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MALTA CONVOY CHAPTER TWO

Days Three and Four

Taking a break after an air attack on the third day, we were out on the fo'c'sle when a sailor right up in the bows on the starboard side let out a yell:
'TORPEDO! TORPEDO!'
Stupidly, we rushed over to the side to see. Being nearest to the guardrail on the port side, I peered into the blue water of the Med. Suddenly I saw a thick stream of bubbles appear near our port bow, and trace a rapid path away from us, almost at right angles.
'Gawd! That was close!' a sailor near me muttered. It was the bubbles rising from the compressed air driving the torpedo that I had seen.
But as we looked we saw that the torpedo was making into the centre of the convoy; our station was on the right flank of the lines of merchantmen. We turned to the bridge.
'TORPEDO!' we yelled in unison.
A hand waved from up aloft, and a voice came down through a megaphone: 'Keep a look out for others!'
We rushed over to the starboard side: somewhere out there a submarine was lurking. But the surface was broken into small waves, and the sunlight glinted fiercely on them. It was impossible to make out a torpedo track until it was too late.

We ran back to the port side, to see what was happening. That torpedo was running free among the ships. No doubt a signal had been hoisted, to warn the other ships of the danger, but they in their turn could not espy the track of bubbles. We however could. Lining our eyes along the track left on the surface, we estimated that it was making directly for the cruiser Nigeria, that it was on an intercepting course. We began shouting and waving our arms, wildly. Some sailors on the foredeck of that cruiser saw our gesticulations, but at that distance could make nothing out of what we meant. Fascinated and horrified we watched as the track made for the next cruiser in line.

All at once a plume of water shot up two hundred feet into the air, from just aft of the bridge of the Nigeria, obscuring the superstructure. Sailors on her fo'c'sle seemed to tumble about, several falling on their hands and knees. As the spray began to subside, the noise of the explosion struck the Manchester's side, having travelled underwater to reach us.
Already the Nigeria was slipping back, losing way, and within a minute she had dropped well astern. Two destroyers were circling her and laying a smoke screen to prevent the submarine skipper from putting another torpedo into her.

We felt the Manchester alter course sharply to starboard.
'TORPEDO ON THE STARBOARD BOW!' was being shouted over and over again.
The ship righted herself almost as suddenly. We must be making a reciprocal course, parallel to that of the torpedo, but in the opposite direction. That way we would present the smallest breadth of target area.
'STAND BY!'
'BEND YOUR KNEES!'
Action stations sounded at that moment, and we rushed for the turret door, unsure whether in the next moment the torpedo might not strike us too, and send us sprawling like ninepins.
Inside the turret the starboard gun crew were talking excitedly.
'Just twenty feet there was between!'
'Straight down the starboard side, she went!'
'A second later for the turn, and we'd have bought it!'
'Yeah, aft somewhere...'
In the enclosed space of the turret, we sweated. Was another torpedo on its way? How many subs were out there, loosing off tinfish at us? Why hadn't the destroyers picked them up?
'There's a merchantman gone,' announced the midshipman, his eyes glued to the binocular pieces. 'And another enveloped in smoke.' We listened in silence, still much more concerned about the torpedo that might be making for us, rather than about the merchant seamen in the water.

For now we were a prime target, the largest warship left in the convoy. I felt the selfishness of personal fear had permeated the turret, and sensed it in myself as well. I didn't want to find myself in the midst of an explosion that would lift A turret, still sealed and intact, sheer from its shaft, and heave it over the ship's side. An image of the turret, plunging into the water and plummeting down into the depths, taking us all to the grave, had taken hold of my mind, and would not be exorcised.

