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HMS Norfolk (78)

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Norfolk in wartime camouflage. As she still has an X turret, this photo is pre-1944.
History
United Kingdom
NameHMS Norfolk
NamesakeNorfolk
BuilderFairfield Shipbuilding & Engineering Co. Ltd, Govan
Laid down8 July 1927
Launched12 December 1928
Commissioned30 April 1930
IdentificationPennant number: 78
Honours and
awards
  • Atlantic 1941
  • Bismarck Action 1941
  • North Africa 1942
  • Arctic 1943
  • North Cape 1943
  • Norway 1943
FateSold for scrapping on 3 January 1950
General characteristics
Class and typeCounty-class heavy cruiser
Displacement
  • 10,035 long tons (10,196 t) (standard)
  • 13,420 long tons (13,640 t) (full load)
Length632 ft 9 in (192.86 m)
Beam66 ft (20 m)
Draught18 ft (5.5 m)
Installed power80,000 shp (60,000 kW)
Propulsion
  • 4 × Parsons Brown-Curtis geared steam turbines
  • 8 × boilers
  • 4 × shafts
Speed31.5 knots (58.3 km/h; 36.2 mph)
Range12,000 nmi (14,000 mi; 22,000 km) at 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Complement710 private ship, 819 war
Armament
Armour
  • Belt: 3.5 in (89 mm)
  • Citadel: up to 4 in (100 mm)
  • Turrets: 1 in (25 mm)
Aircraft carried2 × Supermarine Walrus flying boats (operated by 700 Naval Air Squadron)

HMS Norfolk was a County-class heavy cruiser of the Royal Navy; along with her sister ship Dorsetshire she was part of a planned four-ship subclass. She served throughout the Second World War, where she was involved in the sinking of the German Navy's battleships Bismarck and Scharnhorst.

Construction

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She was laid down in July 1927 at Govan by Fairfield Shipbuilding & Engineering Co. Ltd and launched on 12 December 1928. She was commissioned on 30 April 1930.

Service history

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1933 HMS Norfolk Summer cruise map

Inter-war period

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In September 1931, the crew of the Norfolk were part of a mutiny that later became known as the Invergordon Mutiny. The ship later served with the Home Fleet until 1932 and was then Flagship of the 8th Cruiser Squadron on the America and West Indies Station, based at the Royal Naval Dockyard on Ireland Island in the Imperial fortress colony of Bermuda, between 1932 and 1934. Ships based at Bermuda spent much of the year cruising around the Americas individually or in small groups, while being available to respond to states of emergency (including hurricane relief and protecting British interests during civil wars such as the Cristero War in Mexico) anywhere in the region. The entire squadron would exercise at Bermuda. Norfolk left Bermuda, and the station, on Wednesday, 21 November, 1934, for England,[1] in storm conditions.

From 1935 to 1939, Norfolk served with the Commander-in-Chief, East Indies, before coming home to refit in 1939, being still in dockyard hands when war was declared.

Second World War

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At the outbreak of war in 1939, Norfolk was part of the 18th Cruiser Squadron of the Home Fleet, and was involved in the chase for the German battleships Gneisenau and Scharnhorst. She was soon receiving numerous repairs for damage that she had received, not to mention vital modifications to the ship. Her first repairs were carried out in Belfast, after damage from a near-miss by a torpedo from U-47, the submarine responsible for sinking the battleship Royal Oak at Scapa Flow.

Shortly afterward, bomb damage that she had received from an air raid by eighteen sixteen Junkers Ju 88 of Kampfgeschwader 30 and Heinkel He 11 of Kampfgeschwader 26 at Scapa Flow on 16 March 1940[2] forced her into yet another repair, this time on the Clyde.[3] After these repairs had been completed Norfolk proceeded to a shipyard on the River Tyne for a new addition to her equipment – a radar set.

In December 1940, Norfolk was ordered to the South Atlantic on trade protection duties. Operating out of Freetown as part of Force K she participated in the hunt for the pocket battleship Admiral Scheer.

