HMS Abdiel (M39)
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|---|---|
| Abiel class | |
.jpg) The HMS Abdiel |
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| Overview | |
| Type | Mine layers |
| units | 6th |
| Shipyard |
J. Samuel White , Cowes , BauNr. 571 |
| Order | 1938 |
| Keel laying | March 23, 1939 |
| Launch | April 23, 1940 |
| Commissioning | April 15, 1941 |
| Whereabouts | Sunk September 10, 1943 |
| Technical specifications | |
| displacement |
2650 ts |
| length |
127.4 m (418 ft) above sea level |
| width |
12.2 m (40 ft) |
| Draft |
3.4 m (11 ft) |
| crew |
244 men |
| drive |
4 Admiralty Kessel |
| speed |
40 kn |
| Range |
5800 nm at 15 kn / 472 t oil |
| Armament |
|
| 1.1946 |
Armament |
| Manxman |
3 × 2 - 102/45 Mk XIX |
| Apollo |
2 × 2 - 102/45 Mk XIX |
| Ariadne |
2 × 2 - 102/45 Mk XIX |
The Royal Navy's HMS Abdiel (M39) was the lead ship of the class of fast mine-layers named after her . The first four ships were ordered before the outbreak of World War II and delivered in 1941. Two more orders were given during the war.
The order for the Abdiel went to the J. Samuel White shipyard . On April 15, 1941, it was completed as the largest new building in the shipyard. The boat was lost on September 10, 1943 during the occupation of Taranto after a mine hit.
Building history
Even before the outbreak of World War II , four shipyards received orders each for one of the new, high-speed mine-layers, which were sometimes referred to as mine cruisers. The ships should be able to lay mine barriers near enemy ports at high speed. In terms of length and engine performance, almost like light cruisers, their armament hardly corresponded to that of a fleet destroyer - the permanent speed that could be maintained at sea was, however, much higher than that of cruisers and destroyers
. The smooth deck type comprised a protective deck for the planned 150 mines which stood next to each other on four pairs of tracks behind the machines. Only the two outer tracks reached further forward into the living quarters.
The main artillery armament should ultimately consist of three 102 mm twin guns of the type Mk.XVI. These lighter weapons compared to the usual destroyer armament should improve the possibilities of anti-aircraft defense. In particular, the 120 mm Mk.XII guns planned for the most recently ordered fleet destroyers ( Tribal Class , J and K Class ) had a very small area of fire against attacking aircraft due to the low possibility of increasing them. The fact that the attackers were getting faster and faster also further shortened the possible response time. So the plan to install two of these twin guns was abandoned and instead three 102 mm / L45 Mk XVI twin guns were planned. Their greater possibilities for increasing and higher rate of fire gave considerably better defense options. The temporarily considered installation of two of these guns to the rear was quickly abandoned, since the historical tracking by surface ships was not the main problem of modern units. The most dangerous opponents of warships near the enemy coast were land planes operating at sea.
For the close range, a 2pdr anti-aircraft pompom quadruplet , which was set up high behind the funnels and had a large fire area, and two heavy 0.5 inch Vickers quadruple machine guns at the bridge ends completed the armament. 15 depth charges could also be carried for anti-submarine defense.
The HMS Abdiel was ordered with two sister ships in autumn 1938. The order went to the J. Samuel White shipyard in Cowes on the Isle of Wight and was the largest ship built by the proven destroyer shipyard . After the keel was laid on March 23, 1939, the ship was launched on April 23, 1940 as the first of the sister ships. On April 15, 1941, the Abdiel , again as the first miner of the class, was taken into service and used during the acceptance tests.
She was the second ship to be named after the biblical person Abdiel . The first HMS Abdiel was a flotilla of Marksman class , the Cammell Laird in 1915 built, which was used as a minelayer and until 1936 deleted.
Mission history
At the beginning of the war in 1939, the three ships ordered in 1938 and another mine-layer ordered in March 1939 were under construction at four well-known destroyer shipyards. Their continued construction was not given priority, as these shipyards had to build new escort vehicles and repair the existing ones. While the Abdiel was launched in April 1940, the others were not launched in the other shipyards until autumn 1940. In the spring of 1941, all four ships were about to be completed.
First missions
On March 22, 1941, the Abdiel interrupted her inspection trips, as she received the order to deploy mine barriers, which should make it difficult for the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau to break out of Brest. In the three missions 'GV', 'GX' and 'GY' moved the Abdiel from 23 to 28 March, the destroyers Intrepid , Impulsive and Icarus mines near the Little Sole Bank 65 km WSW of Brest. The operations were secured by the destroyers Kipling , Kelly and Jackal .
From April 17 to 30, 1941, the Abdiel tried to carry out its acceptance tests, but had to stop again. With the cruiser Dido and the “5th destroyer flotilla” with the destroyers Kelly , Kipling , Kelvin , Jackal and Jersey she was supposed to transport military supplies for Malta to Gibraltar . The group departed from Plymouth was assigned to the Mediterranean fleet there.
