The Sinking of the Bismarck by William L. Shirer Read Free Book Online Page A

as well as the air—a rare quality in any airman.
    From the moment news was received that the Bismarck was lost, Sir Frederick had had a hunch about what she was up to. She was making forBrest or St. Nazaire. Several naval officers at the Admiralty and on the ships at sea had had the same feeling. But Bowhill’s hunch was something special.
    He was sure that the German battleship would not head directly for the French ports. Rather, he thought, she would follow a wide circle. She would steer first for Cape Finisterre on the northwest coast of Spain. Since Spain was neutral, the Cape’s lighthouse was still functioning. (The lights along the coasts of France and England were extinguished during the war as a measure of self-protection against hostile ships and planes.) Then, the Air Marshal reasoned, the Bismarck would proceed around the Bay of Biscay to haven at St. Nazaire or Brest.
    On the evening of May 25, when Bowhill conferred with the Admiralty, he insisted on being allowed to follow his hunch. One of the two Catalinas must cover an assumed course of the Bismarck toward Cape Finisterre in Spain.
    After some argument the Admiralty gave in to him on condition that the second plane search farther north on an assumed course of the enemydirectly toward Brest. The square of search thus became a rectangle tilted northeast. It was about two hundred miles long and a hundred miles wide. It lay some 600 miles northwest of Cape Finisterre and 700 miles due west of Brest. If the Bismarck were making for either place, Bowhill calculated, she ought to be somewhere within the rectangle by 10:00 A.M. on May 26.
    It was a rather large area for just two planes to cover, and the weather reports were discouraging. There were high winds and low clouds over mountainous seas. The Catalinas would have to get down low to discover any ships. And identification in such conditions of bad visibility would not be easy. Still, Sir Frederick was fairly optimistic as his two aircraft skimmed over the waters of Lough Erne, rose into the air and headed southwest into the darkness before dawn.
    ***
    As daylight broke on May 26, Force H was getting close to the prey. But closing in on the Bismarck was not the only problem faced by Vice-Admiral Somerville aboard his flagship Renown . He had another. Ever since steaming out of Gibraltar onthe night of the 23rd he had been concerned about running into the German battle cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau . On that day British planes had reported the two warships still in Brest, where they were undergoing repairs from a bombing by R.A.F. bombers some weeks before.
    But after Somerville’s squadron headed northward in the Atlantic, he received no more news about the two German ships. By May 25—two days later—the commander of Force H had to face the possibility that the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau might well have completed their repairs and put out from Brest to come to the rescue of the Bismarck . If so, they might be dangerously near his own squadron, which was no match for them.
    Twice during May 25 as he sped toward the general direction of the Bismarck , Admiral Somerville had sent out aircraft from the carrier Ark Royal to look for the two German battle cruisers. But visibility had been so poor that the planes had been recalled shortly after taking off. In the evening the Admiral gave orders that the first dawn patrol of planes the next day would have to disregard the Bismarck , desperate as the searchfor her was. They must look first to see if the German battle cruisers were near by.
    The night of the 25th grew very stormy. So high were the waves that speed had to be drastically reduced—from twenty-six knots to twenty-three, and then down to nineteen and finally, just after midnight, to seventeen knots. At this rate, Somerville realized, he would never be able to converge on the Bismarck . And the high seas were threatening to smash up his ships. The small destroyers were barely able to keep afloat,