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0:38

Hello, and thank you for listening

0:40

to The History of World War

0:43

II Podcast, episode 443, a two-episode special.

0:48

First, historian Angus Constam

0:50

comes on to discuss his book, The

0:52

Convoy, where one man decides

0:54

to go hunting for the U-boats versus

0:57

the other way around. And then back

0:59

to the Eastern Front with The Clash

1:01

of Titans. Mr. Constam,

1:04

the author of over 100 books like

1:06

Salerno, 1943, The Battle of North Cape, and

1:10

his biography on Blackbeard, comes

1:13

on to discuss a moment during the war

1:15

that will see the Battle of the Atlantic changed

1:18

in favor of the Allies and bring hope

1:21

to the British people. Mr. Constam,

1:23

thank you very much for being with us today.

1:26

It's an absolute pleasure. So,

1:29

I want to say that, as you can imagine,

1:31

and I'm sure you've gotten a lot of feedback,

1:34

this story, this book that you've written, The

1:36

Convoy, it just goes and goes

1:38

and goes, and I just know it's

1:40

going to be turned into a movie. When that

1:42

happens, please call me, and

1:45

I'll carry your bags, and I'll be your

1:47

assistant, whatever, it would just be so much

1:49

fun. But this was an incredible

1:51

story with a lot of significance that I don't

1:53

think I appreciated until I read

1:56

your book. So, how did you

1:58

come across

1:58

this particular convoy? this story?

2:01

Well Ray, it started but it

2:03

had nothing to do with it originally because

2:08

about a dozen years ago I started interviewing

2:12

Arctic convoy veterans and

2:15

because you know they were getting a bit

2:17

long in the tooth and I wanted to get

2:19

them while I still could and I was

2:23

and they were both merchant Navy British

2:25

ones some some Norwegians

2:27

in fact as well and mainly

2:30

British some American Canadian and

2:33

what got me was

2:37

one of them said that the

2:39

Arctic convoys were a sort of walk

2:41

in the park and kidding

2:44

me it's freezing out there and you know

2:46

and he said you know he was he was in this con

2:48

in this gerbaltic convoy and he

2:52

was more terrified then at one

2:55

stage than than at any other point

2:57

and I was and that was

2:59

HG 76 and I was

3:02

and there was a merchant naval

3:05

guy who was actually torpedoed four

3:07

times in the war which you know he's

3:09

a bit of a gona I think on his merchant

3:11

ships and I learned two things

3:13

for him one is in the British Navy at then the

3:15

British Merchant Service at the time when

3:18

you were torpedoed that

3:20

was your pay stopped the soon the moment

3:22

you stepped off that ship into

3:24

into the lifeboat and and

3:27

he said he couldn't funny it happened up in

3:30

it was taken into merman's car Archangel

3:32

or somewhere and he had to wait three months or something

3:34

and they're basically living on Red

3:37

Cross parcels

3:39

how usually it worked better

3:42

but and

3:45

but he was he was taking

3:47

part in this convoy as well so there

3:49

were two guys who I spoke to who

3:52

would play department and that's

3:54

kind of and it kind of sat on a bank burner

3:57

for a long while and then I just

4:01

a couple of things, a couple of catalysts then

4:04

just saw a written article about it by a

4:06

guy called Mal Wright, a guy, Australian,

4:09

who I historically have a lot of time for, and

4:11

he mentioned it in

4:14

a short magazine article.

4:17

And that got the ball rolling. So

4:19

there we go.

4:20

That's incredible. And you're right. I mean,

4:22

to go back to something you just said, that convoy

4:25

must have been quite something to have someone

4:27

go, oh, an Arctic convoy? Yeah, that's a

4:29

Tuesday for me. Thank God I'm not having

4:31

to do the Gibraltar run again. I mean, that

4:33

speaks volumes in and of itself.

4:36

Yeah. I mean, to put it context,

4:38

HG76 came at

4:40

a time, it was running from Gibraltar

4:43

in, it left on 14th

4:45

of December, 1941. I'm sorry, I'm

4:47

going to put my dates in

4:50

the sort of British ways. Apologies

4:52

for that. I put them in a kind of logical

4:55

order. So

4:58

you guys do it for 4th of July, don't you? You

5:00

know, so it's the one exception.

5:05

The main because it predates messing

5:08

around with dates, maybe, but anyway, late

5:10

December, 1941, a week after exactly

5:13

a week after Pearl Harbor. So,

5:17

and at this point, the British have been fighting

5:19

kind of the Battle of the Atlantic

5:21

on their own, and things have been

5:24

really getting kind of hairy. And

5:27

when you have convoys where it's

5:29

fairly, it's not unknown

5:31

to have 10 or 12 merchant ships

5:34

sunk in that convoy, then

5:36

you can see something about

5:38

what this guy was speaking about, because they little

5:41

in the way of escorts. And,

5:44

and the losses were just quite,

5:46

quite astronomically high. And

5:49

by the time his Arctic convoys were going

5:52

about, convoys were much better

5:54

protected. And part of the reason was

5:57

thanks to some of the breakthroughs that

5:59

came. with HG-76.

6:02

Wow, that's incredible. So yeah, whether ships

6:05

are full or they're empty and they're going back home, it

6:07

doesn't matter. All of these ships are valuable

6:09

because they're going to be obviously needed

6:12

in the future, which brings us to one,

6:14

Johnny Walker. So he's going to be in charge

6:16

of the escorts part of this convoy.

6:19

And he's got some ideas that he's been working

6:21

on for some time about how to reduce

6:23

the number of lost ships. His

6:25

idea is to be a lot more aggressive.

6:29

Can you introduce us to Johnny Walker, please?

6:31

Yeah, sure. Captain

6:34

Frederick Walker, and

6:36

he was given the nickname Johnny after the

6:38

Scotch, after the whisky. So

6:42

it seems logical. But

6:49

he was a rarity in the interwar

6:52

years in the Royal Navy because

6:55

if you wanted to get ahead, you had

6:57

to specialize in, ideally, gunnery,

7:00

something like that. Gunnery or torpedoes or

7:02

something at the fighting end

7:05

of the... Gunnery

7:07

was best because that's battleships, cruisers,

7:10

surface engagements. And that's where

7:13

the flag officers were groomed

7:16

from gunnery and torpedo schools and things.

7:19

That kind of thing. But Walker

7:21

did, was he specialized in anti-submarine

7:24

warfare, which was almost frowned

7:26

upon. It was kind of ignored.

7:29

And Sonar,

7:33

or Azdic as the British called it at

7:35

the time, was sort of perfected at the tail

7:37

end of the First World War. And the interwar

7:39

years, there was a little bit of development in it. But

7:42

people like Walker were... He

7:44

was one of the guys who kind of got

7:47

to grips with it and figured out what could be done

7:49

and helped develop improvements

7:52

in it. And

7:55

so by the time the war started, he was still

7:57

being kind of ignored. He was an expert.

8:00

in anti-submarine warfare. But

8:02

he got command jobs, he was sent

8:04

out to the Far East to be essentially

8:08

the skipper of what was essentially

8:11

the admiral's yacht, and all these jobs

8:13

which were not really

8:15

where his real talents lay. And

8:19

that went right through to time of Dunkirk

8:22

in 1940 where

8:26

the evacuation of Dunkirk

8:28

where he was taking part in supporting

8:30

Admiral Ramsey's evacuation,

8:34

his Operation Dynamo. But

8:37

where he really needed to be was in

8:40

the Atlantic fighting U-boats. And that's

8:42

what happened. It took until it

8:44

was the middle of 1941 before he actually

8:47

got the command he needed, which was command

8:51

of a group of anti-submarine

8:54

group of sloops, which

8:56

are like small modern frigates I

8:58

suppose, and corvettes

9:00

which are a little bigger than, well

9:03

as you know you've probably all seen the Kralsee

9:06

which is an excellent movie, but you

9:08

know how tubby a corvette

9:10

is, you know, it pops

9:13

along at 16 knots or whatever. But they

9:16

could be mass produced based on a whaler,

9:19

a design of a whaler, interwar

9:21

whaler, and they were

9:23

really helping to fill

9:26

the gap. So earlier in

9:28

the war in 1940 a lot of the destroyers

9:30

were used for fleet burps, the smaller ones.

9:33

Americans really pitched in with those 50

9:36

Lend-Lease destroyers, one of

9:38

which plays a major part in

9:40

HG-76. But it's the

9:43

really short of escorts. But by 1941,

9:46

by the middle of 1941, they started to

9:48

come online. These new corvettes

9:51

and other warships are starting to appear. So

9:53

there's a little more escort going

9:56

on and a little less

9:58

just having to make do with the few ships

10:00

you have. So Walker was right in

10:02

there. His emphasis was on teamwork

10:06

and skill

10:08

and teamwork and really

10:11

using a number of warships

10:13

to hunt. And the Admiralty, the

10:15

British Admiralty, their whole idea

10:17

with convoys, it was that their

10:20

aim was to get the convoys safely from point

10:23

A to point B. Now that

10:25

wasn't good enough for Walker. He

10:28

said, look, passively, yeah, passively,

10:31

escort in the convoy isn't enough. If

10:32

you want to safeguard convoys

10:35

and convoys

10:35

in the future, the aim is to sink

10:38

U-boats. So he developed

10:40

a more aggressive kind of tactic, which meant

10:43

hunting, physically hunting down

10:45

U-boats while still performing

10:48

his escort duties, which

10:50

is something that didn't happen. So

10:53

in HG76, he finally

10:55

got, that was the first convoy, he got a chance as

10:57

convoy escort commander, as a

10:59

chance to show exactly what he could do.

