In April 1940
Bomber command were asked to commence laying magnetic mines in the North Sea
and was the fruition of a project that the Admiralty had been developing since
1936. By June 1939 the first orders were arriving at the Admiralty and the Air
staff requested thirty units to be placed at their disposal to be test dropped
by torpedo bombers and a conference proposed to discuss the application and
effect of the mine on warfare. The outbreak of the war delayed any response
from the Admiralty but when they did finally contact the air ministry they were
very optimistic about the deployment and potential informing them that 170
units would be available for the Fleet Air Arm and Bomber command to drop by
the summer of 1940.
Ever concerned by neutral opinion it
was deemed necessary that they would alert the Germans and other nations of the
vague area of the mine field so as to tie in with The Hague convention which
was clear that all naval mines had to remain attached to their moorings in
charted fields but as magnetic mines didn’t have moorings they were not specifically
covered. The Admiralty liased closely with the Foreign office on how to proceed
and were advised to avoid all neutral countries’ territorial waters even if
unrecognised or disputed and to give four days’ notice so that they could with
all of their embassies in the target area with enough time to give forty-eight hours’
notice. Similarly, the Admiralty would alert the BBC who would put out a notice
at the same time as the Foreign office. All of this required the Air Ministry
to give the Admiralty a week’s notice of the planned operation.
Projections were made stating that the
British would need to lay some 4636 mines using a total of eight squadrons
laying some 460 per month in home waters, the Middle and Far East theatres if
Italy and Japan were to join Germany. There was however a major problem with
the mine’s deployment with the Air Staff revealing to the Naval staff on 19
September that Coastal command’s bombers, the Bristol Beaufort (the Blenheim’s
stable mate) and Blackburn Botha were not entirely up to the task with the
Botha’s range not extending past the Kiel canal and no other aircraft really
suited to deploy it although tests on the upcoming Stirling and Halifax were
being carried out. Another problem was that the mine’s mechanism was not really
designed to withstand the impact on the water following an air drop and tests
were undertaken with only a fuzing attachment to the torpedo dropping mechanism
was added to both aircraft to rectify things. As an interim measure Coastal
command did some tests using the obsolete Vickers Wellesley and found that they
could drop the mines at 200 feet at a speed of 167 mph and that it had the
range to be effective but in the same conversation they also stated there were
no Wellesley squadrons in Britain and that the ministry had already decided the
mines had to be dropped from no less than 500 feet and that they would continue
to search for an adequate aircraft.
By 1 December the Admiralty had
perfected their trials and had set about having the outer casing of the mine
strengthened to withstand the drop but they were optimistic that drops could
now be achieved with production set at 80 in February, 180 in March and then
100 per month until the bulk order of some 980 were ready in November with this
figures unalterable.
The RAF had also developed a variant
of the mine which, although not as effective as the original it could be
dropped by Bomber Command aircraft without much modification. The Air ministry
also advised that the best conditions for delivery of these bombs would be on
moonlit nights with longer nights in the winter. A compromise was reached with
the decision to have a massive concerted effort on the seven nights in April
with the hoped result of total disruption of German shipping with the primary
target being the Kiel fjord and the Elbe estuary with secondary targets at the
Jade and Ems estuaries.
Yet another problem was to rock the
project as the number of Beauforts, only fourteen aircraft in
 |
| Coastal Command's Bristol Beaufort |
March, meant that
the operation had to be pushed back until June when forty would be available or
convert the project to Hampdens of which seventy-two were available in February
and projections of up to one hundred and fifty by June. The mines had to have
their tail pieces refitted with drogues to allow them to be dropped from 500
feet at a Hampden’s cruising speed.
Maurice Strefton of 49 Squadron
described the approach:
one had to come down to three hundred feet to put
the mine down. Not only for accuracy but you had to come down to the level
because if it was dropped too high the mine would disintergrate but at three
hundred feet it would hit the water and settle softly to the bottom of the
canal or sea. (1)
On the 3 February the Air Ministry
wrote to the Admiralty to inform them that the Beauforts range of 350 miles
when loaded may not be adequate to reach the target areas some 410 miles away
but that the Hampden could, thought it could not go beyond Swinemunde
scuppering the Admiralty’s hope of mining as far afield as Danzig!
