The last battle of the Bismarck changed the tides during World War II. The Bismarck was Germany’s most famous battleship during World War Two, and was sunk on May 27, 1941. The Bismarck had already sunk the battleship HMS Hood before being sunk herself. For many, the end of the Hood and Bismarck symbolized the end of the time when battleships were the dominant force in naval warfare, to be replaced by submarines and aircraft carriers and the advantages these ships gave to naval commanders.
The Bismarck weighed over 50,000 tons and about half of this weight was armor. This amount of armor gave the Bismarck many advantages in protection but it did not slow her down. It was able to go a speed of 29 knots in normal conditions. When launched in 1939, the Bismarck carried a vast array of weapons. The ship carried 8 15-inch guns, 12 5.9-inch guns, 16 4.1-inch Anti-Air guns, 16 20mm Anti-Air guns and 2 Adaro 96 aircraft. The Bismarck had a crew of 2,200 to make this vessel functional. In comparison this ship to the HMS Hood, which was built about 20 years prior, it weighed 44,600 tons. It was considerably faster than the Bismarck, reaching a maximum 32 knots. The ship did not need nearly as many men to make the ship functional and had a crew of 1,419. The Hood was launched in 1918 and was equipped with 8 15-inch guns, 12 5.5-inch guns, 8 4 inch-AA guns, 24 2-pounder guns and 4 21-inch torpedoes. Even with all these advantages, the Hood had one major problem; it did not have the same amount of armor as the Bismarck. Within two minutes of being hit by the Bismarck, the Hood had broken her back and sunk.
On May 18, 1941, the Bismarck and the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen secretly escaped out of the Baltic port of Gdynia to attack allied convoy...
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...e attack had hurt the Bismarck. Through the night, the Bismarck was annoyed by destroyers under the command of Captain Vian.
The destroyers followed the Bismarck and sent her position back to the Norfolk. On May 27th at 08.47, the Rodney opened fire on the Bismarck. At 08.48, the King George V followed. The Bismarck tried to fire back but a salvo from the Rodney took out the two forward gun turrets. By 10.00 all the Bismarck’s main guns had been destroyed and her mast had vanished. By 10.10, all her secondary guns had been destroyed and the Bismarck sat in the water like a sitting duck. At 10.15, Tovey ordered the Dorsetshire to finally sink the Bismarck with its torpedoes. Three of the torpedoes were fired at the Bismarck causing massive amounts of damage. She sank into the ocean at 10.40. Out of a crew of 2,200, there were only 110 survivors and 4 were officers .
The USS Indianapolis was a heavy cruiser. She did not have heavy armor which made her vulnerable to torpedo attacks. She had been ordered to sail on July 16, 1945, to deliver a bomb that would end the war. Unfortunately, it sank before it arrived.
... Harbour on 19 February: in total, 45 Allied warships and merchant vessels were in the harbour at the time of the raids. The warships included the United States Navy destroyer and seaplane tender . The RAN ships in port were the sloops and, corvettes and, auxiliary minesweepers and, patrol boat Coongoola, depot ship, examination vessel, lugger, and four boom-net ships. Several USN and Australian troop ships were in the harbour along with a number of merchant vessels of varying sizes. Most of the ships in the harbour were anchored near each other, making them an easy target for air attack. In addition to the vessels in port, the American Army supply ships Don Isidro and, Philippine vessels acquired as part of the South West Pacific Area command's permanent Army fleet earlier in February, were near Bathurst Island bound for the Philippines on the morning of the raid.
With World War II lasting six years, there were many battles that had taken place. Three major events that are famous from this war are D-day, Pearl Harbor and Battle of Iwo Jima. D-day, which is where Saving Private Ryan begins, is known as the largest amphibious attack in history. Before the attack could take place though there was a lot of planning done. In months before the attack, General Dwight Eisenhower led allies in an operation to make Germany believe that their main target of invasion was Pas-de-Calais, along with a few other locations. The operation that led Germany to believe this was carried out by fake equipment, a phantom army located in England, counterfeit radio transmissions, and double agents. Once Eisenhower knew Germany was mislead, he led the troops into battle. This attack began with British, American, and Canadian forces landing on five different beaches all along the coast of Normandy on June 6, 1944. By the end of the first day approximately 156,000 al...
...ater, the British still held their ground, though it continued to mist and the shelling was more constant. A 5.9 shell flying over his head, Blunden and his men began exploring the trench they were in, and they managed to find an intact listening set. Perceiving from the continuous shell blast that a full-scale attack would soon be made upon them, Blunden telephoned an SOS to the artillery; a reply was sent that they could offer no help as their headquarters had recently been attacked and had thirty dead and wounded.
