Breakout

They dragged Samples up last. When they laid him on deck Kingsmill and Bunce were already below in the rolling ship. He was shivering with cold and shock. There was no more room below for him and they had no more blankets. To prevent him dying of exposure, a big sailor lay on top of him to try and warm him up. The sea was very choppy and every now and again as the boat gave a lurch he said politely to Samples, 'Excuse me, sir, I am not used to these small ships. I have always served on bigger ships.' He kept leaving the shivering observer to stagger to the side and vomit violently. Then he would come back and lie on him again. Samples began to dread his return; the smell of vomit was worse than the cold and his wounds.

Samples recalls, 'I was very upset about my shivering. I was only 23 and thought it would look as if I were frightened. But I will never forget the most pleasurable experience of my life. When I got to Ramsgate they put a semi-circular cage with a radiant heater over the lower half of my body in hospital. I stopped shaking like a leaf when the warmth and feeling came back. It was a sensation that has never been equalled. Being so young I was terribly embarrassed when they tended to my wounds, and nurses stood by whilst doctors picked the German E- boat shrapnel out of my bottom.'

While Esmonde's Swordfish and Kingcombe's Spitfires were giving the Germans their first real taste of opposition, where were the rest of the RAF fighters? The other four squadrons— two from Biggin Hill and two from Hornchurch — either took off too late or lost their way in the mist. When those Spitfire squadrons finally arrived, it was nearly 1 p.m. and the Swordfish battle was already over.

Two Spitfire squadrons from Hornchurch—64 and the 411 Canadian — were ordered to rendezvous with the Swordfish at 12:30 p.m. But 64 Squadron did not arrive over Manston until 12:45 p.m. to find the Swordfish gone. Ten aircraft set course for Calais, patrolled for a short time but saw nothing and flew back to their base in Essex.

The Canadian 411 Squadron, led by Sq. Ldr. R. B. Newton and Wing-Cdr. Powell, found the battleships after the Sword-fish had been shot down and were fired upon by flak ships, but did not engage in any other action.

The other two Biggin Hill squadrons of twenty-six fighters who were supposed to join Kingcombe's ten Spitfires in keeping the German fighters off the Swordfish were also a vital quarter of an hour late. When they climbed to attack the Luftwaffe umbrella, the Swordfish had already been shot down.

One of them, the 401 Canadian Squadron, reached the ships at 1 p.m. German fighters tore towards them, and Pilot Officer Ian Ormston shot down one ME and damaged another.

Biggin Hill's third squadron, 124, although airborne at 12:20, also missed the Swordfish but had dog-fights over the Channel with the Luftwaffe.

The squadrons behaved with great bravery, but their attacks made no difference to the outcome of the Swordfish battle. They had missed the Swordfish through a combination of inefficient ground work and bad weather, causing them to lose their way.

Kingcombe's 72 Spitfire Squadron's log entry said, 'First big offensive of the year. Ten Spitfires at 12:18 escorted six Swordfish in an attack on the Scharnhorst, escorted by light craft, in the Straits of Dover. 72 Squadron's score was the largest of any squadron.'

As the Spitfires turned back to England to refuel, the five Swordfish survivors rescued from the sea were being taken back to Dover and Ramsgate.

The only uninjured survivors were observer Edgar Lee and Gunner Donald Bunce. Edgar Lee was ordered to report personally to Admiral Ramsay who signalled the Admiralty, 'In my opinion the gallant sortie of these six Swordfish constitutes one of the finest exhibitions of self-sacrifice and devotion that the war has yet witnessed.'

Shortly after the Swordfish attack, three more MTBs under Lt. D. J. Long left Ransgate to intercept the battleships. It was an unsatisfactory engagement on both sides. Due to bad weather and engine trouble none of the three boats found the ships. Long fought a battle with the E-boats and the destroyer Friedrich Ihn, who chased him off — but not fiercely enough. Friedrich Ihn's captain, Lt. Cdr. Wachsmuth, was criticized for not pursuing Long's boats more vigorously.