Careful planning and coordination
between Coastal Command and the Ministry outlined target areas, landmarks and
possible enemy opposition in W.A.15 which was originally issued to Coastal
Command on 19 February. The prime targets areas were set with practicable
locations being the Scheleswig coast to the Fehmarn Belt and from the Cadet
Channel to Cap Arkona, with another off Peerd point, Ragen Island to the German
coast no further than the 16˚ Meridian. The crews were briefed to drop their
mines away off the coasts and out of sight of lighthouses, flak ships and any
other landmarks so that the white impact splashes would not be observed by the
light of the moon however the bombers should avoid coming between the moon and
the shore so to avoid being silhouetted and observed. Operations should only be
carried out by moonlight except in cases where features and landmarks were easy
to locate in the dark.
The predictions for loss were
considered to be manageable with only those aircraft that were operating close
to shorelines and harbours that might be detected and intercepted. The line of
attack should be carried out at low level to avoid RDF detection and the idea
of diversionary attacks were also suggested but these would need to be
coordinated carefully.
The implementation date was pushed to
April as the two Coastal Command squadrons were being converted to Beauforts
and the Hampden squadrons on loan would require intensive training in
navigation and pinpoint accuracy drops at low level with the seven-day moon
period in March was considered to be ideal. The operation or “Gardening”
missions were to put the maximum amount of aircraft and mines out on the first
night and as many available on the following nights with the aim of planting a
patch thoroughly within a week.
As late as the 11 March Coastal
Command were still unhappy about the target areas suggested by the ministry
warning that some were deeper than the five fathoms prerequisite and they also
appraised that it would be better if a small force of highly trained pilots
mined smaller areas accurately rather than an airfleet of semi trained crews
attempting to mine a wider area poorly. The Air Ministry were anxious to get on
with the mission and though it understood Coastal Command’s concerns they felt
that even if inaccurate, a wider field would be more damaging to shipping and
the mines wouldn’t be dropped in the shallows as they might be recovered by the
Germans intact. A further set back to the use of Hampdens came on 8 March at a
joint Navy and Airforce Technical branch meeting where it was revealed that the
parachute fitted to the mine was not adequate to be dropped at the required 200
mph. Not wanting to go off “half cock” with the small amount of Beauforts
available the Ministry and Admiralty decided to postpone until they had a
suitable replacement. Luckily a chute under development at Woolwich for star
shells was tested at Farnborough the following week to much success.
With the parachutes now working, two
squadrons, 49 and 83 were loaned to Coastal Command and training programme was
instituted whilst tests were carried out at Pembroke docks to register splash
visibility using oil drums full of sand. Further tests were carried out using a
concrete dummy which weighed closer to the 1500 lb of the real mines. The major
concern was that the white splash of the mine’s impact on the sea would be seen
reflected in the moonlight.
Mine production was still nowhere near
adequate levels and a further 3000 units were ordered on top of the previous
980 as the proposed operations in Arpil would consist of one squadron of
Beauforts and six squadrons of Hampdens! The Air Ministry allocated 200 mines
with 155 going to the Hampden squadrons and the Admiralty providing personnel
to advise mine handling at each airfield.
With the final preparations completed
the orders were sent out to the squadrons that Kiel, Elbe and Lubesck should be
prioritised with thirty-eight mines each carried out by the Hampdens of Bomber
Command. The two Commands should
coordinate on the best time to carry out the attack and not let the weather
interfere too much. If the Baltic weather was unsuitable then the North Sea
must be attempted and vice versa. The operation must go on. After exhaustive
reconnaissance of the areas it was decided to drop mines on Schillig Roads and
Kiel Fjord on clear moonless nights as well where possible.
The signal to begin came through on 8
April with Coastal Command scheduled to begin on the 12/13 April at Schilling
Roads and Elbe hoping to catch returning German warships who had been engaged
in Norway but bad weather cancelled it. The Hampdens made their first raid the
following night operating from bases at
Scampton, Hemswell and Waddington.
Each area mined was given a letter
with a corresponding vegetable such as Yams for the Jade estuary (Y) with mines
being referred to as “vegetables” bit it wasn’t the only duty for the aircraft
as on the 26 April it was requested that returning aircraft should machine gun
the Luftwaffe’s seaplane bases around the Heligoland Bight to try and alleviate
the pressure placed on British shipping in the Thames estuary from the German’s
mining operations.
