HMS Lightning (G55)

HMS ''Lightning'' was an L-class destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was launched on 22 April 1940 and sunk on 12 March 1943 by German Motor Torpedo Boat ''S-55''.

Ordered under the 1937 Programme and laid down as Job No J4502, Hawthorn Leslie & Co of Newcastle Upon Tyne were awarded the contract to build her with machinery supplied by Parsons. She would be the 10th Royal Navy ship to bear the name ''Lightning''. Build was completed on 28 May 1941 but had been delayed by late delivery of the three twin 4.7-inch mountings required meeting the original design. The tender cost was £440,807 which excluded items such as weapons and communications equipment supplied by the Admiralty.

On 25 March 1942, ''Lightning'' was adopted by the Borough of Doncaster as part of a Warship Week National Savings plan. Doncaster and the surrounding boroughs raised over £800,000 in National Savings and effectively paid for the ship. At the same time ''T/S Lightning'' was formed in Doncaster for Sea Cadets, that continues to this day. HMS Lightning was the subject of an Oscar Parkes drawing created into a popular postcard by J Salmon Ltd Sevenoaks Kent.

Operational history

On Wednesday 28 May ''Lightning'' was assigned to the 19th Destroyer Flotilla with the Home Fleet at Scapa Flow. She was joined by her sister ship . Her other two sister ships and were not ready for combat. She was however joined by four half-sister ships , , and . All four would later be lost during their first year of operational service.

Operation Substance

Operation Substance was the first real operation ''Lightning'' was part of. She formed part of the Home Fleet escort for convoys WS 9C and MG 1 to the island of Malta. The convoy comprised ships , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , and . The convoy left Derry on 13 July, and arrived at Gibraltar two weeks later on 27 July.

Her next operation was Operation Style in which ''Lightning'' escorting a small convoy of Royal Air Force reinforcements. She did not escort the convoy all the way and arrived back in Gibraltar on 4 August, just as the main convoy arrived in Malta. On 22 August 1941 ''Lightning'' sailed from Scapa Flow with and to search for the crippled Free French submarine , which had been attacked by a German aircraft off the coast of Norway. She was later met by the cruiser and eventually found ''Rubis'' near the Skagerrak and escorted her into Dundee for repairs.

Operation Halberd

''Lightning'' and ''Laforey'' left Greenock for the first major Malta convoy of the war on 17 September 1941, crossing the Clyde Boom at 0530. ''Lightning'' joined the convoy with many of the capital ships from the Home Fleet. These included , , , , , , ''Cossack'', ''Fury'', and . She then passed through the Straits of Gibraltar and met up with Force H. Throughout the operation ''Lightning'' would see some of her heaviest fighting. She and the rest of the convoy were attacked by German bombers who used a mixture of high altitude bombing, dive bombing and low level torpedo bombing. At 1340 on 27 September 1941 ''Lightning'' was very nearly hit. A torpedo from an aircraft missed the ship by .

On 25 October ''Lightning'' left the Clyde and was transferred from the Home Fleet, based at Scapa Flow, to Force H based at Gibraltar. During November and December 1941, as part of Force H, ''Lightning'' had a mainly escort role. Escorting convoys that were from the UK, picking them up in the Bay of Biscay and often taking them through the western part of the Mediterranean Sea towards Malta. She also escorted aircraft carriers carrying Supermarine Spitfires. ''Lightning'' was one of the escorts of the aircraft carrier when she was sunk by a torpedo on 13 November 1941.

On 11 December 1941, ''Lightning'', and were ordered to leave Gibraltar and rendezvous with the battleship , in mid Atlantic, and escort her to America. ''Duke of York'' was carrying Winston Churchill, and Chiefs of Staff to the Arcadia conference in Washington. Commander Stewart was taken ill just before sailing and First Lieutenant Bromley took command. Bad Atlantic weather delayed the rendezvous, at 1830 on 17 December in approximate position 38-30N, 23W joined ''Duke of York'' with ''Highlander'' and ''Harvester''. With the bad weather continuing, the destroyers remained with ''Duke of York'' until 20 December then at 1800 in approximate position 35N, 40W, detached again to Ponta Delgada, Azores to refuel. Continuing to Bermuda where ''Lightning'' shared an anchorage with the US Navy aircraft carrier , they arrived at Newport News on New Year's Eve. Afterwards, they returned to the UK, pausing at St. John's, Newfoundland, departing 16 January 1942 and arriving at Greenock on 25 January, where Commander H G Walters took command.

