Northover Projector (part 1)

 I'm going to two part this one, as it got a bit long, and I'm really busy this week. If you check my Facebook on Wednesday you'll see why

Born on 31st December 1882 Harry Robert Northover is a curious figure. He passes through history with very little wake, but at certain moments he leaves his fingerprints as he goes. What little we do know of him seems to suggest that before the First World War he was a gun maker, and expert in all things mechanical, that is at lest written on his wartime service record notes. During the First World War he was part of the British Army and rose to the rank of Sergeant. Then he transferred to the Canadian Army in January 1916 at the rank of lieutenant, ending up as part of the 90th Royal Winnipeg Rifles. Here he served as a Quartermaster Sergeant in their machine gun platoon, by 1918 it seems he might have been promoted to Captain. Northover also won the Military Cross at some point after January 1916, but there appears to be no record what for.

A picture of Harry Northover at the 1938 Bisley clay championship

During this time, he made several patented designs relating to machine guns. These included a flash absorber, that has at least one eye witness account of its use. These were fitted to Colt machine guns (likely the  M1895/14) and made the weapon hard to detect when firing. Equally as it increased the barrel pressure the attachment improved the performance of the guns rate of fire. It looks like a large tube mounted on the muzzle like a modern-day sound moderator but with the barrel offset to the top of the tube.

Northover also invented feed belt boxes for machine guns and a new improved Lewis Gun magazine filling machine. The Royal Commission for Inventions awarded Northover £200 for the flash absorber, £1500 for the feed boxes and £500 for the Lewis Gun filling machine. In 1919 the now Major Northover competed at Bisley where he won a silver cross. Then, once again, Northover slips into obscurity.

He re-appears on 21st of October 1938 winning a major clay target competition at Bisley. It is likely that in the inter-war years that Northover settled at Bisley, as he was the director of the Bisley Clay Target Company (and suddenly his 1938 win becomes slightly clearer), and later records have him living at Bisley House, Kensworth, Dunstable. In the inter-war years, he was also awarded a MBE.

Then the Second World War broke out. Now in his late 50's Northover continued with his life, until May 1940. At that time France was in the process of collapsing to the German assault, and Britain was preparing to carry on alone. On the 14th of May Antony Eden broadcast his call to arms for volunteers to the Local Defence Volunteers. Unsurprisingly as a crack shot, and a Major from the previous war, Northover joined up.

A very early parade for the LDV.

What happened next is remarkable simply for its speed. Keep in mind the Germans invaded France on the 10th of May. The LDV were formed on the 14th, and Dunkirk was on the 26th. Before the end of May Maj Northover had designed and built the prototype of a weapon that would become known as the Northover Projector. This weapon was exhibited to Winston Churchill at No 10 Downing Street. It had cost Northover around £330 to build, which likely included his time, as the final production version of the weapon would cost but £6. After viewing the weapon Winston Churchill ordered a demonstration on Hangmoor ranges, which he viewed personally. After the demonstration he immediately ordered 10,000 weapons.

 The weapon was designed to fire a Molotov Cocktail out to 200 yards. The charge was some five grains of black-powder in a cellophane cup. Over this cup are some wadding in the form of fibre boards and rubber padding. This would provide obturation and a cushioning effect on for the glass bottle. The bottle would be loaded first, followed by the charge. As the breech closes nipples on the breech face would finish ramming home the round and pierce the cellophane cup. When the hammer is released a blasting cap placed on the hammer would ignite the black-powder sending the Molotov Cocktail on its way. Opening the breech would automatically re-cock the hammer. At which point a new blasting cap is placed on the hammer, and new bottle and charge loaded.

During one test, in very poor conditions with a thick mist, the target consisted of two 60 gallon oil drums stacked on top of each other, Range for the trials was 60-200 yards. It was judged that around 70% of rounds would have hit a tank or truck sized target.

An improvised mobile mount (see the bottom of the page for more info)

The ammunition for the weapon also went through several versions. The first designs considered projecting a simple Molotov Cocktail, however in July 1940 Albright & Wilson demonstrated an incendiary grenade using white phosphorus. These were developed into the No 76 self-igniting phosphorus grenade. They were a ½ pint bottle which came in two versions, denoted by the colour of the bottle cap. Red was hand throwable, and green had a thicker wall that meant it could be fired by the Northover Projector. Even these thicker ones would sometimes burst and ignite in the breech or barrel of the gun. This was not seen as an issue as every time it happened the entire mass was thrown clear of the gun by the black-powder charge. The hand thrown ones were considered unreliable and needed a lot of force to be broken and could be safely dropped. If it was dropped on a stone, then it was considered dangerous.

Part two can be found here.

