| Torpedo Alley | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part ofWorld War II, theBattle of the Atlantic, and theSecond Happy Time | |||||||
 USCGC Dione escorting a convoy through Torpedo Alley, 1942 | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
 United States United Kingdom |  Germany | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
.svg) Harold Raynsford StarkErnest KingRoyal Ingersoll Daniel de Pass[1] |  Karl DönitzRobert-Richard ZappRolf Mützelburg | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| ~1,512 killed at least 87 ships sunk | 145 killed 40 captured 4 submarines sunk.[2][3][4][5] | ||||||
Torpedo Alley (also calledTorpedo Junction or theBattle of Torpedo Junction) was a region off the coastline of theNorth CarolinanOuter Banks, named for the high number of attacks onAllied shipping byGermanU-boats inWorld War II. An estimated 80 to over 100 Allied ships were sunk, mostly during theSecond Happy Time in 1942.[6][7] Torpedo Alley encompassed the area surrounding theOuter Banks, including Cape Lookout and Cape Hatteras.[8] In all oceans around North America the German submarines sank about 400 ships with 5000 deaths. The U-boats were defeated by the convoy system that went into effect belatedly in 1942.[9]
Following theGerman declaration of war against the United States,Rear Admiral Karl Dönitz began to implement Operation Paukenschlag (transl. Operation Drumbeat), a plan for U-boats to attack Alliedmerchant ships off theEast Coast of the United States.[10] The most intense attacks took place off the Outer Banks of North Carolina, specifically chosen by U-boats for their hunting grounds as thecontinental shelf was narrowest along the coastline, allowing the submarines to easily hide in the deeper waters off the shelf.[11]
Allied merchant ships were nearly defenseless in the opening stages of Operation Drumbeat. No convoys ran along the East Coast for the first half of 1942,[12] usually sailing with their lights on and without zig-zagging. The settlements on the Outer Banks, along with lighthouses andlight buoys, illuminated the silhouette of the ships passing and allowed U-boats an easy target many a time.[13] It was said among locals of thevillage of Hatteras that the flames from torpedoed tankers burned so brightly that one could read a newspaper at night. All sorts offlotsam—including oil, wreckage, and bodies—washed up on the beaches.[13][14]
Between the months of January and June 1942, in the waters off North America a total of 397 Allied ships were sunk.[8][13] Due to the sheer amount of Allied losses, the region was nicknamed "Torpedo Alley" (Alternatively, Torpedo Junction) by Allied sailors.[14] It was also referred to as "the Battle of Torpedo Junction" by the crew of theUS Coast Guard CutterDione.[15]
Empire Gem was a 10,600-ton Britishtanker built in 1941, armed with one 4-inch (100 mm) gun, one 12-pounderanti-aircraft gun and sixmachine guns. While offDiamond Shoals on the night of January 23, 1942,U-66 underRobert-Richard Zapp detected the unescortedEmpire Gem and the unarmed American ore carrierSS Venore. A few hours later, at about 2:40 am on January 24,U-66 attacked by firing a spread of torpedoes at Empire Gem. One of them struck the tanker at the tanks on the starboard side and the ship immediately began to burn and sink. The U-boat then fired additional torpedoes; one struck theVenore, which also sank. Both vessels sent out anSOS and shortly after an American motor lifeboat fromOcracoke Coast Guard Station arrived to rescue survivors. Fifty-five men out of fifty-seven were killed on Empire Gem includingRoyal Navy gunners and another seventeen men were killed on theVenore. Twenty-three survivors from both ships were later rescued by American forces.[16][17][18]
San Delfino was an 8,702-ton armed British tanker. She was attacked east of Cape Hatteras at position35°35′N75°06′W / 35.583°N 75.100°W /35.583; -75.100 on April 10, 1942 byU-203 underCaptain LieutenantRolf Mützelburg. At 3:47 amSan Delfino was hit by a torpedo but it had no effect. A second spread missed their target but a final shot hit the ship at 5:08 am, sinking the vessel, killing twenty-eight men and sending another twenty-two into the water. The action occurred early in the morning, and the gunners aboard had not been able to see a target. It took seven torpedoes altogether to destroy the ship. The Master and twenty-one crew members were rescued later on by the naval trawlerHMTNorwich City and landed atMorehead City.[19]
On March 19, 1942,Dixie Arrow leftTexas City, Texas, bound for the city ofPaulsboro, New Jersey. She carried 86,136 bbl (13,694.5 m3) ofcrude oil to be used for theAllied war effort, following a forty-fathom (240 ft; 73 m) curve offCape Hatteras due to the captain's concerns about the shallow depth of the water.[20] The tanker soon sailed into the hunting grounds of German U-boats, and was torpedoed thrice on March 26 byU-71 just around 9:00 AM.Dixie Arrow broke in two due to the explosions.[21] Able seaman Oscar Chappell turned the ship into the wind to save crewmen trapped by fire on the bow, but was killed by the flames in doing so.[22] Only one of the ship's lifeboats safely made it away, the other three either being destroyed in the initial explosions or being succumbed by the fire that had engulfed the ship. The crew was never able to send a distress signal.[23] The US NavydestroyerUSS Tarbell arrived around 9:30 AM, roughly half an hour afterDixie Arrow had been torpedoed. The destroyer dropped multipledepth charges in hopes of sinkingU-71, though none of them did anything to harm it. USSTarbell rescued 22 of the ship's 33-man crew, taking them toMorehead City, North Carolina.[20][24]