The Admiralty’s Fleet Arm Swordfish of
815 squadron were also brought in to assist the proves of mining with their
first Gardening operation in the Wester Ems on 27 April. The lion’s share of
the planting was done by the Hampdens who dropped 109 in the Elbe, Kiel canal
and other targets but fog had interfered and operations after the 25 April had
to be cancelled.
The Beauforts were temporarily
withdrawn from Gardening for operations against Stavangar and against the
German fleet or the liners SS Europa
and SS Bremen which had been used to
transfer Wehrmacht units to Norway. Four of the Beauforts were permanently
detached for anti-shipping operations from 4 May with the rest of 22 Squadron
returning to Gardening operations.
May saw plans for the expansion of
these missions with production of mines reaching four hundred per month with
the parachute production expected to keep up and a greater expectation on the
air crews being able to operate on clear starlight nights as well as the moon
phase. So optimistic were the Admiralty that they wanted more aircraft to take
part where they and excess stores of mines were available. Studies were made of
German losses in the fields already “planted”, areas which had been swept by
the Kriegsmarine’s units and new fields were looked at with reconnaissance
reports scrutinised in depth as to their suitability. With German military
policy being active in maritime operations with Wesserung and threatening the
Low Countries the Admiralty, whose ships were held down with other duties
believed that mining German waters was the best course of action to slow German
movements. Through April eleven vessels had been sunk including eight German,
one train ferry and two unknown vessels and a further five damaged. The RAF and
Admiralty were reliant on foreign news agencies and sources but with the German
invasion of Holland these sources quickly dried up leaving them almost blind as
to what damage had been caused. There were no reports from the Jade and Wesser
estuaries as the German press understandably kept news of any sinkings quite.
By June reports came back that a total of fourteen German vessels (including
two minesweepers) and ten neutral vessels had been successfully mined but there
might have been more, whilst further news came in that Deflziji had to close
and the Kriegsmarine ordered to sweep the area taking four days seriously
disrupting traffic to the Ruhr and costing two vessels. The Kiel canal was also
closed to neutral shipping with all marine lighting west of 12˚ 25 ‘E were
switched off and Finnish shipping agents raising insurance by fifty percent for
all ships going to Germany from the 23 April whilst one of their shipping lines
suspending all routes to their ally because of the danger posed by the mines.
Following the fall of France and the
commencement of Operation Seelöwe the Gardening
 |
| Bomber Command's Hampdens |
operations became even more
important with the Admiralty even proposing mining British ports and estuaries
to dry them to the German invaders. This would be solely a Coastal Command
operation as the Hampdens would be ear marked with trying to intercept the
invasion fleet in the channel or attack French ports. It was a situation that
Coastal Command were unable to deal with as their Beauforts were undergoing
engine replacements and they requested assistance from the Fleet Air Arm for
any suitable aircraft should the situation arise.
Until that time however operations
were expanded to include Dunkirk and Boulogne as well as East Scheldt and Maas
Delta all of which were planted on the 26 June and between 3 and 5 July
respectively. Bomber Command requested that they be completely relieved from Gardening
missions through August in favour of active bombing campaign against the
multitude of German targets but this was overruled by the Admiralty and the Air
Ministry with a limited operation of six aircraft being retained. The Admiralty
believed that keeping up the pressure by the constant laying of mines would not
give the Germans time to overhaul their minesweepers but a grateful Admiralty
did send a telegram of thanks to the minelaying squadrons who by the end of
August had laid 780 mines with almost two thirds of those carried out by the
Hampden squadrons.
All operations were suspended for
tests to the mines in early September and again in the middle of the month as
the Admiralty were concerned about the mines interfering with the fleet’s manoeuvres
but Le Havre (the Anemones patch) was first mined by 812 squadron’s Swordfish
because of the large concentration of invasion barges and small support craft
that was building up in the port whist a detachment of 42 Squadron’s Blenheims
mined the area off Lorient. In October the bombers only mined one new area in
the east of Scheldt near Terneusen by the Swordfish of 812 who laid the
throughout the month. The area, like Le Havre was a major artery for invasion
barges and traffic which was coming through the Terneuzen - Ghent Canals. On 23
November though the Admiralty had requested that the RAF no longer concentrate
on the lines of communication and distribution along the Dutch and Belgian
coasts but to concentrate on the German base ports themselves with the top
catogary of targets being Kiel and Baltic ports, Elbe, Jade and Ems Rivers,
Brest, Lorient and Gironde river with the invasion ports and Seine estuary
falling to the lowest catogary which were only to be mined if specifically
ordered. The Admiralty believed that the more important the base the more
resources would be expended to sweep and keep the sea lanes open. They also
believed that one raid on each port laying twenty-four mines would be
sufficient to cover all the targets with 336 for Class A, 156 for Class B and
48 for Class C with none for D unless specifically called to do so. This figure
was currently well above the best of previous operations but the Admiralty,
although accepting that there was a shortage of aircraft and crews with other duties
often taking priority but they also appraised the crews as having become
experts and more precise in their accuracy and with mine production at a steady
700 units per month there would still be a monthly surplus.