11:02

That's amazing. Yeah, because his more

11:04

aggressive style is going to be needed. I

11:06

think you say somewhere in the book when convoys

11:09

first started, yeah, the number

11:11

of escorts was minimal, but they're

11:13

losing ships left and right. I mean, the

11:15

island of Britain Churchill himself is truly

11:18

stressed and worried about just

11:20

losing so many ships faster than

11:22

they can build them. So he's going to get

11:24

a chance to implement this, like you said, because

11:26

of the increase in ships. And you

11:29

mentioned the battle of the Atlantic a couple of minutes

11:31

ago. I mean, it really is bad

11:33

for Britain. They're pretty much alone

11:36

on this. The Americans aren't in this,

11:38

they're not able to be in on this yet. This

11:41

is a convoy that really does need

11:43

to get through. They need these ships because there's going

11:45

to be a lot more convoys that's going on.

11:48

But, and this is where we get to the heart

11:50

of the story, the day after day of

11:53

battle as the convoy goes on,

11:55

which we're going to touch on in a second. But

11:57

until I read your book, I don't think I

11:59

fully Appreciated that convoy duty

12:02

is chess. It's not checkers.

12:04

It's not one short sharp battle

12:06

Everything's decided the loser goes home or

12:08

they're all at the bottom of the ocean. I mean it

12:11

plays itself out There's a rhythm to it.

12:13

There's moves counter moves anticipating

12:16

your opponent but at the

12:18

same time like Johnny Walker will show

12:20

if you're Hard working

12:22

and you're thorough about what you're trying to do it

12:25

will pay off You just may not see

12:27

it at the beginning of the convoy.

12:29

Well, that's exactly it It's his

12:32

emphasis was teamwork and when he got these ships,

12:34

he couldn't even have all of his

12:37

his group of warships

12:39

of nine warships in one place to one time

12:42

before this convoy or much right

12:44

now They were always been peeled off to

12:46

edit who to escort

12:48

other convoys and but what he was

12:51

trying to do was work them up You

12:53

know naval parlance working up his Training

12:56

to before for war as effectively

12:58

as it can and that's exactly what he was doing

13:01

He was taking them up to a base in the

13:03

in the west coast of Scotland Training

13:07

there and then and then before

13:10

in in the fall of the

13:14

late fall they were shipped down to Gibraltar

13:16

as escorting on a convoy

13:19

in the way, of course and Once

13:21

the they were injured brought to their aim

13:23

was to escort the

13:26

first real job was to escort HG 76 but

13:30

The teamwork thing actually paid off because

13:32

a few weeks before one of these little

13:35

corvettes Marigold

13:37

they were all flower class corvettes are

13:39

all named after flowers and they Marigolds

13:42

are quite sensible but you start getting

13:44

names of ships with flowers where you have to look

13:46

them up in the In the

13:48

dictionary because some of them

13:51

have just created Pencilman

13:54

is one of them and Samifier

13:56

and things, you know, it's really unusual side, but you

13:58

have building so many of them you start going through

14:00

the hole. You're

14:03

looking for rare flowers to name ships after.

14:05

However, Marigold sinks

14:08

a U-boat off Gibraltar

14:10

or close to Gibraltar. And this is

14:12

around the time that HMS

14:15

Ark Royal, the British carrier was sunk there.

14:18

And this all plays in as part of this

14:20

whole change of strategy

14:23

by the Kriegsmarine, where

14:26

they're starting instead of Vice-Admiral

14:29

Dönitz in charge of the U-boats is

14:32

concentrating on the transatlantic

14:35

convoys. Due

14:37

to Hitler's orders, he has

14:39

to divert them into attacks on

14:42

ones coming in and out of Gibraltar. He

14:44

also has to send U-boats into

14:46

the Mediterranean. And this was one of

14:48

them, one of them had sunk. They sank the

14:51

British battleship Barham off

14:53

the coast of North Africa, and then the carrier

14:56

Ark Royal close to Gibraltar.

14:58

So they were having an effect. But

15:01

once they were in there, they

15:03

were in the Mediterranean, it was a kind of a

15:05

one way thing and getting them back out due to the

15:07

tides. And also the defenses

15:09

around Gibraltar. It was a kind

15:11

of tough proposition. And they didn't

15:14

really do it once the war began in Ireland.

15:17

Yes, I love that party

15:19

book. And I didn't put that together for myself.

15:21

One of the many things in your book that you helped me

15:24

understand better. But once those subs

15:26

go into the Mediterranean, because Hitler

15:28

has promised Mussolini support, you've

15:30

got to support your partner. But at the same

15:33

time, those U-boats were being very

15:35

effective in the Atlantic. And

15:37

I imagine Dönitz was not too

15:40

happy with having some of the subs taken

15:42

away and taken into the submarine. But

15:44

and you stress this in your book, Johnny

15:47

Walker wasn't the only one who

15:49

was thinking about the future

15:51

thinking about a better way to to deal

15:54

with convoys to protect convoys. Donis

15:56

has also spent years thinking about how

15:58

you know, sub-attack plans

16:01

and he finally gets to implement his

16:04

ideas as well.

16:05

Yeah, 1941 is kind of big time for Dönitz. He, first of all,

16:07

in 1940, of course, there's

16:13

the fall of France and rather than the very

16:16

small number of U-boats starting the war, having

16:19

to leave places like Kiel and Wilmshaven

16:23

to get out into the Atlantic past where

16:25

I live here in Orkney to get out there.

16:28

He now has to go, he now has

16:31

bases like L'Oréon, Saint-Azur

16:33

and Bordeaux right on the Atlantic

16:36

itself on the coast of the Bay of Biscay. So there's

16:39

no need for that big trip

16:41

around the north of

16:43

Britain. They can just head straight out to sea.

16:46

Better still, they have airfields there

16:49

and if you

16:51

really like French wine, thousands of

16:54

people go to a place called

16:56

Bordeaux, which does a kind of a nice wine. I'm

16:59

very fond of it myself. But

17:01

there's the airfield

17:03

there, Bordeaux-Marignac, used

17:06

to be a World War II airbase

17:09

for the Luftwaffe and

17:11

it was there that they based their Focke-Wulf 200 Condor,

17:13

four-engine maritime

17:18

reconnaissance aircraft. They were bombers really,

17:20

but they made perfect maritime reconnaissance

17:24

airplanes because they

17:26

could range out about 14-1500 miles into the Atlantic.

17:30

And once they found a convoy, they

17:33

could shadow it for a dozen hours before

17:35

they were relieved. So basically

17:37

they're a real pain. And

17:41

one of the problems was you could

17:43

drive these things off if you were within range

17:46

of land-based aircraft.

17:48

But for these convoys, that really meant

17:52

within range of the

17:55

southwest corner of Britain around Plymouth

17:58

and Devon

18:00

and Cornwall, Airbases then,

18:03

and then also Gibraltar. But in between, there

18:06

was nothing, nothing at all. So

18:10

these things had fair, had free

18:12

reign to shadow convoys. And

18:15

once they did, they would vector in

18:17

U-boats. They would raid U-base, they

18:20

would contact Durnitz's

18:22

headquarters outside Lorient

18:24

in a nice seaside villa. And he

18:27

would, they would direct the U-boats there.

18:30

This whole thing by Hitler came

18:33

at a bad time for Durnitz, because

18:37

he was winning the tonnage war, which was basically

18:40

sinking more British merchant ships

18:42

than the British could build, British and

18:45

the Canadians. It

18:47

was only two things happened, of course, the America

18:50

entering the war on 7th of December, meant

18:53

that suddenly you had this phenomenal

18:56

shipbuilding capacity, which

18:58

totally changed that whole dynamic.

19:01

But at the time, it was

19:04

looking pretty bad for Britain because they were losing

19:07

ships at a great, you

19:09

mentioned earlier, you can sink

19:12

empty ones, or ones just in balance

19:14

because that was still 4,000, 5,000 tons

19:18

of merchant ship that couldn't carry a

19:20

cargo anymore. Right, exactly.

19:23

So they were almost as good as a Fui-laden

19:25

ship. And the British were losing

19:27

this badly. And

19:30

the number of escorts gradually

19:33

increasing started to make a difference. So

19:36

things like Johnny Walker

19:39

getting a chance to do this was one

19:41

of the two key elements that made

19:43

HD 76 such

19:46

a key convoy and such a kind of success

19:49

too for the Allies.

19:50

Hey, everyone, Ray here. So the

19:53

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21:14

Right, which

21:16

is what makes this story and this book so

21:19

amazing. You've got Johnny Walker. He's been working

21:21

on this. He's been practicing a little bit. He wish

21:23

he could have practiced more obviously, but he's

21:26

about to test himself. Donitz has got

21:28

his Wolfpack ideas. He's got the coast

21:30

of France. He's got the reconnaissance plane.

21:32

So he's got what he wants to a degree,

21:35

and they're both going to go at each other,

21:37

you know, indirectly through their ideas.

21:39

And that's what makes this so. This is why it's

21:42

perfect for a movie. Not that you need me to

21:44

tell you that. So these two giants

21:47

are about to butt heads. Could you

21:49

please, and you've already touched

21:51

on it a couple of times, but if you could just maybe give

21:53

us an idea of HG-76. It's about to

21:56

leave Gibraltar. How many ships in the

21:58

convoy are we talking about? about and how many escorts,

22:01

you know, what is Walker working with?

22:04

Right. Hg 76,

22:09

Homeward Gibraltar, it stands

22:11

for, their

22:13

OG and Hg and all

22:16

convoys have these, have these initials

22:19

Sierra Leone ones, transatlantic

22:21

ones, all have different ones, different,

22:24

different numbers, but it was just one of hundreds

22:26

of convoys in crossing

22:29

the Atlantic during the war. She

22:33

was particularly special

22:35

in terms of what she was, she

22:38

was doing, there was nothing hugely

22:40

vital except that she

22:42

had 32 merchant ships of various

22:44

sizes. But

22:48

their arrival in Britain would

22:51

make a big difference because at

22:53

the time Britain was really struggling. This is what

22:55

it, what these ships carried

22:58

in their holes was really what was

23:00

needed to keep Britain in the war.

