Kirov Saga: Hinge Of Fate: Altered States Volume III (Kirov Series) (39 page)

Yet
that was not so.

Part XII

Valiant

“You are well aware that it is not
numbers or strength that bring the victories in war. No, it is when one side
goes against the enemy with the gods' gift of a stronger morale, that their
adversaries, as a rule, cannot withstand them.”

―
Xenophon, The Persian Expedition

Chapter 34

Lieutenant
Dawes had spent two hours at the hospital and finally had
his shoulder wound cleaned up, stitched and bandaged. The medic seemed upset to
be bothering with him, and Dawes had the distinct feeling that the man bore him
some animosity. This was confirmed when he slipped on his officer’s jacket and
began making his way to the door, pressing through the crowded room past men
with much more serious wounds.

“Bloody
officers,” he heard the medic mutter under his breath. “Sit about while the
rest of this lot carries the burden, eh?”

Dawes
gave the man a look over his shoulder, but said nothing. In fact he felt a bit
wilted by the remark, and resolved to try and find something more to do. There
were men here that looked like they would surely lose an arm or leg, and others
with head wounds that still darkened the bandages with clotted blood. Then
there were those silent stretchers, where men lay with their faces covered with
woolen blankets, and all too many of them.

Dawes
had retreated from the hospital as the Germans closed in, the harsh tang of
blood and death on the air, and was soon swept up in the general withdrawal
south through the town towards the Main Wharf. It was there, by Dock Number 3,
that he finally came across a senior officer, a colonel in the 9th AA Regiment.
He stepped up smartly and saluted, but the Colonel was too busy shouting at a
3.7-inch gun crew to notice him. Finally he gave him a sour look.

“Yes?”

“Lieutenant
Dawes, sir. I was Duty Officer on the North Mole Tower, but have no assignment
now.”

“North
Mole? The German’s took that this morning.”

“Right
sir. Well I’ve been pushed out with all the rest, and I’m looking to take a new
post.”

“Well
you might get up Breakneck Stair, or down to Europa Point to see what’s going
on. They’re moving the 25 pounders north, and you could lend a hand.”

“Good
enough sir. I know the Windmill Hill area fairly well.” Dawes saluted again and
was off, feeling just a bit better now that he had some sense of direction and
purpose again. He remembered there was a battery of 25 pounders sited near the
Georgian building known as “Bleak House,” which had become the R.A. Officer’s
Mess. He had eaten there a few times, but had come to feel it was too posh for
his liking. Some of the officers even took to dining in their dress uniforms,
which he felt a bit odd given the more casual atmosphere of Gibraltar, where
one was just as likely to see a subaltern running about bare headed and
shirtless on the job.

Breakneck
Stair was well named, a circuitous and sometimes steep route up the flanks of a
long plateau that sat beneath Saint Michael’s Cave. As the road doubled back on
itself, you would just keep craning your neck and looking up to see how much
more of a trek it was before you got to the top. But Dawes decided to head for
Windmill Hill by taking the road down past the other two military hospitals,
and the Naval Signals Station. It would take him right up through a notch to
the Windmill Hill, and from there he knew of a rickety old ladder down the side
of the ridge that would land him very near the battery he had in mind.

The
farther he got from the town and docks, the better he felt, and he realized the
sound of the fighting, and sight of the wounded men, had jangled his nerves a
bit. He went down the road past Buena Villa east of Rosia Bay, mixed in with a
stream of men slogging their way towards the Naval Hospital. The sun was low
and dusk at hand, and he realized how very hungry he was. It was worth taking a
peek at Bleak House to see if anything was being served, and he didn’t think
anyone would be swanking about there with a war on today.

Before
he got there, however, he passed by the Naval Signals Station where there
seemed to be quite a stir. Men were cheering and seemed well worked up over
something, so he stuck his nose in through the door to see what was happening.

“What’s
up here?” he ask a ranker by the door.

“Royal
Navy’s coming, sir!” The private gave him a toothy grin. “Just got the signal
in a moment ago. There’s to be no searchlights switched on after midnight.”

Dawes
raised an eyebrow. “Good show,” he said. Then he was on his way again. The
Royal Navy had scooted out 24 hours before the Germans launched the attack.
That told him the up and ups knew what Jerry was about, and now, with this
news, he realized the move must have been well planned all along. He smiled,
his steps just a little lighter, and soon became part of the news bustling
south along the cobblestone roads as he made his way towards the ladder down to
Europa Point.

The
Royal Navy was coming home again! Let’s see how the Germans like it when old
Rodney
and
Nelson
let loose with those big 16-inch guns.

* * *

Admiral
Somerville had taken Force H out into the western
approaches to the straits, where the twelve fighters off HMS
Hermes
had
sparred briefly with the Luftwaffe that day. When the Germans had achieved
their primary goal in driving the British fleet off, they then turned the
weight of their air power on Gibraltar itself. As darkness fell on the first
day Somerville paced on the bridge of the battleship
Nelson
.

The
news coming from the Rock was grim after the first day of battle. The Germans
had overrun the airfield and cemetery, seized the North Mole, Grand Casemates,
and were blasting away at the old Moorish Castle. Some few had managed to scale
the precipitous north face and were inside the upper gallery, though that
incursion had been contained by the timely arrival of troops from the Black Watch.
It was the British position along Devil’s Road and the high ground behind it
near the old Windsor Battery that seemed to be the focus of German attention
now, along with continuing house to house fighting in the town itself.