The Air Ministry were sceptical about
the ability of their squadrons to carry out the Admiralty’s projections and
their own forecasts showed that five squadrons of sixteen aircraft would be
needed to be able to meet the demand. With Coastal Command not having enough
aircraft it meant that they would either have to call on Bomber command to
assist regularly or to permanently allocate three bomber squadrons to Coastal
Command so as to alleviate Bomber Command of massed Gardening operations but
effectively cutting into their established numbers. The Deputy Chief of Air
Staff believed that;
The effect of our mining has been an outstanding
contribution to our war effort. Had we the means it might have already proved a
decisive factor in the Sea War. It may still do so. 2
He continued to opine that they needed
to maintain their size of force and also suggested that the Expansion and
re-equipment Policy Committee should allow the allocation of some of the newer
Manchester and Stirling bombers which could range as far as the Baltic and
would give these aircraft an easy test operation for range and acclimatisation
of crews without coming across serious opposition.
Although Bomber Command’s Hampdens
were still doing the majority of the sorties through October and November they
were going down in number (63 in October and 55 in November) which alarmed the
Admiralty who were keen to up the pressure on Axis submarine ports at Lorient
and Bordeux as well as the Kiel Canal which was used by U-boats and the Bismarck and the Tirpitz when they were commissioned. The Air Ministry responded on
Boxing Day 1940 saying that they would make new aircraft and crews available to
the mining operations where appropriate.
Bomber Command were anxious to use
their aircraft on an active campaign against German industry and Oil and were
suffering losses in this campaign which meant less aircraft were available for
Gardening. Adverse weather also made the operations through the winter of 1940
difficult and it was hoped that when the bigger, heavier four-engine bombers
became available they would be able to carry three or five mines which would
greatly assist in reaching the Admiralty’s quota. This was agreed by the
Expansion and re-equipment Policy committee on 19 December with 7 Squadron’s
Stirlings and 207 Squadron’s Manchesters which would release the Hampdens back
to bombing operations. Bomber Command reported that a Stirling’s maximum
payload was six mines but for optimum range they would carry three whilst the
Manchester carried five which meant that Coastal Command could utilise one such
squadron and meet the Admiralty’s quota with ease and plant a whole patch in a
single sortie.
On 19 December mining operations in
the Channel recommenced with a new type of mine fitted with a steriliser which
gave the mine an operational life of six weeks rather than a year which meant
that the Admiralty could operate without worrying about sailing into their own
minefields but still keep up pressure on the Germans who, it was hoped might
believe the old patches were “safe” and start using them again. The old type
mines were still “planted” in the Seine and introduced to Dieppe and St Malo
where as the steriliser fitted mines were introduced to the Channel ports of
Boulogne, Calais, Zeebrugge, Dunkirk, Le Havre and Flushing, however these new
mines were not properly introduced until April 1941.
In December Coastal Command’s seconded
Swordfish of 812 squadron mined an area off Brest that the Hampdens had mined
in August and October and in the Seine estuary on the 8 December. The patches
were still ever changing with the Channel still closed and with German Flak
batteries being deployed along estuaries and ports which had to be avoided.
Following the October mining in the approaches to Brest the field flight path’s
had to be changed to avoid the strengthened German flak defences but still
being able to effectively mine the mouth of the harbour. The same was also true
for Lorient harbour. This attention to detail gave the crews a sense of
security and routine especially compared to missions over Germany and the
well-defended Naval bases at Kiel and Wilhelmshaven and they probably shared
Coastal Command’s evaluation:
Nowadays everyone treats Gardening in quite a
nonchalant way, except that there are one or two gardens in rather sticky
localities such as round the mouth of the Scheldt, and gardens off Brest. 3
The missions also gave opportunity for
the crews to fins other targets to strafe and bomb such as shipping or on rare
occaisions attacking the Luftwaffe;
As we
crossed over Cherbourg on the way home an aircraft passed us going in the
opposite direction with his navigation lights on. This must have been a Hun
which had been bombing England… At last, through the wecome beam of an enemy
searchlight, we identified it as a Dornier 17. Moreover, both pilots on board
seemed very happy, they had their full cockpit lights on…
In the rear both my bottom and top
guns slid slowly over to the starboard side and I told Mac to take careful aim.
