Message Traffic heard by RODNEY 24 May 1941

[dunmunro]

We have to remember that Hood was firing upon PE, not Bismarck and therefore Briggs is actually talking about PE, not Bismarck, albeit with the understanding that both PE and Bismarck were firing at Hood.

There is a topic here:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=7736

which I started to look all at the evidence as to when Bismarck and PE opened fire. I think it is pretty convincing that Bismarck opened fire at ~0553 and PE sometime after that.

[Alberto Virtuani]

" I think it is pretty convincing that Bismarck opened fire at ~0553 and PE sometime after that."

...again.... Should we cry or laugh ? Luckily we have official German documents stating that both BS and PG opened fire at 05:55.

Bye, Alberto

[Byron Angel]

"The same shells were fired during the whole engagement (HE base fused shells): please read Jasper report. Never heard of SAP shells for the German 203 gun. A 203 HE shell could never penetrate the 2" deck of Hood, while BS AP shell would have easily."



Prinz Eugen carried the following types of 20.3cm projectiles (per pg 63 of Schmalenbach's "Kreuzer Prinz Eugen - Unter Drei Flaggen").

> 320 x 20.3cm Sprenggranaten mit Kopfzunder (gegen leichte Ziele)
High explosive shell with nose fuze, for use against unarmored targets.

> 320 x 20.3cm Sprenggranaten mit Bodenzunder (gegen leicht gepanzerte Ziele)
High explosive shell with base fuze, for use against lightly armored targets.

> 320 x 20.3cm Panzersprenggranaten (gegen schwer gepanzerte Ziele
Armor piercing shell, for use against heavily armored targets.

> 60 x 20.3cm Leuchtgranaten
Starshell.

Go here - http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNGER_8 ... Ammunition - for an explanation of the difference between Sprenggranate mit Kopfzunder (nose fuze) and Sprenggranate mit Bodenzunder (base fuze).

The nose-fuzed high explosive round has no effective armor penetration capability and is designed for attack of unarmored targets. It will explode upon impact with water, giving a better mark for initial spotting.
Projectile weight = 122 kg
Bursting Charge = 8.93 kg

The base-fuzed "high explosive round is actually an uncapped common (probably a better description than SAP) shell with limited AP performance (5cm homogeneous plate @ 9500 meters) designed for attack of lightly armored targets. This is the round employed by Prinz Eugen at Denmark Strait.
Projectile weight = 122 kg
Bursting Charge = 6.54 kg

The base-fuzed capped AP round is a conventional AP round designed to attack more heavily armored targets (relatively speaking for a cruiser). Its AP performance at 20,000 meters = 10cm vertical face-hardened plate

- - -

Please go to pg 132-133 of Schmalenbach's "Kreuzer Prinz Eugen - Unter Drei Flaggen" -

Uberlegungen des Verfassers und Berechnungen (gestutzt auf die 20.3cm Schusstafel und die Diensvorschrift G. Kdo 100 "im Gefecht - Wahl der gunstigsten Gefechtsentfernungs") kommen zum Ergebnis, dass bei gunstigstem Zusammentreffen der verschiedenen Faktoren die 20.3cm Panzersprenggranate von PG den Panzer von HOOD habe durchschlagen konnen. Doch PG hat mit Sprenggranaten mit Bodenzunder geschossen, die erheblich geringere Durchschlagleistung haben.

Translation -
"Considerations of the author and calculations (based on the 20.3cm range table and the service manual G. Kdo 100 "in combat - choice of the most favorable battle distance") come to the conclusion that in the most favorable coincidence of the various factors the 20.3cm Panzersprenggranate of PG could have penetrated the armor of HOOD. But PG fired Sprenggranaten mit Bodenzunder (base fuze), which had a considerably lower penetration performance."

- - -

Please go to pg 35 of Prinz Eugen's War Diary -

"The 1st Artillery Officer [Korvettenkapitan Paulus Jasper had counted on engaging a 10,000 ton opponent and had therefore selected base-fuzed shells."

Prinz Eugen chose to fire projectiles which had a capability to get through light (</+ 5cm) armor, not simply high explosive shells.


B

[Alberto Virtuani]

Hello everybody,

thanks to Byron Angel for the info: it's exactly as I have already said, the same HE base fused shells were fired during the whole engagement.

No SAP shells for PG 20.3cm and the HE (base or nose fused) were unable to penetrate the 2" deck: around 5 cm is the max penetration at 10km against vertical armor (almost 90° impact angle) for HE base fused shells... no data for horizontal penetration at all at 17-18km (less than 20° descente angle) as logical (http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNGER_8-60_skc34.php).

This points to a PG shell to have started at around 05.57:30 the Hood boat deck fire (Jasper gunnery report in PG KTB is very clear in this sense, allowing to calculate the interval needed to fire 2 Vollsalve+ 2 semi-salvos, spotting the fall of shells and correcting fire before hitting).