23:03

And they ranged from things like iron,

23:05

just basic stuff like iron ore

23:07

to and iron, varieties,

23:10

all kinds of stuff like this, but also

23:12

foodstuffs. And that was kind

23:14

of crucial. Britain wasn't couldn't

23:17

produce enough food herself to

23:19

feed her population in wartime. She needed

23:23

to import things like wheat

23:25

from Canada from the United States or

23:28

the Hg 76

23:30

included ships that had come up around

23:34

up the coast from Africa, from

23:36

the Indian Ocean, forever

23:38

else, the Gaddington Gibraltar for this last

23:40

run, including Spanish

23:43

onions, which filled

23:45

a hold of Spanish onions from Huelva

23:48

just up by Seville there. And

23:52

that

23:52

was something

23:55

of a luxury in a way in wartime

23:57

Britain, a rationed item. A

24:00

ship full of onions would be kind of the news

24:02

when it arrived in Liverpool. It would arrive safely.

24:05

So the convoy itself, 32 merchant

24:08

ships of various sizes, but mixed bag

24:10

of goods on board. Most

24:13

of them were British, but some were, there

24:16

was some Norwegian, some Swedish,

24:20

various other nations

24:23

were represented in it. Not

24:26

quite as multinational as later convoys,

24:28

like we mentioned the Arctic convoys, where there

24:31

was a major American effort

24:33

in the shipping effort there. But

24:36

so this was this was a slightly different composition,

24:39

but all

24:41

just just as vital all

24:43

the goods in it. As for the escorts,

24:46

Walker had his own escort group of nine

24:48

ships, two sloops, and seven

24:51

of these little corvettes. But

24:54

Gibraltar was

24:57

able to provide other ships too, which

24:59

so he could pretty much double

25:01

the size of the escort. And

25:04

some of the ships were added

25:06

to it from other convoys and

25:09

were lent for just a few

25:11

days and

25:13

are sent out from Gibraltar. So

25:16

efforts were made to protect this convoy. And

25:18

the reason was they knew from intelligence,

25:21

you know, but everyone knows about the enigma

25:24

codes being broken and the ultra

25:26

intelligence where the

25:30

British admiralty knew that the Germans were going

25:32

to target this convoy and that

25:34

a wolf pack was being formed by donuts

25:36

called wolf pack sea robber

25:39

or sea robber, which is essentially

25:41

pirate. So wolf pack pirate

25:44

is a great name. There's the

25:46

movie title. It is right

25:48

there. But it has got about a

25:50

dozen, initially a dozen new boats

25:53

are forming and they're ordered to

25:55

rendezvous off capes and Vincent. That's

25:57

the bottom left of Portugal. So

26:00

easy reach of Gibraltar and

26:02

in Gibraltar itself, Gibraltar

26:04

Bay, imagine it, filled with shipping, these

26:07

merchant ships, there are other convoys assembling

26:09

at the same time. And right across

26:12

the bay is the Spanish port of Algeciras

26:15

and of course Spain. The

26:18

Franco had just won the Spanish

26:20

Civil War, they were kind of on

26:24

the German side. So the Abwehr,

26:27

the German intelligence agency had

26:30

coast watchers essentially in Algeciras,

26:34

so they were there in binoculars watching the harbour

26:37

and they would know when a convoy was sailing

26:40

and when the ships were getting steam up.

26:42

And that could be radioed to the German

26:45

embassy in Madrid and then within an

26:47

hour that was passed

26:49

on to Berlin and then eventually

26:51

on to Dunitz himself. So

26:54

the Germans were very,

26:57

that great source of intelligence,

27:00

once the convoy was at sea, they could use direction

27:02

finding, radio direction finding to

27:04

pinpoint convoy movements through

27:08

radio signals and then of course they

27:10

also had these search aircraft. So the

27:12

Germans were quite, they kind of

27:14

knew when the convoy was going to sail

27:17

and what roughly what

27:21

it composed. What they didn't realise

27:23

were two things, one was that

27:26

Walker was in charge and

27:28

he was ready to try it, his new tactics. The

27:31

other big plus they had was

27:33

audacity. Now HMS

27:35

Audacity was an escort carrier

27:39

and the British at the time

27:41

called them auxiliary carriers, they hadn't figured

27:43

out that actually it was, well it was the Americans who came up

27:45

with escort carrier which is a much more sensible

27:48

name and they had their

27:50

own one, the USS Long Beach which was

27:53

doing operational trials

27:55

at the time I believe.

27:57

But Audassie

28:01

was a one-off, she was a prototype for the British.

28:03

She was a German

28:06

cargo liner, which was

28:09

essentially, she was captured in 1940 in

28:12

the Caribbean. And they

28:14

took her to the

28:20

northeast of Britain to a shipyard and

28:23

as the squadron leader

28:25

of the fleet era, the British

28:27

Navy's fighter

28:29

squadron that was embarked in there

28:31

said, as he was telling his pilots,

28:34

essentially, they just cut it down to

28:36

the deck level and clapped on

28:38

a flight deck onto the top of it. And that's essentially

28:40

what it was. It was the ugliest, most

28:43

impractical aircraft carrier, no

28:45

island, no

28:48

lift, no hangar, just

28:51

a flat flight deck and a few restor wires

28:53

and that was it. But she

28:56

was a prototype and her

28:59

job, remember I said there

29:01

was that gap with these condors,

29:03

they could

29:07

shadow a convoy and there's no way the convoy

29:09

could deal with it. Well, when

29:12

Audassie was finished and commissioned,

29:14

she sailed with a convoy from

29:17

Liverpool down to Gibraltar and

29:20

in that convoy escort, she

29:23

managed to shoot down one of her planes,

29:25

managed to shoot down one of the condors that

29:27

was shadowing it. So she kind of proved her

29:30

worth, but the other thing she did, and

29:32

this became key

29:34

for HC-76, was her

29:36

pilots would go up in their Martland

29:38

fighters, a wildcat, essentially a US

29:40

Navy wildcat. The

29:43

British gave them their own name, Martland. And

29:47

the pilots loved them because they had these really

29:50

rubbish British planes and build-in, like

29:53

why planes, not by planes like the swordfish

29:56

because that wasn't a fighter, but they had equally

30:00

poor design into war years, fighters.

30:02

All the budget went to the RAF

30:04

and they could get glamorous fighters like

30:07

the Spitfire, but the fleet arm always

30:09

got the short end of a stick back into

30:12

aircraft design. So they loved the

30:14

Marlott. But when they take

30:17

off on a dawn sweep, and the idea

30:19

was you would search around

30:21

a convoy. And this happened, they

30:23

perfected this on the way down to Gibraltar

30:26

and so for HG-76 they

30:28

had it nailed. And the

30:31

trouble, it's all about the design of a U-boat.

30:34

And we think of U-boats being these all powerful

30:36

warships and Type 7, Type

30:40

7C U-boats are Type 9 ones which made

30:42

most of the Wolfpack were

30:45

not that fancy because they,

30:47

yeah, they could do 17 knots or so

30:50

on the surface, which was fast enough

30:52

to get ahead of a convoy and wait

30:56

in a sort of ambush position for it

30:58

and then they would submerge. As

31:01

soon as they submerged, they could only do about seven

31:03

knots, which is actually just a fraction

31:06

slower than the convoy itself. So

31:10

that's not kind of useful. So they have

31:12

to operate in the surface. So suddenly

31:16

you've got these Marlottes that would then be

31:18

the eyes in the sky that would go around

31:20

the convoy, find a U-boat

31:22

on the surface and if

31:25

any other guy was in charge of the escort group,

31:28

he would just say, yep, there's a Wolfpack

31:30

out there and we found a U-boat. But

31:33

with Walker, that was different. They

31:36

were finding U-boats 30 miles

31:38

away from the convoy and he would send out four

31:41

escorts to go and attack it, to hunt it

31:43

and attack it guided in by the aircraft. So

31:46

this was a whole new ballgame. So

31:49

the escort carrier was a big advantage. It

31:51

could chase the shadowing

31:54

aircraft, the condors and it could also detect

31:57

U-boats on the surface.

33:13

nine

34:00

comms ships in four rows that the last

34:02

row is just made up with is like half

34:05

a row and there

34:07

each rows is 400 yards

34:09

apart if you're a naval type that will

34:11

be two cables maybe

34:14

a wonderful yeah let's do things in

34:16

cables just to confuse them

34:20

and so you've got this box of ships and

34:22

it's about four miles across that's a lot

34:24

of ocean yeah and around

34:27

that you've got this ring of escorts

34:29

of his little corvettes and sloops and

34:32

the odd destroyer

34:34

escort and various other things and

34:37

Walker actually has enough for two rings what

34:40

he's got a kind of double protection

34:42

so but what he does when the convoy

34:45

goes out it forms up it

34:47

leaves it at about just before

34:50

four o'clock on the on Sunday the 14th of December

34:53

heads out at Gibraltar forms

34:56

up in the strait of Gibraltar

34:58

and starts heading out east

35:01

into the Atlantic sorry west into the Atlantic

35:04

and it's there

35:07

is a marvelous marvelous bits

35:09

where the Commodore you

35:12

see each Commodore has a Commodore and

35:14

each convoy has a Commodore

35:16

in charge of it and in this case

35:19

this was no exception this is a retired vice-admiral

35:21

a British Admiral he was in the First World War

35:25

and so

35:27

he's brought back from retirement and you know

35:29

he's spent his days fishing and having

35:32

a good time and playing quest or whatever and that

35:34

suddenly the war starts again so he's called

35:36

back to the colors and instead of a nice

35:38

warship he's put on to a merchant ship

35:41

as the him and a group

35:43

of about six guys with his signalers

35:46

with with their flags and whatever and

35:49

that's it you're saying right you're running this convoy

35:51

so but he does a great job and what he does

35:54

is he knows there's a wolf pack out there so

35:57

he jinx left he goes turns

36:00

down and it follows the

36:02

contours, it follows the coast

36:05

of Morocco and it kind of side, the

36:07

side steps, the U-boats. So

36:10

for the first couple of days everything's fine

36:13

until the Germans

36:15

suddenly realize that something's wrong and

36:17

they start sending the U-boats out

36:20

to meet them. On the morning of the 17th

36:22

of December, that's when

36:24

things really kick off because the first,

36:27

the first, the condor

36:29

sights the U-boat, sorry, sights the convoy

36:31

and then at

36:35

the same time one

36:37

of the marklets on its dawn sweep

36:40

sights a U-boat and one of

36:42

the first of the ones, and of course you get one

36:45

U-boat, then you get all the others

36:47

coming because it'll be radioing to its

36:50

buddies and they'll all be assembling.

