'A STIRRING MEMORY' - THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE CHANNEL DASH
12 February 2021
On this day in 1942, the Royal Navy attempted to stop a breakout by the core of Hitler's Navy from Brest to Germany - the 'Channel Dash', a date which has entered Fleet Air Arm history.
With its vast natural harbour – 70 square miles in all, formed by the convergence of three rivers – and easy access to the Atlantic via the narrow strait, the Goulet, the Breton city of Brest had been a vital naval base since the days of Cardinal Richelieu, home first to the La Royale, and later Marine nationale.
In the summer of 1940, came a new inhabitant: the Kriegsmarine, which regarded the port as its greatest prize when France fell to the seemingly-unstoppable German Army.
No longer did the great ships of the German Navy have to run the gauntlet of the North Sea between the Shetlands and Norway, or the Iceland Gap. From the Atlantic shores of France, they could strike at the supply lines of the British Empire.
Or at least that was how the leaders of the German Navy viewed the ports of France in the summer of 1940. The reality proved to be very different – for the German surface fleet especially.
Brest in particular became not a sword lunging into the Atlantic but a sanctuary for German warships escaping the clutches of the Royal Navy.
It was to Brest that the sisters Scharnhorst and Gneisenau – the British determined the 38,000-ton leviathans with their nine 11in guns apiece were battle-cruisers, the Germans insisted they were Schlachtschiffe, battleships – had fled after a two-month-long sortie in early 1941.
Continues at:
https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-l ... annel-dash
AND
Royal Navy
On this day in 1942 Swordfish of 825 Naval Air Squadron scrambled to intercept the core of the German Fleet sailing through Dover Strait - known to history as the 'Channel Dash'.
Watch this excellent short movie put together by historian/TV presenter Dan Snow and the photographic team at RNAS Yeovilton (825's present-day home) describing the self-sacrifice of the Swordfish crew who tried to attack the formidable enemy force.
https://www.facebook.com/royalnavy/vide ... 1239676260