"Lieutenant General, 15 enemy ships, seem to be turning into double-row columns."

On June 11, at 48 a.m., the radar of the battlecruiser "Hood" heading south appeared oncoming German fleet suddenly changed from a single column to a double column.

"Lieutenant General, one of the columns is coming towards us!"

Two minutes later, the radar officer reported loudly again.

"That's a destroyer detachment," said Lieutenant General Holland calmly, "the Germans may not have the radar as good as ours, so they need destroyers to flares."

Now Britain has a fire control radar code-named "Type 284", which was installed on the "Hood" and the "Prince of Wales" in March 1941. Therefore, these two warships can fire at night without the help of flares.

However, Germany's radar is slightly worse and cannot act as a fire-controlled radar. However, using the 22 radar for searching, the approximate location of the enemy ship can be determined, and then the light cruiser and destroyer can be used to illuminate the flares.

"Let the Edinburgh, Electra, Echo, Adventure and Cossack form a formation to exchange fire with the enemy's destroyers."

Lieutenant General Holland immediately adjusted his arrangement and sent a light cruiser and three destroyers to block the Germans' destiny formations and flares.

The four British ships quickly drove out of the queue and formed a formation, and then rushed to the formation of six German ships at a height of 32 knots. The six German ships were the "Berlin", "Vienna", 13, 14, 15 and 16.

The first exchange of fire broke out between these 4 British and 6 German ships.

The first one to fire was the S-class "Vienna", which hit the flares over the British light cruiser "Edinburgh" that rushed in the front. Then the "Edinburgh" also fired a flare, illuminating the "Vienna" that did not have a fire control radar on the British light cruiser and destroyer at this time.

Immediately afterwards, the "Edinburgh" and "Vienna" became living targets to attract shells. The unfortunate thing was that the German "Vienna" was hit by 4 6-inch shells and 3 4-inch shells in less than 5 minutes. The hull caught fire in many places and had to withdraw from the battle under the cover of the smoke released by the destroyer. The situation of the British "Edinburgh" was much better. It was a "10,000-ton light patrol". Although the main gun was only 6 inches in diameter, it had as many as 12 and its armor was relatively strong. Therefore, it was still not a big deal to be hit by several German 15 shells. After repelling the "Vienna", it aimed the muzzle at the 78-ton "Berlin".

At the same time, the confrontation between the battleship and the heavy cruiser also began! The first one was the "Hood". When the "Hood" approached the main formation of the German ship, Lieutenant General Holland ordered the fire. The target was the first battleship of the German ship formation, Lieutenant General Holland, believed that it was a battleship, but in fact it was the "Prince Eugen" heavy cruiser. After the "Hood" opened fire, the "Prince of Wales" also opened fire. Its shooting target was the second battleship of the German ship formation. The British also believed that its battleship, but in fact it was the "Luzov" heavy cruiser.

Major General Erich Bay made an unexpected and strange formation, with two heavy cruisers in front, and the battleship of the "Gneisenno" ranked third in the column. As a result, both the "Hood" and the "Prince of Wales" were fooled, treating the two heavy cruisers as opponents.

While the British fleet opened fire, Major General Erich Bey ordered the fleet to turn 2 degrees left to seize the leading position. His formation now ran out of the 32.5 knots, while the British fleet could only maintain a 28 knots flight. Although the "Houd" ran out of 29 knots in the sea test after the last overhaul, considering the age of the "Houd", no one dared to let it use its strength.

Long before the naval battle, the generals and elite staff of the British Royal Navy had studied ways to deal with German fast warships. According to the Royal Navy's artillery expert, Lieutenant General Hotworth, who once served as the captain of the USS Hood, and Lieutenant Holland, the current captain of the USS Hood. When confronting the German fast battleship, Hood should use the bow to face the enemy, so as to minimize the area of ​​ammunition as much as possible, and then turn to swing the power of all the main guns after the distance between the two sides is close. At the same time, the thickest side armor can be used to fight the enemy to avoid the weak deck being hit vertically by the enemy's 38 shells.

To be fair, this set of tactics is very suitable for the British fleet battleship, which is slower but has relatively strong firepower and thick enough armor, but the Hood is a battleship cruiser with thin skin and large filling. However, Holland still adopted this set of tactics today. Faced with the turn of the main fleet of the German fleet, the "Houd" and the "Prince of Wales" chose to have a full impact. Therefore, the German fleet successfully seized the leading position.