“The Battle of the Bulge, fought over the winter months of 1944 – 1945, was the last major Nazi offensive against the Allies in World War Two. The battle was a last ditch attempt by Hitler to split the Allies in two in their drive towards Germany and destroy their ability to supply themselves” (Trueman).
After the first couple hundred troops went off the tanks and vehicles came off. This created space for the onboard medical personnel to make the boat a hospital. The ship was shooting at the enemies from the top and shot the mine bombs which helped a lot. The crew were supplying medical treatment and food to the soldiers. Everybody on the ship were fighting for their lives and were going a 110 percent like this was the last thing they were going to do which was a big reason Sword beach the Allied powers
The two participants, SS Mont-Blanc and the Norwegian ship SS Imo were both doing their part for the war effort, the former transporting explosives to the Western Front, the latter helping the Belgian refugees. The two ships met in the harbour of Halifax, Nova Scotia. It was the early morning of 6th December 1917, and just before 9 am, a small collision at 1 mph speeds occurred between the two. This collision, despite its scale, ignited benzole fastened to the deck of Mont-Blanc.
World War II was filled with turning points, including Midway, El Alamein, and Moscow. Stalingrad, however, was not simply a turning point. It was the decisive battle of the most violent and destructive war ever fought. It is a fitting testament to the importance of Stalingrad that General Chuikov, the tough-as-nails commander of the 62nd Army that defended the city, would later lead his men in the final battle of the European war, the assault on Berlin.
The Germans did great damage, and they sunk many of the British merchant ships, (see appendix 1) and if this battle had not been declared, Britain would have been in a very bad situation. Britain was once the world’s largest ship-building nations, and they could easily replace the ships that were sunk but, soon they were not able to keep up with the damage that the German...
Von Der Porten, Edward P. The German Navy in World War II. New York: Thomas Y.
The battle of Stalingrad may have very well been the most important battle over the course of World War II. Not necessarily remembered for its course of fighting, the battle is more known for its outcome. Not only did the battle turn out to be a major turning point in the war, it may have saved most of Eastern Europe from incomparable destruction. The battle included two of the biggest political and military icons of their time, Stalin and Hitler.
“The situation is grave… (and) is created by the German program [of building a battle fleet]… When that program is completed, Germany, a great country close to our shore, will have a fleet of thirty three dreadnaughts”
“Nice and silent alright boys, don’t draw too much attention.”The elite troopers snuck through a back door killing all Germans in sight. After an hour of silent killings the Canadian Elite paratroopers freed enough men to make a new army. The same can not be said for Thomas now leading an armada of destroyers, corvettes and submarines based on a German design, he wanted to attract as much attention to draw the Germans away from the prisons. After two month of fight at sea the allies broke through the naval defences and landed in France. Having surrounded the coastal defences from front and behind the battle lasted only a short week. During the next 5 months Canadian troops lead the way as the allies tore through the European main land Wiping out any German defences. Jaxson and Thomas stopped only 5 miles from the capital of Germany, Berlin. The western allies waited 4 months for the USSR to open an eastern front. Finally on January 20th 1950 the Russian red army bombarded the German eastern front. Thomas and Jaxson heard about it the next day rushed to launch their western push. The Two sides met in Berlin on January 31 1950. They traced Hitler to a bunker under the city. Thomas and Jaxson stood in front of a bunker where Hitler was hiding in. Three days passed, nothing happen. On the fourth day the sound of two gun shots marked the end of Hitler's rule. He and his doctor
World War II was coming to an end in 1945. During the WWII and postwar many important events took place, however, there is one historical event that occurred towards the end of the war. An event that has not been talked about till decades after it happened. We are all familiar with the sinking of the Titanic and thousands of lives that were lost the day the ship sunk. A similar event took place in the Baltic Sea in 1945 of a ship called Gustloff. The sinking is considered to be one of the deadliest marine tragedies ever to happen in the world. The author of Crabwalk, Gunter Grass was one of the few authors who shed light on the sinking of Gustloff through the stories of the fictional character Tulla Pokrefke, a survivor of the ship. The little
Thunderous booms and bangs sounded the evening of February 15, 1898. The battleship Maine exploded on the harbors in Havana, Cuba. Panicky passengers scurried frightened to safety, while some remained trapped, helplessly, with no possible escape. Startled survivors searched for crew members and friends. The battleship which detonated into several pieces sank to the ocean floor dragging rapt wounded and dead. Two-hundred and sixty-six of the three-hundred and fifty-five officers, crew members, sailors, and Marines on board died or drowned in the explosion or shortly after suffering from injuries or shock.