Lfd. Nr.: 1491
| Seegebiet: | Westraum |
| Datum / Zeit: | 04./05.07.1944 01u00 |
| Ort des Gefechts: | N Le Havre |
| Verbandsführer (S.O.): | LtCdr. Bradford (Donald) |
| Angreifer: | 55th MTB 632 650 ; 29th MTB 459 464 |
| Gefechtsbericht A: | Further action occured when two minesweepers were detected when leaving Le Havre at 0243 , and attacking M.T.B.s damaged one before enemy returned to harbour. Enemy shore batteries joined latter action but with inaccurate fire. One M.T.B. was damaged, one slightly damaged and one rating wounded [1]. -> After the actions shortly after midnight, MTB 459 and 464 sighted two German minesweepers escorted by two R-boats. As the M.T.B.’s turned in for a torpedo attack, they were seen, and the enemy opened up with ‘starshells’ and 88 mm shells. The shore batteries opened up as well. Their shells came crashing angrily about the boats, making a most uncomfortable barrage.[2] -> From Ken Forrester, If I only had known [3]: We hadn’t been sitting there long when we picked up two minesweepers leaving harbour. They were either M class or large trawlers. From our plot of them it seemed that they were sweeping the inshore channel up to Cap d’Antifer, so we moved off to attack. Jimmy Fulton (MTB 650) still had his torpedoes, so I told him to sneak in on the seaward bow while we came in on the quarter. The idea being that we would rush in and open up with guns, thus attracting their full attention, leaving as I hoped, the chance for Jimmy to get in an unobserved attack with torpedoes. In we went and as we moved in we saw and felt a large explosion astern of the sweepers; they had swept a mine. As soon as we got inside visibility range we illuminated and opened up scoring two direct hits with our 6 pounder with the first two shells. Back came the reply thick and fast, they were M class alright. We stuck it out, hoping to see one of them go up in a cloud of smoke and flame from Jimmy’s torpedoes, but it wasn’t to be; they weren’t to be caught napping. As soon as Jimmy poked his nose in sight he caught it just as we were doing. He made a quick short attack and fired his torpedoes, but missed. Then we both settled down to a gun action. The gunners were giving of their best that night. We went in for the last run and found them both stopped and in a pretty bad way, but still plenty of fight. As we went in, Ford (MTB 632) got hit in the forward petrol compartment from a 40 mm shell, trouble in no small way. We turned round to the west to make a dash out of range of the shore batteries, who were then starting to be fairly accurate. Jimmy was also in a bad way, having been severely damaged and he disengaged with us. It seemed as if 632 was on her last legs, the bridge and engine room were smothered in clouds of black smoke and we could see flames down in the forward petrol compartment and the forward end of the engine room. The motor mechanic was performing miracles of engineering and fire fighting, nursing along the engines, two of which were damaged and at the same time directing the attempts to quell the fire in the engine room. We steamed west at the best speed possible until it seemed that she was on the point of blowing up and then cleared the engine room — having stopped the engines and pulled the petrol compartment fire extinguisher plug — the fire went out and the smoke dispersed. We were safe enough, and after inspection of the damage we got going and struggled slowly back to the anchorage. MTB 632 was a shambles and had to be sailed back to pay off: a severe loss to the flotilla."[3] -- |
| erkannte Gegner: | Minensuchboote |
| alliierte Erfolge: | keine |
| alliierte Verluste: | MTB 632 konstruktiver Totalverlust [3] |
| tatsächliche Gegner: | Trawlers der 38. M-Flottille |
| Gefechtsbericht B: | 05.07.: 2. S-Flottille (...) hatte zwischen Kap Antifer und Kap de la Hève laufend Gefechtsberührung mit 2 SGB und 2 MGB's. Ein Oberflächenläufer wurde ausmanövriert. Durch Zeitverlust war Durchbruch nach Westen nicht mehr möglich [5] - 4. R-Flottille hatte 6 sm nördlich Antifer Gefecht mit feindlichen S-Booten. Kap de la Heve feuerte auf Anforderung der R-Boote 2 Salven Störungsfeuer. R 224 und R 218 haben sich im Nebel während des Gefechts gerammt. Auf einem Feindboot wurde schwere Detonation, anscheinend von Munition, beobachtet [5] - 38. MS-Flottille hat sich in der Nacht an Gefecht eigener S- und R-Boote mit feindlichen Gun-Booten beteiligt [6]. |
| Ausgewertete Quellen: | 1) Admirality War Diary, 5.7.1944, page 89/90 (Scan 89/90) ; 2) https://naval-museum.mb.ca/mtbs/29th-mtb-flotilla/brief-history-part-2-march-to-june-1944/ ; 3) https://cfv.org.uk/research/personnel/memoir/if-i-only-had-known ; 4) Peter Scott, Battle of the Narrow Seas, Chapter XVI (ed. 2009 p.199/200) ; 5) KTB SKL Teil A, 05.07.1944, S.108 , 6) KTB SKL Teil A, 05.07.1944, S.110 ; |
| Letzte Änderung: | 01.08.2024 |