The improvised mobile mount:
That mobile mount is interesting because not so long ago I found the following two pictures in an archive:

There's a number of pictures of similar hand carts in use with the Home Guard, such as this one, which shows a Northover Projector broken down and loaded on a hand cart wheel base.
Image credits:
www.scienceandsociety.co.uk, www.staffshomeguard.co.uk and www.nevingtonwarmuseum.com

Tornado Visit

Due to the recent announcement of the RAF's last flight of a Tornado as they retire, I felt it would be a good time for a Tornado related story. 

In the second half of 1990 the Gulf War broke out. The war would be won by the Allies, but many people missed one important point. The Allies won mainly because they fought the war exactly like they had planned to fight the Soviets in Europe. The NATO members had trained extensively together, and so when the Allies had to fight a large Soviet equipped enemy, they simply reverted to their training.
One of the training exercises was named Red Flag, it is run several times a year in the United States, with the sole aim to provide full scale training for aircrews from across NATO. In April 1990, as usual a Red Flag exercise was held, during which the RAF's Tornado's would play their usual role of airfield destruction.

On this particular scenario, the fourth in the exercise, the Tornado's would be leading a strike package to hit a dummy airfield. The lead Tornado, with the squadron code FG, was flown by an extremely experienced pair of aircrew, for example the navigator had been trained and served on Vulcan bombers, and had some 440 hours on the Tornado. The opening part of the sortie went according to plan, and the Tornado crew were soon at their holding point orbiting and awaiting for all the other strike packages to get into place.

Gratuitous Tornado shot!

While in their holding pattern they noticed a problem. Fuel was not transferring from FG's wing tanks to their fuselage ones. This could be a serious problem, in under three minutes the entire might of the Allies air forces would swing into action. Fighters to keep enemy aircraft suppressed, electronic warfare aircraft to hinder enemy radars and Wild Weasels to suppress enemy air defences. Literally hundreds of planes from across NATO would be in action to deliver the Tornado's to their target.
Then in the detailed debrief of the mission the strike leader would be aborting. The Tornado crew began to carry out their checklist of fixes for the fault, and it seemed to both crew that the problem had been solved. Then the show began.

One of the RAF's main missions during any war with the Soviet Union, and a mission they would fly against the Iraqi air force, was the destruction of enemy airfields. For this the Tornado would approach at low level, a skill that the RAF trained extensively for. There are stories from the Iraq war of RAF planes leaving skid marks in sand dunes as they were flying so low, or of RAF strike packages flying so low they would often fly underneath the other air forces planes. When the RAF Tornado's switched to carrying radar seeking missiles, they would often be flying below the planes they were protecting and when you launch an anti-radar missile the first part of the flight profile would be to climb, so the planes above the Tornado Wild Weasels would see missiles climbing towards them...

A RAF Jaguar pulling up slightly, over a Iraqi air base, underneath you can see a MIG-23, and an Iraqi who just got the shock of his life!

Either way at low level the Tornado's would be able to get into position, then attack the heavily defended airfield. One weapon used for these attacks was the Hunting JP233, an utterly unique weapon that consisted of two pods mounted under the fuselage of the Tornado. These pods would dispense mines and cratering charges as the Tornado flew along the length of the airfield’s runway. The cratering charge would render the runway unusable by aircraft, and the mines would prevent repair work being carried out.
This did mean that the Tornado would be flying straight and level, in one of the most concentrated areas of AA weapons, lit up like a Christmas tree for several seconds, an utterly scary thought for any pilot.

Because of this risk, and that each JP233 was only effective at destroying runways, Tornado's also trained to toss bombs at targets. It was this later tactic that FG was utilising to attack their dummy target
On their way out from their strike, the crew of FG noticed that the fuel issue they had thought fixed, had indeed continued. Calculations quickly showed they were too short of fuel to reach their home base. They were even short of fuel to reach one of the emergency divert airfields at Indian Springs. There was one airfield they could reach though, it went by the name of Tonopah.

Tonopah is home to one of the US's top secret research establishments called the 'Skunk Works'. It was also home to the Constant Peg Program, which flew and tested captured Soviet planes. At the time the latest super top-secret USAF plane at the airfield was the ultra top-secret F-117 stealth 'fighter'. It should be noted that the RAF aircrew were fully aware of the nature and existence of the F-117, as the information had been briefed out the year previously, indeed there was even an RAF Tornado pilot flying with the F-117 program. Which makes what happened next all the more peculiar.

When the crew of FG declared an emergency, and that they were diverting to Tonopah, they were questioned for some time about 'why they had to go there', 'what was wrong with their plane', 'why couldn't head to Indian Springs', and the like. Eventually the crew said they had two options, Tonopah or ejecting to let the Tornado crash.

After they landed, they were ordered to park up and shut down but not to leave the aircraft. Shortly afterwards their plane was surrounded by vehicles and armed guards. The crew of FG were taken to an enclosed room and interrogated for several hours, by both military and civilian personnel. When the navigator asked for a toilet break, he was escorted by a guard who remained with him inside the toilet.

