HMS Cornwall (56)

Cornwall

Ship data flag  United Kingdom Ship type Heavy cruiser class Kent class Shipyard Devonport Dockyard , Plymouth Launch March 11, 1926 Whereabouts Sunk on April 5, 1942, like the HMS Dorsetshire , by dive-bomber planes of the Japanese aircraft carriers Hiryū , Akagi and Sōryū southwest of Colombo , Sri Lanka 1 ° 54 ′  N , 77 ° 54 ′  E Coordinates: 1 ° 54 ′ 0 ″  N , 77 ° 54 ′ 0 ″  E

Ship dimensions and crew length 190 m ( Lüa ) width 20.80 m Draft Max. 4.95 m displacement Construction: 9,750–9,010 t Maximum: 13,450 t   crew 700 men

Machine system machine 4 Parsons steam turbines with 8 Admirality boilers Machine performance 80,000 hp Top speed 31.5 kn (58 km / h)

Armament 8 × BL 8-inch ship guns Mk VIII (20.3 cm) in four twin turrets Mk II, two each on the fore and aft 4 × 4 in Mk V (10.2 cm) in four single mounts, replaced in 1937 by converted 8 × 4 in Mk XVI in four double mounts 4 × 40 mm Vickers Mk II in single mounts, replaced in 1937 by 16 × 40 mm Vickers Mk VIII in eight-way mounts 4 × 47 mm Vickers until the start of the war 9 × 20 mm Oerlikon cannons from the start of the war 8 x 21 inches (53.3 cm) above water in two sets of four Armor Main belt: 25 mm Magazine: 25-102 mm Gun turret : 25 mm Barbette : 25 mm

The HMS Cornwall was a heavy cruiser of the Kent class in the Royal Navy . It was built from 1924 to 1928 in Devonport Dockyard in Plymouth , Great Britain . On April 5, 1942, she was sunk during the Japanese attack in the Indian Ocean 320 km southwest of Ceylon with her sister ship HMS Dorsetshire in an attack by Japanese dive fighter planes after reconnaissance planes of the cruiser Tone had discovered them.

history

Dorsetshire and Cornwall during the heavy dive attack on 5th April 1942 (photographed from aboard a Japanese plane)

After its completion in 1928, the Cornwall became part of the China Station fleet .

Before the start of the Second World War , she was ordered to Great Britain in 1938, her armament modernized and, after this work was completed, moved back to the China Station in 1939. In September 1939, after the start of World War II, the cruiser was relocated to the Indian Ocean and part of the newly created Force I, which was stationed on Ceylon to protect the trade routes . From October 5, she was involved in the search for the German " pocket battleship " Admiral Graf Spee . In Force I, the Cornwall formed a combat unit with cruisers Dorsetshire and HMS Gloucester .

On May 8, 1941, the Cornwall sank the German auxiliary cruiser Pinguin with a 20.3 cm salvo, detonating the 130 mines on board. When the penguin sank, the Cornwall rescued 60 crew members and 22 Allied prisoners. The Cornwall was hit aft in the attack and had to go to the dry dock of the port of Durban for repairs, which she was able to leave on June 10, 1941. On November 25, 1941, the Cornwall landed the French merchant ship Surcouf on the east coast of Somalia , loaded with food for Djibouti and sailing under the flag of the Vichy regime , and brought it to Aden .

In early April 1942, the Cornwall and Dorsetshire escorted the aircraft carrier HMS Hermes to Trincomalee on Ceylon for repairs .

On April 4, the Japanese carrier fleet was discovered and the two cruisers left Colombo port . At sea, they were hastily loaded with fuel and arrived at the British base of Addu Atoll shortly after midnight. On April 5, 1942, the two cruisers were discovered around noon by a reconnaissance aircraft of the Japanese cruiser Tone 370 km southwest of Ceylon. 53 dive bombers type Aichi D3A Japanese aircraft carriers Hiryu , Akagi and Soryu attacked the two British ships. The attack with 250 kg bombs began at 1.30 p.m. Within eight minutes the Dorsetshire was hit ten times and sank. Due to heavy hits from the engines and pressure vessels, the Cornwall's pumps and guns failed within a short time, and she sank after twelve minutes and nine bomb hits.

The British cruiser HMS Enterprise and the destroyers HMS Paladin and HMS Panther rescued 1,122 people and brought them to the Maldives the next day from the total of 1,546 crew on the two ships .

Military situation

It was "the most dangerous moment" for Churchill when Cornwall was attacked and sunk in the Indian Ocean on April 5, 1942 by Japanese dive bombers

Because of the precarious military situation of the Allies in the Pacific War at the time , Winston Churchill called the sinking of Cornwall the “most dangerous moment” of the Second World War, because that finally ended the Allied dominance in the Pacific. Not only had the Japanese now successfully sunk heavy cruisers by aircraft, but they had already bombed and sunk the British battleship HMS Prince of Wales and the battle cruiser HMS Repulse on December 10, 1941 . On December 7, 1941, the Kidō Butai succeeded in the attack on Pearl Harbor , sinking the battleships of the US Pacific Fleet, and she was able to move the military weights in the Pacific with the successful air strike on Darwin on February 19. The British land forces had already been crushed in the Battle of Singapore from January 31 to February 15, 1942, Christmas Island was conquered on March 3, 1942 , and on April 5, 1942 the Japanese Air Force bombed Colombo on Ceylon .

It was not until the Battle of Midway from June 4 to 7, 1942 between the large ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy and the United States Navy , with the sinking of four Japanese aircraft carriers , that the military turnaround in favor of the Allies in the Pacific region.

literature

• Roger Chesneau (Ed.): Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922-1946 . Conway Maritime Press, Greenwich 1980, ISBN 0-85177-146-7 .
• Alan Raven, John Roberts: British Cruisers of World War Two . Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, MD 1980, ISBN 0-87021-922-7 .
• Jürgen Rohwer: Chronology of the War at Sea 1939-1945: The Naval History of World War Two . 3rd revised edition. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland 2005, ISBN 1-59114-119-2 .
• MJ Whitley: Cruisers of World War Two: An International Encyclopedia . Cassell, London 1995, ISBN 1-86019-874-0 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} uboat.net : Allied Warshiphs: Hms Cornwall (56). Heavy cruiser of the Kent call. , accessed on December 29, 2011.
2. ^ Paul S. Dull: A battle history of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1941-1945 . Naval Institute Press, Annapolis 2007, ISBN 978-1-59114-219-5 , pp. 108 ( books.google.de ).
3. ^ Jürgen Rohwer and Gerhard Hümmelchen : Chronology of the Naval War in April 1942 in the Württemberg State Library. Retrieved October 19, 2010 .