NAZI NAVY MUTILATED

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 114, 12 April 1940, Page 7

NAZI NAVY MUTILATED

aircraft. The usual tales were put out by the German wireless of several battleships and cruisers being sunk or seriously damaged. Actually two cruisers were slightly damaged by air missiles, but that did not interfere at all with their work and they are still with the Fleet. H.M.S. RODNEY STRUCK. , One very heavy bomb hit the flagship Rodney, but her very strong deck armour resisted the impact successfully—a satisfactory commentary on the structure of British inen-o-war. Four officers and three men were injured. The cruiser Aurora, which was joining the Fleet, was subjected to five diving attacks which were pressed with courage but which all failed. The destroyer Ghurka, which was escorting the Aurora, was hit. She listed very heavily and sank after four or five hours, hut all her crew except 14 were rescued. On the same afternoon the destroyer /lulu sank a German U-boat off the Orkneys. FIGHT WITH SCHARNHORST. Meanwhile, far to the north off Narvik at daybreak the Renown perceived the Scharnhorst and a 10,000-ton Hipper class cruiser which had evidently gone up with the German force the day before. After an exchange of lire at 18,000 yards the Renown observed hits forward on the superstructure of the German battle-cruiser. Therealter her whole armoury stopped firing, but later after having turned she began firing under local control. The speed which the battle-cruiser maintained was very great and the Renown had to push to 24 knots though very heavy seas were breaking over her forward gun turrets, and after a further two minutes of firI ing a vertical column of smoke from j what they called a possible second hit J was observed in the Scharnhorst, who then turned away and lied at high speed without hampering herself by further firing. An unexploded shell passed through the Renown about water level and another carried away the main aerial, but there were no casualties- “ The cruiser of the Hipper class now tried to cross the Scharnhorst,” said Mr Churchill. “This ship and the Gneisau are Germany’s most modern and most formidable vessels. 'The 'Hipper class vessel then threw a smoke screen to cover the Scharnhorst and the Renown opened fire upon the Hipper class ship, which turned away and both ships retired at high speed, the Hipper dodging the fire, which became intermittent. In the end they succeeded in getting away and firing ceased at 29,000 yards when they became invisible.” , . ~ Mr Churchill then reported on the attack on Narvik announced bv Mr Chamberlain yesterday. He added the information that from all they had heard at the Admiralty late on luesday night they thought the operation was so hazardous that at 1 o dock they told the captain of the destroyer llotilla that he must be the sale judge whether to attack. Captain War burton Lee attacked. “In the beginning all tliev told us was what they nacl lost. They said nothing more and I let it go out, because I do not think j wc want to have any kind of mealy mouth to the public. Therefore I put it out although there was nothing to relieve it. “The moment we get any news—be it bad or good—once we can rely

upon it we shall present it to Parliament, to be broadcast, and to the Press. Pam all for propaganda and publicity, but the best propaganda is results and 1 must say these are coming to hand in no unsatisfactory manner.”

LOSS OF GLOWWORM. RENOWN BATTERS SCHARNHORST. FAROE ISLANDS OCCUPIED. (British Official Wireless.) Received April 12, 11. SO a.in. RUGBY, April 11. Continuing his speech in the House of Commons Mr Churchill said that the British were occupying the Faroe Islands—a strategic point o! high importance—and would shield them from all the severities of war and establish themselves there conveniently by sea and air until the moment came to hand them back to the Crown and people of Denmark liberated then from Nazi thraldom. While Iceland required lurtlier consideration, he could say that no German would set foot there with impunity.

Mr Churchill’s story of Wednesday was of ’the air action and bombing in Bergen Fiord by the R.A.F. and the Fleet Air Arm. The last detail ho gave the House was of the attack at daybreak to-day by 18 torpedo-carry-ing aircraft of the Fleet Air Arm on enemy shipping in Trondheim Harbour.

Hitler had cast the interests of the German navy upon wild waters and most grievous losses had already been sustained. Four cruisers —nearly half Germany’s pre-war strength and much more than her now existing strength—had been sunk and a number of destroyers and several more U-boats had been destroyed—all since Sunday. The German navy was thus deeply mutilated. In addition British submarines had taken heavy toll from all German transports and store ships crossing to Scandinavia. All German ships in the Skagerrak and the Kattegat would be sunk. Already a dozen snips, some of large tonnage, had been sunk or captured there or in the North Sea. The House listened with deep attention to the details Mr Churchill was able to give of the events since Sundav night when on the news that German battle-cruisers with a number of other cruisers, vessels and destroyers were out- in the North Sea moving northwards, the Commander-in-Chief put to sea to bring them to action. At the same time independently a strong British naval force was approaching Narvik to lay minefields off the Norwegian const." They were laid according” to plan at daylight on Monday morning. GLOWWORM’S GREAT EIGHT. Mi' Churchill then told the House ol the presumed loss of the Glowworm, a destroyer which was detained through waiting to pick up a man lost overboard—how she was proceeding to rejoin her force when she first saw one of the enemy destroyers at 8 o clock on Monday, and then two, how slia engaged them, how later she reported an unknown enemy ship lietorc hoi and how the last message ended abruptly and the Admiralty could only conclude she had been sunk by supenoi > During Monday morning it looked as if these enemy forces which contained a German battle-cruiser and other important ships would be caught between the British naval forces in the north and the main Home Fleet, both of which were superior, but m the mists and storms the German f° rL '® s £ away. On Tuesday the Fleet was cruising to the south about level with Bergen when during the afternoon l was attacked continuously by German