Bedfordshire was a 443-ton Britishtrawler. On May 10,Bedfordshire andHMTLowman were deployed from their base at Morehead City toOcracoke Island to search for a U-boat spotted in the area. When the vessels arrived they were discovered by Captain LieutenantGunther Krech ofU-558 who proceeded to shadow the vessels until later that night. Krech attacked after assuming he had been detected by the British ships - firing a spread of torpedoes at theLowman but they all missed. The British then maneuvered and began droppingdepth charges but these failed to destroy their target. At 5:40 in the morning on May 11, the U-boat fired a single torpedo atBedfordshire which missed but a second hit the trawler and it quickly sank with all thirty-seven hands. Two bodies were eventually recovered by the Americans who buried the dead on Ocracoke, creating the British Cemetery there.[5][25]
The next warship sunk wasKingston Ceylonite, another Britishnaval trawler serving in American waters off North Carolina. On June 15,Kingston Ceylonite was sailing offVirginia Beach in convoy KN-109 when she unknowingly entered asea mine field laid byU-701 four days earlier. The British trawler struck one mine at position36°52′N75°51′W / 36.867°N 75.850°W /36.867; -75.850 and sank. Thirty-three men went down with the ship and only eighteen survived. Two other tankers and thedestroyerUSS Bainbridge also hit mines that night but were saved from sinking. Some of the dead washed up on Ocracoke Island and were interred with the men ofBedfordshire.[26]
The small 170-ton American trawlerYP-389 was destroyed during an action withU-701 in the early morning on June 19. German CaptainHorst Degen decided to surface the submarine and engage with hisdeck guns in order to save torpedoes. Armor-piercing rounds splashed all around the American ship for an hour and a half before she sank. Because of a faultyfiring pin in the trawler's 3-inch (76 mm)dual purpose gun, only.30-06 Springfield rifles, .30 cal machine guns and depth charges could be used to defend the ship. Of a 25-man complement, six American seamen were killed in battle and the eighteen remaining went adrift. The Germans suffered no casualties thoughU-701 sustained slight damage.[27][28]
William Rockefeller was a one-gun American tanker of 14,054 tons, sunk 16 nautical miles (30 km) east-northeast of Diamond Shoals on June 28, 1942. At 6:16 pm, Horst Degen'sU-701 released a torpedo which hit William Rockefeller's pump room on portside amidships while she was steaming on a non-evasive course at 9.2 knots. The torpedo tore a twenty-foot hole in the ship and oil sprayed everywhere, causing a fire. The pump room flooded along with one of the ship's tanks and the cargo aboard caught on fire. Nine officers, thirty-five crewmen and sixarmed guards evacuated the ship and were picked up twenty minutes later byUSS CG-470 which then depth charged the area inconclusively.U-701 surfaced the following morning around 5:20 am and delivered acoup de grâce which sank the American ship at position35°11′N75°07′W / 35.183°N 75.117°W /35.183; -75.117 without loss of life.[29]
The first of three German U-boats sunk during the battle for Torpedo Alley wasU-85, sunk at midnight on April 13, 1942. While operating within sight ofBodie Island Lighthouse, thedestroyerUSS Roper detected the surfacedU-85 on radar at a range of 2,700 yards. As the German submarine attempted to head south, theRoper closed to 700 yards.U-85 fired a torpedo from her stern and began firing with her deck gun, but the American destroyer evaded all of the shots.U-85 then turned to starboard and closed to within 300 yards of theRoper, which opened fire with a 3-inch (76 mm) gun and machine guns. The destroyer hit the U-boat once before she submerged, and then dropped 11 depth charges, sinking the sub. All 46 German crew members were killed; theRoper recovered 29 of their bodies. Some of the dead were wearing civilian clothing and had wallets with U.S. currency and identification cards, suggesting that the submarine had been involved in landing German agents on the mainland. A nighttime military funeral was held for the dead Germans atHampton, Virginia. The hatch ofU-85 is now on display atCape Hatteras Lighthouse and theenigma machine resides at theGraveyard of the Atlantic Museum inHatteras.[5][30]
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U-352, under Captain LieutenantHellmut Rathke, was destroyed on May 9, 1942, by theUnited States Coast Guard. At position34°21′N76°35′W / 34.350°N 76.583°W /34.350; -76.583, offCape Lookout, theUSCGC Icarus picked up a sonar contact just before a torpedo exploded nearby.LieutenantMaurice D. Jester knew right away that they were under attack by a submarine and he suspected where the Germans would fire their next torpedo from. The Americans maneuvered and dropped five depth charges, and when sonar detected the U-boat again,Icarus moved accordingly and dropped two more charges, forcing the Germans to surface. Then a short surface action occurred asIcarus opened fire with machine guns and prepared to ram the enemyU-boat. Before the range closed, the crew ofU-352 evacuated their ship and the Americans ceased fire after dropping one last depth charge as the submarine sank. TheIcarus left the scene but was ordered to return and pick up the German submariners still in the water.[31] Fifteen Germans were killed and 33 survivors were taken toCharleston, South Carolina, the following day. Jester received aNavy Cross for his victory over the Germans.[3] The remains of theU352 lie in 115' of water, 26 miles South of Beaufort inlet, NC.
The destruction ofU-701 happened on July 7, 1942, near Cape Hatteras, and was the last sinking of a German submarine in Torpedo Alley. AmericanLockheed Hudson aircraft from theUnited States Army396th Bombardment Squadron attacked the surfacedU-701 with depth charges. The attack was successful and the U-boat sank with 29 hands. Seventeen survivors then went adrift in lifeboats for two days; when they were rescued by American forces, only seven remained. The submarine rests in 110' feet of water near Cape Hatteras, NC.[32]
German casualties in Torpedo Alley totaled 100 dead and forty captured.[4]
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