Battle of the Third Reich

"The captain made what he thought was the right choice, but the result did not go as he expected. Who would know in advance what would happen next, and wish his soul a rest." Gerald moved away with the hot soup The lunch box stretched out a cross on his chest.

"Go on, Gerald, and what happened to the ship later." Sergeant Coleman sat opposite Gerald, and he pushed a plate of cured meat in front of the French sailors.

"We haven't waited for the lifeboat to return, and some people are anxious." Gérard nodded his thanks to the sergeant. He forked a piece of cured meat from the plate with a fork.

"Some sailors who think they are good in water, are going to swim with a lifebuoy to the other side. Among them is a friend of mine, his name is Louis Noel, from Ainol, which is close to Sao Paulo. I have never seen He is a stronger sailor, he is one and a half meters tall, two heads taller than me." Gérard chewed the cured pork slices and picked up an aluminum drinking glass with beer.

"So did he succeed? This Noel." asked a young German sailor on the side.

"Like other people who want to do this, they were swept away by the water. You know that the Loire is not a small river ditch in the country. At that time, it was at low tide. The speed of the river itself was very fast, plus where we are. The waterway is dug by hand, so there is a strong undercurrent under the water. We can only watch them being taken away by the river, there is no way. Listen to my commander say if these people have not been washed into the sea, at least there are Fifty percent of the chances can survive, but so far, I haven’t heard of any one of them being found."

"It's terrible, this is the first time I have heard of such a thing."

"You are too young to know that we were in Narvik at the time," said a sergeant with a beer.

"Please, don't mention Narvik again."

"It's time to start again."

"We all know."

"Sergeant Norman, let Geral finish the story." Several veterans in the dining room clamored.

"Okay, okay, please continue, Geral." Corporal Norman said with a smile and shaking his head.

"We had originally considered using a wooden door in the cabin to tie a raft, but the sailors' previous dismissal made us dismiss this idea. Then your reconnaissance plane appeared in the sky, and the officers asked us to use anti-aircraft guns to fire, but everyone at the time Very scared, nobody wants to obey the orders of the officers.

We thought that this warship was destined to be finished. Everyone would be sent to your prisoner of war camp. The battle belonging to us was already over, so nobody wanted to go to death at this time.

So we all hid in the cabin and left the officers on the deck. The result was that they waited less than a minute. These "brave people" hurried into the cabin. They were really a group of hypocritical guys. You've all seen one of them, Captain Raoul. "

"The proud grouse in the anti-aircraft command post." a German sailor said with a smile.

"I'm not going to defame a French naval officer in this way, but you are indeed very vivid." Geral broke off a piece of crusty white bread.

"Don't interrupt, what happened later?"

"We didn't dare to run to the deck before dark, and the power supply has not been restored, even the phone between the cabins could not be connected. Everyone can only rely on manpower to communicate the instructions of the superiors. To be honest, few people take these commands back. We can’t say that we are weak, but what everyone thought was how to survive.” Gerald said with a sigh of emotion.

"I can understand that on a battleship that has lost all its power and is stranded, people really don't have much choice." Sergeant Norman nodded and said.

"At around four o'clock in the afternoon, the Germans had entered the city of Saint-Nazaire. Our watchman noticed that there was black smoke in the direction of the base. Afterwards, we learned that several workers left on the pier lit a fuel We heard a fierce exchange of fire from the shipyard, when Jean Barr didn’t have many self-defense weapons, and we didn’t even have marines among us.

Some people think we should hang white flags and surrender to the German Army. At that time, we were also very worried about being bombed by your Air Force, because there were two planes flying around the port all the time. We believe they could not see this stop on the river. Battleship in the center. "Geralr put a few slices of bacon and pickled cucumber in the bread, and then spread a spoonful of French seeded yellow mustard.

"They did see it." A voice interjected, and the sailors looked up and saw a German captain standing at the door.

"Sir!" Everyone in the cabin quickly stood upright.

"Sit down, I just passed by the door just now. After hearing your discussion, I am also very interested in the story told by Gerald." A sailor gave up his seat and Captain Kobiski sat with a smile At the table.

"Pour a beer for the captain." Sergeant Coleman ordered.

"No, I'll be on duty later." The captain declined his subordinate's hospitality.

"The reconnaissance aircraft did find this battleship, and they also reported to their superiors." The captain took the topic of Gérard.

"The problem is that the Army's goal at the time was to occupy the city. They didn't put this information in a category that required priority." The captain took the coffee delivered by the sergeant, bowed his head and smelled the taste, then nodded his thanks.

