walker became Experimental Commander at HMS Osprey .

Second World War

1939-1941

When World War II began in 1939, Walker's career seemed to be over. He still had the rank of commander, had been passed over in his promotion to captain and actually wanted to go into early retirement. He won a reprieve and was named an officer on the Operations Staff of Vice Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay in the 1940s . Walker still had no active command, though there could be no doubt that his anti-submarine skills were essential to the Battle of the Atlantic. During his time as an officer in the Ramsey Operations Staff, the legendary Operation Dynamo took place near Dunkirk , during which the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and French troops were evacuated from France. The evacuation was a great success; more than 330,000 British and French troops escaped into the United Kingdom. He was mentioned by name in the war report for his services ( Mentioned in Despatches ).

First active command

Walker finally received command of the 36th escort group (36th escort group) in October 1941, he commanded the sloop of the Bittern class HMS Stork . The escort group consisted of two sloops and six corvettes and was stationed in Liverpool , where the area command for the Western Approaches was also located. The escort group was primarily responsible for securing convoys to and from Gibraltar .

The first opportunity to test his pre-war anti-submarine skills came in December 1941 when his group escorted convoy HG-76 (32 ships). In the course of this convoy battle five German submarines were sunk, three by ships and two by airplanes. U 574 from Type VII C under the command of Dietrich Gengelbach had on December 19 after a successful water bombs appear -attack and was rammed by Walker's ship. The losses suffered by the British in the battle for HG-76 were the escort aircraft carrier HMS Audacity , the destroyer HMS Stanley and two merchant ships . This is believed to be the first Allied victory in the defense of a convoy in the Battle of the Atlantic. Walker received the Distinguished Service Order (DSO) for this on January 6, 1942 . Walker's group sank at least three other submarines by mid-1942. In July 1942 he was awarded the first Distinguished Service Order clasp.

Formation of the first submarine hunting association with new tactics

In 1943 Frederic John Walker took command of HMS Starling , a Black Swan class sloop

In 1942 Walker left the 36th escort group and was promoted to Captain (D) Liverpool, which gave him some time to recover. Eventually, in 1943, Walker became commander of the Second Support Group, which consisted of six sloops. Walker himself drove on the recently commissioned HMS Starling , which belonged to the Black Swan class and was the group's flagship . The other five ships in the group were the sloops HMS Cygnet , HMS Kite , HMS Wild Goose , HMS Woodpecker and HMS Wren . The group was intended as reinforcement for attacked convoys. She had the means not only to escort and defend the convoy, as was previously the case, but to actively track down, pursue and destroy the submarines. The new creeping attack tactic developed by Walker was crucial for the success. While two ships kept in contact with the enemy submarine via Asdic and radar , the rest of them kept going over the dive site and throwing depth charges at the target. Walker had proposed this novel idea to his superior, Commander-in-Chief of Western Approaches Command Sir Max Kennedy Horton . This new tactic of active hunting for submarines, which became possible with the decryption of the Enigma code by Bletchley Park (BP), was to prove to be very successful and ultimately to be a decisive factor in the victory over the in the battle for the Atlantic Run submarines. One eccentric aspect of Walker was the playing of the tune "A Hunting We Will Go" over the Tannoy ship speakers on returning to their bases.

1943-1944

Class IX submarine
Class X submarine

In June 1943, the Starling alone sank two enemy submarines. U 202 under the command of Günter Poser was forced to surface by depth charges on June 2nd and then sunk by the deck guns , U 119 ( Type XB ) was again forced to surface by depth charges on June 24th and then rammed. U 449 under Hermann Otto was sunk by the Second Support Group on the same day. On July 30, Walker's group encountered a group of three submarines in the Bay of Biscay (two were Type XIV supply boats - they were also known as "dairy cows"). After the sighting, the Jagdgruppe immediately opened fire with the deck guns. U 462 (Type XIV) from Bruno Vowe and U 504 ( Type IX C / 40 - a long-range submarine) under the command of Corvette Captain Wilhelm Luis were badly damaged and sank. The third submarine U 461 (Type XIV) was sunk by a Short Sunderland aircraft.

On his return to Liverpool, Walker learned that his son Timothy had died. He was part of the crew of the submarine HMS Parthian , which was lost in the Mediterranean in early August 1943 . On September 14, 1943, Walker was awarded the Order of the Bath .