When the two sides were about 18 meters apart, the fast cruiser Prague in the German fleet fired a flare, and the flare landed accurately around the Hood, covering the battlecruiser, which was as huge as a mountain, in a dazzling white light.

Then the six 38 main guns of the Gneiseno, Prince Eugen and 16 main guns of the "Luzov" opened fire at the same time. All 22 cannons were aimed at the Hood that rushed in the front, while the Hood and Prince of Wales could only fight back with four 15-inch cannons and six 14-inch cannons at the bow.

When the German battleships and heavy cruisers opened fire, Lieutenant General Holland realized that he had just shot the wrong target. He quickly ordered the "Hood" and the "Prince of Wales" to re-target the "Gneisenno" and opened fire. At this moment, a shell from the "Prince of Eugen actually hit the "Hood".

The bounce point was an anti-aircraft artillery shell storage box on the starboard deck. These ammunition storage boxes installed outside the armored deck were hit during the battle of the 1939 "Scharnhorst". Afterwards, during the overhaul of the "Hood", some ammunition boxes were transferred to the bottom of the deck. However, due to the increasing threat of German air force, many anti-aircraft guns had to be temporarily installed. The ammunition boxes of these anti-aircraft guns were installed on the deck. As a result, they were hit again this time, and the ammunition explosion and fire were also caused.

Lieutenant General Holland called out "Oops". Now it's a night battle. If someone gets on fire, he will become a living target for sucking shells? In this case, it will be inconvenient to escape!

"Order the rescue of the damage and immediately extinguish the fire." Lieutenant General Holland paused, and then issued another order: "The whole team turned left and headed 28 degrees!"

He felt that he could no longer get close to the other party and was preparing to keep his formation parallel to the German fleet. But at this moment, the shells from "Prince Eugen" hit the "Hood" again, and the huge vibration caused by the explosion of the shell caused the 284 fire-control radar of the "Hood" to malfunction. Without the fire-control radar, Holland could only order the "Hood" to fire the flares. However, before the flares were fired, the "Gneisenno" fired a "cross-fire" at the "Hood".

"Damn!" Lieutenant General Holland took a deep breath, "Fall" means the landing point of the shells slept in front, back and forth, left and right of the ship. This shows that the enemy ship's firepower has "catched" the "Hood", and when to hit it is a matter of chance.

Moreover, the Gneisenno has now replaced the 38 main guns. If the Hood is given a gift, it will be a big problem.

Lieutenant General Holland had already developed the intention of retreating at this time. His mission was originally to lure the enemy. Now he has not lureed "Bismarck", but only lureed a "Gneisenno" to complete the mission.

So he ordered the fleet to turn left 2 degrees and prepare to turn around and escape. However, less than a minute after the order was issued, he ran to the 10,000-ton light patrol "Edinburgh" north of the "Hood". Suddenly, a news that scared him was heard: an unknown fleet appeared 25 nautical miles north, with two hulls, and was about to move south!

There were actually two German ships in the north! Hollander suddenly had a premonition of being doomed. He now knew that there was a German battleship south of him, the Gneisenno with only 6 cannons. Then the remaining two "Bismar" mostly went around the north and south. Now it happened to attack the Gneisenno from north to south!

"Turn right 25 degrees!" Lieutenant General Holland, who was a little desperate, ordered a turn again. This time he would not go north and break through to the southwest.

"Telephone the Nelson to inform our fleet that it is in a tough battle. Please go south to reinforce immediately!"

Then Lieutenant General Holland ordered the radio station to ask for help for the "Nelson" telegram. Now the fleet with the "Nelson" flagship is less than 6 nautical miles away from the Shetland Islands. After driving faster, you can arrive in three hours...

Unfortunately, the Hood didn't have 3 hours to wait.

Due to the back and forth turn, the firepower of the "Hood" and "Prince of Wales" was not fully utilized, and the German ship formation on the opposite side was still intact, while the distance between the two ships was soon approaching about 13 meters from the German ship formation. At this time, the fire on the "Hood" was still not extinguished and became a good target in the dark.

At 1:15 am on June 11, the Gneiseno made the first round of volleys, while the Prince Eugen and the Lüzov made their 18th and 16th round of volleys. One of the three ships hit the Hood almost at the same time, and all hit the deck. Among them, a 38-based main gun shell fired by the Gneiseno hit the lifeboat deck at the rear of the mainmast of the Hood.
Chapter completed!