On 18 January 1941 Norfolk, under the command of Capt. Phillips, acting upon a report from the AMC Arawa seeing in the far distance the gunflashes of the German auxiliary cruiser Kormoran sinking the tanker British Union, joined in the search for the German raider together with her sister ship Devonshire.[4] In February, she escorted Atlantic troop convoys, but by May she had returned to Icelandic waters.

Bismarck
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On 21 May Norfolk, under the command of rear Admiral Frederic Wake-Walker,[5] was patrolling in the Denmark Strait against possible German raiders. When the British received news of an impeding attempt of the German battleship Bismarck and heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen to breakout into the Atlantic, the Denmark Strait patrol was reinforced with Norfolk's sister ship Suffolk, which was refuelling at Iceland. In the evening of 23 May the two cruisers were patrolling 15 miles apart when Suffolk spotted the two German ships. Suffolk could hide in the mist but when Norfolk made contact with the German ships she was spotted by Bismarck as well and the German battleship fired five salvoes at Norfolk before she too could escape in the mist. Norfolk and Suffolk continued to shadow Bismarck and Prinz Eugen with their radar and sent regularly contact reports, in order to guide a British force consisting of the battleship Prince of Wales, the battlecruiser Hood and six destroyers under the command of admiral Lancelot Holland to the scene. At midnight Bismarck suddenly reversed course and tried to chase the cruisers away. Norfolk and Suffolk lost contact and as a result, Holland sent his destroyers away on a fruitless search for the German ships. When contact was finally regained Holland could close in on the German ships but now the British ships were approaching slowly on a converging course rather than the planned advantageous head-on approach.[6] In the ensuing Battle of the Denmark Strait Hood was sunk and both Bismarck and Prince Of Wales were damaged. Holland had not tried to involve the shadowing cruisers in his battle plan, the cruisers were too far away to close in before the battle was over. Only Suffolk fired a few salvoes which fell far too short.[7]

Both cruisers and the damaged Prince Of Wales continued to shadow the German ships in order to guide the Home Fleet to them. During the afternoon of 24 May, Bismarck turned twice on her pursuers and had a brief gun duel with first Suffolk and then Prince Of Wales. With these diversions, Prinz Eugen was able to slip away to continue merchant raiding whilst the damaged Bismarck wanted to head to the french port of Brest for repairs.[8] During the evening an attack with nine Fairey Swordfish was launched from the approaching Home Fleet. In bad visibility the aircraft detected Bismarck at 23:30 and the shadowing British ships with their radar, and made contact with Norfolk to get a proper heading towards the enemy. The aircraft scored one hit but this did not affect Bismarck much.[9] Norfolk was trailing Bismarck with her radar on the port side. As the British ships entered the open Atlantic, they started to zigzag because of the U-boat danger. Norfolk had a fixed radar, not a rotating one, and was able to track Bismarck only during the first leg of the zigzag. When Bismarck turned away on 25 May at 03:06 to starboard and behind the trailing ships, the manoeuvre was detected too late and the British ships lost contact. The Norfolk, Suffolk, Prince Of Wales and the approaching Home fleet fanned out to regain contact but the Bismarck had escaped.[8] During the subsequent search for the Bismarck, many British ships had to give up the hunt because of fuel shortage and because they were searching in the wrong direction, thinking the Bismarck would either continue into the Atlantic or return to Norway. Wake-Walker anticipated Bismarck continuing to a French port and when Bismarck was found back on 26 May at 10:30 by air reconnaissance, Norfolk was in a position to pick up the chase again. Bismarck was rendered steerless as a result of a torpedo aircraft attack the same day at 20:47 by the aircraft carrier Ark Royal from Force H. During the night Norfolk closed in together with the battleships Rodney and King George V, but waited untill the morning of 27 May to attack. They sank Bismarck in the German ship's final battle.[8]

Arctic Convoys

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Norfolk with destroyers and merchant ships in a Russian inlet whilst on northern convoy duty. Photograph taken from Scylla

From September onward, she was employed as an escort for the arduous Arctic Convoys. Norfolk was part of the cruiser covering force of Convoy JW 55B when it engaged Scharnhorst, on 26 December 1943. She scored three hits on the German ship, and received several 11-in shell hits (all passing through the thin-skinned ship without exploding) in return, before she withdrew; Scharnhorst was later caught and sunk by the battleship Duke of York and her escorting cruisers and destroyers. She sustained damage (especially to X-turret and barbette) in that confrontation, and she was subsequently repaired/refitted (losing X-turret in favour of additional AA guns) on the Tyne, which prevented her from being involved in the historic D-day landings.