Bye, Alberto

[Herr Nilsson]

1) Jasper is clear enough that his 4th salvo was the one that hit Hood and started the fire, I don't see any reason why he should be wrong as his account of the PG opening salvos is precise and he even explains how he could ditinguish between the 15", the 8" and the 6" splashes... He was far away, but his job was to look at the fall of shells and evaluate them: Leach, Rowell and Hunter-Terry were doing other things (and from their viewpoint they could not see all the falling salvos), but H-T at least could write down some timings, and this is key to confirm what happened.

Jasper doesn't attribute the fire to Prinz Eugen at all. Brinkmann is undetermined and only Schmalenbach speculates that it's "very likely, almost certain" that the salvo starting the fire was from Prinz Eugen.

[Alberto Virtuani]

Hello everybody,

I don't see much "indeterminateness" in PG officers' statements (see below, but possibly they too were "astutely falsifying" reports as the British...), however the fact that the shell did not penetrate the Hood deck strongly points to a HE relatively light shell from PG.Also, the Baron attributes the hit to PG, that means nobody on board Bismarck claimed the hit for Schneider in the next days...

"...of the impacts), a salvo from Prinz Eugen was delivered, which, according to my observations through large binoculars, caused a conflagration in the vicinity of the aft mast. Before further hits..." (Schmalenbach)

"...not visible since they were concealed by the target. By contrast, {after firing] the bracketing group an extraordinarily bright fire flash appeared on the enemy ship's aft section at the level of the aft mast. The fire developed on the portside of the opponent, since the superstructures stood out as sharp silhouettes. Immediately thereafter I received the order from the ships.." (Jasper)

"...salvo, with a target shift to King George. Both ships are on target after the first salvo. After the impact at 0557 of the 2nd salvo from "Prinz Eugen" a rapidly spreading fire at the level of the aft mast was observed, apparently involving the aircraft hangar or petrol storage [gasoline]..." (Brinkmann)

******

[Attachments, consisting of annotated text in .jpg format, retyped and reinserted as regular text by moderator. The use of attachments in these sorts of situations is discouraged; in almost all cases scans from text -- or in this case, apparently scans from retyped text -- can be much more efficiently replaced by simply retyping the material in question and inserting it in the body of the comment itself. It is unclear whether the material inside square brackets in the Schmalenbach/Jasper/Brinkmann quotes above were in the original texts quoted or have been inserted later by Mr. Virtuani. Material in italics above has been underlined in the original submission, apparently by Mr. Virtuani; it may not appear in the original text. In general, standard and well-established academic rules for emphasis, etc. should be used in quoting text from previous works. WJJ]

*****



Bye, Alberto

[Alberto Virtuani]

Hello everybody,

here the source of the attachments. I beg pardon to everybody for not having indicated the source (Hood website), that I gave for evident: (http://www.kbismarck.com/archives/pg-ktb.zip pag 44, 39 and 20 respectively)


Regarding the moderator suggestion, I'm afraid I don't have time to retype everything (and introducing my own mistakes) or (much worse) just stating something giving a wrong interpretation without posting the written statements as they are.
The retyping should be done on an exceptional basis only.


Bye, Alberto

[Byron Angel]

"I don't see much "indeterminateness" in PG officers' statements (see below, but possibly they too were "astutely falsifying" reports as the British...),"

Unfortunately, IMO, this sort of approach to the topic makes any useful discourse unlikely.

B

[Bill Jurens]

Attachments are currently posing technical problems. In situations, e.g. the reproduction of graphics, etc., where the usage of attachments is unavoidable, there is of course, little alternative. Purely textual attachments, e.g. scans from books with or without underlining, etc. should be avoided if possible, unless the text is fairly lengthy, e.g. a page or so. In most cases, the amount of text that is reproduced is, in practical terms, minimal, and it's been my experience that that taking the trouble to scan a small piece of text and edit it in a graphics program hardly ever represents a significantly smaller commitment of effort than just rekeyboarding the original text from scratch or -- if repeated use is anticipated -- rekeyboarding it once and simply going back to take a portion of the original file. If emphasis in the original text is required or desirable, material can be placed in italics followed by "emphasis mine" in square brackets...

So, again, I would request that, if possible, posters refrain from posting small 'snippets' of original text in the form of attachments. It would make my life, at least, a little easier and decrease visual 'clutter' on the board.

Bill Jurens

[Alberto Virtuani]

Hello everybody,

Bill Jurens wrote: "So, again, I would request that, if possible, posters refrain from posting small 'snippets' of original text in the form of attachments."

but again I repeat that:
1) I will not loose time retyping things that can be scanned and posted and (mostly)
2) I will not take the risk to enter my own errors while retyping...
I do hope we are still free to post in the form we prefer in this forum.


Bye, Alberto

[Herr Nilsson]

I can understand Alberto's reluctance to a certain degree. The main problem is that the transcript/translation-PDF prevents cut and paste. The underlining was already done in the original German text by the way.

As several times before I can state that the translation is very good, because it softens the German tendency to use excessively long and/or nested sentences, but sometimes it's also a bit misleading. I've tried to translate it as close as possible to the source text. I'm afraid it sounds very clumsy.

