HMS Vortigern (D37)
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The HMS Vortigern (D37) was a destroyer of the V and W class of the British Royal Navy , which at the end of the first and beginning of the Second World War was used. On March 15, 1942, she was sunk by German speedboats while escorting a coastal convoy off Cromer .
Building history
The keel of the destroyer with the hull number F35 was laid on January 17, 1916 at the J. Samuel White & Co. shipyard in Cowes , England , where the ship was launched on October 5, 1917 and entered service on January 25, 1918 was asked. It was named after Vortigern , a British prince of the 5th century. The Vortigern was the third boat of the class built at the shipyard and was one of the 23 boats of the V-class named subgroup. White had been to the V-leaders belonging HMS Vampire in September 1917 and the Delivered on December 5, 1917 sister boat HMS Vectis completed. With the Winchelsea and Winchester delivered in March / April 1918 and the Witherington , Wivern , Wolverine and Worcester, which were only completed after the end of the war, the shipyard built most of the V and W class boats. The design of this class of destroyer was aimed at supporting the operations of the Grand Fleet in the North Sea , which is why they were designed for high speeds over relatively short distances. Like eight sister boats of the V-class, the Vortigern could be converted into a mine- layer within 24 hours . These boats had mine gates in the stern. During the conversion, they gave both torpedo sets and the lower stern gun "Y" ashore on the quarter deck and were able to take over up to 60 mines, which were protected by curtains.
Mission history
The HMS Vortigern changed its ID several times at the beginning of its service and belonged to the 11th destroyer flotilla of the Grand Fleet in the summer of 1918, which consisted of three flotilla leaders, five R-class destroyers and ten other V- and W-class boats. At the end of 1918, the Vortigern belonged to the British units in the Baltic Sea that were stationed there to protect the Baltic States against German or Soviet attacks. Under Rear Admiral Edwyn Alexander-Sinclair , the 6th Light Cruiser Squadron with HMS Cardiff as its flagship and five sister ships and the six destroyers Verulam , Valkyrie , Vendetta , Vortigern , Westminster and Wakeful of the 13th Flotilla went into the Baltic Sea. At Christmas 1918, the Vortigern , Wakeful and Vendetta fended off the attack by two Soviet destroyers off Tallinn and the British succeeded in bringing down the Soviet Russian destroyer Spartak (ex Kapitan Miklucho-Maklaj , Kapitan Kingsbergen ) , who lost both screws while on the run due to grounding was brought in by the Vendetta . The Russian destroyer brought in was handed over to Estonia as the core of its own fleet. The second attacker was also caught by the British two days later and this boat was also handed over to the Estonians. In February the first units of the British were relieved and the Vortigern returned to Great Britain. There the Vortigern came to the 1st Destroyer Flotilla.
Use in World War II
The lack of suitable ships forced the Admiralty at the beginning of the Second World War to also use the now obsolete V and W class destroyers. While other ships were fundamentally rebuilt in order to achieve better suitability for use as convoy escort (they were too fast for this purpose and had too short a range), the Vortigern kept their original equipment. She was therefore referred to as a “short-range escort” together with sister ships that were also not modified and used accordingly. Modifications to the armament included, among other things, the exchange of astern torpedo tubes against a Zwölfpfünder- Fla -Geschütz and to get more space for water bombs and other equipment, the dismantling of the "Y" -Geschützes.
At the beginning of the Second World War, the Vortigern belonged to the 13th destroyer flotilla. For example, in February 1940 she escorted convoy HGF-18 from Gibraltar to Liverpool . Later she was assigned with her flotilla to the Force H formed in June 1940 and took part with this on July 3, 1940 in Operation Catapult , the attack on the French fleet in Mers-El-Kebir . On the approach, the Italian submarine Marconi attacked HMS Vortigern , but missed it.
In the meantime assigned to the 5th Destroyer Flotilla, on August 31, 1940, after the sighting of German ships, it joined HMS Kelvin and HMS Jackal as reinforcement to part of the 20th Destroyer Flotilla ( HMS Express , HMS Esk , HMS Icarus , HMS Intrepid and HMS Ivanhoe ) who was supposed to lay the mine barrier "CBX.5" on the Dutch coast . When trying to intercept the German ships, HMS Express ran into a mine in the German barrier "SW 1". HMS Esk and HMS Ivanhoe also ran into mines during a rescue attempt . The first sank immediately, the second was sunk by the Kelvin after the crew had been sunk because towing was too risky.
The end of the Vortigern
On the morning of March 15, 1942, Lt. Cdr. Ronald Stanley Howlett, DSC , RN commanded destroyers to escort coastal convoy FS-349 when it was attacked by German speedboats about 17 nautical miles off Cromer . The Vortigern received a torpedo hit in the bow from the S 104 speedboat , which belonged to the 4th S-Flotilla, and sank quickly. The other escort ship , the corvette HMS Guillemot , initially did not contain any survivors in order not to endanger the convoy. The commander followed a corresponding order. The guillemot did not return until evening to look for members of the Vortigern crew . Two men were rescued from the stern protruding from the water, twelve more were fished out of the water. 147 crew members died, some of the dead were rescued by lifeboats from Cromer and Sheringham . During an investigation it was found that the life rafts were lashed down contrary to the relevant orders and therefore did not float when the ship went down. Few of the crew members also appear to have worn life jackets.
The writer Nicholas Monsarrat , who was part of the crew of the HMS Guillemot , described the sinking of the HMS Vortigern in his book "Three Corvettes".
The wreck lies at 53 ° 13 '6 " N , 1 ° 6' 54" E. at a depth of 23 m. Since it was considered an obstacle to shipping, it was partially cleared despite its quality as a war grave and so badly destroyed that in 1986 divers discovered a set of triple torpedo tubes complete with torpedoes no less than 500 m away from the main wreck site. Since 2006 the wreck of the Vortigern has been protected as a “Protected Place” by the “ Protection of Military Remains Act ” of 1986. The wreck can be viewed from the outside by divers, but entering, collecting souvenirs or performing salvage work is prohibited.
Individual evidence
- ↑ HMS Vortigern (F35, G21, G03)
- ↑ the former Russian destroyers were renamed Wambola and Lennuk ; In 1933 they were sold to Peru
- ↑ S.Stokes: Naval Actions of the Russian Civil War. Pt.3 (PDF; 392 kB)
- ^ Rohwer: Sea War. P. 58.
- ^ Rohwer, p. 57.
- ↑ Rohwer, p. 228.
Web links
- HMS Vortigern Service history WWII
- uboat.net: HMS Vortigern
- ship-wrecks.co.uk: The loss of HMS VORTIGERN ( Memento from November 1, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) (English)
- BBC WW2 People's War: The battle of Oran (by a crew member of the HMS Vortigern )