36:53

And like I said, they can't, at

36:55

night, they attack at night under

36:57

cover of darkness. At

37:00

dawn they tend

37:02

to go away from the convoy. They could see the

37:04

smoke from over the horizon, a dozen

37:06

miles away or

37:09

thereabouts, 12, 15 miles

37:11

depending on visibility from

37:13

the conic to the U-boat, but

37:16

they're fairly safe. But suddenly these marklets

37:18

are up there and they're spotting them and

37:20

that's exactly what happened to U-131. And

37:23

it was

37:26

kind of unfortunate for it, especially because

37:29

Walker was in charge and he sent four of

37:31

his ships to go and attack it and they hunt

37:34

it and hunt it and hunt it until they

37:36

get it. What

37:37

did Walker did?

37:39

Sorry, Ray,

37:42

go on. No, no, no, I apologize.

37:44

You go right ahead. Let me

37:46

just do this, Rokok. I'm sorry. I'll just,

37:49

I'll just brood on. You get awarded, Ray. That's

37:53

right. Let me say this and then you can either respond

37:55

or keep going. Yeah, so the one

37:57

thing that it really helped me understand, and I think it's a good

37:59

thing, is that I'm in your book was Walker and

38:02

you touch on this a moment ago was Walker was like

38:04

the submarines Let's force them down.

38:06

They're limited in their speed and they're limited

38:08

in other options. Let's keep them down there

38:11

That's where they're weakest and that's where

38:13

we'll get the mess So he's got a plan to drive

38:16

them under and the plane certainly do help

38:18

with that But it like you said at night That's

38:21

when the U-boats come back and that's the

38:23

that's the scary time for all the convoys

38:25

because that's normally when the U-boats Creeping

38:28

close and do their thing

38:29

Yeah, so what happened that morning on the on

38:32

the 17th Sunday

38:34

Monday Tuesday Yeah,

38:36

Tuesday 17th This

38:39

you boat you 131 Corvett and Capitan

38:43

aren't bowman's in charge of it and he's

38:45

spotted and

38:49

Suddenly you get these four escorts

38:53

Directed towards them by the the

38:55

circling aircraft now What

38:58

they used to do imagine a sonar

39:00

or as More Aztec is

39:02

the British merely calling Works

39:05

like an ice cream cone shaped

39:08

Sound beam right and so when the ship

39:10

passes over it When

39:13

you're directly over that you boat you lose

39:16

contact for a view for a vital,

39:18

you know 30 seconds or so until you start

39:21

dropping those depth charges So any

39:24

really smart you boat skipper will

39:27

suddenly increase speed and just

39:29

head away and try to avoid that Right

39:32

what Walker did by hunting in groups was

39:35

he would have one ship whose sole job was

39:37

to Detect that you boat

39:40

on sonar and then

39:42

shadow it and then keep that contact

39:44

and it would use this radio to

39:46

direct the other ships Over

39:49

the you boat and then depth charge it and

39:52

so it was all about teamwork and communication

39:56

Which is something that you know, the Navy all

39:59

navies have taken in the world since, but it

40:01

seems sensible. But

40:04

in those days, it wasn't necessarily

40:06

practice. They didn't have the escorts to do it.

40:08

But now for the first time, they were

40:10

really using them far more effectively. And

40:14

Walker's thing was, you don't just drop the

40:16

depth charges, you keep dropping depth charges

40:18

until you make sure you've got that thing.

40:21

And that's exactly what happened to poor

40:23

Bauman and his crew. So

40:26

that was the first you were, actually, though, is the

40:28

second U-boat from the Wolfpack. One

40:30

was sunk off Capes and Vincent. It was

40:32

in the wrong place at the wrong time. Remember

40:35

I said it was assembling off there. A

40:37

British group of, a British and Australian

40:39

group of warships came and

40:42

detected this U-boat in the U-boat. It

40:46

was still, was just leaving the U-boat

40:48

assembly area off Capes and Vincent

40:51

for the Wolfpack. And

40:53

U-127 was sunk by these

40:56

Allied destroyers. But

40:59

U-131 was the first blood for Walker

41:02

and his tactics and his convoy. And it happened the

41:04

next day. And it's the same thing,

41:07

because they're detected by one of the

41:09

one of the Martlets or the Wildcats, if

41:11

you prefer. Same thing, morning,

41:14

morning, the thing they

41:17

spotted during a morning sweep.

41:19

And then it's by 10 in the morning

41:22

that U-boat 434 is sunk. So

41:24

two U-boats sunk in two days

41:27

is unheard of in these operations,

41:29

all for the loss of no ships

41:32

to the convoy. So this

41:35

is all going well, but at the same time, the

41:37

Admiralty in London is radioing

41:40

to Walker and saying, look,

41:43

we've got reports that, you mentioned

41:45

doing it's going a bit crazy. And

41:48

in a way he was doing that. He was doubling down

41:50

instead of saying, look, this is getting a bit

41:52

hairy. There are other convoys out there. We'll

41:54

take these away and we'll attack another

41:56

convoy. He doubled down. He

41:58

was sending a green force. reinforcements from

42:01

the Atlantic. Diverting ships which

42:03

were already on their way out. And

42:05

remember, this is a week after Pearl Harbor.

42:09

So it's the start of what was known

42:11

as the second hunt, the happy period.

42:13

Well, it's happy, not happy for the merchant ships,

42:15

but it's happy for the U-boat crews

42:20

cruising off the American Eastern seaboard. And

42:23

it was just happy hunting for them. But

42:27

these were ships which were on their

42:29

way out there, to

42:32

sink ships off the Carolinas or Newfoundland

42:34

or anywhere down the coast. And

42:36

they were now diverted down to this running

42:38

battle, which was taking place

42:41

as the convoy was heading north parallel to

42:43

the coast of Portugal, about 100

42:47

miles out to sea. So

42:51

Dunitz is reinforcing this

42:54

already quite tough convoy battle.

42:57

So the British now have

42:59

got these signals saying,

43:01

you know, there's more. And

43:06

they go from, you know, there's four U-boats, there's

43:09

six U-boats. In the end, there

43:11

were 11 U-boats attached

43:14

even temporarily to

43:17

Wolfpack Sea Robber. But normally

43:19

you're dealing with six of them at any

43:22

one time. But Walker is told

43:24

that these are assembling and they're

43:26

going to get you and they're going to

43:29

hunt for you that night. So he knows that a

43:32

big kind of the first of the big

43:34

challenges is coming up ahead.

43:37

Right. And can I just say, when I was

43:39

reading this book, when you got to the part where

43:41

you describe the maneuvers, when

43:43

he would send out like four ships to

43:45

hunt us up, I really love, I mean,

43:47

it was coordinated, it was thought out, it

43:49

was obviously effective. So Dunitz

43:52

loses one sub, he loses two

43:54

sub and he's starting to lose perspective.

43:56

Like you said, he keeps sending more and more

43:58

subs. important for the

44:00

listeners to remember that as far as anybody

44:03

is concerned on both sides, maybe

44:06

with the exception of Walker himself, everybody's

44:08

expecting the convoy to lose a certain

44:10

number of ships because as you said earlier,

44:13

that's just what happens. They just can't keep up

44:15

with them. But quickly, this is starting to

44:18

turn into something that's bad for the U-boats. But

44:21

then along comes what happens

44:23

to HMS Stanley. Could you

44:25

describe that for us, please?

44:28

Yeah, back just to talk to the

44:30

point about convoys. Yeah, they reckon that 10%, 50% losses

44:36

was acceptable. Wow. So that

44:38

in the size of this convoy, that's three

44:40

to five ships that was seen as standard

44:43

losses for the time. Just written on more.

44:46

It was a bad anymore.

44:48

It was a bad convoy that could have three or four

44:50

times that in some really great

44:52

shockingly bad cases. So

44:56

and with this number of U-boats concentrating,

44:58

that was going to be particularly, you

45:01

know, a real challenge. Yeah, Stanley.

45:05

Well, Stanley was a

45:08

lend lease destroyer. Thank

45:11

you, America. These

45:15

were really useful at a critical

45:17

time. Remember, said the Britain were almost

45:20

no escorts available. The

45:23

fleet destroyers were needed with the fleet. Britain

45:26

was fighting in the Mediterranean. It was fighting

45:28

in the the the Kriegsmarine in the North

45:31

Atlantic and and

45:34

and it needed every destroyer

45:36

it could. So other escorts were few

45:39

and far between. But these old 50 old destroyers

45:42

were really useful. And one of them was Stanley.

45:44

I can't remember what what American

45:46

was it? McCulloch? USS McCulloch?

45:49

Sounds right. Yeah, she

45:52

she was obsolete. She

45:55

was a bit of a rust bucket, but

45:57

she was she was a useful

45:59

unit.

45:59

and that she had

46:01

a, I hate that phrase unit, it's

46:06

a modern thing, isn't it? It's

46:08

usually a ship. And

46:11

Stanley was a Clemson class or something

46:13

destroyer who

46:17

was essentially just given a

46:20

coat of paint and a British crew fitted

46:22

with British Azdic or

46:24

sonar and

46:28

sent back out to war.