Eventually the crew were informed that they would be returned to their base, but the Tornado had been confiscated and they would be told when they could retrieve it. The crew were hooded and driven to Tonopah's perimeter and then returned to their base.

The day after the crew were flown back to Tonopah, escorted to Tornado FG, and told they had 40 minutes to get airborne and clear the area. As they arrived at the aircraft, they found that it had been serviced by the ground crew at Tonopah, who had also, rather cheekily painted a F-117 on the tail, and inside the cockpit was a ticket for parking illegally on a US military base. The crew, and FG, returned to their home base without further incident.

"Was I a good Bomber?"

Image Credits:
www.vintagewings.ca

Luftflammenwerfenzeug

Late in 1939 a young German officer approached his superiors with a new idea, a novel weapon that could defend their bombers from attacking fighters. The officer was (possibly) Lieutenant Karl-Heinz Stahl from Kampfgeschwader 51.  His bright idea was to fit a flamethrower in the tail of the bomber and when an attacking fighter closed up give it a dose of fire! This was presumably to force the fighter to break off its attack, or even set it on fire. Design and development continued until several test flights were carried out at Tarnewitz in February 1940.

A later flamethrower, in Romania in 1944.

The first versions of the device had a single nozzle, but later ones had a pair of nozzles. It was essentially a 1918 pattern flamethrower fed from a 24in long cylinder that was just 7in wide. This bottle contained 15 litres of fuel and was pressurised to 590lbs/sq.in. Hydrogen spark ignition was fitted. The fuel was nothing more advanced than oil. To fire the radio operator in the bomber pulled on a cable, which exited the cockpit, ran along the outside of the fuselage, and then attached itself to the firing mechanism. In tests a range of about 100 feet were achieved. It was in this guise the weapon was deemed ready for its first combat trial, over Britain.

British plans of the instillation.

On the 15th of September 1940, Eagle Day, the climatic day at the end of the Battle of Britain, nineteen Do 17's took off at 1000 from Cormeilles-En-Vexin, and headed towards London, their target was the marshalling yards at Clapham Common. These planes were all from KG76, and one, the rearmost plane was fitted with the flamethrower equipment. It was flown by Feldwebel Heitsch, with Fw Schmid as the radio operator, and thus in charge of the new weapon.
The formation of Dornier’s approached London at 16,000ft, before the first fighter was spotted. A lone Hurricane closed in from astern, exactly in the prime spot for the flamethrower to attack. This Hurricane was flown by Sergeant Ray Holmes. At a range of 400 yards he opened fire. Immediately Fw Schmid triggered the flamethrower.

HE-111 using the flamethrower during testing.

There was one tiny flaw in the design. All the testing had been done at lower altitudes. At 16,000 feet the air pressure was so low that the flame thrower failed to ignite the oil completely, and a small thin flame shot out the back of the aircraft. It did however spray the front of Sgt Holmes' aircraft with oil, momentarily covering his windscreen with oil and obscuring his vision. Sgt Holmes let the air stream clear his cockpit and as it did so he realised he was almost on top of the Do 17, so he pushed his stick forward and dived under the aircraft.

As Sgt Holmes hurtled through the formation of Dornier’s he lined up on the next in line, firing repeated bursts at it, the crew immediately began to bail. The first man out had his parachute caught on Sgt Holmes' wing, so Sgt Holmes began several gentle manoeuvres to see if he could get the parachute to slip off, which it did.
Sgt Holmes now found himself astern of a third Do 17, ahead of it lay Buckingham Palace, and the bomber was heading straight towards the King! Sgt Holmes opened his throttles, zoomed through the defensive gunfire from the bomber, extended out in front of it, and turned back in for a head on attack to try and force the bomber to break off.
As he opened fire the first rounds came out then his guns clicked empty. His attacks on the first and second Do 17's had used up all his ammunition. With nothing else to do, Sgt Holmes decided to ram the Do 17, he said he was aiming to cut through the tail, which he thought looked awfully weak, and rely on the sturdy reputation of the Hurricane. The impact destroyed both planes, Sgt Holmes and the German pilot both managed to bail out of their stricken planes, both were wounded in the chain of events. Sgt Holmes was hit by his own plane as he bailed out and survived, but the German pilot was not so lucky.

One of the iconic pictures from the Battle of Britain, a mangled Do 17 crashing to earth. This is actually the third Dornier that Sgt Holmes rammed.

Back aboard Fw Heitsch's Do 17, Sgt Holmes' first burst had hit the starboard engine, causing a loss in power. The Dornier began to descend. He was set upon by several fighters, and each time they approached the flamethrower was triggered, with no negative effect upon the enemy. Indeed, it made the Do 17 look like it was far more badly damaged than it was, and the huge black cloud of flame and smoke stood out serving to attract more fighters to her position.