The destroyer flotilla's report said, 'The destroyer Friedrich Ihn brought on itself the fire of the English coastal artillery and switched the attention of the batteries from the big ships by drawing their fire. Friedrich Ihn carried out the task allotted to her by fighting off the English MTBs with great success. As a result the British MTBs did not succeed in reaching the German battleships. However, it is incomprehensible that at 2:18 p.m. the destroyer did not successfully attack the two English MTBs coming towards her. This would have been the right thing to do.'

Now the Germans were through the Straits unscathed, and were beginning to run up the Belgian coast. All of them had the feeling that, far from the battle being over, it had hardly begun.

The Admiralty had flung six old Fleet Air Arm biplanes in a doomed attack on the ships. Surely now the greatest battle-fleet in western waters was racing to sink them? In fact, all there was in the Home Fleet base at Scapa Flow that day were the new battleship Duke of York and the three heavy cruisers, London, Sheffield and Liverpool. At sea in the area were aircraft-carrier Victorious and heavy cruisers Berwick, Shropshire and Kenya. Together they could have made an annihilating attack. Instead, they remained aloof while the Royal Navy launched its last attack against the German battleships. It was to be made by Pizey's six 20-year-old destroyers.

The RAF had not really entered the battle yet. At 2:30 p.m., nearly 700 bombers and fighters were beginning to take off from airfields all over Britain for a massed air attack. Unfortunately, because of the confusion, they were taking off piecemeal.

Meanwhile, Admiral Ramsay was sitting on the navigating counter in Dover Operations Room swinging his legs when the phone rang for him. He kept saying, 'Yes sir, no sir.' He put down the phone and said, 'That was the Prime Minister. He wanted to know how they had managed to get through.'

Flt.-Lt. Gerald Kidd, who had been called in from Swingate Radar Station said, 'I could tell him why. It was simply due to the fact that there was no forethought, no co-ordination whatsoever. I am going to write a report on it. I don't care if I am court-martialled.' Ramsay paused for a moment and then said, 'Go ahead. Somebody must say so.'

When Churchill telephoned Dover Castle, Nora Smith with the rest of the afiternoon shift had already started tracing the battleship plots for future reference. She made two copies which later were shown to important visitors. Churchill was to be one of them.

IX ADMIRAL CILIAX LEAVES HIS FLAGSHIP

February 11 was the last night of the stand-to for the six destroyers in Harwich. On the morning of the 12th, the operation was to be abandoned and the destroyers were to return to Sheerness. Looking at the charts on that evening Pizey said, 'As tomorrow's the last day, I've got the Commodore's agreement to go out at 6 a.m., to exercise the ships in pairs in the wide swept Channel.' In fact, he admits that at the back of his mind was the thought they might be more useful at sea if the Germans did come through. As the captains of the six destroyers met for the last time in Harwich harbour, it looked to them as though the alert was all over. Four hundred miles away in Brest, Admiral Ciliax and his captains were ready to cast off within three hours.

On 12 February, when the six destroyers slipped their cables and began to head out of Harwich harbour before dawn, it was the start of a cold misty winter's day. It was barely light when Campbell, with Captain Mark Pizey and his navigator, Lt. Tony Fanning, on the bridge with him, cleared the boom. Strung out behind them were Vivacious, Worcester and Walpole, followed by the 16th flotilla leader, Mackay, with Whitshed. They were accompanied by six Hunt Class destroyers with 4-inch A.A. guns to protect them from German aircraft while they exercised.

In the centre of the flotilla was HMS Worcester inevitably known in the fleet as the 'Saucebottle.' On her bridge were Lt.-Cdr. Colin Coats, a 39-year-old grey-haired regular R.N. officer, who had spent most of his time in destroyers, and his first lieutenant, curly-bearded Richard Taudevin, who had an RNVR wartime