'The convoy is re-assembling,' the middie told us, swinging his periscope around in a steady sweep. 'Dido' - that was the anti-aircraft cruiser - ' is coming up to take the place of the Nigeria. Can't see the Nigeria at all now, much too far astern.'
When finally we were allowed out on deck again, we could count only nine merchant ships. We noticed too that the convoy had for the first time taken to zigzagging to defeat submarines trying to manoeuvre into attacking positions; they were slower than the convoy and so had to lie in wait on what they hoped would be our course. But as the zigzags were highly irregular, and the pattern could itself be changed by flag hoist at any time by the Admiral of the convoy - now aboard the Cairo - we felt that the subs had less chance of securing hits. There was one major disadvantage, however: zigzagging took time, and so it would take us longer to get to Malta.

Moreover, with each air attack the convoy now scattered; ships in line present a much easier target for bombers, and had less freedom to fire than when sailing independently. The merchantmen, too, found that their main defence lay not in the two oerlikons mounted on either side of the bridge, but in swift and sudden changes of course, and for this they needed plenty of searoom to move about in without risking collision. Thus, following each air attack — and there could be four or five in a day - the convoy lost more time in reassembling from all the various directions into which the individual merchantmen had dispersed. None of this operation could be done at more than 14 knots, so skippers who had chosen to escape from the attacking squadrons by turning and shaping a course to the north or south kept the others waiting while they made up the distance again.

One vessel, a tanker called the Ohio, had been so badly damaged in her engineroom that she had dropped right behind. She was still making her way independently, headed east with a destroyer escort, but at only 5 knots! She was carrying fuel for ships and planes on Malta; any torpedo or well-placed bomb would turn her into a huge sheet of flame. (In the event she plodded on, suffering many air attacks, but finally limped under tow into Valetta harbour, pitted and buckled, yet just afloat and with her cargo intact, to the delight of the Maltese.)

At the time of the torpedoing of the Nigeria, we on the Manchester had been at action stations for a total of about twenty-four hours. In A turret we slept when we could on the warm steel plates, or dozed out on deck between air attacks. Food came to us on trays: cold sandwiches and purser's kye - the thick cocoa always available in the galley. On that we were expected to keep our bodies fit and our morale up. But the strain was beginning to tell. We were now well into our third day in the Med. The fleet strength we had set out with had now shrunk to three cruisers (one medium and two light) and a number of destroyers. Over a third of the merchantmen had gone. There were few jokes being passed round, and those were weak and half-hearted. Most of us were wrapped in a cocoon of weariness and anxiety, hoping we would be spared, but well aware that the most dangerous stretch lay ahead - the passage between Sicily and North Africa.

During the next night we had to stand to more than once, I seem to remember. We were able to snatch rest in fits and starts only. Sleeping twenty-one men in the narrow confines of a turret meant that you lay down where you could, and on your side. There wasn’t room to lie on your back. You even had to use the protruding horizontal flange of each of the two girders ran fore and on either side of the centre gun. On this smooth six-inch wide surface of steel I lay on my side, hooking my fingers round its edge to prevent myself from slipping off on to the men pressed together on either side of me. When we had to stand to for an alert during the night, and struggled to our feet, uncertain as to what kind of threat faced us this time, we would look into each other's faces and read anxiousness holding down fear, a preoccupation with one's own safety above all, and a readiness for the panic dash to the turret door if the ship was badly hit. Amongst the crew of the turret were a couple of Canadians from Cape Breton island; they would try to keep each other's spirits up with a remark now and then in a weird form of French. But for the most part we just stood at action stations, bodies acheing with fatigue, in a dejected silence.

The fourth morning found the convoy still unchanged from the evening before; no ship had succumbed during the night. As the hours went by without air attack, a little of our former courage returned. The spell free from standing-to had enabled the bridge to release the cooks, who had prepared a strong broth to go with the sandwiches; with warm food inside our bellies, conversation began once again to pick up. If we could make it through the gap, we told each other, we would soon be within radius of air cover from Malta. There were still the enemy subs, of course ...

