Ralph’s second convoy experience, in 1941, also had its moments of terror. Ralph was on duty on the 8pm to midnight watch near Iceland when the captain said to him, “I’m off to bed. It looks nice and quiet.” Ralph noticed a glow on the port bow. At first he thought it was a moonrise, but it wasn’t: it was a tanker torpedoed and in flames 1,000 feet high. This was one of the victims of Nazi U-boat captain Otto Kretschmer, the notorious German “Sea Wolf”. During this U-boat attack, Ralph saw “a ring of burning ships-- at least ten vessels were sunk.” Then there came to his ears a curious scraping sound. There were no reefs in the Atlantic, and his ship was fourth in line in the convoy, so they could not have run over debris from a sub attack. What had caused the noise then? A few minutes later, there was a loud “whoompf” noise, and the tanker lifted into the air. It had been damaged by a U-boat surfacing too soon after tying to get underneath the tanker to the other side of the convoy “in search of easy pickings,” laughed Ralph. Their ship sustained no observable damage, and managed to make it to England, but at reduced speed. The fourth engineer confessed his nerves were “shot” during the engagement.
As for “Sea Wolf” Kretschmer, his luck ran out not long after. On March 17, 1941, his U-boat 99, crippled by a depth charge from a Royal Navy vessel, was forced to surface, and his subsequent capture meant he was sent to POW camp in Bowmanville, Ontario, where he was to cool his heels until his release in December 1947. He had sent some 40 ships and 46,000 tons of shipping-- and a great number of hapless men-- to the bottom of the sea. Ralph had felt helpless during this attack on the convoy, and morale among the crew was low next morning, as the convoy had sustained heavy losses, but over the radio came a BBC announcer’s voice reporting that two U-boats had been sunk. “We got two of the bastards!” was then the exultant cry, and morale dramatically improved.
Ralph wanted to make a number of points about convoys during the Battle of the Atlantic.
He attended one of the convoy planning conferences, under false pretences, in Halifax before the ships left. Had his imposture been detected, it would have ensured he would be “sent to the brig.” He substituted for his captain, then the worse for drink, by wearing a uniform his rank did not entitle him to, but his deception was not discovered. Perhaps by re-telling this story he was making a point about a lack of security. He did say that the meeting he attended was made up of “tired businessmen,” and perhaps it was. It took a long time to line ships up to form a convoy. Sailors slept in their clothes, with greatcoat and sea boots ready to hand as this was essential in an emergency. Orders were then passed on by signal flags, and ‘zig-zagging’ to evade submarines if any were in the immediate vicinity, a ‘cumbersome’ process, as a course change for lumbering merchant shipping had to be executed every 20 minutes. Two convoys were sometimes sent, one after the other, 40 miles apart, with cruisers and battleships sailing back and forth between them for protection. Once a huge battleship appeared out of the mist one afternoon, a behemoth bristling with huge guns “sticking out on all sides like a porcupine.”
