HMS Bitter (L07)
 The Burning Bitters 1940
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HMS Bittern (L07) was a sloop that was taken over by the Royal Navy on March 15, 1938 as the third ship in its class . But it was the first to be completed as a long-range escort ship.
The name Bittern (dt. Dommel ) of a heron-like bird was to be given to the first ship of this class, but it was completed as a yacht for the Admiralty and was named after the previous ship, the Enchantress , when it was christened on October 21, 1934 . The second ship of the class was completed as the unarmed survey ship Stork .
Completed as the sixth bitter of the Navy in 1938, the sloop was extensively tested, especially since the type had some novel equipment. In addition to an anti-aircraft armament like a cruiser, the Admiralty had the small ships equipped with new types of stabilizers of the Denny-Brown type , which should increase the accuracy of the weapons.
The sloop was lost early in the Second World War on April 30, 1940 off Namsos in Norway . The Bittern was awarded the Battle Honor Norway 1940 for their missions .
History of the ship
The Bittern , which was delivered in March 1938 , was the third ship of the class acquired since 1934. The sloop was ordered by the Royal Navy on May 26, 1936 from the J. Samuel White shipyard in Cowes on the Isle of Wight . The construction of the ship, which was part of the 1935 budget, began on August 27, 1936, and was launched and christened on July 14, 1937. However, it was the first to be completed as a long-haul escort ship as planned.
The above Type ship Bittern of the new class was completed in April 1935 as a yacht enchantress for the Admiralty by John Brown & Company . The second ship of the class, the Stork , built by William Denny & Brothers in Dumbarton , entered service as an unarmed survey ship in September 1936 and remained in service in the Far East and Malay Waters until 1939 . So the last ship of the class became the actual type ship of the class comprising only three sloops. She received the planned three 102 mm twin anti-aircraft guns . These four were 47 mm 3pdr-Hotchkiss of dubious combat value, a heavy four-12.7mm Vickers antiaircraft machine gun and fifteen depth charges . In order to be a more stable platform for use in air defense, the ships of the class were equipped with stabilizers of the Denny-Brown type and the Bittern first received a new High Angle Control System (HACS) to increase the probability of hits in the air defense. After extensive tests with the new ship, the HMS Bittern came to the 1st Anti-submarine Flotilla in Portland at the beginning of 1939 , whose air defense capabilities she significantly strengthened.
Calls
After the extensive test program of the third completed ship of the class, which was also completed as a sloop for the first time, the Bittern came in January 1939 as a flotilla leader to the aforementioned 1st Anti-Submarine Flotilla in Portland , which belonged to the Portsmouth Command . Were shortly before the outbreak of war in the summer of 1939 to this training unit also three old destroyers of the V- and W-Class , with Vanquisher , Walker and Walpole , six Patrol Vessel of the Kingfisher class and five submarine hunters from the trawler type .
This unit was disbanded at the beginning of the war and formed other units or was distributed. The Bittern came to the Rosyth Escort Force , which included Wallace , Whitley and Valorous, three older destroyers converted to escort boats of the WAIR type , as well as four other sloops. The escort force vehicles were used to secure the coastal and Norway convoys, but were reclassified into four task forces soon after the war began. Bittern was the lead ship of Group 2 , to which even the Sloop Enchantress and the destroyer Brooke belonged. The sloop remained in this unit and the area of operation until spring 1940.
Use before Norway and loss
On April 8, 1940, the sloop was assigned to the Home Fleet to strengthen its air defense during the planned mission off Norway. The Germans' surprise attack on Denmark and Norway ( Enterprise Weser Exercise ) forced the British to make new plans. The sloops Black Swan , Flamingo , Auckland and Bittern were supposed to transport 700 advance troops to Norway from the 14th. They took Royal Marines and supporting army units on board and on the 15th the Bittern ran with the Black Swan Åndalsnes south of Drontheim, where they put small units ashore on the 17th and then called Ålesund .
Then the Bittern went north to strengthen the air defense of the Allied troops landed there from the 18th at Namsos together with the flak cruiser Carlisle . On the 25th, the sloop moved to Åndalsnes to take on the same tasks there. Allied supplies for Andalsnes and Molde have been landed there since the 21st, which were protected by the flak cruisers Carlisle and Curacao and the sloops Black Swan , Flamingo and Fleetwood .
The Allies were unable to land sufficient quantities of troops or materials, nor was a quick advance possible from the chosen landing sites, so that the Sickle Force withdrew on April 30, 1940.The Bittern took part in the evacuation of the Maurice Force as an anti -aircraft ship from Namsos. During German air raids, it was badly damaged at the stern by Ju 87 Stukas of I./StG.1 . The burning ship was evacuated and eventually sunk by the destroyer Janus after he had recovered the last of the crew. The sinking took place because one expected further losses when attempting to tow the incapable of maneuvering ship and wanted to ensure that the Bittern did not get into the hands of the Germans and that they would gain knowledge of the most modern British Asdic systems. Twenty men lost their lives on the lost Bitter . The Bittern was subsequently awarded the Battle Honor Norway 1940 for their work in front of Norway .
The other two sloops in the Bittern class
| Surname | Pennant | shipyard | Keel laying | Launch | in service | fate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Enchantress | L / U 56 | John Brown & Company Clydebank, BuildingN ° 540 |
March 9, 1934 | 10/21/1934 | April 8, 1935 | i. D. as Admiralty Yacht, 9.39 to 6.45 escort ship, Battle Honors Atlantic 1939-45 , Mediterranean 1942 and North Africa 1942/43 , civil use from 1946, demolished in 1952 |
| Stork | L / U / F 81 | William Denny & Brothers Dumbarton, BuildingN ° 1282 |
06/19/1935 | 04/21/1936 | 09/10/1936 | i. D. as an unarmed survey ship, 9.39 to 9.45 escort ship, Battle Honors Norway 1940 , North Sea 1940 , Atlantic 1940-44 , North Africa 1942 and Normandy 1944 , 1.1946 flagship of the Fisheries Protection Squadron , 1948 reserve, from 6.1958 demolition in Troon. |
Individual evidence
- ^ U-Jäger Kingfisher , Kittiwake , Mallard , Puffin , Shelldrake and Widgeon (1935–1938)
- ↑ AS-Trawler Basset , Sapphire , Topaze , Tourmaline and Turquouise (1935)
- ↑ also Convoy C with the sister ships Enchantress and Stork (which first had to be converted into combat ships again), the newer Pelikan and the somewhat older Hastings, which was converted for anti- aircraft defense
- ^ Rohwer: Sea War, April 16-18, 1940 Norway Operation "Sickle"
- ↑ HMS JANUS (F.53) - J-class Destroyer
- ↑ Rohwer: naval warfare , 29.- 30.04.1940 Norway
literature
- Roger Chesneau (ed.): Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922-1946 , Conway Maritime Press, Greenwich 1980, ISBN 0-85177-146-7
- Arnold Hague: Sloops: A History of the 71 Sloops Built in Britain and Australia for the British, Australian and Indian Navies 1926-1946. World Ship Society, Kendal (1993), ISBN 0-905617-67-3
- Jürgen Rohwer , Gerhard Hümmelchen : Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. Manfred Pawlak VerlagsGmbH (Herrsching 1968), ISBN 3-88199-0097
