The Battle for the Danish Strait was a sea battle during the Second World War between the ships of the Royal Navy of Great Britain and the Kriegsmarine (naval forces of the Third Reich). The British battleship Prince of Wales and the liner cruiser Hood tried to prevent the German battleship Bismarck and the heavy cruiser Prince Eugen from breaking through the Danish strait into the North Atlantic.
History
Operation “Rhine Exercises” called for the exit of the battleship Bismarck and the heavy cruiser Prince Eugen to the Atlantic Ocean via the Danish strait. The main purpose of the operation was to enter the maritime operations of the British merchant fleet. It was assumed that the Bismarck would be bound for escort convoys, while the Prince Eugen would sink merchant ships. The commander of operations was Admiral Gunther Lutyens, who asked the command to postpone the beginning of the campaign, in order to reach the next passage of Tirpitz or the “pocket battleship” Scharnhorst, which was being repaired in the port of Brest. However, the commander-in-chief of the Kriegsmarine, Admiral Erich Raeder, did not support Lutyens and on May 18, 1941, Prince Eugen and Bismarck took to the sea.
On May 20, the German ships were seen by the neutral Swedish cruiser Gotland. On the same day, about a squadron of two large warships of the Norwegian resistance met. On 21 May, Great Britain received from its military attaché at the embassy, the passage in the Kattegat Strait of two large German ships. From 21 to 22 May, the ships took to the fjords near the Norwegian Bergen, where they were repainted, and Prince Eugen was refueled. Bismarck, for unknown reasons, did not refuel. While the ships were at anchor, they were photographed by British air force reconnaissance aircraft. Now the British admirals accurately identified the Bismarck.
The commander of the English fleet, Admiral John Tovey, almost immediately sent the battleship Prince of Wales, and the liner cruiser Hood, escorted by destroyers. The cruiser Suffolk was supposed to make contact with the cruiser Norfolk located in the Danish Strait. The light cruisers Birmingham, Manchester, and Arethusa were to patrol in the strait between the Faroe Islands and Iceland. On the night of May 22, the Admiral King George V itself led the aircraft carrier Victoria with an escort from the base at Scapa Flow.
On the evening of May 23, the British cruisers Norfolk and Suffolk discovered the Bismarck group, which was moving at a speed of 27 knots in the Danish Strait. With the help of newly installed radar, Suffolk tracked the Bismarck’s movement during the night and transmitted its coordinates to the main forces. The British plan was to get closer to the Bismarck from the dark (southern) side, while the silhouette of the German ships would be visible against the light background of the northern part of the sky. However, at 00-28, Suffolk lost contact with Bismarck and the plan did not work. For fear of losing the Bismarck, Holland ordered to stop moving to the optimal point of the meeting and turn to the south-southwest, sending the destroyers to the north. At this time, the German ships, trying to bypass pack ice, changed their course at 00-41, and as a result the group of destroyers passed by only 10 miles away without noticing the enemy. At 2:15 on May 24, the destroyers were ordered to divide into intervals of 15 miles to make their way north. Shortly before 03-00 Suffolk again discovered the Bismarck on its radar and transmitted its coordinates. Hood and Prince of Wales were now at a distance of 35 miles. Holland was ordered to turn in the direction of the enemy and increase speed to 28 knots. The British ships were at a disadvantage: meeting at an obtuse angle meant a long-distance battle, in which the thin deck armor came under a withering fire. The situation worsened even more at 03-20 when the Bismarck made another turn to the west: now the squadrons were practically parallel.
Course of Battle
At 05:35 on May 24, a watchman from the Prince of Wales spotted the German squadron at a distance of 17 miles. The Germans knew about the presence of the enemy from the use of hydrophones and soon noticed the British ships on the horizon. Holland had a choice: either continue escorting Bismarck, waiting for the arrival of the battleships of Admiral Tovi’s squadron, or to attack independently. Holland decided to attack, and at 05:37 gave an order for engagement with the enemy. At 05:52, the Hood opened fire from a distance of about 13 miles. Hood, at full speed continued engagement with the enemy, seeking to limit the time of falling under fire. In the meantime, German ships hit the cruiser: the first 203-mm projectile from Prince Eugen hit the Hood amidships, next to the aft 102mm unit, and caused a massive fire of stockpiles of ammunition. At 05:55, the Holland ordered a turn of 20 degrees to the left so that the stern guns could shoot at Bismarck.
Approximately at 06:00, the cruiser was hit with a volley from the Bismarck from a distance of 8 to 9.5 miles. A powerful explosion took place, which tore the cruiser in half. Hood quickly sank. Prince of Wales, located at a distance of half a mile, was hit with fragments of the Hood.
The cruiser sank in three minutes, taking 1,415 men with it, including Vice Admiral Holland. Only three sailors were saved, who were picked up by the destroyer HMS Elektra, who came up after two hours. After the sinking of the Hood, the Prince of Wales was under fire from two ships and retreated after receiving several hits. At the same time, it managed to hit the Bismarck, which determined the further course of the battle – one of the shells opened large oil storage tanks on the Bismarck, and the wide oil trace prevented Bismarck from eluding the British ships that pursued.