"We are also very strange. Until dark, the Germans did not send people to board the ship. They did not seem to see this warship at all. You know that this is a 38,000-ton battleship. The bridge is 30 meters high. Floating on the river like a hill." Because of the presence of officers, Geral stopped his dinner.

"Actually, it's very simple. The army used to have no one on board because they got the information that this warship has been sunk by the French navy and the facilities on the ship have been destroyed. This is already a useless scrap ship. Plus At that time, the military mission was very urgent, and they had no spare personnel to get on board to check it, and put it aside in a hurry." The captain said while drinking coffee.

"Where did they get the information?" Coleman asked curiously.

"A reconnaissance battalion captured four lifeboats on the shore, and the captured sailors confessed. It seemed that they wanted to protect the people who remained on the ship, so they deceived the army scouts." Kobisky said with a shake of his head.

"I am aware of this for the first time. We have been wondering why the four lifeboats did not return. It was because of their lies that they left us trapped on the boat for six days." Gérard One The expression on his face suddenly realized, and then he shook his head bitterly and said.

In order to save weight, Jean Barr took only two days of food for two hundred people when sailing, because in the original plan they only needed one day to get to Bordeaux, and then replenish supplies and fuel there.

The two tugs had fled one after another, and Lieutenant Colonel Berticchi couldn’t find a reason to stop them from doing so. The astronomical tide that night did not allow the hull to escape the reef, and even if they successfully floated, they could no longer start the power . The bilge pipeline entered the water, the entire power system completely collapsed, two diesel generators stopped working one after another, and the fuel oil and boiler pumps driven by electricity were no longer operational.

The warship completely lost the possibility of escape. Berticchik's mentality also showed some changes. He was no longer in a hurry to destroy the warship. The naval lieutenant began to plan for his future.

The day after the next day, the sailors and military students on this warship tried everything they could to try to attract the attention of the Germans on the shore.

The main force of the army that occupied Saint-Nazaire at that time had already left this military port and began to accelerate towards the south of France. Only some logistics and security forces remained in the city. Because of their lack of military strength, they did not even send personnel to the river bank. This means that all the efforts made by the French navy sailors on the ship have been shown to the blind.

Although there are less than half of the people on board, they are carrying daily food. After losing power, they cannot be kept for a long time in the hot summer. In the sun, the temperature in the cabin quickly rose to forty degrees. Without electric drive, the ventilation system stopped working, and people could not stay in the closed bottom cabin activities, otherwise there would be a danger of suffocation.

The sailors hung a string of white sheets on the mast and watched the cars on the road along the river bank, but they turned a blind eye to them.

On the third day, all the last food on the ship was eaten up, and French officers and men began to face the danger of famine. Although there is a lot of water in the freshwater tanks, there is no pump to pump freshwater into the water supply system. They can only open the bolt-sealed hatches and use the buckets to extract drinking water. Because of the hot weather, the water quality has also begun to be fast*.

They hung a flag of distress on the mast, and even lit a bonfire on the deck, but it still didn't help. No one ignored them, as if the whole world had forgotten this battleship.

On the fifth day, a cargo ship downstream from Nantes passed by Jean Barr and found the French sailors who were madly semaphores on the ship. The captain docked to the German commander in Saint-Nazaire. The unexpected discovery was reported, which finally caught the attention of the German Army.

At this time, the German talents found that there was such a big fish hiding under their eyes. Paradoxically, during the five days of occupation of Saint-Nazaire, no one proposed to check it. The garrison commander reported this situation to his superior quickly, saying that there is a French battleship in his jurisdiction that has not been disarmed.

"When the German navy's speedboat leaned on the side of the ship, we were like seeing a loved one. I never thought I wanted to see the German so much. I remember giving the sailor who boarded the ship a big hug and a kiss. He shook the man on the cheek." Geral scratched his head in embarrassment.

"It’s not just the sailors who were scared. After we boarded the ship, we found that the battleship was basically intact. The commander of the garrison in Saint-Nazaire was also rewarded for this because he broke the highest army captured so far. Historical records, but I think this is more like disguising the dereliction of duty of the intelligence service." Kobisky drank the coffee in the cup, then he stood up to bid farewell to the group of sailors.

"I'm going to watch on the bridge. I'm glad to hear Gerard's wonderful story. I'm sorry to disturb your dinner." The captain walked over to the hatch.

"Everything has passed, Géral, Jean Barr has been renewed. But I suggest you should record your experience on this battleship. When our juniors read this history, I believe they will I feel very interesting."

The captain returned a salute to the sailors and turned and walked out of the hatch. (To be continued.)