HMS Ramillies (07) - The North Atlantic: Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Bismarck

The North Atlantic: Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Bismarck

Ramillies was assigned to North Atlantic convoy duty on her return to Britain. This was a critical assignment as the British Empire and Dominions were now alone, losses to submarines were high, and the home country was in immediate danger of being starved into submission. Should German surface raiders, whether converted merchantmen, heavy cruisers, pocket battleships or full-sized battleships, break out and destroy a British convoy, it might be sufficient to tip the balance. Across this ocean came food, rubber, lumber, mineral ores, weapons and munitions from Australia, New Zealand, South East Asia, South Africa, South America, Canada and the United States, oil from Venezuela and the Middle East and troops from India and Canada. One decimated troop convoy might lead Canada and the other dominions to stop moving troops across. Outward bound were troops, munitions and aircraft for East Africa, the Middle East, India and the Far East.

On 12 January 1941 Ramillies left Britain as escort for 40,000 troops in a large convoy from Britain south past the danger zone to West Africa. They were bound for the Middle East.

The Ramillies was on duty in the North Atlantic Ocean escorting Convoy HX-106, some 41 ships, eastbound from Halifax, Nova Scotia to Liverpool, England when on 8 February 1941 the two new German battleships, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, appeared over the horizon. The German squadron was under the command of Admiral Günther Lütjens. The captain of the Scharnhorst offered to draw off the Ramillies, so that the Gneisenau could sink the merchant ships. It is unlikely, however, that Ramillies' captain would leave the convoy he was protecting to chase the much faster German ship. Further, Ramillies was armed with the excellent BL 15 inch Mk I naval gun and was capable of doing significant damage to the German vessels. In the event, Lütjens strictly followed Hitler's directive not to engage enemy capital ships. The presence of Ramillies was sufficient to deter the attack.

On 24 May 1941, Ramillies, Captain Arthur D. Read commanding, was south of Cape Farewell, Greenland, on duty escorting Convoy Hx 127 eastbound from Halifax. Some 57 merchant ships were in the group bound for Liverpool, with the most common cargoes being, oil, aviation spirit, lubricants, gasoline, lumber, grain, steel, sugar, scrap iron, and pig iron. Two ships carried general cargo, and there were single ships carrying molasses, trucks and cereal. Other escort vessels were designed to meet a submarine menace, and included a modern Canadian destroyer, HMCS Ottawa, the Indian navy sloop, RIN Sutlej, an ex-US Navy obsolete destroyer, HMS Salisbury, an escort destroyer, HMS Hambledon, corvettes HMS Larkspur, HMS Begonia and several other smaller ships. If anything Ramillies would have been a liability dealing with submarines. She was there as insurance against attack by surface raiders.

If Ramillies had to face a major surface attack, the two destroyers were probably the only escorts of value to her.

The new German battleship Bismarck broke out into the North Atlantic after sinking the battlecruiser HMS Hood, Britain's largest warship, in the Battle of the Denmark Strait. Ramillies was well east of Newfoundland to the southwest of Bismarck, and if Bismarck had continued its raid, Ramillies was all that the Royal Navy had to stop it from ravaging the sealanes off North America. On 24 May 1941 the Admiralty ordered Ramillies to leave the convoy and steam on a course to intercept the enemy ship. The Bismarck sustained some damage in the action against the Prince of Wales, and opted to make for France for repairs, instead of continuing on a convoy raiding mission.

It was a measure of the desperate situation of the Royal Navy that such an old ship was sent out alone to intercept one of the world's most potent battleships supported by the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen. Fortunately for her, she was not put to the test.

Another typical assignment was to provide ocean escort to convoy HX 130, bound for Liverpool with 45 merchant ships. Ramillies joined the convoy just outside Halifax harbour at 1530 hours on 1 June 1941 and remained with the ships till 9 June at 53 30 north and 46 48 west, the mid-ocean meeting point, where an escort from Britain took over.