On 14 March 1942 ''Lightning'' was taking part in an anti-submarine ASDIC sweep in the Gibraltar Straits when her rudder was badly damaged, one of the depth charges exploded underneath her prematurely. She had to return to Gibraltar for repairs in number two dry dock.

Operation Ironclad

During Operation Ironclad ''Lightning'' played a key role in the taking of a naval base at Diego Suarez. ''Lightning'' played her part without any action during this opening stage. However, at 1710 on 5 May 1942, ''Lightning'' bombarded a hill position that was being used by the enemy. The next day ''Lightning'' again bombarded enemy positions, this time a castle on a hilltop and an ammunition dump. At 1530 ''Lightning'' along with ''Laforey'' and ''Lookout'' escorted the battleship out to sea to search for a reported enemy battleship which was not found, although ''Laforey'' sank an enemy submarine during night.

On 7 May 1942 at 1030 ''Lightning'' bombarded an enemy shore battery, on the far side of the peninsula, that would not surrender. Within half an hour of ceasing fire the battery surrendered.

After Operation Ironclad, Between May and July ''Lightning'' was temporary transferred to the Far East Fleet, sailing to Colombo in Ceylon, for a boiler clean. Completed by 11 July, the following day, at 0600, ''Lightning'' put to sea as 'A Force' with the battleship , the aircraft carriers , , the cruiser , and four destroyers including ''Laforey'' and ''Lookout''. The task was to sweep the area to the Chagos islands to try to bring the Japanese to battle, and then proceed to Addu Atoll to oil. The monsoon season had arrived and no Japanese were found. ''Lightning'' returned to Colombo, and was ordered to proceed to the Mediterranean.

Returning from the Indian Ocean, ''Lightning'' arrived at Freetown. On 1 August, she departed in company with ''Laforey'', , ''Lookout'' and the aircraft carrier ''Indomitable''. That same evening, at 2100, the ship's lookouts sighted three small boats and, after investigating, picked up all the crew of 35 plus 4 gunners and a dog (given to ''Lightning'' as a gift, and named ‘Flash’) from the 10,095 ton Norwegian merchant vessel ''Tankexpress''. She had been sunk by a U-boat a week earlier (25 July 1942). The merchant crew, together with their captain, Anders Skånberg, were landed in Gibraltar, on 8 August while ''Lightning'' was refuelling.

Operation Pedestal

By mid 1942 the strategically important island of Malta was being starved by the German and Italian blockade. Without the island fortress the Allies could not strike at convoys from Italy that were supplying the Axis armies in North Africa. Further more, it was realised that an Allied North Africa campaign could not begin until the Axis armies had been weakened by lack of supplies. A huge escorting force from the Home Fleet and Force H from Gibraltar was assembled to escort fourteen merchant ships from the UK to Malta. Many capital ships were damaged in the desperate air and submarine attacks. Only six merchantmen got through but Malta was never under pressure again and so the Allied invasion of north Africa (Operation Torch) was made possible in November 1942.

''Lightning'' joined Force Z comprising aircraft carrier ''Indomitable'', cruiser ''Phoebe'', and sisters ''Laforey'' and ''Lookout''. On 3 August 1942 Force Z met up with the main Force X from the UK just off Gibraltar and refuelled alongside ''Indomitable'' the next day. On 5 August 1942 the convoy passed through the straits en route to Malta. On 11 August 1942 ''Lightning'' along with ''Lookout'' was screening the aircraft carrier , when the nearby carrier was hit by four torpedoes from the German submarine . In only eight minutes she had sunk. On 12 August 1942 ''Lightning'' came under attack from bombers and had several near misses during the raid.

