Who Really Sank Bismarck, the Pride of Hitler’s Fleet?
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Iain Ballantyne’s blog on submarines of the Cold War generated quite a deal of interest so I’m delighted to welcome Iain back again as a Guest Blogger, this time his topic is slaying the myths of the battleship Bismarck. Iain has released a paperback edition of ‘Killing the Bismarck’ which provides some fascinating updates to his earlier hardback and is justly recognised as the definitive account of the British part in the battle.
Over to Iain…
The Atlantic, 27 May 1941
The smoke over the water had not long dissipated, the fire snuffed out and thunder only just faded. The wrecked battleship Bismarck was now lying on the floor of the ocean, the majority of her crew killed aboard or drowned.
The British battle-wagon HMS Rodney sailed away from the scene of combat in company with the Home Fleet flagship HMS King George V. It was Rodney’s massive 16-inch guns that did the close-up killing of Bismarck.
Killing the Bismarck
- ‘Within the span of seven days
From view to chase and kill
The pride of Hitler’s Navy learned
The might of Britain’s will’
If you believed this triumphant verse, it was all pre-ordained and those impudent Germans should have known better than challenge an island nation that had ruled the Seven Seas for centuries.
In some ways Rodney’s sailor wasn’t wrong. The Germans had sent out their newest, most powerful battleship along with the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen to destroy Allied convoys. While delivering a serious blow by sinking the battlecruiser HMS Hood on 24 May, the Germans soon discovered the Royal Navy could soak up disaster, spring back and bring its still considerable might to bear.
The reality is that no warship is unsinkable, no navy can totally control the oceans, but the British had more experience and a bigger, better-balanced navy than Hitler had allowed his admirals to create.
However, if you are to believe today’s majority perception of the Bismarck action the German battleship was unsinkable – in fact, she was so strong and invincible that it wasn’t the British guns and torpedoes that sank her, but her own scuttling charges.
Debate has raged for years around this point, making it the focus of underwater investigations on Bismarck’s wreck. Some found ‘proof’ that scuttling sank her; while others have offered evidence she was already sinking due to the holes caused by British shells and torpedoes.
The mighty 16-inch guns of HMS Rodney – the weapons that destroyed Bismarck.
Credit: US Naval Heritage and History Command
But sea battles are not a game of top trumps, comparing calibres of guns and flaws in naval architecture. What matters is the human element and in that respect Bismarck was defeated before her final battle. Her men were utterly demoralized by being harassed across the ocean by the British. They had experienced a huge high after destroying Hood on 24 May but by 26 May were in a deep depression. They regarded the admiral in charge of their raiding mission as a Jonah and saw their chances of reaching a safe port as virtually zero. After the Swordfish attack that destroyed their vessel’s steering, many in Bismarck’s crew just gave up.
And this brings us to the key element of controversy that my book ‘Killing the Bismarck’ presents, namely the contention that some of her crew tried to surrender at the height of the battle. When the hardback edition was published, and the surrender angle received national newspaper coverage, this caused outrage – from the USA and UK to Poland – among the ranks of those who still believe in the ‘invincible Bismarck’ myth.
One thing I have learned over the past decade or more that I have been writing naval history books is that the accepted view of how events happened often collapses, or at least can sometimes prove open to question, when you go deep into the archives.
With regard to the Bismarck action I looked at the ‘surrender’ claims via three different accounts. I found one (by a Rodney officer) in the archives of the HMS Rodney Association. In another, the son of the man involved (a rating in Rodney) volunteered transcripts and sound recordings. The third, from a sailor in the cruiser HMS Dorsetshire, was in the archives of the Imperial War Museum. The signs that these men saw included a man sending a signal via semaphore, mysterious light signals and a flag raised that seemed to indicate a desire to ‘parley’.