46:30

And she was torpedoed early

46:33

in the morning of the 19th

46:35

of, on the 19th of December.

46:41

And it was 4.15 and she was behind

46:43

the convoy. I remember that

46:46

big box four miles across and she was

46:49

at the middle of the back of this box a

46:51

mile or so behind it. And

46:57

her skipper, David Schoebel,

47:00

just he

47:04

got no warning of it. His crew got no warning of it. Suddenly

47:06

they were just hit by two pitot fired by

47:08

this U-boat, U-574 hits the port

47:10

side and

47:13

she just starts going down. A

47:16

mile away off a starboard

47:18

beam is Walker

47:20

on the bridge and bridges

47:23

is open bridges in these ships. It's none

47:25

of these nice

47:28

cozy bridges the British had

47:30

the idea which not sure a lot

47:34

of sailors would have agreed

47:36

with the Admiralty in this that if you're in

47:38

an open bridge, you can see things coming

47:41

like a Stuka's are attacking your off-creech

47:43

and there's something going on there. You can see

47:45

them and you can react to them. And

47:49

there were also, I imagine

47:51

armchair admirals like the idea

47:53

that they'd be alert

47:55

and whatever and you'd get, complacent

48:01

in your nice enclosed bridge.

48:04

My time in the Navy was all in nice enclosed bridges,

48:06

thanks very much, and I'm very

48:09

grateful to the ship designers for that one. But

48:12

so he was having his cup of cocoa,

48:14

I think it was being brought to him, a tea or

48:16

a cocoa or something, on

48:19

the bridge of HMS Stork, his

48:22

sloop. And he was about

48:24

a mile away from Stanley and she suddenly

48:26

just erupted. He was, they heard

48:30

that Stanley had reported sighting

48:32

a U-boat and, or having

48:34

contact with a U-boat and then she

48:37

exploded. So what Walker

48:40

did is he, as well as being aggressive,

48:42

he'd also developed his own tactics. And

48:46

one of them was called Operation

48:48

Buttercup. That

48:50

was his, yes, very un-military,

48:53

but kind of, yeah, that's

48:55

Walker's, Walker's way. He didn't take things.

48:58

He was a very serious guy, very religious,

49:01

very centurion figure, but he

49:04

had a degree of flippancy about him too,

49:06

which is quite nice. His

49:08

nickname for his wife was Buttercup. And

49:11

that's sweet. Yeah, but in

49:14

this context, it was, it was a little

49:16

different. So Operation Buttercup, he had

49:19

essentially, you

49:21

keep on bursting into the land every

49:24

time. Buttercup

49:27

is, yeah, Buttercup.

49:31

All these operations of all these

49:33

marvelous names, you know, are

49:36

very martial names, but this doesn't.

49:39

Anyway, the, the operation which

49:41

can't be named was, essentially,

49:44

he had, you know,

49:47

if the convoy was attacked, he'd respond

49:50

and he trained his, his command

49:53

to, if he called out Buttercup's

49:57

astern or port or starboard, that was

49:59

the thing.

52:00

He keeps a mile away from the wreckage

52:03

of Stanley, so he doesn't hurt

52:05

the men in the water. Again, that's

52:09

the cruel sea for you, isn't it? But

52:14

he detects the U-boat and starts depth

52:16

charge attacks, and he starts

52:18

plastering it and eventually damages

52:21

U-574 and brings it to the surface.

52:26

As you say, we won't spoil the story in

52:28

the book, but what happens is a kind

52:30

of ludicrous situation where

52:33

the U-boat's turning circle is sharper

52:36

than Walker's sloop. So

52:38

the two kind of circle around each other,

52:40

shooting at each other, until Walker

52:43

gets the good angle

52:45

and he kind of manages to ram it.

52:49

And Walker didn't just ram it, he rammed

52:51

it and then depth charged it as he was going

52:53

over it. He

52:55

kind of made sure that 574

52:58

wasn't going anywhere. So

53:01

all this was just part

53:03

of Walker's attack plan. His

53:06

aggressive tactic of just hunt.

53:08

If they're going to attack somebody in the convoy,

53:10

in this case it was Stanley, but it could have been a merchant

53:13

ship, you respond immediately

53:15

by hunting it until it's sunk.

53:18

And that's exactly what happened there. Although,

53:23

like you said, there were several U-boats in the area, and

53:25

that night, just about

53:30

an hour later, the convoy

53:33

suffers its first loss, the

53:35

SS Ruchinga, which goes up and

53:40

is torpedoed by U-108, another lucky U-boat. So

53:45

it's all going down. In

53:47

this convoy battle, the Germans

53:49

kind of back off for the night

53:52

because it's obviously the alarm

53:54

by this pyrotechnics

53:57

going on, but also losing one of their

53:59

own U-boats is... that is

54:01

a bit of a body blow. So that's three

54:03

U-books now for loss

54:05

of one merchant ship and one escort.

54:07

That's incredible. And you

54:10

do such a great job in the book of Balancing

54:12

Out. There's attacks, there's

54:14

counter attacks, there's Walker's moves, there's

54:16

ideas. And

54:19

it's almost like Walker's

54:22

ideas are pitted against Donitz's

54:24

numbers, because like you said, he just keeps throwing

54:26

subs of this thing. But all the while,

54:29

the convoy is getting ever

54:31

closer, it's getting ever closer to home. And

54:33

most importantly, it's getting ever closer

54:35

to being protected by the land-based

54:38

planes in southern UK.

54:41

And so that's still going on. But

54:43

then again, the one huge

54:46

advantage of the convoy had, the wild card

54:49

that they may not have counted

54:51

on was the escort carrier.

54:53

But then the carrier's commander doesn't

54:56

take Walker's advice, I guess technically

54:59

he doesn't have to, but he ends up

55:01

paying the price for not sticking to

55:03

Walker's plans. Could you describe that

55:05

for us?

55:07

Yeah, Commander

55:10

McKendrick was a

55:12

pilot. By training,

55:14

he was a First World War pilot.

55:17

He landed up being

55:20

in the RAF, then

55:22

the Fleet Air Arm, and he

55:25

did his ship command course and

55:27

became the skipper of this, of

55:30

Odasi. He was the perfect guy for it. But

55:33

after a few nights of these

55:35

attacks, he decided

55:37

that, look, they

55:40

were intercepted signals

55:43

from the Germans saying that

55:45

this carrier is basically

55:47

a pain in the ass, we've got to get that,

55:50

it's causing a lot of trouble. So he decided

55:53

he was going to be, his

55:55

carrier, Odasi, was the prime

55:58

target more than even the most... merchant

56:00

ships. So he thought by

56:02

sitting in his position is slot at the

56:04

back of the convoy, it was actually dangerous for

56:07

the merchant ships around him. So

56:09

he got into the habit of at night

56:11

pulling out of the convoy and operating

56:14

on his own sometimes with an escort.

56:17

But on the night of the 21st, Walker

56:20

couldn't afford an escort because they

56:22

were actually attacked by they

56:25

they knew that they were going to be attacked that night,

56:28

again, due to intercepted signals by

56:30

at least six, maybe more U-boats.

56:33

So he was expecting he needed

56:35

every ship. And what Walker did was come

56:38

up with a plan of holding

56:40

a mock battle. This is one of his ideas that didn't

56:42

work well. And the reason is, it

56:45

was a lack of briefing to the convoy,

56:48

because a mock battle

56:50

is great, these ships go off and start

56:52

firing off depth charges and star shells

56:55

and the convoy quietly turned as goes

56:57

in an opposite direction. And

57:00

again, it's that idea of kind

57:02

of sidestep the U-boats. And it

57:04

would have worked if the convoy itself

57:06

hadn't suddenly got panicked by all this and

57:08

started firing off star shells

57:10

themselves. So every U-boat

57:13

in in 10 miles could

57:15

see them and knew exactly where to go. So

57:18

all this was going off. But at the same time, another

57:21

U-boat, U-751 spotted what it thought

57:25

was that the skipper thought was a probably

57:28

a lone tanker or something a straggler. So

57:30

we repeated it hit it. And it was

57:32

only then that he figured out this was the carrier,

57:35

this was a destiny. Because

57:37

McKendrick had taken it was operating on his

57:39

own about 10 miles away from the the

57:41

convoy. And he

57:43

was and pitched our night, you could

57:46

barely see you know, the end of your flight

57:48

deck on the carrier, apparently. And

57:50

but he could see this, but

57:53

this U-boat spotted him and hit him. And

57:56

so her destiny is dead in the water. She's

57:59

lost power. just sitting there. And

58:03

what the skipper of U-751 does is he

58:05

gets all his torpedoes,

58:12

you know, he's fired off his torpedoes, he

58:15

has to reload them. And

58:17

that takes time and these U-boats are, the

58:20

space in them is limited, you need to like

58:25

diesel subs, the nuclear

58:27

boats are a bit different, but all diesel subs

58:29

you need every inch of space.

58:34

They have to move bags of onions and bags

58:36

of crates of, you know, cans

58:39

of spam or whatever out of the way to get

58:41

at the torpedoes to reload these things

58:43

because, you know, you've got to move them through the ship

58:45

and into the, so that all takes time.

58:48

So it's sitting there reloading. Walker

58:51

just sent orders his mock battle group,

58:54

these four escorts, they're having this mock

58:56

battle and they said, look, two of

58:58

you come back to me, two of

59:01

you go and escort audacity. And

59:04

that's why he does because at the same time, that

59:06

same moment the convoy is under direct

59:08

attack, it's got no fuel

59:10

than four U-boats circling around it, all

59:13

trying to break in through his formation.

59:15

And that's when the convoy

59:17

takes a second loss when a

59:20

Norwegian ship, the Anivore, erupts

59:24

near the back of the convoy and it goes down in

59:26

a minute. She's, she'd have

59:28

heard of, I can't remember the number of crew, I

59:30

think 40 odd, there's something like four survivors.

