Aboard Obdurate, Obedient and Orwell, the sight and sound of Rear-Admiral Burnett’s guns to the north-east was a godsend. They had been laying smoke to cover the convoy and knew he was on his way, but had only a sketchy idea of where or when he would arrive. Despite the smoke, at 11.42 Lützow finally caught a glimpse of her quarry and opened on the merchantmen with her secondary armament, straddling the freighter Calobre, peppering her with splinters and forcing her to drop out of line and transfer the convoy vice-commodore to Daldorch.[113] The convoy made an emergency turn to course 225°, while the British destroyers came around to the eastward to cover it with smoke and open fire on the German pocket battleship, although all their shots fell short. In reply one of the Lützow squadron destroyers, in all probability Z30, also opened fire. Johann Hengel was at his action station at the aft radio station and remembers:
My service started at 08.00 and went on until 12.00. During this time we came to a full-scale alert, everybody was at battle stations… At approximately 11.00 hours we had our first battle contact. I remember this exactly because at the time I briefly left the radio station. Dawn was breaking, one could see the visible horizon very well.[114] Our ship’s artillery as well as our fourfold torpedo came into action.[115]
None of Z30’s shells or torpedoes found their target, and following one broadside with her main armament, Lützow also ceased firing. At 11.45 she made a turn to port, coming onto course 290° to join up with Hipper.
Shortly thereafter Commander Kinloch sighted Admiral Hipper and her two destroyers 4–5 miles (7.5–9.2 km) to the north, on a southwesterly course. The British destroyers turned together to the north-west and with Obdurate leading, steered to place themselves between the convoy and this new enemy. By this time, however, Lützow was rapidly closing the distance to Hipper and with her secondary armament opened an accurate fire on the British destroyers, to which they replied. At 12.00 Lützow’s main armament joined in, and Obdurate immediately suffered damage from a near miss.
The twenty-year-old officers’ cook aboard Orwell, Smith Belford, witnessed the duel between the destroyers and their fearsome opponent from his action station at ammunition supply for the destroyer’s ‘Y’ turret. Ammunition was stored under the captain’s cabin (not to be confused with the captain’s day cabin under the bridge), sent up via two chutes then pushed by hand up a slide to the turret. Standing on the upper deck, Belford saw in the distance the telltale ripples of flame as Lützow opened fire and the first salvo screeching over the speeding destroyer. He remembered Lieutenant-Commander Austen ordering ‘Astern!’ The abrupt change in pace evidently upset the pocket battleship’s gunnery as the next salvo fell just ahead, where Orwell would have been.[116] Lützow was also considerably hindered by the freezing up of her navigation perioscopes and target instruments.
As both the Hipper and Lützow squadrons continued off to westward, the British destroyers again fell back to cover the convoy.
Bearing round in a wide loop to port, having engaged Eckholdt and Beitzen, at 11.54 Force ‘R’ altered course to westward and at 12.15 obtained an RDF contact on a large ship bearing 230°. This was Hipper retiring from the battle, and was followed at 12.23 by the sighting of two destroyers to the south at some 8000 yards (7315 m) distance. These were almost certainly Richard Beitzen and Z29, and they were in a good position from which to launch a torpedo attack. Rear-Admiral Burnett altered course southward to engage them, however in the director control tower above Sheffield’s bridge, observers had spotted Lützow beyond the destroyers at a range of some 17,000 yards (15,544 m). Closing to 14,000 yards, (12,801 m), Sheffield and Jamaica opened fire on the pocket battleship at 12.29. Lützow replied immediately with main and secondary armament, and was joined a few moments later by Admiral Hipper. Observation positions on the German flagship were now clear of ice and smoke, and within minutes her salvos straddled the British cruisers. Force ‘R’ was now coming under fire from Lützow to the south and Hipper to the west, and had also to watch for torpedo attacks from the destroyers.[117] In view of this Rear-Admiral Burnett altered away to the northward, and by 12.36 the battle was over. Jamaica claimed one hit on Lützow but there are no reports of damage to the pocket battleship in the German records.
Rear-Admiral Burnett maintained contact with the withdrawing German forces until 13.45 when radar contact was lost. He first swept south then north to ensure that the enemy were not doubling back, then returned to cover the convoy, which he had still not seen, and of whose position he was still very uncertain.
As the drama of the battle was being played out, another drama, and one that was to have disastrous consequences for the Kriegsmarine, was just beginning. Observing the battle from some distance, at 11.45 (just as Force ‘R’ engaged Hipper and Eckholdt in quick succession), Kapitänleutnant Herschelb of U354 despatched a curiously worded message to Admiral Kluber in Narvik – a message destined to be dramatically misunderstood by the German high command: ‘Watching from this locality the battle has reached its climax. I can see only red.’[118]
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114
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