Another shot from testing, this time in a Do 17.

 The Do 17 crash landed just after 1200 near Shoreham. Fw Schmid, the radio operator had been badly wounded in the repeated attacks and died shortly after the bomber landed. The other survivors of the crew were captured by the local Home Guard, and seeing the shocked nature of their captives they were taken to the nearest pub for a pint before being sent to captivity.

The Do 17's final resting place at Shoreham. You can see the flame throwing gear projecting out the tail. One would presume the casualty is Fw Schmid.

The flame throwing gear along with the aircraft was salvaged, and an attempt was made to test fire the device. However, the horribly complex firing system meant that despite several attempts to repair it the time and effort were not seen as useful. The gutted Do 17 was used as an attraction to raise money for the Lowestoft Spitfire fund.

An account from the official report on what went wrong with firing tests on the flamethrower.

Image credits:
British national archives, weaponsman.com and www.luftarchiv.de

Halifax Rocket

In the late 1930s The Air Ministry started work on the Halifax bomber. The original specifications included the ability for the Halifax to be able to dive bomb. This was a requirement that was removed when the bomber was converted to its four engined version. However, for a lot of its life the Halifax retained the short wingspan and sturdy construction that was required for dive bombing. Thus, in late 1943 when the Air Ministry begun to look at rockets for its aircraft, one of the planes considered to carry such a weapon was the Halifax.

In October 1943 Halifax JD212 was modified by the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment at Boscombe Down in Wiltshire. Two four shot rocket racks were fitted between the fuselage and inner engine. The Halifax has bomb bays in its wing roots in the same location, so to avoid fouling these the rockets were held away from the wing and presented forward of the leading edge of the wing.

Halifax bomb bays, here you can see the wing bomb cells clearly.

A series of tubes formed a scaffolding to hold the racks. To protect the points where the scaffolding joined to the rocket racks fairings of very thin steel were constructed on the back and front of the rack. These fairings caused considerable difficulties during a maintenance trial. It took four men some 3.5 hours to remove the racks and re-install them. This was down to having to line up all the holes in the fairings with the scaffolding. As the fairings were such light steel, they had warped which meant that the holes no longer lined up. One of the recommendations of the final report was to use a thicker gauge of steel to prevent this issue.

A sight unit was installed in the cockpit. The sight unit was a standard Mk.III L reflector sight. It was fitted to an arm, that allowed it to be swung up out of the way so that it was lying along the roof of the cockpit. The pivot was fitted to the main cockpit arch and locking, and unlocking was done via a wing nut on the pivot. As the arm traversed along an axis that ran between the fore and aft, it meant that even if the sight was locked slightly out of position it would not significantly affect the accuracy.

The Halifax was flown with all the modifications fitted, and full performance data was obtained. Before taking to the skies and launching rockets, the trials team conducted a series of ground firings.
It was found, due to the height of the installation above ground it was easier to load the rockets in from the rear, instead of the more traditional loading from the front.

The traditional way of loading a RP-3 Rocket, tail first.

The first test, was logically, a salvo of two rockets, one from each rack. The entire eight were launched without problem in four salvos. The rockets fired from outboard to inboard. One curiosity was discovered, however. On a Halifax, in-between the inner and outer engines there are a few inspection holes in the underside of the wing. These have rubber covers on them. In each firing these were knocked off by the launch blast. This was made all the more remarkable due to the mass of the engine being between the rockets and the inspection holes, as well as being some 15 feet away.
The next firing was a salvo of four, this time with two from each rack. Again, apart from the rubber covers falling off no damage was encountered.
As it would turn out the salvo of six rockets was the last trial. After this the trials team halted work due to damage suffered by the aircraft. On the port side, one rocket did not function correctly, the resulting damage was a screw being knocked out of the engine fairing.

On the starboard side all rockets fired normally. The blast caused several rivets and screws to be blown out of the wing root, three rear wing bomb bays were blown open, and the control bar in the roof of the bay was snapped, the rear fairing on the engine was popped out and over the forward fairing which would have prevented the flaps being lowered. Finally, the flap itself was badly damaged, being bent upwards by a result of the blast. It was judged the damage was caused by the suction effect from the blast, magnified by the arch like nature of the fuselage, wing and engine.

It is likely that these would not have been insurmountable problems, however the Air Ministry had decided against fitting such weapons to a bomber and the project was dropped. These details all came from a file at the National Archives. There is another file on the Shorts Sunderland being fitted with rockets as well. 

JD212 was repaired, returned to service and served out the war in 419 Squadron, RCAF. The last record I've been able to find was of her being used was for laying mines in Fakse Bay in mid to late 1944.

Gas! Gas! Gas!