59:33

So, and she sank, she sank by almost,

59:36

almost unsentaneously in a minute. Walker

59:39

does his, he thinks,

59:41

coming from starboard, every, every

59:44

taking a couple of moments to think, think it through,

59:46

you'd have figured out it was a stern. Yeah.

59:49

So he's actually does his, you know, all

59:52

the star shells and things and that whole routine

59:54

in the wrong direction. And the

59:57

U-boat who did the jeed, U567, skippered

1:00:01

by Engelbert Endras,

1:00:04

a U-boat ace, he manages to get

1:00:06

away. But at the same

1:00:09

time, there are three other U-boats circling

1:00:11

around the convoys trying to break in and they're all spotted

1:00:13

at different stages by different escorts.

1:00:15

So they're all fighting pretty hard

1:00:18

to chase these U-boats and depth charge

1:00:21

them and all these convoy

1:00:23

battles are erupting all around.

1:00:25

So it's a pretty fraught time and

1:00:27

this is the climax of the whole thing.

1:00:31

But Endras is one of the, is it interesting because he's

1:00:33

a U-boat ace. I

1:00:36

live in Orkney and overlook my study

1:00:38

here overlooks Scapa Flow and

1:00:40

I can see the buoy where the battleship

1:00:44

Royal Oak was sunk by Guinter

1:00:46

Preen, U-47 in 14th December 941, sorry 939. And Endras was

1:00:55

his second in command. He was

1:00:58

his ex-o. And

1:01:01

what happened is by

1:01:03

then by 941, he was sending a

1:01:05

U-boat ace, but he was also a kind of jaded

1:01:07

one. A lot of the

1:01:10

top U-boat aces had

1:01:13

been lost by then. He

1:01:15

should really have been retired to a staff job

1:01:17

and commanding a flotilla

1:01:21

from the comfort of an armchair in

1:01:24

Lorient or somewhere, but they kept him at sea.

1:01:27

And so he was

1:01:29

taking part in these attacks, but he got

1:01:31

that second ship. But he

1:01:33

was just one of the number of reinforcements sent

1:01:36

and doing it sent Endras

1:01:38

along with a single Endras is coming like it was

1:01:41

like an encouraged morale of

1:01:43

his already

1:01:45

depleted wolf pack to kind

1:01:47

of keep fighting.

1:01:49

Right. So again, this is the

1:01:51

part like you said, this is the climax. But

1:01:53

by now, as someone who sat here and

1:01:56

read, you know, a lot of the book

1:01:58

all in one go, the 10th of December by this

1:02:00

time is incredible. There's moves,

1:02:02

there's counter moves, both sides have

1:02:04

drawn blood. But

1:02:07

again, you're still waiting because I didn't know

1:02:09

the end of this story. So I'm still waiting for

1:02:11

something amazing to happen for the Germans.

1:02:14

And then suddenly tons of convoy ships are

1:02:16

lost because like you said, that's kind of what's

1:02:19

been happening. So it's tit for tat.

1:02:21

But again, the convoy never stops moving.

1:02:23

They're getting closer. Walker gets to

1:02:25

try his ideas. And you stress

1:02:28

in the book, there were some of the escorts that

1:02:30

were never meant to go the entire

1:02:32

journey. So they're turning around, they're heading back

1:02:34

to Gibraltar. So he's losing escorts

1:02:37

left and right. The story just builds

1:02:39

and builds and builds. And that's

1:02:41

where we're gonna leave it for the listeners. Cause

1:02:44

I really want them to experience what

1:02:46

I experienced. But I will warn the

1:02:48

listeners, you

1:02:51

have a knack for making the

1:02:53

last sentence of every chapter

1:02:56

make me turn the page and keep

1:02:58

reading. Okay, I'm gonna stop here,

1:03:00

stop here. And then you would, this cute

1:03:02

little sentence and

1:03:03

the master of cliffhangers. That's

1:03:06

all I can say. But anyway, this book- Well,

1:03:08

I mean, I've got to say, I

1:03:12

like writing narrative history and I liked reading

1:03:14

it. And I blame Bruce

1:03:16

Canton for it. You know, there's the

1:03:18

Merton Civil War books like

1:03:21

Grant goes south or move south or whatever and

1:03:23

all those. And he

1:03:27

could take a lot of information and

1:03:30

synthesize it down into something that

1:03:33

was really readable and

1:03:36

made sense and

1:03:38

was great, and made you want to read to

1:03:40

the next chapter. And I was

1:03:42

a kid when I read those and I thought,

1:03:45

that's the way to, that's great. You

1:03:48

read a lot of history books and they kind of take

1:03:50

a really interesting thing and turn

1:03:52

it into something turgid. Of course,

1:03:55

I've always wanted to make the Bruce

1:03:57

Canton style of doing these things

1:03:59

rather. than something

1:04:02

duller, something less rigid. So

1:04:06

if you can't make it exciting

1:04:09

to yourself, that's

1:04:13

no good. You've got to make it exciting for yourself and for the readers.

1:04:16

Exactly.

1:04:17

Well, mission accomplished because

1:04:20

I lost a lot of sleep. So thank you a lot

1:04:22

for that. So just

1:04:24

give us an idea. So

1:04:28

what were some of the final tallies, if

1:04:31

you have that off the top of your head, like how many of the

1:04:33

convoy ships made it? How many U-boats

1:04:35

were lost? Because again, this is something that

1:04:38

did not happen before. This is something

1:04:40

new in the Battle of the Atlantic.

1:04:43

Yeah, well, just to spoil

1:04:45

the ending slightly, the bulk

1:04:47

of the convoy reached Liverpool

1:04:50

on the 29th of December and

1:04:54

with 30 ships, those two

1:04:56

were lost, but the rest made it.

1:04:58

So that was well below the average,

1:05:02

but until now it was

1:05:05

rare for U-boat to be sunk in the

1:05:07

convoy operation.

1:05:09

And suddenly to have

1:05:14

this number, four or five

1:05:17

or six U-boats

1:05:19

sunk or damaged or literally

1:05:22

just, well, you got

1:05:24

to the stage that

1:05:27

by Christmas day when

1:05:29

the convoy had reached, was

1:05:33

reinforced by warships from Western

1:05:36

Approaches Command and

1:05:38

was within air cover of Britain, suddenly

1:05:42

doing its calls off the attack. So he actually,

1:05:46

he may have been obsessed with it, but

1:05:48

at least he knew when to, when

1:05:51

finally to cut his losses. And

1:05:54

so he knew when to fold them.

1:05:57

Yes, but yeah, but like you

1:05:59

said, I think at least five U-boats

1:06:01

were lost and others were damaged.

1:06:03

So he's gonna have to change

1:06:06

up some tactics, at least in the short

1:06:08

term, because they have to make good those losses. So

1:06:11

this is the Battle of the Atlantic slowly

1:06:14

coming around, slowly changing, there's gonna be

1:06:16

more ships, the Americans involved. And I

1:06:18

think some of Walker's attitude,

1:06:21

as far as being more aggressive, starts to

1:06:23

spread throughout some other escorts.

1:06:25

So I think it's his idea to

1:06:27

take the fight to the enemy and to

1:06:29

not simply defend ourselves.

1:06:32

Yeah, that's it, Ray. Durnitz

1:06:35

was fighting a tonnage war and winning it. And

1:06:37

suddenly this was the first time when

1:06:39

the tonnage war has been turned around. Now

1:06:41

it was his U-boats who were losing

1:06:44

the tonnage. And that was kind of

1:06:46

a bit of a turning point. But when

1:06:49

Walker got home, the two things

1:06:51

happened. The Admiralty, British

1:06:53

Admiralty, or like anything in the British military,

1:06:56

it takes time, normally takes time for them at

1:06:58

least a century of them to figure out

1:07:01

what to do and change their mind, I think.

1:07:04

Can you imagine the days when the Americans

1:07:06

stopped wearing red, for instance, as a uniform?

1:07:09

Yes, they must have taken it. But

1:07:13

they latched onto this quite quickly

1:07:15

when the Admiralty probably a little

1:07:17

better than the army, I suppose. And

1:07:20

they'd figured out that two things were a success.

1:07:22

One was Walker and his aggressive tactics.

1:07:24

And that became enshrined

1:07:27

in the manuals for

1:07:30

escort commanders in the future, not

1:07:32

just in the British Navy, but

1:07:35

the US Navy. Because the US Navy was

1:07:37

starting to enter the battle of

1:07:39

the Atlantic themselves. And they

1:07:42

were taking the lead in a way from the

1:07:45

way the Royal Navy had dealt because the Royal Navy

1:07:47

had been fighting this since 1939 and

1:07:50

had gained experience

1:07:52

of it. But Walker's

1:07:54

tactics were then taken on board. But the other big

1:07:56

Anglo-American angle was the escort carrier.

1:07:59

Because... Yeah, Adasti

1:08:01

was lost, but she was a prototype. And basically

1:08:04

the first American one was

1:08:07

being built. More was at sea,

1:08:09

was doing her, was

1:08:11

operational. You had more

1:08:14

being built and more in

1:08:17

means, vast numbers more. So

1:08:19

that escort carrier was going to

1:08:21

be a real convoy. A turning

1:08:24

point in the Battle of the Atlantic was when those

1:08:26

things appeared in numbers to make a real difference.

1:08:30

Right. And the happy time that the U-boats

1:08:32

had is going to come to

1:08:34

an end. Angus, thank you very much

1:08:37

for this book. Thank you for your time. For

1:08:39

everyone out there, it's the convoy, HG-76,

1:08:42

taking the fight to Hitler's U-boats. One,

1:08:45

you will enjoy the book. Two, you will learn

1:08:47

a lot. Three, you're probably going to

1:08:49

miss some sleep. But Mr. Constan, thank

1:08:51

you very much for your time, and

1:08:53

I hope you have a good rest of your day. Well,

1:08:56

you can avoid the sleep problem by listening

1:08:58

to the audio book, and then you can

1:09:00

just switch it off when you

1:09:02

want to do something. It keeps you

1:09:04

awake when you're driving.

