Convoy HN 20 - warsailors.com (original) (raw)
CONVOY HN 20 – Norway-U.K. Departed Norway on March 18-1940 and arrived Methil on March 22
Notes: All the Norwegian ships mentioned here are discussed on this website, some are listed in the Homefleet section. The easiest way to find them all is via the Master Ship Index.
A document giving information on convoys attacked by aircraft, says that a group joining HN 20 from Kirkwall, as well as both sections of Convoy ON 21 were attacked separately at dusk on March 20-1940 as follows:
6 Heinkels attacked the 15 ships on their way eastwards from Kirkwall to join ON 21. 3 of the Heinkels were driven off by 2 Skuas, which were with this section of the convoy. At 19:15 that evening, 15-20 bombs were dropped, damaging 3 ships, which put in to Kirkwall. One of them, the Norwegian Svinta had to be towed by the tug St. Mellons - follow the link to Svinta for details.
2 Heinkels attacked the northbound Methil section of ON 21, with the result that an incendiary bomb caused a small fire in one of the ships.
A British ship, which was en route from Kirkwall with 2 others to join HN 20 for Methil, received minor damages and returned to Kirkwall. The 7 ships from HN 20 that were destined for Cape Wrath were shadowed but not bombed.
In addition to the Skuas, Gladiators, Blenheims and Hudsons were also sent out to protect these various groups of ships.
One of the ships mentioned above was probably the British tanker Daghestan. This ship is listed in Jürgen Rohwer's "Axis Submarine Successes of World War Two" as damaged by a bomb hit on March 20-1940, later sunk by U-57 on March 25, 9 n. miles E Copinsay, Orkneys. (Uboat.net has a page about the loss of this ship - external link).
Also, there's a note in the report saying that minor damages were suffered from air attacks whilst in convoy by the Norwegian Tora Elise and Erling Lindøe, as well as the Swedish Utklippan and the British Northern Coast. No date or convoy is given for these attacks, but according to my own text for Tora Elise and Erling Lindøe, these ships were both attacked on March 20-1940. Tora Elise is said to have been attacked by a group of Heinkel aircraft and damaged when en route to England, which would indicate she was in an HN convoy - however, she was, in fact, in the U.K.-Norway Convoy ON 21 at the time. Erling Lindøe's voyage information is given as Casablanca to Lysaker, Norway, when attacked on the same date, and she's also listed in Convoy ON 21 (as is the Swedish Utklippan).
Escorts mentioned on this page:Sheffield, Cairo, Escapade, Electra, Escort, Encounter, Kimberley, Kashmir.
See also the text under March 18 on this external page (scroll down in the text), which mentions this convoy and its escorts (also mentioned under March 19 and March 20. As can be seen, the British Thistlebrae and Daghestan are said to have been in Convoy HN 20).