Use in the Mediterranean
From April 24 to 28, 1941, the association ran as "Force S" to Malta and unloaded its cargo there. The "5th destroyer flotilla" strengthened since Gibraltar around the Kashmir remained there as a complement to the Force K. At the same time with Operation Dunlop by the "Force H" the Ark Royal flew 30 Hawker Hurricane fighters and three Fairey Fulmar to Malta. The Abdiel ran with the Dido and the destroyers Janus , Jervis and Nubian and the empty transporter Breconshire to reinforce the Mediterranean fleet to Alexandria , where the formation arrived on the 30th.
On May 21, the Abdiel put its first mine lock of 150 mines in the Mediterranean off Akra Dhoukaton ( Cape Dukato ) on the southern tip of the island of Lefkada in the Ionian Sea . The Italian destroyer Carlo Mirabello (1916, 1840 ts) and the gunboat Pellegrino Matteucci (1924, 620 ts) as well as the German transporters Kybfels (7764 BRT) and Marburg (7564 BRT) were lost on this barrier within 24 hours .
In the night of May 26th to 27th, the Abdiel landed 800 more commandos at Suda Bay accompanied by Destroy Hero and the Australian HMAS Nizam . Already on May 31, 1941 , Abdiel , the light cruiser Phoebe and the destroyers Jackal , Kimberley and Hotspur in Sfakia , Crete , who had come from Alexandria , evacuated 4,000 British soldiers from the island at night, 2000 had to be left behind.
From June 10th, the mine-layer was then used as a transport to support the enclosed Tobruk . In July, the Abdiel transported reinforcements from the Army and the Royal Air Force to Cyprus with her sister ship Latona . In August both mine layers supported Tobruk again with the Australian cruiser Hobart and destroyers Napier and Nizam . From August 19, they transported Polish troops to Tobruk to relieve the Australian troops who were to be released back home. The Latona was lost on October 26th in front of Bardia after a bomb hit by a German Junkers Ju 87 . At the beginning of November there were further trips with destroyers to Cyprus and at the end of October the “5th Indian Division” was relocated to Beirut .
In December 1942 the Abdiel was assigned to the British Eastern Fleet and moved to Trincomalee .
Short service in the Indian Ocean
The Abdiel arrived there on January 10, 1942 . On the 27th they put their first four mine locks in the Andaman Islands . In a second deployment, three more locks followed around MacPherson Strait . When starting to march back from Port Anson , the Abdiel hit the ground and damaged the starboard shaft. She could return to Colombo with only one usable machine. A repair was not possible there and the Abdiel had to go on to Durban in March , where a careful examination was carried out in the dock. Not only the shaft, but also its suspension was in need of repair. Only makeshift repairs were possible on site and the Abdiel should therefore be repaired in Great Britain. The mine-layer, which was partially operational, should therefore remain in South Africa until it was replaced by the sister ship Manxman . The journey home therefore only began in June, on which a load of gold bars was picked up in Cape Town. On the way to Pointe Noire in the French Congo colony , at that time the only colony ruled by the Free French , was called, where the Abdiel not only replenished its supplies, but also had to carry out further emergency repairs. In July the ship unloaded its gold cargo in Glasgow and then went to Newcastle to be repaired at a shipyard. The radar equipment was also improved. After a few shipyard test drives, the Abdiel took over mines in Milford Haven on December 24, 1942 and placed an offensive barrier off the coast of Brittany at Vierge on December 30 .
Back in the Mediterranean
On January 2, 1943, the Abdiel took over new mines in Milford Haven and ran through Gibraltar to Algiers on the 6th. Abdiel placed its first ban on 8/9. January on the access route of the Axis powers to their bridgehead in Tunis and walked back to Bone after the mission. From there she ran via Malta to Gibraltar, where she took over a new mine load from the mine cruiser HMS Adventure (6740 ts, 1926), which was used as a transporter for the mines needed by Abdiel , as the allies have not yet had any mines in the western Mediterranean stood. On January 31, the miner broke off the first attempt to reinforce the barrier after it had come into action with German speedboats. On February 3rd, the planned reinforcement of the barrier was achieved and the Abdiel then ran to Mers el Kebir in order to get new mines from the Adventure there. On the 4th they moved closer to the combat area after Bone with the destroyers Lightning and Loyal . From there, the lock was reinforced on the 7th.
In order to carry out repairs and to take a new supply of mines on board, Abdiel ran back to Great Britain via Algiers on the 8th. On the 26th she returned to Algiers repaired and fully equipped for further missions. On the 28th, she put another barrier northwest of Bizerta and got into a skirmish with speedboats again. In Mers el Kebir she received new mines from the newly equipped Adventure and relocated them in a new lock on March 5th, this time the mine-layer was secured by the destroyers Lightning and Loyal . On the 6th she took over new mines from the Adventure and then returned to her companion destroyers Lightning and Loyal in Bone. While laying another barrier, she discovered a small Italian convoy that she shot at. Since she had thrown her mine inventory down to 16, she ran with the destroyers Pakenham and Paladin to Malta.