On November 6, 1943, Walker's group U 226 and U 842 sank . At the beginning of 1944 it again demonstrated its dangerousness and effectiveness when it sank six submarines during an operation: on January 31, the U 592 , on February 9, U 762 under Walter Pietschmann , U 238 under Horst Hepp and U 734 under Hans- Jörg Blauert , on February 11th U 424 by Günter Lüders and on February 19th U 264 . The commander of U 264 Kapitänleutnant Hartwig Looks and parts of the crew survived the sinking of their boat and went into British captivity.

On February 20, the HMS Woodpecker from the Jagdgruppe was hit by an acoustic torpedo from U 256 under the command of Oberleutnant zur See Wilhelm Brauel and sank seven days later after an unsuccessful attempt to tow the damaged ship to the nearest British port , there were no dead. On their return to Liverpool, the Second Support Group was enthusiastically received. Albert Victor Alexander , First Lord of the Admiralty , personally honored Walker. He was named captain and received a second Distinguished Service Order clasp.

In March 1944, escorted Walker with his group the American cruiser USS Milwaukee on his way to the Soviet Union under the Lend-Lease Act (lend-lease-act). Two submarines were sunk on the outward journey, three on the way back. Walker's last assignment was to secure the English Channel against German submarines on D-Day . This mission lasted two weeks and was very effective as not a single submarine was able to get into the channel and attack the Allies. Walker's personal stresses were enormous. On June 13th he was awarded the third clasp of his order and on June 20, 1944 again Mentioned in Despatches .

Death and honorable burial at sea

Walker suffered a thrombus in the brain on July 7, 1944 and died two days later at the Naval Hospital in Seaforth near Liverpool at the age of 48. His death was due to overwork and exhaustion.

The funeral ceremonies took place at Liverpool Cathedral with full military honors in the presence of about 1000 people. In a dignified procession with representatives of the Navy, the funeral procession went through the streets of Liverpool to the port. The destroyer HMS Hesperus, under the command of Captain Donald Macintyre, another well-deserved submarine hunter, picked up the body for its final voyage to sea for burial .

Shortly thereafter, Walker was Mentioned again on August 1, 1944 in Despatches as a further honor .

Commemoration

Statue of Frederic John Walker at Pier Head in Liverpool

Walker sank more submarines than any other British or Allied commander during the Battle of the Atlantic; he was thus instrumental in the victory of the Allies in this battle, one of the most important campaigns of the war.

In his honor, a statue by the sculptor Tom Murphy was unveiled by Prince Philip at Liverpool Pier Head in 1988 . The statue shows Captain John Walker in a typical pose. The initiative for this statue came from the Captain Walker's Old Boys Association. Members of the association met in Liverpool on the 60th anniversary of their victory in the Battle of the Atlantic in 2003 to commemorate their comrades.

Walker's grandson, Patrick Walker, continues as President the work of the Captain Walker's Old Boys Association, who have taken care of the memory of the Captain and his crew.

literature

  • Terance Robertson: Walker, RN . Evans Brothers Limited. London 1956. (English)
  • Dan van der Vat: The Atlantic Campaign . 1988. ISBN 0-340-37751-8 (English)
  • Paul Kemp: U-Boats Destroyed . 1997. ISBN 1-85409-515-3 (English)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b A. B. Sainsbury: Walker, Frederick John (1896-1944). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861411-X , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of January 2011, accessed January 24, 2008.
  2. ↑ London Gazette . No. 34925, HMSO, London, August 16, 1940, p. 5063 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).
  3. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 35407, HMSO, London, January 2, 1942, p. 135 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).
  4. ↑ London Gazette . No. 35648, HMSO, London, July 28, 1942, p. 3346 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).
  5. ↑ Lyrics of A Hunting We Will Go. Written By: Thomas Arne on KIDiddles.com
  6. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 36390, HMSO, London, September 10, 1943, p. 902 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).
  7. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 36561, HMSO, London, June 9, 1944, p. 2817 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).
  8. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 36572, HMSO, London, June 16, 1944, p. 2932 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).
  9. ↑ London Gazette . No. 36634, HMSO, London, July 28, 1944, p. 3568 ( PDF , accessed October 1, 2013, English).

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Walker, Frederic John
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British Royal Navy officer, submarine hunter in World War II
DATE OF BIRTH June 3, 1896
PLACE OF BIRTH Plymouth
DATE OF DEATH July 9, 1944
Place of death Seaforth near Liverpool