Battle map showing the scope of the Bismarck action from 23 May 1941, when Bismarck and Prinz Eugen were shadowed by British cruisers, through the Battle of the Denmark Strait, on 24 May, to the final clash on 27 May
Copyright © Dennis Andrews
The British sailors I quote were in a very good position to see what was happening. They were in action stations with an excellent view of the enemy and certainly in Rodney’s case they had high-powered optics and could see with shocking clarity what was happening. I don’t think people realize just how close Rodney was in the final moments. The men who were best able to see what was happening in the fore part of Bismarck were sailors in British warships, not German survivors. The latter mainly came from well-protected engineering spaces deep within the citadel or served in the equally robust main armament turrets aft.
Was it possible for the British to take Bismarck’s surrender? No. Some sailors may have been trying to surrender in the fore part of the ship, but their shipmates elsewhere continued to fire on the British. Was it an attempt to surrender on authorization of Bismarck’s commanders, or just an initiative by some sailors who understandably wanted the killing to stop? Nobody will ever know for sure. No battleship deep in the heat of action has taken the surrender of another, at least not since the end of the wooden walls.
Rodney and King George V were two very important capital ships. The British didn’t have many and the Royal Navy was in May 1941 taking a hammering in the Mediterranean during the Battle of Crete. Bismarck’s sister battleship, Tirpitz, was expected to set sail at any moment while there were other German high seas raiders lurking in Brest, waiting to come out and savage Allied shipping.
To risk King George V and Rodney would have been a gigantic strategic error. Bismarck’s ensign continued to fly, she was still firing and for the sake of Britain’s security she had to be destroyed as a fighting entity. After the guns ceased firing on both sides – and it’s worth pointing out the Bismarck’s guns did not fall silent until the British put them out of action – it was a different matter. The brotherhood of the sea saw the hand of mercy extended.
The most controversial element of the fresh material in this edition of ‘Killing the Bismarck’ is an account by an aviator who took part in the May 26, 1941 attack on the German battleship that fatally damaged her steering. Terry Goddard was a young Observer in a Swordfish of 818 Naval Air Squadron. Until he got in touch with me I thought John Moffat was the only living veteran of that crucial episode.
Iain Ballantyne
It does contradict some recent claims about whose Swordfish torpedo did the fatal damage to the German battleship. History is organic, and ever evolving, with fresh perspectives to be discovered even now more than 70 years on from the Bismarck action.
I was also pleased to be able to present material from another surviving veteran, who back in May 1941 made a transatlantic passage in Rodney as a 17-year-old midshipman. There is also a blow-by-blow account freshly rediscovered by the son of a Royal Marine officer who served in the gunnery director position of the cruiser Norfolk.
Of course as the years go by the opportunity to encounter veterans of the Second World War is diminishing rapidly, so I doubt very much there will be another edition of ‘Killing the Bismarck’ that presents fresh eyewitness material on top of that already discovered. However, even as the paperback rolled off the presses, I heard of another veteran who may have a story worth telling and who is still with us…
‘Killing the Bismarck’ is published by Pen & Sword. I have three copies of the paperback to give away. To go into the hat, email julian@julianstockwin.com with the name of the naval current affairs magazine of which Iain is currently editor.
Please include your full postal address. Deadline: June 3. Winners will be notified by email.
Iain is the author of seven naval history books. His most recent hardback is ‘Hunter Killers’, Orion Books.
Julian Stockwin 
The sinking of the Bismarck was a war crime as it was sailing back to port and its crew tried to surrender before scuttling the ship.