From there she made three trips to Haifa in March , from where she also transported mines for future missions to Malta, among other goods.
On April 4th, 5th, 7th and 8th, four more mine operations were carried out in the bottleneck between Sicily and Tunisia, secured by the destroyers Paladin and Kelvin . During the mine barriers that Abdiel had launched in the Strait of Sicily since January, the Italians lost not only transports but also the two torpedo boats Uragano and Ciclone (910 tons, February 3 and March 7, 1943) and the four destroyers
Lanzerotto Malocello (1930, 2125 tons, March 24),
Saetta (1932, 1,225 tons, February 3),
Ascari (1939, 1645 tons, March 24), and
Corsaro (1942, 1,645 tons, January 9, 1943). In addition, the
Maestrale (1934, 1440 tons, January 9th) was seriously damaged.
From April 11th, the ship resumed transport tasks in the eastern Mediterranean, with the first voyage in this task from Haifa to Cyprus on the 14th. From June onwards, mainly troops from Egypt were transported to Malta in preparation for the planned landing of the Allies in Sicily. Immediately before Operation Husky began , the Abdiel transported personnel from Alexandria directly to the attack zone.
The end of Abdiel
The ship remaining in the central Mediterranean to support the troop movements took over parts of the troops and equipment of the British 1st Airborne Division in Bizerta for the occupation of Taranto ( Operation Slapstick ) following the armistice of Cassibile . On September 9, 1943, she marched with the 12th Cruiser Squadron and the cruisers Aurora , Penelope of the Arethusa class , the anti-aircraft cruisers Dido and Sirius and the American USS Boise to Taranto. The Allied ships arrived in Taranto on September 10th. A lack of caution led to the run-up on the mines laid by the German speedboats S 54 and S 61 on their retreat the day before. Two exploded under the Abdiel that immediately massive ingress of water had decreased and in a short time at 40 ° 27 ' N , 17 ° 15' O . Six officers and 42 men of the crew as well as about 120 of the 400 soldiers embarked died. In addition, a large number of soldiers were seriously wounded.
The Abdiel-class mine layers
| Surname | Shipyard | Construction no. | Keel laying | Launch | finished | Final fate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Abdiel | M39 | JS White | 571 | 03/23/1939 | 04/23/1940 | 04/15/1941 | Sunk in Taranto on September 10, 1943, 168 dead |
| Latona | M76 | Thornycroft | 4.04.1939 | 08/22/1940 | 4.05.1941 | Sunk after an air raid off Bardia on October 25, 1941 , 27 dead | |
| Manxman | M70 | Stephens | 568 | March 24, 1939 | September 5, 1940 | 06/21/1941 | Demolished after fire in 1972 |
| Welshman | M84 | Hawthorn Leslie | 623 | June 8, 1939 | September 4, 1940 | 08/25/1941 | Sunk by U 617 east of Tobruk on February 1, 1943 , 155 dead |
| Ariadne | M65 | Stephens | 591 | 11/15/1941 | February 16, 1943 | October 9, 1943 | 1963 demolished |
| Apollo | M01 | Hawthorn Leslie | 654 | 10/10/1941 | April 5, 1943 | 02/12/1944 | 1960 demolition |
literature
- Tom Burton: Abdiel-Class Fast Minelayers (= Warship Series 38). Profile Publications, Windsor 1973.
- Henry T. Lenton: Warships of the British & Commonwealth Navies. 2nd edition. Ian Allan, Shepperton 1969.
- Antony Preston: Destroyers. Hamlyn, London et al. 1977, ISBN 0-600-32955-0 .
- Jürgen Rohwer , Gerhard Hümmelchen : Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. Manfred Pawlak VerlagsGmbH, Herrsching 1981, ISBN 3-88199-0097 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Burton: Abdiel-Class Fast Minelayers. 1973, p. 27 f.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, p. 115.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, p. 119.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, p. 129.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, p. 128.
- ^ Antony Preston: Destroyers. 1977, p. 119.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, pp. 165, 176.
- ↑ a b c d e Burton: Abdiel-Class Fast Minelayers. 1973, p. 30.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, p. 183.
- ↑ a b Burton: Abdiel-Class Fast Minelayers. 1973, p. 39.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, pp. 320, 328, 343.
- ^ Jürgen Rohwer, Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. 1981, p. 383.
- ↑ after engl. Wikipedia only 54 soldiers; no source named
- ↑ David and Hugh Lyon; Siegfried Greiner: Warships from 1900 to today, technology and use . Buch und Zeit Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Cologne 1979, p. 56 .