1:09:06

There we go. Point well taken, sir.

1:09:09

I will get me the copy of that. Thank

1:09:11

you.

1:09:12

Thank you, Ray. Great speaking to you.

1:09:15

Programming note. Hey, everyone. Ray

1:09:17

here. My health

1:09:20

issues are plain tag with me, and they

1:09:22

tag back in. So I have the next

1:09:24

episode written, but as you can probably

1:09:26

tell from my voice, yeah, I'm not

1:09:29

reading anything anytime soon. So I had

1:09:32

two gentlemen – I use that term loosely –

1:09:34

who've been on the show, and they're going to

1:09:37

do this episode for me this week. Tony

1:09:39

Lupo and Ryan Fairfield from the Warrior

1:09:41

Next Door podcast, they've been on the show a couple

1:09:43

of times. I think they're going to come on next month or later this month.

1:09:48

Anyway, so they have generously

1:09:50

agreed – because I contacted them at the last

1:09:53

moment – to read this week's script. So

1:09:55

we are going back to the Eastern Front

1:09:58

and see what Army Group North has done.

1:09:59

is up to.

1:10:01

I'll be back as soon as I can. Hey

1:10:03

everyone, welcome to another

1:10:05

episode of the History of World War II

1:10:07

podcast. As you can tell,

1:10:10

I'm not Ray Harris. Unfortunately,

1:10:12

Ray is sick this week and, to further

1:10:15

your despair, he's invited the hosts

1:10:17

of the Warrior Next Door podcast to

1:10:19

handle host duties for this episode. My

1:10:22

name is Ryan Fairfield, one of the

1:10:24

co-hosts of the Warrior Next Door podcast,

1:10:27

here to introduce this episode and provide

1:10:29

a little background on who exactly we are.

1:10:32

And shortly, my counterpart, Tony

1:10:34

Lupo, will lead the episode. You

1:10:37

may have heard about us previously on the history

1:10:39

of World War II as guests of Ray in

1:10:41

episodes that aired in November of 2021 and 2022, where

1:10:43

we discussed the

1:10:47

vision of our podcast and even played some

1:10:49

clips from veterans that we featured. Tony

1:10:52

and I have been interviewing veterans as volunteers

1:10:54

for the Library of Congress Veterans History Project

1:10:57

since 2003 and have amassed well

1:10:59

over 200 interviews in our database. Our

1:11:02

podcast centers on the experience of

1:11:04

each veteran so that we

1:11:06

can make new generations aware of their

1:11:08

experiences, values, trials,

1:11:10

and sacrifices. You can

1:11:12

find us, the Warrior Next Door podcast,

1:11:15

on all major podcast directories. Now,

1:11:18

sit back and listen to my co-host, Tony

1:11:20

Lupo, narrate episode 443.

1:11:32

Hello, and thank you for listening

1:11:34

to the History of World War II podcast,

1:11:37

episode 443, part

1:11:39

B, The Clash of

1:11:41

Titans.

1:11:43

Last time, Field Marshal von

1:11:45

Lieb's Army Group North had shattered its

1:11:48

way through the Baltic States, now just inside Russia

1:11:50

proper. Their next obstacle,

1:11:52

and close to the last one before Leningrad,

1:11:55

was the Luga Line, about 85 miles

1:11:57

or 136 kilometers

1:11:59

south of the border. of Leningrad. That's the

1:12:01

town itself in front of

1:12:04

or to the west of the Luger River

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that was the basis of the defensive

1:12:08

line that ran from the Gulf of Finland

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to pass Lake Ilman in the south.

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As the defensive line was just over 100

1:12:17

miles or 160 kilometers long,

1:12:20

the Germans might be forgiven for thinking

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they could just focus their panzers and smash

1:12:25

through.

1:12:26

But those days were gone.

1:12:29

In fact, since late July, the

1:12:31

Germans found that when they attacked and took

1:12:33

an area or city, the Soviets

1:12:35

were soon counterattacking in

1:12:38

waves, causing the Germans

1:12:41

to close ranks more often than

1:12:43

continuing to send units forward.

1:12:46

Now it seems more units had to be thrown

1:12:48

together, and not just to win a local contest,

1:12:51

but to hold said area afterward. Thus,

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Lieb decided that before the Luger

1:12:56

area, again in front of the river,

1:12:59

would be attacked again, he would wait

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for the majority of the 18th Army to

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move into position, coming from

1:13:05

northern Estonia, and

1:13:08

for the 16th Army to move up from

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eastern Latvia. This

1:13:13

they did, and on August 8, the

1:13:15

Germans advanced, and then they didn't,

1:13:18

as they were unable to penetrate the Hydra-like

1:13:21

Soviet lines. To be

1:13:23

sure, the Soviets were killed or captured, but

1:13:25

there always seemed to be more ready

1:13:28

to take their place. Still, the

1:13:30

attackers took advantage of the long defensive

1:13:32

line. Closer to the coast, or

1:13:34

north, the Soviet 8th Army

1:13:37

was slowing the advance of the 41st

1:13:39

Panzer Corps. But then,

1:13:41

the 8th Panzer Division was attached

1:13:44

to the 41st Panzer, which

1:13:46

began to move once again. But

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it was the success of the German units

1:13:51

further to the south that made the difference.

1:13:54

Lieb's plan called for the just

1:13:56

mentioned 41st Panzer Corps to

1:13:58

fight in the north. coming ever closer

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to Leningrad. Meanwhile, the

1:14:03

56th Panzer Corps would make for

1:14:05

Luga proper. That is, the

1:14:07

city located roughly in the middle

1:14:10

of the Luga line, and once past

1:14:12

all resistance, the corps would

1:14:14

swing northward, as would the 1st

1:14:17

and 28th Infantry Corps. They

1:14:19

were to reduce the Soviet 48th

1:14:21

Army in front of them, located just

1:14:24

above Lake Ilman. And the

1:14:26

39th Panzer Corps, borrowed from Army

1:14:29

Group Center, was on the way, but would

1:14:31

not be in the area until August 24th.

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Sticking with this plan for a moment, after

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the line was breached at Novgorod, just

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above Lake Ilman, was taken, the

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Germans would travel up to the Volkow

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River that ran north to south. Turning

1:14:46

the tables, the Volkow would be

1:14:48

used by the Germans as a defensive

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line while Leningrad was destroyed,

1:14:53

completely on Hitler's

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personal orders. Fortunately

1:14:59

for the 41st Panzer Corps in the north, the

1:15:01

more southern units had success, which forced

1:15:03

the Soviet 8th Army, also

1:15:06

in the north, to back up closer

1:15:08

to the coast, thus avoiding

1:15:10

being cut off by the German troops further

1:15:13

to the south that could have

1:15:15

swung in behind them. The

1:15:17

Germans came at the Luga line on August

1:15:20

8th and 9th. This left

1:15:22

the 16th Army to attack south

1:15:24

of Lake Ilham a few days later. And

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it would be their success that threatened

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the entirety of the Luga line.

1:15:33

The Germans came in hard, but

1:15:35

were met with equal resistance.

1:15:38

Still, now that the attackers were

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more focused, breaches started appearing

1:15:43

in the defensive line. Soon, some 30,000

1:15:45

Soviet troops were cut off and surrounded.

1:15:48

The remains of the Luga operational group

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had only nine divisions, but each

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division now had a fraction of the men

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they did before this attack. Things

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looked bad for the defenders. But

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as this was still early in the war, Stalin

1:16:03

remained convinced that he could simply

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keep throwing his men at the Germans

1:16:08

until they stopped. So a

1:16:10

counterattack was being planned and

1:16:12

the Soviet target was the area around

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Lake Ilmen where the Germans had

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first broken through. The

1:16:19

Soviet counterattack, called the Staraya-Russia

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offensive operation, would have two

1:16:25

large forces. The just created

1:16:27

48th Army which would attack north of

1:16:29

the lake, while the newly created

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34th Army but backed by the

1:16:34

11th and 27th Armies would drive

1:16:36

west, just below Lake Ilmen. Their

1:16:40

goal was to retake and hold

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Staraya-Russia and in order

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to do that, they would have to destroy

1:16:47

the German 10th Infantry Corps of

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the 16th Army. The added

1:16:51

benefit was the panzers

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without infantry for protection

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were vulnerable.

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This counterattack commenced on August

1:16:59

12th and right away the 10th Infantry

1:17:02

below the lake was in serious trouble.

1:17:05

Forget holding the line, they were about

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to be overwhelmed themselves. Wasting

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no time the next day, August

1:17:12

13th, the 56th Panzer

1:17:15

Corps fighting closer to Luger proper,

1:17:18

thus to the north of Lake Ilmen, were

1:17:20

ordered to be pulled out of their current

1:17:23

fight, head south and save

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the 10th Infantry Corps. But

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there is only one problem with that. The Soviet

1:17:30

forces in front of the 56th Panzer

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Corps, now down to two motorized

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divisions, were not allowing the Germans

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to pull away. The more they tried,

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the more the Soviets came in. There

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was nothing for it. The 10th Infantry

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was told to hold on while the 56th

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Panzer Corps made their own mad dash

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at the enemy units in front of them. It

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took this push to drive the Soviets

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back enough for the 56th Panzer

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Corps to pull away and move out

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five days later. This desperate move

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paid off as the Soviet 34th

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Army, giving the German 10th

1:18:05

Infantry Corps hell, were

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caught unawares and in their flank.

1:18:10

The results were predictable enough.

1:18:13

The Soviet 34th Army was driven

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back and some 12,000 of its men

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were captured. Meanwhile,

1:18:20

below Lake Ilman, the Soviet 34th, 11th, and

1:18:22

27th Armies were also mauled

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by the

1:18:28

16th Army and 56th Panzer

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Corps. This allowed the Germans

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to come ever closer to Leningrad. The

1:18:36

newly arrived 39th Panzer Corps from

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Army Group Center dashed to a

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place to the southeast of Leningrad.