Good morning! It wasn’t a war crime. I first published the British eye witness accounts of the possible surrender attempts by SOME of the crew, so I’ve studied those moments from various angles. The guns of Bismarck were still firing, the ensign was still flying and so for the Royal Navy there way of knowing what the real intentions were. Sailing back to port is not a reason for a warship to be allowed a free pass. Bismarck was a powerful unit and remember her job was to destroy British merchant shipping and that was the mission of the U-boats and Condor bombers too. They killed many people with their activities – often in defenceless ships. Once in a safe port – and with crew rested and vessels repaired – Bismarck and U-boats would come out to attack merchant shipping again. When the Luftwaffe bombers blitzed Plymouth or London and turned for home it didn’t give them a free pass either. Obviously the horror and the moral dilemmas of the Bismarck’s end provide us all with a lesson in the reality of war. A lesson the brutal Nazi regime ignored in its bid to starve Britain into surrender. As for the scuttling, the charges were detonated just before the Dorsetshire’s torpedoes hit the Bismarck – but she was already sinking anyway, due to the many holes below the waterline already inflicted in the battle. I hope that helps clarify the reality of which I wrote above.
Churchill had removed the difference between military and civilian targets by illegally arming merchant ships in World War I. The Blitz was in response to the RAF bombing cities and towns in Germany from 11 May 1940 onwards. The Royal Navy had imposed an illegal blockade in an ettempt to starve Germany’s entire civilian population, just as it had from 1914 to 1919.
Churchill should have been tried for the sinking of Bismarck, as well as for beginning the deliberate area bombing of civilians in World War II: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/hitler-didn-t-start-indiscriminate-bombings-churchill-did-
Firstly as you will be aware the U-boats initially preferred using their own guns in WW1 to sink merchant ships and, if they could assist the crews to reach a safe harbour or get picked up they did. But no wise person could expect merchant ships to just sit there and take it from U-boats in a totally new kind of warfare when the country’s fate was at stake. The guns were more of a deterrent than an actual means to sink a U-boat and the Germans did abide by restricted war on commerce, but as the blockade tightened to try and end the war – and the Allied direct response to U-boats got more effective – the Germans resorted to unrestricted warfare to cut off Allied war materials and food supplies. This was due to their inability achieve a decisive result via their attempt at brutal conquest on the Western Front and lack of decisive result in the East. In terms of the WW2 blitz, I think the people of Warsaw and Poland, and before them those of Spain, might have something to say about Blitzkrieg and terror bombing tactics of the Luftwaffe ref ‘who started what’. And let’s not forget the first aerial blitz in history was mounted by the Germans in WW1 against London while their warships also bombarded British coastal towns. Via their U-boats they came close to starving Britain into asking for ‘terms’ in 1917. Finally, sea combat is also a brutal affair – which we should never ever forget and dictators should ponder before they send people to their deaths – and sadly Bismarck and Nazi Germany reaped what they sewed, which was a tragedy for her crew, but the loss of Glorious in June 1940 was an equal shock for the UK, as was the sinking of Courageous (Sept 1939) and death of all but three of Hood’s ship’s company (24 May 1941). That does not deny the horror of the events of Bismarck’s end, but we should always bear in mind the many merchant mariners, civilian passengers and others in addition to naval personnel killed by the U-boats, surface raiders and Luftwaffe at sea. That had to be stopped. To emphasise: sinking Bismarck was entirely necessary and not a war crime and letting a raider like her escape to a French port would have been a body blow to the cause of the democracies against rampant totalitarianism.
This is now closed for further comment; thank you all for your input
The Germans stopped civilian ships to search them for weapons at the start of Wold War I, but Churchill prevented this by introducing Q-ships with concealed deck guns and by ordering merchant captains to evade and ram U-Boats that surfaced.
The Germans only bombed military targets in Spain at the request of the Spanish government. They bombed military targets in Poland – Warsaw was on the front line during the fighting and was heavily defended by the Polish army.
Churchill began the deliberate area bombing of civilians and night terror attacks in Iraq in the 1920s: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-29441383
My grandfather Cecil Pippett a commissioned master of arms was on the HMS Dorsetshire and had given the order to fire the ships torpedo from the deck of the Dorsetshire that caused the sinking of the Bismarck , he was on the HMS Dorsetshire until it was bombed and sank on Sunday 5th April 1942 , he was a fortunate survivor.
may god rest all their souls.
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My dad ted palmer was on the rodney still going now
My father served on the Rodney for five years during WW11, including the sinking of the Bismarck.