Some two years ago I posted an article which mentioned a Project D.30. This was an attempt to fit a WASP flame throwing equipment to a Sherman tank. In addition, it was considered for firing chemical agents as well. The link can be found here:

https://overlord-wot.blogspot.com/2016/08/vehcile-of-fire-part-two.html

Well I recently read some documents that discussed WASP flamethrowers using chemical weapons and the trials that were carried out. These seem to pre-date, or at least coincide with Project D.30, so it is possible the two were connected.

In early March 1944 Porton Down received a pair of Universal Carriers fitted with WASP flame-throwing gear. These were both a MK.I and a MK.II versions. Both were modified for the trials. They simply had the electrical spark ignition system on the flame gun disconnected, which would normally ignite the flame fuel. A further change was to the Mk.II which had a different nozzle put in place. As the Mk.I didn't have a nozzle it was left unmodified.

WASP Mk.I

WASP Mk.II

As well as the nozzle the other difference between the two marks was the Mk.II had a slightly lower operating pressure (280lbs/sq in vs 250lbs/sq in) and a sight for the gun. The two fuel tanks contained 60 and 40 gallons and were pressurised by carbon-dioxide cylinders.
The main and obvious difference between the two marks, however, is the flame gun mounting itself. The Mk.I had a boom attachment that the gunner moved to aim the weapon, the Mk.II had a weapon identical to the Crocodiles flame gun.

The Mk.I's mounting had an extra valve on it, which was located on the pintle mount. During the course of the trials this began to leak slightly so a drip tray was fitted. Equally after repeated shots with thickened liquids a film began to form on the valve preventing it from closing properly. The simple fix for this was to clean the valve each time the tanks were re-filled. The re-filling process was done exactly the same way for gas or flame, the tanks simply had the liquid poured in.

The ranges achieved were also remarkably consistent with those achieved by flame fuel. Maximum range for the Mk.I was about 60 yards, with 70 for the Mk.II. The optimum range was found to be about 40 yards for the Mk.I and about 15-20% further for the Mk.II, depending on the exact chemical mix. One curiosity was using a thickening agent only affected the liquid at closer ranges to the vehicle, unlike with flame fuels, which get improved range from thickening. When thickened the jet quality became less diffuse and the minimum range was decreased. But even without thickening no appreciable amount of liquid struck the ground within 20 yards of the firing vehicle.

After carrying out range trials a sandbagged bunker was created, with a lot of its mass below ground and a firing slit left open. This was used at a target with a range of 30-35 yards. Several shots were required to get a hit on the aperture, but when they did the results were quite lethal. 
In the first trial a gas identified as "MS" was used. I've been unable to identify which chemical this is exactly, so if anyone can answer that, let me know please. This was enough to cause 100% casualties from skin burns to anyone inside the bunker within twelve minutes. Even those wearing respirators would be killed.

In a second trail hydrocyanic acid (also known as HCN or "AC") was used. Within fifteen seconds a peak of measurement of 112,000 mg per cubic metre were recorded. This would have been fatal to anyone within the bunker, even if fully protected by respirators. This was still the case after two minutes when a hatch way was opened to allow the gas to evaporate. Even after some 19 hours measurements were showing a lethal dosage inside the bunker, although at this point it is likely that gas masks may have offered some protection.

The WASP Mk.I and its crew showing the heavy contamination...

...and the relatively uncontaminated WASP Mk.II and crew.

A final series of trials were carried out to test the contamination of the vehicle and crew. The liquid gasses had red dye added, and the crew and vehicle were covered with a white sheet. It became clear that both the vehicle and crew would become contaminated. If a persistent agent was used this would be quite an issue. However, with non-persistent agents such as "AC" the concentrations would be low enough that the crew could survive with protection.

Image credits:
National Archives.

Imposter's Bad Luck

Shortly after 1100 on the 14th of September 1914, Captain Noel Grant was peering through his binoculars at a vessel on the horizon. The vessel the British captain was staring at was carrying the Cunard Line's colour scheme, and was identified as the RMS Carmania, and she was making steam away from him.

RMS Carmania

Cpt Grant had reported aboard his ship, one of Cunard Line's passenger liners at the outbreak of the First World War. His ship had been equipped with eight 4.7" guns and dispatched from Liverpool to the South Atlantic to patrol the South American coast looking for merchant raiders. Cpt Grant had suspected that there was just such a commerce raider operating from Trindade Island, but all he had found was another of Cunard Line’s ships... There was only one problem, Cpt Grant was standing on the bridge of the RMS Carmania. Whomever the imposter was, she wasn't who she claimed to be. This was further reinforced by the fact she was making steam away from him, possibly to escape, possibly to gain manoeuvring room without the risk of finding the island in the way.