To make
matters worse, the French had sortied with the battleship
Normandie
from
Dakar, and this ship had sailed north with lighter escorts to join with
Jean
Bart
off Casablanca. Somerville believed the move to be defensive in
nature, and an attempt to forestall any possible British move against
Casablanca, but the fact remained that these two dangerous ships were at large
to the south, and Force H would have to post a watch. The Admiralty had already
been forced to cancel O.A. and O.B. series convoys out of the UK, and several
already at sea had been ordered to disperse over 100 ships. There were also 97
merchantmen at sea in three northbound convoys in the SL series out of Sierra
Leone and bound for Liverpool. That was a lot of merchant traffic to look
after, and there would be no help coming from Home Fleet. The Germans were also
on the move.

Now the
Admiralty was in a quandary over what to do about Gibraltar. The situation
reports, and plans already underway to occupy the Azores, were ample testimony
to the fact that Their Lordships did not believe Gibraltar could be saved.
Though Churchill bristled at the thought of losing the Rock, a long time symbol
of British power, the practical necessities of war now weighed heavily in the
matter. He first lobbied to advance the scheduled October departure for WS3, a
“Winston Special” troop convoy planning to deliver reinforcements to Egypt.
Might these troops get down to the Rock instead?

The
Admiralty was of a mind that they would be at grave risk trying to reach
Gibraltar and laid out the situation in no uncertain terms. The convoy was
comprised of fast troop liners, like
Georgic
,
Duchess Of York
,
and other smaller liners like
Oropesa, Dorset, Highland Brigade
and
Perthshire
.
The harbor was presently contested, and so the ships would have only lifeboats
available to try and put troops ashore, all under German air attack from
Stukas
and also exposed to shore batteries in Spanish Morocco.

The
memory of the great disaster during the evacuation at Brest was still too fresh
in the Admiralty’s mind. There the liner
Lancastria
had been sunk by
German bombers with her decks packed with troops, and over 5800 died in one
awful blow. It could not be allowed to happen again.
A reinforcement for
Gibraltar was therefore deemed impossible at this time, and quickly put out of
the question.

Churchill
then turned his eyes on further operations against the Cape Verde and Canary
Islands with these troops, but the Admiralty argued that the reinforcement
might best remain on schedule for Egypt, which would now need all the support
it could get. What about the forces still lodged at Freetown from the aborted
attack on Dakar? Might they have another go there? At this the Admiralty
reminded Churchill that the battleship
Richelieu
was still anchored at
Dakar from the latest intelligence reports, making a landing there another
chancy prospect.

Churchill
was at his wits end. “Here we have two Royal Marine Brigades sitting about on
their thumbs in this dire hour, and doing nothing!” He continued to demand that
every effort be made to make use of these troops, and so all the plans that had
been spun out for Operation Puma and the Canaries, and Operation Shrapnel for
the Cape Verde Islands were suddenly being put in motion.

In the
meantime, Somerville rankled at the thought that he had been forced to slip
away with Force H just when Gibraltar most needed him. He knew that he had to
keep a strong force at sea, but he had three battleships, and proposed that he
send one in a daring night raid to pound German positions and at least make a
showing. The Admiralty waffled at this, pointing out that the moon was full and
the Germans had been mounting continued night raids with JU-88s. They finally gave
their grudging approval, urged on again by Churchill, who saw the move as
almost a necessity. “The thunder of the guns of the Royal Navy must be heard to
echo through the corridors of that embattled fortress, and will resound on
through all the years to come,” he argued with styled elegance. HMS
Valiant
was therefore selected and ordered to detach on the night of the 16th of September.

To guard
against the possibility of U-boat attack,
Valiant
would be given a
strong escort of destroyers, and a light AA cruiser,
Coventry,
for added
air defense. The mission was to make a quick run through the straits, let the
guns roar in reprisal against German positions in the north and La Linea, and
then get out with equal alacrity. They were on their way at 20:30, just after sunset,
with the full moon already rising low above the horizon to the east and
painting the way in a shimmering glow on the sea.

The
move actually caught the German Luftwaffe by surprise, as they did not expect
the British would risk capital ships in the strait under these conditions. A Ju-88
raid with 36 planes based at Seville had been scheduled for midnight, which is
when the British ships planned to be south of Gibraltar after a four hour run
at
Valiant’s
best speed from their starting point about 120 kilometers
east of Tangier. When shore watchers there reported sighting the British
raiding force approaching the strait, it was moved up an hour to attack the
British ships as they approached.

The
planes found the British squadron steaming on the moon drenched sea and began
their bombing runs. The Ju-88 had been designed as a fast heavy dive bomber, or
Schnellbomber
, which became a workhorse of the Luftwaffe, affectionately
called Mädchen für Alles, the maid of all work. The Germans would press it into
service in great numbers as a reconnaissance plane, dive bomber, level bomber,
night fighter and even a torpedo bomber, but tonight it was the heavy dive
bomber role that was called to task. The fast twin engine planes came roaring
out of the dark sky, and the air alert was raised throughout the squadron.

HMS
Coventry
was quick into action with her five 6-inch guns able to double as AA guns,
augmented by two 3-inchers, and two 2 pounders.
Valiant
herself had even
more firepower, with ten twin 4.5 inch dual purpose guns that soon began to
blaze away with four octuple QF-2 pounders, and four more quad Vickers machine
guns chattering away.

The
destroyers added their wrath to the flak with
Hotspur
leading in the
van, keen to get back at the Germans after her ignominious eviction earlier.
Greyhound
followed in her wake like a faithful hunting dog, while
Fearless
, and
Forester
flanked the big battleship, screening
Valiant
from torpedo attack, and
the destroyer
Fury
churned in the wake of the entire formation on ASW
watch.