The Gathering Storm. Geirr Haarr

followed suit on receiving the signal. At that time, the weather was calm with a swell from the north and, shortly after, a U-boat became visible on the crest of a swell. Graham held his fire, hoping to get closer, but when it was at some 5,500 yards the U-boat, which was U63, dived rapidly.

      Narwhal was ordered back to take care of the convoy and get out of the way, while Graham ran on for another few minutes at full speed before slowing down to give the Asdic a chance. Almost at once contact was obtained at 800 yards and he turned to attack. Contact was lost during the turn, though, the ship still having considerable way on her. Contact was regained, and a second attack was commenced. Meanwhile, Inglefield, Escort and Imogen were also closing and in their eagerness to deliver the first successful attack the destroyers got in each other’s way and contact was lost again. At about 08:30 Escort obtained contact and went straight in to attack. After this, Captain Percy Todd of Inglefield took charge and formed the four destroyers in line abreast, commencing a sweep. Unknown to the British destroyer captains, U63 had been damaged by the depth-charges dropped in spite of the melee, and Lorentz was compelled to take his boat to the surface at around 09:55. At the time, Escapade was furthest away and ordered by Todd to rejoin the convoy while Inglefield and Imogen headed for the German, both ships opening fire with their forward guns. U63 sank within minutes, and Inglefield, Imogen and Escort lowered boats, picking up survivors. The entire crew of four officers and twenty-one ratings were rescued. One man later died and was buried at sea. During interrogation, some of the officers criticised Lorentz for the handling of the boat, while he criticised his watch officer for not having torpedoes ready in the tubes when attacked, thus rendering U63 defenceless.³³

      On 8 March ON-18 was attacked by three Heinkels from KG26, but few bombs were dropped and no damage done. On 20 March, both sections of eastbound ON-21 were attacked in the Fair Isle area, as was a group of ships from Kirkwall, joining westbound convoy HN-20. Some of the ships were damaged, but none sank. Similar air attacks occurred during the next weeks on virtually every North Sea convoy, eastbound and westbound. Skuas and Hurricanes stationed on Shetland and the Orkneys or in the north of Scotland combined with the gunfire of the escorting anti-aircraft cruisers, effectively kept the Luftwaffe bombers at a distance and no ships were lost in the North Sea convoys.