The imposter was actually the German ship SMS Cap Trafalgar. Entering service in April she was considered to be one of the most ornate and grandest cruise liners afloat. However, this lavishness had not been extended to her engines. The engines were triple expansion steam type, while the RMS Carmania had steam turbines. Despite being about 800 GRT heavier, the British ship was slightly faster.

Interior of the SMS Cap Trafalgar

The SMS Cap Trafalgar had departed Germany on a route that included Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. On the outbreak of war she had reached Buenos Aires. She then sailed to Trindade Island where she met the gunboat SMS Eber. The Eber had transferred its guns and a portion of its crew to turn the SMS Cap Trafalgar into Hilfskreuzer B. This refit had added two 4.1" guns and six 1-pounder pom-pom guns (other sources say it was six Hotchkiss revolver cannons), along with removing one of her funnels and gaining a new paint scheme which made her look almost exactly like the RMS Carmania.

SMS Cap Trafalagar with SMS Eber alongside on Trindade Island

Under the command of Capitan Wirth, she began her first cruise. This sortie resulted in no successes against the teeming shipping off the Brazilian coast, so Hilfskreuzer B returned to her base for more coal on the 13th September. A day later the real RMS Carmania broke the horizon and the German ship scrambled to get away.
After a short pursuit the German realised he couldn't escape the turbines of the British ship, and he turned sharply to starboard, and came about and begun to close. At around 8,500 yards the RMS Carmania opened fire, the German responded immediately, both ships missed. While the ships might well have been carrying naval grade guns, they lacked the aiming infrastructure and control gear that a normal warship would use. Shells were brought to the guns by hand, from stores in the cabins nearby. Equally they lacked the armour plate of a warship.

RMS Carmania's engine room

As the two ships sedately turned blazing away at each other the pom-pom guns of the German ship seemed to be the most effective. Easier to aim and score hits with, on a normal warship the effect would have been minimal, on the unarmoured and unprotected RMS Carmania the shots would sail straight through the structure of the ship.

At first both ships tried to sweep the decks clear of their opponents. Then the first real round impacted, the RMS Carmania managed to score a hit on the Hilfskreuzer B with one of her 4.7" guns. This caused the ornate German interior to burst into flames and started a small list to starboard. Shortly afterwards a German shell hit a stateroom forward of the RMS Carmania's bridge, and destroyed a water main. The stateroom burst into flames, with no water to fight the fire it quickly spread. The fire became so fierce it spread to the bridge and caused the captain and his command crew to have to abandon the area and fight the ship from an improvised bridge in the aft of the ship.

RMS Carmania's bridge after the fire.

Emboldened by their success the Germans continued their barrage of fire on the upper decks hoping to disable the crew of the guns, or even dismount the weapons. The British changed tactics and began to fire directly at the water line. Even without gun directors and range finders the huge wall of the Hilfskreuzer B's sides soon became riddled with shot, she began to take on water, and her list became worse. Even so the damage to the RMS Carmania was terrible, she too was listing, and with several raging fires. After about 90 minutes the two titanic ships separated, turning away from each other. The Hilfskreuzer B began to send distress signals, which were soon answered by German colliers from Trindade Island. The RMS Carmania steamed away, the day after she was barely afloat and luckily, she met a British cruiser.

 Meanwhile the Hilfskreuzer B was done for, as the list worsened she began to launch lifeboats and the crew abandoned ship. The German support ships managed to pull most of the men from the Atlantic. The Germans took the stranded sailors to Buenos Aires, where they were interred for the course of the war. Exact casualties for the German side are unknown, with estimates between 16-51 killed. The British lost just nine killed.

The RMS Carmania was repaired and continued patrolling around Portugal, until she was assigned to the Gallipoli campaign. She then was used as a troop ship, one of her final acts in service was returning Canadian soldiers to their home. Then she returned to her peace time job of cruise ship. Finally, in 1932 she was sold for scrap.

Last Mission of the Excalibur

Born in June 1921, Cyril Joe Barton was educated in Surrey. When he reached the age of 16 he was accepted as an apprentice draughtsman at the Parnall Aircraft factory in London. This meant that he was in a reserved occupation at the outbreak of the Second World War. Barton endured the Blitz, still working at the Parnall factory, helping to build the trainer aircraft that company produced. In 1941, at the age of 19, he resigned from his reserved occupation, and joined the RAF Reserve. He was formally enlisted to the RAF in April 1941.

Cyril Joe Barton

Training pilots in the UK was tricky. At any moment a brand-new pilot could stumble into a German and the weather was mostly uncooperative. In addition, as an operational theatre the skies were quite crowded with friendly aircraft. Thus, the UK found overseas locations to train the pilots. One of these schemes was based in the US and was called the Arnold Scheme. Leading Aircraftman Barton arrived in the US on the 17th of January 1942 and took his first flight on the 19th. Barton graduated as a Sergeant Pilot in November, by March 1943 he was back in the UK and part of a series of training squadrons flying Whitley's.