Then counted slowly.
“one – two – Three,” and then yelled “Let him have it Mac!”
There was a quick staccato roar as all four guns belched out tracers and the
Dornier dived to the ground with one engine on fire. (4)
In the period of April-December 1940
it is estimated that 1243 mines had been laid of which 765 were laid by Bomber
Command. At the time it was believed that fifty ships measuring 108,860 tons.
Post War it was revealed by Lloyds that the figure was a lot higher standing at
120 ships measuring 111,163 tons were lost with a further eleven worth 31,190
tons, damaged by every type of mine. Of the aerial mines it is estimated that
86 ships, worth 82,983 tons, were sunk and a further ten (17,070 tons) were
damaged with around half of those being sunk by mines laid by the Hampdens in
the Kattogat Belts and western reaches of the Baltic. In the period between
April and November 1940 only XX Hampdens had been lost on Gardening operations
proving to be the safest operational sortie they carried out in the year.
There was a small descrepency with the
original Air Staff Memorandum (no. 60) giving credit to Bomber Command for
sinking four ships off the Dutch Islands which were in fact mined by Coastal
Command who exclusively mined the Dutch, Belgian and French coasts and the
Hampdens covering Brest, Germany and the Baltic.
On 10 January Bomber Command
instructed 5 Group that Gardening missions were only to be used for training
their crews for night operations and navigation which would release experienced
men for more essential Oil operations over Germany. As a gesture they did offer
that on nights that they were not able to conduct bombing missions that they
would release fifteen aircraft with trained crews. On the 25 January this was
ratified with Gardening missions only to be undertaken at the C-in-C’s
discretion for the training of fresh crews, by Stirlings and Manchesters as
part of the Squadron’s conversion process and trained Hampden crews when the
weather over Germany precluded bombing operations. This left Bomber command
with only the Oil targets in German y and the possibility of invasion ports and
vessels on the specific instruction of the Air Ministry.
Coastal Command were concerned at the
idea of untrained crews now carrying out their vital work and out of this
concern they pressed for one Hampden Squadron to be permenantly be assigned to
their Command. It was an understandable concern as simple mistakes could be
made which could invalidate the whole mission. Sgt Peter McDermott of 61
Squadron recalled his first flight;
We were caught in searchlights and flak started to
burst around us as I set course on our timed run of exactly forty six seconds.
“One, two, three” intoned Staff as the flak continued to rattle on the
fuselage. He got to about twenty when he said “I’m not sure of the count, Skip,
we had better go back and start again.” Came the roar from the experienced Les
Boot “Carry on, it’s twenty nine, thirty,”… On “Forty-six taken up again by the
navigator we dropped our mine. Euphoria We had struck our first blow against
the Reich. (5)
In a communique to the Air
Ministry on 13 February, Coastal Command expressed this concern especially
pointing out that with Bomber Command no longer operating there would be no
mines laid east of the Elbe which was where they were causing the most damage and
were causing problems for the Kriegsmarine’s larger vessels and it was further
questioned as to whether they would be able to reach the Admiralty’s proposed
quota. The Director of Naval Co-operation concurred and pressed for Bomber
Command to step up its effort rather than scale back.
The Air Ministry however did not agree
due to the more pressing issues faced by Bomber Command and declined the
request for a Hampden Squadron and that Bomber Command’s directive would stand
but assured Air Marshal Bowhill, the C-in-C of Coastal Command on the 5 March
that they would be reviewing the situation regularly.
Operations at the beginning of 1941
had already been sluggish and hampered by bad weather and with the removal of
the Hampdens only Coastal Command’s Beauforts and Swordfish of the Fleet Air
Arm but despite hard work they were unable to get anywhere near the Admiralty’s
quota. A back and forth for solutions was passed between the Admiralty and
Coastal Command with final approval for the riskier daylight operations and the
even riskier dropping mines in front of convoys as they cruised down the coast.
