_July 6, 1942 - The Norwegian Sea_

After a relatively quiet May and June, with nothing more than chasing shadows and seeing the odd German scout plane, we had received orders to screen convoy PQ 17, which departed from Hvalfjord on June 27th. The weather was lousy, with ice and fog, and we hoped that would keep the German planes grounded and the submarines submerged. Things started off badly, with a merchant ship suffering some kind of engine problem turning back, and they got worse, as three ships had to return to port after striking ice in the Denmark Strait.

On July 1, we left Seidisfjord, where we'd resupplied and re-fueled, in the company of HMS _London_, _Tuscaloosa_, _Wichita_, HMS _Norfolk_, along with _Rowan_ and seven Royal Navy destroyers. As we met the convoy, RFA _Gray Ranger_, one of the oilers, was damaged, and swapped places with another oiler, RFA _Aldersdale_, because _Gray Ranger_ would only be able to make eight knots and would have trouble in the heavy weather.

Things immediately got exciting for the fleet, with the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine attacking the convoy on July 2, but on the far side, away from our position in the screen. In the first attack by nine German torpedo bombers, we had no losses and radio reports had one German plane shot down. Submarines and planes pressed the attack, again, away from our screen position, but scored no hits until the morning of July 4, when SS _Christopher Newport_ was hit, and had to be scuttled.

At about that time, we departed our screen position and so we could refuel from _Aldersdale_. On our way to her, our forward lookout spotted a flight of six torpedo bombers which we engaged at long rage. They dropped torpedoes, but at such a distance that they were easily avoided. A short time later, we drove off a single torpedo bomber, and with several hard evasive maneuvers, avoided several dive bombers. One bomb hit about a hundred yards off the port side, which for me was just a little too close for comfort.

The all clear was given, and we secured from full battle stations and made for _Aldersdale_, but the Luftwaffe had other ideas. Our lookouts spotted a flight of two dozen Heinkel 111 torpedo bombers just as my radio sprang to life with urgent sighting calls from the merchants. Lieutenant Commander Gibbs ordered a hard turn to port to clear the convoy, and put ourselves between the Germans and the merchant ships.

As the German planes approached from the south, they split into two groups, both to starboard. We attacked the group on our starboard quarter at maximum range - about 10,000 yards, and kept firing until the torpedo bombers were at a point where our guns put convoy ships at risk of 'friendly fire'. At that point, we switched to the group off our bow and drove off all but one plane which managed to drop two torpedoes inside our screen. They, along with torpedoes launched at long range by the planes we'd driven off, missed. Unfortunately, the original group did not, gaining hits on SS _William Hooper_ and the Russian tanker _Azerbaidjan_.

Our gunners reported four planes damaged, but that was a singularly lousy trade for a merchantman and one of the convoy oilers. We did, finally, in a lull, manage to get refueled from _Aldersdale_, and made our way back to our screening position, feeling good for having prevented more than two losses, but regretting we couldn't stop the attacks completely. We'd just returned to our station, when about 1900, we got word that _Tirpitz_, a German battleship, was sortieing with the pocket battleship _Admiral Scheer_, the cruisers _Admiral Hipper_ and _Lützow_, and a dozen destroyers.

We departed our patrol area at high speed to meet the new threat, with HMS _Duke of York_ and her flotilla, moved to intercept the German surface fleet. We were leaving the convoy exposed to air and sub attacks, which none of the crew was happy about, but the surface raiders were considered a much bigger prize, and if we could sink them, or even damage them, it would go a long way to reducing the danger to convoys in general.

With the convoy completely uncovered, and naked to attack, the British admiralty ordered the convoy to scatter. I relayed that radio signal to the captain who grimly acknowledged it, just as he had the order to leave our screen position a few hours earlier. Knowing what would have happened had we not driven off those attacks earlier in the day, I feared for the worst, and had little hope for the merchants sailing alone.

I managed to catch some shuteye during the night as we steamed a high-speed to fend off the threat from _Tirpitz_ and her battlegroup. By morning, which was July 5, we had several sighting reports of the _Tirpitz_ battlegroup. First, it was a Soviet sub, K-21, who reported his sighting and attacked. An hour later, a Royal Navy Catalina flying boat radioed a position report, and, finally, two hours later, the British sub _Unshaken_, made another report.

In the end, our high-speed run went for naught, as around 2300, we received a report that the _Tirpitz_ and her group had turned for port. That made the loss reports I was picking up on my wireless set even more maddening - a dozen merchantmen, including _Fairfield City_ and _Daniel Morgan_ were sunk by combined attacks by the Luftwaffe and U-boats. As the reports came in, I tallied the names for the captain - _Pan Kraft_, _Washington_, _Carlton_, _Honomu_, _Empire Byron_, _Peter Kerr_, and perhaps worst of all, the convoy Commodore's flagship, _River Afton_. _Paulus Potter_ wasn't sunk, but she was abandoned because she couldn't continue.

Just a short while ago, before I was relieved in the radio room, I added _Pan Atlantic_ and _John Witherspoon_ to my tally. The remaining ships were making for Arkhangelsk, as Murmansk had been heavily bombed by the Germans, though given how few ships were going to make it through, it didn't seem as if much dock capacity would be needed. We returned to our patrol position in the Norwegian Sea to cover for QP 13 which was returning from Russia, and hoped to see them safely to Iceland.

The only good thing to come out of the entire SNAFU, a wonderful acronym our Marines had developed, was that we only suffered seven minor injuries and had no major systems failures. That was little consolation to the poor souls who were forever resident in Davy Jones' Locker, their ships on eternal convoy duty.