In late July he had his first operational sortie, as a second pilot on a Halifax heading to Hamburg, a trip he repeated shortly afterwards. In August he first got his hands on a Halifax himself, but remained on operations as a second pilot.
Between then and March 1944 Barton rose through the ranks to Pilot Officer, and made nineteen sorties, four of which were to Berlin. On one mission his aircraft was shot up by flak and got lost in cloud, however, PO Barton made several attempts to locate and bomb the target. On another mission the aircraft was once again holed by flack and had to make an emergency landing.

At 2214, 30th March 1944, PO Barton's Halifax bomber, named Excalibur, took off from the ill-named RAF Burn. His target for tonight was Nuremberg as part of the Battle of Berlin. 794 other aircraft were involved in the raid, 572 Lancaster's, 213 Halifax's and a small number of pathfinder Mosquito's. This was to be one of Bomber Command's worst ever nights with 95 aircraft failing to return. Excalibur's flight was largely uneventful until they were just 70 miles from the target.

At that point a Ju 88 night-fighter made an attack on Excalibur. The first burst destroyed the intercom. Almost immediately a Me 410 joined in the attack. Repeated salvoes from the fighters ripped into the aircraft. One of these hits destroyed the power supplies to the turrets meaning the crew couldn't fight back, another burst damaged one of the engines, others ripped into the wings.
During the shouted confusion, trying to relay orders, one of PO Barton's commands was misinterpreted and the navigator, flight engineer and bombardier bailed out.

PO Barton had a choice, continue ploughing onto the target, or turn for home. He knew that over the target the burning city below him would silhouette his plane, and any night fighter could find them. Equally his plane was utterly defenceless.
Despite this he carried on to the target, his damaged engine vibrating all the time, slowly getting worse.

A picture showing that the risk of silhouetting was very real. Here a damaged Avro Lancaster has dropped below the height of the bomber stream over Hanover in 1943.

The vibration in Excalibur's damaged engine peaked and then the propeller ripped itself apart. To make matters worse the fuel tanks on the other wing had been badly holed and had leaked all their fuel out, starving the engines on one side of the plane.

Now with only one engine, no defences, half a crew, and a badly damaged aircraft PO Barton finished his trip to the target and turned for home. But how to find home? He had no navigator. Equally, the navigator would guide aircraft around danger zones such as flak hotspots, and here he was deep in Germany surrounded by several of these danger areas.

By dead reckoning PO Barton managed to navigate his way out of Germany. This was made harder by a strong head wind. He also successfully avoided the flak and enemy fighters, all with only one engine. It took him nearly five and a half hours. In the first rays of dawn the crew could see the coast of England ahead. Remarkably they had arrived back in the UK just 90 miles from their home base.

As Excalibur crossed the coast, the last engine began to splutter, a clear indication it was nearly out of fuel. The plane was too low to be abandoned, so PO Barton ordered his crew to crash positions, and began to cast about for a landing site, all the while losing altitude. PO Barton saw that they were heading towards Ryhope Colliery, near Durham. At the time the colliery was surrounded by the houses and schools of the miner’s families. PO Barton wrestled his aircraft over a row of cottages, when the last engine spluttered and died. In the silence Excalibur dipped towards the end house, just clipping it, as she ploughed onwards the rear fuselage with the three crewmen in side it, became detached and skidded to a halt. All three crewmen survived. The forward section carried on its rampage, at some point a local miner heading to work was hit by debris from the plane and killed. PO Barton was rescued from the plane alive, but did not survive his injuries, and died before reaching hospital.

Excalibur's tail section, when it came to rest, with the three surviving crew inside.

For his actions Cyril Joe Barton was awarded the Victoria Cross.

Image credits:
ww2today.com, ww2aircraft.net, aircrewremembered.com, vcgca.org and www.bombercommandmuseum.ca

The Battle of Forrest Damp

At Roermond two rivers join, these are the Maas and the Roer. In 1945 this was the tip of an area called the Roer Triangle. The two rivers formed the left and right sides of the triangle. On the 14th of January the British launched operation Blackcock to clear this area on the Holland-German border, by the time the operation was completed some two weeks later, it would have seen some truly fierce fighting.

At around 0300, on the 21st of January 1945, the 5th battalion, Kings Own Scottish Borders moved out. Their objective was the German town of Waldfeucht. This was winter in central Europe so it was bitterly cold, with three inches of snow on the ground. The 5th KOSB had a company of men leading the way, while the rest of the force moved either in Kangaroo's or carriers. There were some Sherman's from the 13/18th Hussars along for the operation as well. The lead company found a few mines, which it removed, however little other resistance was encountered. Soon the force had seized the town. The town was deserted, with no German forces in place. The population would emerge from their cellars briefly and kept asking about what time it was, or were glancing nervously at time pieces. From this behaviour the British concluded that a German attack was imminent, and they thought first light was the most likely time for this. In a rush the battalion began to get ready for action. Two six pounders were brought forward to cover the north and west sides of the town. After they had been unlimbered and roughly sited work began to dig the guns in. This was severely hampered by the frozen ground. No real progress had been made on these fighting pits when the first rays of sunlight appeared at dawn, filtering through the mist.

