HITLER'S BLUNDER.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 April 1940, Page 5

HITLER'S BLUNDER.

SURVEYED BY MR CHURCHHILL Events of the Great Sea Battle DETAILS OF ENEMY LOSSES IN SHIPS AND PLANES AT LEAST EIGHTEEN CRUISERS AND OTHER VESSELS SUNK At least 18 German ships have been sunk since Sunday, a Daventry announcement states —four cruisers, one or more submarines, one destroyer and twelve transports or supp y ships. The number of German planes shot down this weeic over the North Sea is 21. . In the House of Commons, Mr Winston Churchill, Fust Lord of the Admiralty, gave a review of the naval operations. An air patrol, he stated, reported a German battle-cruiser ana a smaller cruiser and several smaller ships steaming northward. The whole British Fleet immediately set out, while another British force, which had laid a minefield on the coast of Norway, was steaming westward. On the way to Norway, one British destroyer stayed behind to search for a man who had fallen overboard. Two enemy destroyers appeared and were engaged and a third German destroyer came on the scene, after which the messages from the British destroyer suddenly stopped and it must be concluded that she was sunk. On Tuesday afternoon, Mr Churchill continued, German aircraft attacked the British Fleet. A bomb hit the battleship Rodney, but it failed to penetrate the deck armour. Two cruisers were slightly damaged by bomb splinters, but weie still in service. Five attacks were made on the Aurora, which was not hit, but a destroyer, which was accompanying her, was sunk, all the crew being saved. Another destroyer sank a German U-boat off the Orkneys. The Renown sighted the battle-cruiser Scharnhorst and another cruiser north of Narvik. The Renown opened fire at a range of 10 miles and soon afterwards the Scharnhorst was seen to be hit on the fore superstructure. Every gun on the German battle-cruiser ceased fire for some time and when fire was reopened only the aft turret was used. A few minutes later a vertical column of smoke from the battle-cruiser suggested that a second hit had been obtained. The smaller cruiser drew a smoke screen over the battlecruiser and both warships were lost to sight. The Renown had her foremast and wireless shot away and one shell went right through her, above the waterline, without exploding. There were no casualties.