CAB80-8 — Page 24

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2

General Review.

NAVAL SITUATION.

The outstanding event at sea during the past week has been the severe attack on shipping off the East Coast by German aircraft on the 29th and 30th January.

Attacks by U-boats continue to exact a heavier toll of Neutral vessels, not in convoy, than of British shipping. In spite of very adverse weather conditions the convoy system has maintained the flow of shipping, both Allied and Neutral, and in the only case of a successful attack by a U-boat on a British convoy the U-boat was subsequently sunk.

The third Canadian troop convoy has sailed from Halifax escorted by two battleships, one cruiser and four Canadian destroyers.

Home Waters.

The Northern Patrol has been maintained by cruisers and armed merchant cruisers. Heavy ships of the Home Fleet have been at sea supporting the Northern Patrol and covering convoys to and from Norway.

As a result of information received that ships carrying iron-ore to Germany were proceeding outside Norwegian territorial waters, three destroyers were sent to search the Norwegian coast in the vicinity of Jaederens Point, but met with

no success.

The s.s. Durham Castle, prepared as a block ship to obstruct one of the approaches to Scapa Flow, was sunk by torpedo or mine in the Moray Firth whilst being towed to Scapa.

3. Extensive attacks on shipping on the East Coast were carried out by German aircraft on the 29th and 30th January. A dive-bombing attack was made on H.M.S. Coventry and s.s. Manela at Sollum Voe in the Shetlands on the 29th January, and on the 30th January H.M.S. Niger, a minesweeper, had one killed and two wounded as a result of being bombed off Invergordon, although the ship herself was undamaged. Details of the air attacks on shipping are given in Appendix III. Four British ships were sunk and five wrecked. One Neutral ship was wrecked. None of these ships were in convoy. The total tonnage lost by air attack was 28,065 tons, of which 24,341 tons were British.

Forty-four other merchant ships, as well as minesweepers and trawlers, were also bombed and machine-gunned (see Appendix II), and in addition attacks were carried out on the Dudgeon, Galloper, Humber and Kentish Knock light vessels. The Dudgeon was damaged and her crew of eight are missing. A south-bound convoy was attacked on both days without success.

It is estimated that there were at least 67 casualties to personnel, but full reports have not yet been received.

4. In addition to the above-mentioned losses by air attack 18 ships, totalling 34,090 tons, were lost by either mine or torpedo; of these 2 were British, 2 French and 14 Neutral. The total loss from all causes is 27 ships of 62,155 tons.

Foreign Waters.

5. The British s.s. Wing Sang (3,560 tons) was stopped, searched and detained for fifteen hours by a Japanese minesweeper off Foochow. The detention of this vessel was apparently a reprisal for the s.s. A sama Maru incident.

A despatch has been received from the Naval Attaché, Buenos Aires, report- ing on the visit of Rear-Admiral Harwood in H.M.S. Ajax to Montevideo and of H.M.S. Achilles to Buenos Aires. A summary of some further information regarding the defeat of the Admiral Graf Spee contained in the despatch is given in Appendix I.

Protection of Seaborne Trade.

6. 500 ships, including 384 British, 22 Allied and 94 Neutral, have been. convoyed during the week. Included in this number are five ocean convoys, two from Sierra Leone, two from Halifax and one from Gibraltar. One ship, the Greek s.s. Keremiai, was torpedoed in convoy. Two ships were lost as a result of dropping astern of their convoys, s.s. Vaclite by torpedo and s.s. Eston by mine.

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