Naval History
Battle of Fatshan Creek 1857
A Royal Navy force defeated a flotilla of Chinese war junks during the Battle of Fatshan Creek, before the Second Opium War. Sir Henry Keppel, (1809-1904) British admiral. Born in Kensington on 14 June 1809, son of the Fourth Earl of Albemarle, Henry Keppel joined the Royal Navy in 1822. He was educated at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich. He…
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Coastal Command Requirements
‘Caught on the Surface’. The sinking of U-461 by RAAF Sunderland “U” of 461 Squadron RAAF, in the Bay of Biscay in July 1943. [As depicted by aviation artist Robert Taylor.] AIRCRAFT AVAILABLE At the outbreak of war in September 1939 Air Marshal Sir Frederick Bowhill, the Air Officer-in-Chief of…
Foxtrot on the Brink
The Foxtrot class was the NATO reporting name of a class of diesel-electric patrol submarines that were built in the Soviet Union. The Soviet designation of this class was Project 641. The Foxtrot class was designed to replace the earlier Zulu class, which suffered from structural weaknesses and harmonic vibration…
German Naval Activity off Dunkirk 1940
Schnellboot S31 of the same class as S34 So far, German naval activity off Dunkirk had been non-existent, but this situation was not to last. In the early hours of 28 May Kapitänleutnant Rudolf Petersen, commanding the 2nd Schnellboote Flotilla in Wilhelmshaven, called his officers together and briefed them for…
Greek Fleet at Salamis I
Twenty-two Greek cities were represented at Salamis, for a total of more than three hundred ships. Six states from the Peloponnese provided vessels: Sparta, Corinth, Sicyon, Epidaurus, Troezen, and Hermione. In central Greece, Athens and Megara contributed ships, while Ambracia and Leucas represented northwestern Greece. From the islands there were…
Greek Fleet at Salamis II
The commanders left the conference and returned to their ships. By now it was nighttime, hardly the ordinary hour to board. But the Greeks had a great deal to do if they were to be ready to leave for the Isthmus at dawn—and certainly they were eager to leave as…
Hellcats Apogee I
The 15 fast carriers of Task Force 58 brought some 475 Hellcats to the Marianas in the second week of June 1944. Another 66 F6Fs were aboard three of the five escort carriers assigned to support the invasion beachheads in Operation Forager. It was by far the largest Hellcat gathering…