The ideal dug in situation for a 6-pounder in winter. The 5KOSB ones were far from this, and standing out in the open.

The spreading light revealed several large box shapes lurching through the mist, towards the town. It was a full-blown German counter attack, fifteen assault guns lead by two Tigers from Schwere Panzer-Abteilung 301, with infantry from either the 175 or 183rd infantry.

The British asked for their Sherman's to engage the Tigers, whom were sitting targets out in the open. The British tanks refused to show themselves, knowing what the outcome would be. The two 6-pounders, still exposed in the open began to fire. A blazing firefight soon ensued, slowly one by one the crews of the guns were killed or wounded. At one gun Private Archibald Moore, who was acting as a loader, stepped forward and took over when the gun commander was wounded. With small arms rounds sparkling off the gun shield Pvt Moore directed his gun to fire at one of the Tigers.
The anti-tank battery's commanding officer, Captain Robert Hunter took control of the other gun. Cpt Hunter's first shot stopped the Tiger by wrecking its tracks. He continued to pour fire into the tank until it burned.

The two knocked out Tigers at Waldfeucht.

By now the Germans were about 100 yards away from the two 6-pounders pouring small arms fire and grenades at them. Cpt Hunter was wounded by this storm of fire. By now there were only five men serving both guns, one of which was the wounded Cpt Hunter. Together both guns turned their attention on the last remaining Tiger and began to fire as fast as they could. Soon it began to burn.

Men of 5KOSB posing with one of the knocked out Tigers

Pvt Moore then grabbed a Bren gun from beside a dead soldier and opened fire upon the nearby infantry and the fleeing Tiger crew.

On the east side, at the same time, another Tiger had launched an attack with supporting infantry. Here there were no plucky 6-pounders to stop the beast. Four Sherman's were destroyed trying to stop it, which might account for the reluctance of the tank commanders to engage the pair of Tigers. Bitter fighting ensued as the Germans reached the outskirts of the town and began to push through.

The Tiger as it ground down the street blasting into buildings at point blank range ran into two men, a platoon commander named Gideon Scott and his PIAT gunner Pvt Kirkpatrick. The first round failed to detonate and bounced off the Tiger’s armour. Scott began to re-load the PIAT. Another round was fired at the Tiger but missed. The shots had alerted the Tiger crew to the danger, and a hail of gunfire was directed towards the British defenders position. Scott was wounded in the hand.

Scott was born with deformities in both hands. These had nearly prevented him from enlisting in 1939, until he had challenged the recruiters to allow him to fire a rifle, which they were concerned he would have been unable to handle. Scott had shot in competitions for his college at Bisley and was quite a proficient shot. Having proven himself able to shoot he was enlisted.

As they re-loaded for a third shot, Scott saw a wounded soldier lying directly in the path of the giant Tiger, and who would soon be crushed by the 70 tons of tank. Scott leapt up from his position and raced out into the street, despite having already gained the Tiger’s complete attention and his position being the focus of its full firepower. He reached the wounded soldier, and with the ground shaking from the Tiger’s roar he dragged the wounded man into cover with bullets whistling about him.

The Tiger led the advance through the town with infantry storming into its wake. It approached the building chosen as the HQ, Cpt Ravenscroft and his batman begun to lob grenades out of the windows onto the Germans below, until they were captured.

British troops in Waldfeucht

By now it was late afternoon. The Germans had reached the town square, which had become no-man’s land between the two forces. The Tiger claimed a Sherman, four more were knocked out by Panzerfausts in the fighting around the square. The situation was looking bleak, with the Germans now in control of 75% of the town. However, 4th KOSB had arrived and were pushing into the Germans flank. This began to relive the pressure on the 5th KOSB. It still took until midnight to fully evict the Germans. The final Tiger was found stuck in an arch over the road and was destroyed in place.

The battle had raged for eighteen hours. Cpt Hunter was awarded a Military Cross, he remained in the reserves after the war finishing with the rank of Colonel. After the war he ran a company that was the first to produce muesli in the UK. He died in March 2016. Pvt Moore was awarded a Distinguished Conduct Medal and survived the war. 

Cpt Hunter

Scott was awarded a Military Cross, and survived the war dying in 1999. When his children asked him what he had done to win the award Scott replied 'it was for once being first in the queue for the Naafi!'

Image credits:
ww2today.com, businessinsider.com, crimsonaudio.net and telegraph.co.uk