It was a dangerous manoeuvre which had been carried out with a modicum of
success on 22 April.
By 4 April Bomber Command were back in
the frame for further mining operations with the Admiralty keen to deploy
Gardens to stop invasion if Seelöwe looked iminant with the ports from the Ems
to Brest as possible targets as well as coastal convoy routes. Such a task was
well beyond the airforces already available and due to the nature of the
emergency and anti-invasion raid meant that Bomber Command would need to
prioritise it. This Air Ministry considered that mining the fleet of barges
would have more success than actually bombing them in “some cases” 6 and anti-invasion measures were in Bomber
Command’s remit of aims outlined in January.
The notion of high altitude drops as a
used by the Luftwaffe were discussed as a principle by the Air Ministry on the
1 May. The German mines were designed to explode if they struck land but act as
magnetic mines if in water. The Admiralty had noted the amount of extra precautions
they were having to take to watch for these attacks on ports and slim channels
and were hoping to do the same to the Germans. The Air Ministry were satisfied
that their equipment could carry out the task without modification but they
were concerned about the accuracy of the drops from 12,000 feet let alone doing
it whilst under fire from heavy flak emplacements around ports and estuaries at
night as well as raising the question of how severe would their casualties be?
Coastal Command were also worried that as British mines would not explode if
they hit the ground it might mean that they would be recoverable by the enemy
but the Admiralty dismissed this concern saying that the Germans had more than
likely already recovered the mines and cracked their operating system. The
Admiralty believed that Brest Harbour was already a small target and expected
inaccuracies though the Air Ministry believed that from the minimum height of
10,000 feet would lead to a fifty percent accuracy which would not be worth the
losses that would likely be incurred. Bomber Command concurred although
believed 12,000 feet was the minimum height and would prefer a mine without a drogue
or parachute. There was also a strong move to develop a mine similar to the
German model that acted as a bomb and at a conference on 1 July 1941 it was
agreed to start to develop such a mine.
The campagn through 1941 was carried
out by Coastal Command’s Beauforts and the Fleet Air Arm’s Swordfish causing
significant damage to the German shipping including the Sardinen which had to be beached to avoid sinking, a trawler was
lost and an 8000 tonne tanker damage causing the Haugesund to be closed for
five days and convoys diverted to the west of Farmoy island. The Admiralty had
also encouraged a campaign from Jade-Weser to Huibert Gat and to interdict the
heavy traffic between the Elbe and waters of Terschelling which allowed crews
to defer to a more general target zone if enemy resistance was too stiff over a
specific target zone.
By April until June Coastal Command
were concentrating their efforts on the French invasion ports and especially
Brest where the Battle cruisers Scharnhorst
and Gneisenau were anchored following
Operation Berlin and joined by the cruiser Prinz
Eugen following her aborted sortie with the Bismarck.
Following the 15 March Bomber Command
moved away from the Oil plan to deal directly with the threat posed by the
Kriegsmarine in the Battle of the Atlantic with their aircraft engaging in
bombing raids on Brest and along the French and German coasts including
assisting in minelaying. On the 8 April six Hampdens of 44 Squadron laid four
mines at Calais and bombed a submarine building for the loss of P/O Garley’s
Hampden but the nature of the Bomber’s changing role meant these raids were
intermittent with raids also directed towards Berlin the following night and
Bordeux the day after that!
By the end of June 1941 the two commands
had laid 708 mines with Bomber command laying 507 of them, mostly around Brest
and the Bay of Biscay where the Germans had established the U-Boatwaffe. In the
first six months of 1941 the Aerial Sea mines had claimed seventeen vessels
(23,604 tonnes) and a further six (8351 tonnes) damaged giving the overall
number of ships sunk as 103 (106,587 tonnes) and sixteen (25,421 tonnes)
damaged for the loss of fifty eight aircraft, forty one of them Hampdens. The
most successful month was September 1940 when sixteen vessels (14,448 tonnes)
were sunk.
Gardening would continue and was seen
as very successful with limited losses but they would now become part of Bomber
Command’s overall offensive against Hitler’s Navy.
1. IWM Sound archive number Maurice Strefton
2. Official History Vol II p. 332
3. Official History Vol II p. 334
4. G. Gibson Enemy Coast ahead p.104
5. M.
Postelthwaite “Hampden
squadrons of World War II: in Focus” p.38
6. Official
History Vol II p. 338