It was as if the Italians, and the Germans too, had overheard us. Within an hour the alarm for air-attack sounded, and we closed up to our guns. The midshipman, always prepared to tell us the best and the worst, announced that squadrons of bombers were coming in, in large numbers, from two directions, low level as well as higher. As we started swinging to fire six-inch shrapnel shells in amongst the former, he announced dive-bombers too, Stukas. Within seconds the Manchester was shaking violently as the whole of her armament was engaged: the heavy guns and the four-inch firing at the waves of bombers, and the multiple pom-pom and Bofors and Oerlikons raking the sky around the Stukas.

'Train right!' came a sudden command. This meant we were on independent fire, each turret firing separately: the co-ordination had become impossible, for there were too many attackers.
'Low elevation, short fuse!' called the midshipman. 'Target nine torpedo bombers, sea level. Fire at my command!'
The gun captains signalled ready to fire to Toop. 'All guns ready to fire, Sir!'
'They're still coming on, straight for us ... nine hundred yards … eight hundred ... they're rocking, someone else's shells ... seven hundred ... stand by ... FIRE!’
The guns blasted off their shells. Had the torpedoes been dropped? The cruiser slewed violently to starboard, but the midshipman kept his periscope on bearing.
'A huge explosion ... bits of aircraft hurled out from it ... the smoke is clearing ..there's nothing there ...they've just d-d-disappeared!'
The seconds ticked by ... Still no explosion in our own hull. We must have escaped. There was a faint cheer, and then we were punching each other with relief. The attack continued, but less intensely, as we could tell from the sound of our armament, and then broke off.

The bridge spoke up, addressing us over the tannoy, and congratulating us all on the way we had fought off the heavy attack. In spite of its strength, and the attempt to disrupt our defences, only one merchantman had been hit, and not at all badly. Otherwise we were intact. It was thought we had brought down a large number of aircraft, but reports were still coming in. Enemy aircraft losses since the beginning of the convoy were now estimated at 60 plus. And we had sunk two submarines for sure, perhaps more.

Our spirits rose again … and stayed up. There may have been further attacks that day but I don't remember them. By the evening we were much nearer the gap, and due to pass through under cover of night - the fourth of our passage through the Med. By daybreak the next morning we should be well on our way across to Malta. As night fell, we were talking with each other much more freely, and even beginning to think of steaming into Valetta harbour, and of sleeping and eating our fill, catching up on all that we had missed. Once more, after hot soup and sandwiches, we manoeuvered ourselves into our cramped dozing positions on the turret floor, and slept in short snatches, or lay awake, counting the minutes, almost the revolutions, that took us closer to safety.

Torpedoed

At about one a.m. we were stood to. The middie said he could see shell bursts at a distance, low down. This couldn't be torpedo bombers again, surely. Within seconds our guns were ready to fire, the turret was being swung this way and that, as if searching in the night for the target.
'E-BOATS!' shouted the midshipman, as the guns suddenly crashed into action. A surface target at last for the guns to engage - motor torpedo boats! We loaded and fired, in furiously rapid succession; then a lull. We panted, sweating in the warm confined space. 'Here they come again!'
The guns fired repeatedly, salvo upon salvo. Then a brief lull.
'Starboard gun breech getting stiff, Sir!’ Durnford, the gun-captain, reported.
‘Ordnance artificer at the double!' The middie ordered.
The gun mechanic took one swing at the breech, glanced at its rifling, turned to the midshipman and shook his head.
'Starboard gun check, check, check!'
Moments later we were firing away from the centre and port guns only, at a tempestuous rate of load and fire.

As I bent down for the next cartridge case, the turret floor suddenly thrust upwards, rocking me violently. An enormous and deep explosion resonated from within the ship. Then the floor, whipping from side to side, settled down again.
'We're hit!' It was Toop who spoke first. His voice was quiet, but heard all over the turret, for all the heavy armament had stopped firing. We could hear a few units of lighter armament still loosing off rounds, but the bursts had become infrequent, and in a few seconds died away altogether.
We looked at each other: the turret was still mounted on the ship, I thought with relief. And the ammunition locker below hadn't been hit, unless afire had been started and ...
'We're losing way,' said the midshipman. 'Revs are dropping,'

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