The royal family of Norway waving to the welcoming crowds from HMS Norfolk at Oslo

Norfolk was the flagship of Vice Admiral Rhoderick McGrigor off North Norway during Operation Judgement, an attack by the Fleet Air Arm on a U-boat base which destroyed two ships and U-711 on 4 May 1945, in the last air-raid of the war in Europe. When the war came to a close, Norfolk left Plymouth for a much needed refit at Malta, after transporting the Norwegian Royal family back to Oslo after their five-year exile in London. This was followed by service in the East Indies as the flagship of the Commander-in-Chief, East Indies.

Post-war

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In 1949, Norfolk returned to Britain and was placed in Reserve. She was sold to BISCO for scrapping on 3 January 1950. On 14 February 1950, she proceeded to Newport, arriving on 19 February, to be broken up after 22 years of service, in which she gained the Norfolk lineage the majority of her battle honours, including her last.

Notes

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Citations

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  1. ^ "East End News: Personal". The Royal Gazette. City of Hamilton, Pembroke, Bermuda. 23 November 1934. p. 9.
  2. ^ Rohwer 2005, p. 17.
  3. ^ Mason 2010.
  4. ^ Smith & Dominy 1980, p. 118.
  5. ^ Busch 1980, p. 28.
  6. ^ Stephen 1988, pp. 73–78.
  7. ^ von Müllenheim-Rechberg 1990, pp. 140–152.
  8. ^ a b c Stephen 1988, pp. 84–97.
  9. ^ Bercuson & Herwig 2002, pp. 188–193.

References

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  • Bercuson, David J.; Herwig, Holger H. (2002) [1988]. Bismarck. London: Hutchinson. ISBN 0-09-179516-8.
  • Busch, Fritz-Otto (1980). De vernietiging van de Bismarck (in Dutch). Amsterdam: omega boek BV. ISBN 90-6057-197-5.
  • Mason, Lt Cdr Geoffrey B (8 October 2010) [2003], Smith, Gordon (ed.), "HMS Norfolk - County-type Heavy Cruiser including Convoy Escort Movements", Service Histories of Royal Navy Warships in World War 2, Naval-History.Net
  • Kemp, Paul (1993). Convoy: Drama in Arctic Waters. Casell. ISBN 0304354511.
  • von Müllenheim-Rechberg, Burkhard (1990). Battleship Bismarck, A Survivor's Story. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 9780870210273.
  • Rohwer, Jürgen (2005). Chronology of the War at Sea 1939–1945: The Naval History of World War Two (Third Revised ed.). Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-59114-119-2.
  • Smith, Peter C.; Dominy, John R. (1980). Cruisers In Action 1939-1945. London: William Kimber. ISBN 0718302184.
  • Stephen, Martin (1988). Grove, Eric (ed.). Sea Battles in close-up: World War 2. London: Ian Allan ltd. ISBN 0-7110-1596-1.

Further reading

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  • Campbell, N.J.M. (1980). "Great Britain". In Chesneau, Roger (ed.). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922–1946. New York: Mayflower Books. pp. 2–85. ISBN 0-8317-0303-2.
  • Friedman, Norman (2010). British Cruisers: Two World Wars and After. Barnsley, UK: Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 978-1-59114-078-8.
  • Raven, Alan & Roberts, John (1980). British Cruisers of World War Two. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-922-7.
  • Whitley, M. J. (1995). Cruisers of World War Two: An International Encyclopedia. London: Cassell. ISBN 1-86019-874-0.
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