He always maintained that it was the Rodney that sank the Bismark. And because KG5 was the flagship it stood back from the main assault.
He also maintained that because the son of the captain of the Rodney went down with HMS Hood that he got his revenge by pounding and pounding the Bismarck. Apparently, he recalls that the padre of the Rodney pleaded with the captain to cease the bombardment as he maintained that it wasn’t war, but murder.
I’m afraid at least parts of the story you were told are wrong and a classic instance of the fog of memory leading to details becoming confused with the passing years. Rodney’s captain Frederick Dalrymple-Hamilton had a son who was a gun director aboard King George V but he did not have a son aboard Hood, let alone one who had been killed in the engagement with Bismarck. This fact is verifiable beyond doubt: the full list of Hood’s unfortunate crew is available online and contains no Dalrymple-Hamiltons.
As the author of ‘Killing the Bismarck’ and the earlier book ‘HMS Rodney’ let me help untangle this a little, as you are both right in various respects.
It is true that Rodney, with her 16-inch guns did cause the most damage (if you are talking battleships) in the final battle – her hits were decisive – but a lot of her shells (as she only had AP) went straight through.
KGV stood off to allow Rodney the freedom of manoeuvre – not exercised on May 24 in the Denmark Strait by the British – to cause maximum damage to the crippled Bismarck. Some of KGV’s 14-inch shells were seen to bounce off, but others did cause damage – BTW the cruisers Norfolk and Dorsetshire used their guns to cause a huge amount of damage to Bismarck exposed areas, including command and control links. Again, this was different to May 24, when the cruisers watched the action but were not called in.
Capt Dalrymple-Hamilton’s son was indeed in KGV (as explained in ‘Killing the Bismarck’ with quotes from him too). There was a feeling that KGV stood back in the crew of Rodney – but that was down to the normal rivalry etc. They also felt afterwards that their ship’s role was not given the prominence it deserved, again touched on in the books.
Vian’s destroyers also ‘stood back’ and the Swordfish from Ark Royal were warned off from making an attack on morning of May 27, much to their chagrin (also see my 2016 book ‘Bismarck: 24 Hours to Doom’ for more on that from aviators’ POV). One of the chaplains of Rodney did plead with the CO to stop the bombardment and was ordered off the bridge – but, as my books explain, it was a terrible job that had to be done and completed, as the fate of the nation was at stake.
Nobody took pleasure in it. It was not a war crime even though some there later described it as ‘like murder’ (see ‘Bismarck: 24 Hours to Doom’) – some parts of Bismarck fought on even when she was reduced to a floating charnel house. Her colours were not struck and it was impossible to take a surrender in those circumstances, or to know if anyone was trying to do so. Again, discussed in greater detail in the three books.
After destruction of a Nazi weapon of war that a few days early killed 1,415 boys and men in Hood – and threatened more havoc if she got away – the ships of the Royal Navy did their best in the circumstances to provide mercy and salvation to their fellow mariners. It was the feared arrival of the Luftwaffe, the known presence of U-boats (four were in the vicinity) and the lack of fuel that meant they had to leave before picking more people up.
Sorry if this repeats some of the blog, but I hope it clarifies things afresh!
My grandfather also served on the Rodney as a petty officer in the secondary gun turrets and he confirms what you said. My grandfather said that the truth was that the Rodney was ordered into a suicide attack sailing straight at the Bismarck firing all 9 of its heavy guns straight over the bows and closing as quick as possible. He said the orders were effectively to ram the Bismarck if necessary and go down with it. The ancient and badly maintained Rodney was worth the sacrifice while KGV just stood back. My grandfather said that the recoil of the heavy guns firing flat shots directly over the bows buckled the Rodney deck. At the end they were close it was only half a mile away and they could see shells going straight through the Bismarck. My grandfather only spoke about it once and he said he could see German sailors dying on the decks.
Hello Brian.