Follow-up to Operation Torch November 1942

After refits, ''Lightning'' and ''Laforey'' left Greenock 12 December 1942 for Liverpool to escort ''Duchess of Richmond'', a 20,000-ton Canadian Pacific liner which had embarked thousands of troops for North Africa, in convoy KMF 5. On 21 December ''Lightning'' helped rescue more than 1,000 soldiers and nurses from the 23,722 ton P&O liner ''Strathallan'', which was torpedoed by off the coast of Algeria, carrying over 4,000 Allied personnel.

''Lightning'' arrived in Bône on New Year's Day 1943 and joined Force Q which consisted at various times of two cruisers from the 12th cruiser squadron – , , , and – supported by L-class destroyers including ''Laforey'', ''Lookout'' and ''Loyal.''

The sinking of HMS ''Lightning''

During late February and March 1943 ''Lightning'' was escorting troop and supply ships between Algiers and Bône in the day and attacking enemy convoys at night. When in harbour she was attacked every day by enemy aircraft and acted as an anti-aircraft ship. On her last voyage, ''Lightning'' left Bône alone at 1745 hours on the evening of Friday 12 March 1943 and after joining ''Loyal'' provided flanking screening cover to the cruisers ''Aurora'' and ''Sirius''. The plan was to attack a German convoy out of Sicily bound for Tunisia. But when the convoy heard ''Lightning'' had left port, they returned to harbour. At 1851 hours ''Lightning'' was attacked by twelve German torpedo bombers. ''Lightning'' shot down one of the bombers and the attack itself failed to do any damage.

At about 2200 hours interpreters on board ''Lightning'' intercepted a radio message in German, stating that they were about to attack ''Lightning''. At about 2215 hours the German motor torpedo boat (''Schnellboot'') ''S-158'' of the 7th S-Boat Flotilla (First Lieutenant at Sea Schultze-Jena) fired the first torpedo, disabling ''Lightning''. The ship's company had no time to return fire: they were not operating RDF, ASDIC or HF-DF and were not at full fighting condition due to heavy fighting that had been almost continuous during the past few days. The captain turned the ship hard to port to comb the track of the torpedo, but ''Lightning'' was too slow and was hit on the port bow, blowing it clean off. Then a second E-boat, ''S-55'' of the 3rd S-boat flotilla (Kommandant Horst Weber), circled the ship and moved round to the starboard side. The German torpedo boat fired a second torpedo that hit beneath the funnel, destroying both boiler rooms, the pom pom and forward torpedo tubes on the upper deck. Moments later ''Lightning'' was abandoned – she had begun sinking almost immediately after the second torpedo hit. One survivor was picked up by ''S-158'' and the remaining 180 survivors (including the captain, Commander Hugh Greaves Walters DSC) were picked up some hours later by sister ship ''Loyal'', arriving Bone 0500 13 March. Survivors transferred to ''Sirius''. The ship's company disbanded, transferred to other ships and shore base in Algiers.
''Lightning'' was replaced in Force Q by the Polish destroyer . The ship's name is Polish for lightning.

Note

Additional research for the revised edition about HMS Lightning's and her company (Struck by Lightning -2019) revealed one survivor Jack Dunn -a signalman who was on the bridge the night she was torpedoed, who enjoyed his 100th birthday on 9 July 2019. This was recognised by the Sea Cadets of Doncaster SCC T.S Lightning https://www.facebook.com/Lightning106/ -her adopted WW2 town.

Citations

References

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* Dann, John, (2019) ''Struck by Lightning, The Story of HMS Lightning 1941–43'', A First-Hand Account of Life on Board the Ship, UpFront Publishing, revised hardback edition
* Prysor, Glyn, (2011) ''Citizen Sailor: The Royal Navy in the Second World War'', Viking/Penguin Books,

External links

Website dedicated to HMS Lightning and her crew
No longer available,
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Lightning (G55)
L and M-class destroyers of the Royal Navy
1940 ships
Ships built on the River Tyne
World War II destroyers of the United Kingdom
World War II shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea
Maritime incidents in March 1943