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They were to help cut off the city while

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making sure no Soviet reinforcements

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came from the east. Still,

1:18:50

the Stavka, the Soviet High Command,

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continued to create new armies and

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throw them into the fray. But

1:18:57

the Germans using the Volkov River

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to the east of Leningrad kept

1:19:02

the Soviets back. By

1:19:04

September 1st, the last rail

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link to Leningrad was cut. By

1:19:09

September 8th, the last land

1:19:12

route out of Leningrad was cut

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by the 39th Panzer Corps, assisted

1:19:17

by the 28th Infantry Corps. Hitler's

1:19:19

gamble of breaking off the 39th

1:19:22

Panzer Corps had paid off. Leningrad

1:19:25

would not be getting help from Moscow. Not

1:19:28

that the Stavka didn't try. The

1:19:30

Soviet 54th Army threw

1:19:32

themselves at the 39th Panzer Corps

1:19:34

again and again trying to get

1:19:37

men inside the city to help the 55th

1:19:39

Army already there. But

1:19:42

the result? Only more

1:19:44

Soviet casualties and prisoners. And

1:19:48

then Hitler changed his mind. Autocrats,

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after all, are known for doing this.

1:19:54

Why?

1:19:55

Because they can. And no one

1:19:57

can gain seen them. Early

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September, Hitler was ready to move

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on with his largest objective, the

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capture and destruction of Moscow. Now

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he ordered that Leningrad not be destroyed

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forthwith, but rather the people

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therein were to be starved

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to death, or at least until

1:20:17

they surrendered. No, now

1:20:19

Army Group North Lieb was

1:20:21

ordered to hand over all

1:20:24

of his armored units except the

1:20:26

39th Panzer, which had one panzer

1:20:28

and two motorized divisions, and

1:20:31

turn them over to Army Group Center for

1:20:33

the taking of Moscow. It

1:20:35

was to be called Operation

1:20:38

Typhoon. Thus, the

1:20:41

41st, 56th, and 57th

1:20:43

Panzer Corps were ordered south along

1:20:46

with the headquarters of 4th Panzer

1:20:49

Group, which is how Leningrad

1:20:51

was spared, but only

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to suffer greatly for the years

1:20:55

to come. And even then, the

1:20:58

39th Panzer Corps would soon get

1:21:00

orders to push on east beyond the

1:21:02

Volkov River, which they would find

1:21:04

daunting to say the least. Not

1:21:07

that everything behind the German line was

1:21:09

running smoothly. The capital

1:21:11

of Estonia, Tallinn, had

1:21:13

resisted, or rather the Soviet

1:21:15

troops within it had held

1:21:18

back the Germans, who sent

1:21:20

most of their troops on as nothing

1:21:22

could be allowed to delay the taking of Leningrad.

1:21:25

As Estonia is the northernmost

1:21:28

of the Baltic states, Tallinn,

1:21:30

its capital, and largest port city of

1:21:32

the country, had access to the

1:21:34

Gulf of Finland and the Baltic

1:21:36

Sea, making its control vital.

1:21:40

Alas, the city of Tallinn, and

1:21:43

of course the Estonia people, had

1:21:45

been through hell already when

1:21:47

the Soviets came in without

1:21:49

asking. And now the Germans

1:21:51

were here and they had not asked

1:21:54

either. Its

1:22:00

defense was carried out by some reserve

1:22:02

units and a bit later by the 9th

1:22:05

Army, but within it was the Soviet

1:22:07

10th Rifle Corps, comprised

1:22:10

of three rifle divisions and several naval

1:22:12

infantry brigades, so around 50,000 men. This

1:22:16

holdout had to be reduced, if not

1:22:18

simply because those German troops

1:22:20

were now desperately needed at the front, as

1:22:23

Hitler played his rather spontaneous

1:22:25

game of chess. The Germans

1:22:27

came at the 1st Ring of Defense around

1:22:30

Tallinn on August 19th.

1:22:33

It was bloody, it lacked

1:22:35

mercy, and it never seemed

1:22:37

to end. But after four days

1:22:39

of constant fighting, the first line was

1:22:42

breached. This allowed the attackers

1:22:44

to get within six miles of the city

1:22:48

and the fighting continued. Within 48

1:22:51

hours,

1:22:52

the fighting took place on the very streets

1:22:54

of the capital.

1:22:56

The Stavka could see the writing on the wall, but

1:22:58

instead of losing tens of thousands of more

1:23:00

men, it decided to evacuate

1:23:03

those troops that remained and let the

1:23:05

city fall, as it was clearly going to

1:23:07

anyways. The evacuation

1:23:09

got underway on August

1:23:12

27th. The city fell the next day.

1:23:15

The good news for Moscow was that some 30,000

1:23:18

men were taken away, but not

1:23:21

all of them reached safety. First,

1:23:23

almost 12,000 Soviet fighters

1:23:26

were left behind, such was the haste

1:23:28

of the evacuation. They

1:23:30

were captured. Few would survive

1:23:33

the war. More good news,

1:23:35

the Baltic Red Banner Fleet still controlled

1:23:37

the waterways around Tallinn. However,

1:23:41

they did not control the air. Thus,

1:23:44

the Luftwaffe did all they

1:23:47

could to make sure those troops did not get

1:23:49

away unmolested. Of

1:23:51

the two massive convoys of 84

1:23:55

and 78 ships respectively,

1:23:58

five destroyers and forty-five. 31 troop

1:24:00

ships were sunk, only about half

1:24:03

of the 30,000 rescued men

1:24:05

made it away. For

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As stated, elements

1:24:41

of the Soviet Navy still controlled the waterways,

1:24:44

but of course that did not suit Hitler's

1:24:46

plans. Thus Operation Beowulf

1:24:49

was concocted. This

1:24:51

would be the taking of the Baltic islands

1:24:53

of Oso

1:24:54

and Tago

1:24:56

and also Huoma. Whoever

1:24:59

controlled these islands controlled

1:25:01

the Gulf of Riga and the entrance

1:25:03

to the Gulf of Finland. The

1:25:05

bad news for the Germans was that the islands

1:25:08

were guarded by just over 23,000 Soviet troops

1:25:12

who were entrenched in heavy fortifications.

1:25:16

Realizing this, the Germans tasked the job

1:25:18

to the 61st Infantry Division, a few

1:25:21

combat pioneer units, all

1:25:23

carried by 100 ships and they were

1:25:25

protected by 180 small assault boats. The

1:25:29

Soviet troops knew they were coming, but

1:25:31

it didn't make a difference. First,

1:25:34

the smaller islands were landed on

1:25:37

September 8th. As the

1:25:39

defenders could not support each other, the

1:25:41

outcome was a foregone conclusion.

1:25:44

On October 12th, Huoma, the largest

1:25:46

of the islands, was attacked and

1:25:49

the fighting was over by the 21st. Just

1:25:51

like the Eastern Front in general, the Soviets

1:25:54

suffered terribly. 19,000 men

1:25:57

were captured, just under 5,000 were killed. during

1:26:00

the fighting while the Germans lost

1:26:02

just under 3,000 men. But

1:26:05

again, the Germans were being bled

1:26:07

here and there, well,

1:26:09

everywhere,

1:26:10

and time would show this to be a losing

1:26:13

proposition. As bad as this was

1:26:15

for the Soviets, it was actually

1:26:17

worse, as during all

1:26:19

of this fighting to the southwest

1:26:21

of Leningrad, the Finns were still looking

1:26:23

to regain what they had lost during the Winter War.

1:26:27

Just north of Leningrad was the Soviet 23rd

1:26:29

Army stretched across the Karelian

1:26:32

Isthmus from the Gulf of Finland to

1:26:34

Lake Ladoga. The

1:26:37

terms of the Winter War had given the Soviets

1:26:39

more territory in this area to

1:26:41

help safeguard Leningrad, but

1:26:43

the Finns wanted their territory back. And

1:26:47

back on August 6, the

1:26:49

Karelian Army breached the

1:26:52

23rd's defensive line. Actually

1:26:54

the Soviet defensive line was more like

1:26:57

broken into two than

1:26:59

breached, and those Soviet

1:27:01

troops to the most north were cut

1:27:04

off and attacked by other Finnish

1:27:06

units. By August 23rd

1:27:09

this was done. As for the remaining

1:27:11

Soviet troops in a northern area, they

1:27:13

had been taken and evacuated

1:27:15

by boat across the lake with

1:27:18

much sacrifice of some of their comrades.

1:27:21

As for the balance of the 23rd Army, Leningrad

1:27:24

still had to be protected, so the

1:27:26

men were ordered back closer to Leningrad

1:27:29

where the land they had to shield

1:27:32

was more narrow. By

1:27:34

September 1, the Soviet 23rd

1:27:36

Army was back to the 1939 Soviet-Finnish

1:27:38

border. There

1:27:43

would be a few more Finnish raids and

1:27:46

a few more towns taken, ones

1:27:48

that had originally been Finnish and were now

1:27:50

back with their people. And

1:27:52

meanwhile Stalin and Nastavka did what

1:27:54

they do best, created new armies.

1:27:58

Yes the Finns had retaken much of the war, but the Karelians were not. the territory

1:28:00

they had recently lost, but now they faced

1:28:03

even more Soviet troops before them,

1:28:06

should they wish to continue pushing south.

1:28:09

But having reached the Mannerheim Line,

1:28:12

soon named after Commander-in-Chief

1:28:15

Field Marshal Baron Karl

1:28:18

Manheim, they settled down,

1:28:21

even though Berlin was screaming for

1:28:23

help and taking Leningrad. Screaming

1:28:27

may be a bit too hard, but those

1:28:29

screams would come

1:28:31

in time.