Nobody should ever dismiss the insights of anyone who was at the Bismarck Action, but sometimes, if I may be so bold, they have to be taken with a pinch of salt!
Rodney could not fire all nine 16-inch guns over her bows. Only two of the the three 16-inch turrets could do so. The tactics used – and I have studied the track charts for three books – made use of her ability to bring all nine 16-inch guns to bear by snaking around Bismarck.
It was, in BB terms, point blank range while KGV stood off and cruisers piled in when they could, as I may have said previously on here. He’s right, she did fire nine gun salvoes – but on the beam, tho tried not to, alternating turrets/gun patterns, due to potential damage to the ship of all nine guns firing! Adml Tovey recognised sending Rodney in close (2 miles by the end) was the right tactic to maximise her killing power.
I doubt very much there were any orders to ram B/M – the UK had very few modern battleships at this time and in fact none at all to match the hitting power of Rodney and Nelson. Rodney had 500 (mainly RAF) passengers onboard too, so goodness knows what they would have thought to any ‘ramming’! Polish officers were keen to board B/M mind you and were caught sharpening knives at one point.
Rodney was not badly maintained per se, just in need of the regular refit denied to her thanks to constant action and being held in reserve to attack any German invasion attempt in 1940, then convoy escort duties.
I can, I must admit, see Rodney being ordered on a suicide mission to stop a German invasion, so perhaps the two events are being conflated? At 16-years-old she was by 1941 a bit elderly and her boilers leaked plus steering was sometimes wonky, and she had a crack in her main armoured deck – BUT when it came down to it the Rodney did not fail in any respect during the Bismarck Action – thanks to her valiant crew and solid build of course.
She was in 1940 (along with Nelson) the newest battleship the RN had in commission and in 1941 the KGVs were only just entering service. After refit in Boston + Med escort duties, & with Tirpitz now in service, Rodney was (in late 1941) held in Iceland for a period – to work with a KGV Class battleship if need need be to sink that vessel also. The KGVs did not have enough hitting power a many had feared, inc Churchill prior to WW2.
It is true that Rodney did a lot of damage to herself as your grandfather correctly pointed out, but that was not uncommon in such actions (esp with older BBs, such as Rodney and Warspite), and her 16-inch AP shells (and she had no 16-inch HE aboard at time) did go right through those parts of B/M outside the armoured citadel. It must have been a horrifying sight and I have no doubt he saw the full effect and those desperate and dying B/M sailors via high power optics from his 6-inch gun position. He was there at a moment in history, terrible though it was in some respects.
‘She was in 1940 (along with Nelson) the newest battleship the RN had in commission’ – I meant ‘in 1939’!
My father also served on The Rodney and always said that they sank the Bismark
My father Charles Taylor who said the HMS Rodney on which he served during the battle of the Bismark struck the German ship and slowed it down enough for the bigger destroyers to catch up and help the Rodney to finish the battle.
The Germans scuttled Bismarck after their attempts to surrender were ignored by the Royal Navy.
The sinking of Bismarck was a war crime like the failed Operation Chastise, as Tommy Byers admitted.
If you read what Tommy says in my books he does say he felt they were possibly trying to surrender and laments the horrors of war – things we would all know and ponder – however, he also reflects sadly that it was ‘them or us’. You can infer it was a war crime if you like, but you’d be wrong. It wasn’t for reasons I have laid out in other replies plus in ‘Bismarck: 24 Hours to Doom’ and ‘Killing the Bismarck.’ Horrific, yes. Brutal and a dreadful business, yet had to be done by the British as their own country was under existential threat from Germany. The terrible end of a Nazi raider sent out to destroy defenceless merchant shipping.
Churchill had illegally armed merchant ships. He also introduced Q-ships with concealed deck guns, and illegally transported war munitions on civilian ships.
There was no threat from Germany. The only threat was Communism.
Churchill was bribed by Sir Henry Strakosch to betray the UK in 1938 and again in June 1940.