Brinkmann actually writes:

"Both ships are on target after the first salvo, on which [note: the target] at 0557 at [the time of] the impact of the 2nd salvo from "Prinz Eugen" a rapidly spreading fire at the level of the aft mast was observed, apparently involving the aircraft hangar or petrol storage."

Jasper writes:

"However during the bracketing group an extraordinarily intense glow of fire appeared on the enemy ship's aft section at the level of the aft mast."

Schmalenbach writes:

"A short time after the impact of a salvo from Bismarck (I couldn't explain it in any other way because of the rapid succession of the impacts on the opponent on the right as well as the change of colour and height of the splashes), a salvo from Prinz Eugen was landing, which, according to my observations through large binoculars, caused a seat of fire in the vicinity of the aft mast. [Note: Schmalenbach believes this,...]Because before new impacts were landing, a source of glow spread enormously fast to an estimated length of 15 m. [...] From the time of the impact until the all of a sudden initiation of the fire a few seconds elapsed (3-5). I consider it very probable, almost certain, that the the salvo from Prinz Eugen mentioned above caused the fire. A few seconds later a salvo from Bismarck impacted on the aft section, which caused an explosion of enormous size."

[Alberto Virtuani]

Hello everybody,

thanks to Herr Nilsson for the more accurate translation.

The three accounts speak of the Hood boat deck as happening at the time or just after the (landing of) PG salvos... Brinkmann and Jasper don't specify that it was the PG salvo to start the fire, Schmalenbach specify that it is this way and Brinkmann counter-signed his report, attaching it to the PG KTB.

The fact that the shell exploded at contact with a 2" deck point to a relatively light HE shell (not a AP 15" that would have penetrated the deck exploding inside the ship.
The fact that the Baron (on board Bismarck) did not claim the hit for Schneider, attributing it to the cruiser, confirms that nobody on board the flagship ever said it was from Bismarck, whose salvos were well distinguished from the PG ones (see Jasper) also from the flagship.

Germans concluded the same: see Schmundt (http://www.kbismarck.com/archives/pg003.html) who says that PG damaged the opponent during the battle (no hits were confirmed against PoW by anyone, therefore Schmundt meant that PG damaged the Hood, causing the fire).


Bye, Alberto

[Herr Nilsson]

Schmalenbach speculates. Brinkmann's signature just means he has read it. Schmundt wasn't there. He relies most probably on Schmalenbach's speculation.

Müllenheim-Rechberg's book is a rehash of Brennecke's enriched with a few anecdotes and Brennecke is basically a rehash of M.DV.Nr 601 Heft 3.

In 1941 Müllenheim-Rechberg's statement was different:

"Kapitänleutnant von Müllenheim-Rechberg stated, when interrogated aboard H.M.S. "Dorsetshire," that "Hood" closed the range rapidly, made smoke, and was hit as she turned to port, the smoke possibly assisting ranging. He added then that "Hood" blew up on "Bismarck's" fifth salvo and cost Germany forty shells in all. During subsequent interrogation this officer stated that "Bismarck" hit with her second salvo and again with her third, whereupon a sheet of very vivid bright, white flame was seen on "Hood" there being no smoke at all. The absence of smoke and the nature of the flame decided "Bismarck's" officers that petrol storage tanks, fitted for "Hood's" aircraft had been hit. A fourth salvo from "Bismarck" also hit and there was an immense explosion in "Hood." This prisoner stated that he could not say whether the explosion was caused by the development of the fire from the third salvo or by the direct hits of the fourth."
C.B. 4051 (24) - GERMAN BATTLESHIP BISMARCK- Interrogation of Survivors; August, 1941

[Alberto Virtuani]

Hello everybody,

"Schmalenbach speculates. Brinkmann's signature just means he has read it. Schmundt wasn't there, etc.etc….."

….What doesn't fit will be made to fit (viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6728&p=76796&hilit= ... fit#p76796).…


Schmalenbach was observing the fall of shots and he was sure ("speculating" nothing at all...)
Brinkmann signed and submitted to his superiors as per military behavior (he was not like Wake-Walker at the first board, apparently...)
Schmundt examined very critically PG reports and came to the same conclusions...

The Baron does not account for the boat deck fire in his (very confused and third hand referred) interrogatory, but he speaks of smoke (not directly caused by any Bismarck hit).
In his book he may have put together other accounts, but did not confirm his interrogatory and he attributed the hit to PG. Nobody on board Bismarck ever claimed this hit for the flagship.



In any case all reconstructions done after this, accepted it was a HE shell causing the fire, as logic, because a BS 15" shell would not have exploded at contact with the deck and would have most probably caused more serious damages.


Bye, Alberto

[Herr Nilsson]

"Schmalenbach speculates. Brinkmann's signature just means he has read it. Schmundt wasn't there, etc.etc….."

….What doesn't fit will be made to fit (viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6728&p=76796&hilit= ... fit#p76796).…

Means what?