We should have destroyed the Soviet Union and Communism forever in 1941.
My father was on the Rodney as a Royal Marine during war, he always said that they had damaged that German ship Bismark.
my father a Newfoundlander served on theRodney during chase for Bismark always said biggest battle was in port after with crew fromKing George for bragging rights. swears Rodney did the most damage and sank the Bismark
my father was a loader for shells .He said all were invited updeck to watch Bismark sink. His name was John Wade from Flatrock Newfoundland
My late father was serving on the Rodney when the Bismarck was sunk his name was Charlie Nicholson I believe he served as a gunner or gun layer after the war all who served aboard the Rodney were sent a book the Rodney at war I still have this
i have been reading with interest and wish to say i have a hand written account of the sinking of the bismark, my father served on hms dorsetshire as a signal man and was there to witness that day ! i have yet to read in full the story of what happened as my dad has now passed and i must find the strength to read his memoirs .
Hallo Jane, my father was also on the dorsetshie at the time of the sinking of the bismark, he also was in the Signal room as a PO? (not sure) he told me as a kid that he sent the Signal back to the naval HQ.that they have sunk the Bismark! your comments are the closest i have been to someone ( your father) who may have know him personally? I have been trying for ages to get a Crew list of the dorsetshie at that time NO luck!! my father has also past away, perhaps you have more info.than I have?
my fathers Name was Albert (Bert) Henry Vivian
look Forwards to a reply
Excellent article. Had a friend whose father servee on Hood, before she engaged Bismark, and was then transferred to Prince of Wales. This is essentially how he described the action. How he came by the knowledge I do not know. But it is certain, that Bismark did not strike her colours. My father was in Movement Control in the Royal Engineers during WW II, and got to know many officers and men in the RN. He also relayed a similar story.
My Grandfather served upon the Rodney in WW2. He left the Navy after the war, even though he was offered a commission. He vowed never to leave England’s shores again. About 40 years later, during his retirement,he took the family to Spain. In all that 40 years he never said too much about the horrors of WW2, even when pressed by eager grandchildren! Perhaps, therefore, we shall never know.
My Father James Reginald Kehoe served 5 years on the Rodney and was there on that day in B turret, the Bismarck after that action , my Father said, resembled an Aircraft carrier.
Just heard a story from the son of one of the sailors on the Rodney, about the Bismark. The Bismark had struck its colours, a sign of surrender. But on churchills direct order the bismark was to be sunk. In retaliation for the Hood.
Hello Ian,
Thanks for your comments.
Sorry for late response – I have been busy on another book.
I can assure you that isn’t true. I have spent years looking into it (including talking to and exchanging e-mails and letters with dozens of Rodney sailors) and have produced two brutally honest accounts of it.
She had not struck her colours and some of her guns were still firing even if some sailors attempted to surrender – an impossible act to pull off in such circumstances.
Yours,
Iain Ballantyne
I already made one comment but here are MY thoughts. The ship was battered and bruised from the British shelling. Her guns were all out of commission yet no sign of surrender. Her crew set off scuttling charges to prevent capture, although there was no thought of that from the British. The British will always believe they sank her and rightly so, but both British & German Sailors sank the Bismarck.
In essence you are correct. There is a discussion of that in one of the appendices. The British filled her full of holes so that she would have eventually sunk and underwater explorer David Mearns describes Bismarck as a heavyweight boxer who is going down but has not yet hit the canvas. The Germans, who probably set scuttling charges, hastened the end. Thanks for your observations by the way.
This was a good read.
Who really sank the Bismark…
Excellent article, much enjoyed. Father served on the Rodney and previously on the Hood and Warspite. I myself followed earlier generations into the RN in the 50’s. Many thanks again for excellent article.
The ship I live on served on the Kiel Canal from 1895 to 1947 she was the lead tug that towed the Bismark on her final voyage through the canal. Possibly why she still has a Kriegsmarine compass though she was never commandeered by them.