Reaching his patrol area on May 23, Captain Robert Ellis of the Suf­folk found good visibility over Greenland, but on the Icelandic side fog stretched in either direction. When, therefore, he was on his north-easterly run, facing the direc­tion from which the enemy might come, he kept in the open water near the Greenland ice-edge, know­ing that his radar would pick them up a long way ahead. But on the south-westerly leg when the bridge superstructure and funnel smoke obscured the view astern, he steer­ed down the edge of the wall of fog, ready to slip into it if an emergency arose.

There hadn’t been a whisper of the Germans since the sighting in the Bergen fjords two days before; in that time, they could have steam­ed more than i,000 miles; they could be just over the horizon, al­ready at the edge of the Atlantic, on their way back to Germany, or at anchor in some Norwegian fjord. Everyone had his own theory.

It was Able Seaman Newell in the Suffol who brought suspense to an end. At 7.22 p.m., he saw some­thing which for the rest of his life

he would never forget—the Bis­marck, black and massive, emerg­ing from a patch of mist on the starboard quarter, not more than seven miles away. “Ship bearing Green One Four 0,” he shouted, and then as the Prinz Eugen swam into his lenses, “Two ships bearing Green One Four 0.”

Captain Ellis ordered hard a-port and full speed ahead to get into the fog. Another officer pressed the alarm bells and all over the ship men leapt from mess-bench or hammock, slid into sea-boots, snatched coats and scarves, lifebelts and tin hats.

But no salvoes came, and the Suf­folk breached the fog wall unharm­ed. Safe inside, she waited, sending out a string of reports, watching the two blips on the radar scan. The Norfolk, 15 miles away in the fog, picked up the first signals. Captain Alfred Phillips at once increased speed, but in his eagerness mis­judged the direction. He emerged from the fog to find the Bismarck only six miles away, coming straight at him.

The Bismarck’s guns roared in anger. Rear-Admiral Frederick Wake-Walker, in the Norfolk, saw the sea to starboard pocked with shell splinters, observed one shell bounce off the water 5o yards away and ricochet over the bridge. Great columns of milk-white water rose in the air, zoo feet high.

Five salvoes in all were fired be­fore the Norfolk regained the mist;some straddled, and splinters came on board, but there were no casual­ties or hits. Both the Norfolk and Suffolk waited for the Germans to pass, then began to follow. It was not their business to fight the Bis­marck, but to keep in touch with her until bigger ships arrived.

Admiral Tovey, then boo miles to the south-east, was as relieved as the Admiralty in London that his dis­positions had proved correct. But the man to whom the news was of grea­test moment was Vice-Admiral Hol­land in the Hood, which with the Prince of Wales and their destroyers was now only 300 miles away and steering on a converging course.

Preparations for Battle

Jr ANY one ship could be said to have been the embodiment of Brit­ish sea power and the British Em­pire between the wars, it was the mighty Hood. Longer even than the Bismarck (86o feet to 820), al­though narrower in the beam, she mounted, like the Bismarck, eight 15-inch guns in four turrets. Her maximum speed of 32 knots, at the time she was built, made her destroyed by German shells which, fired at long range, had plunged vertically through the lightly pro­tected decks and exploded inside. All big ships built after Jutland had strengthened armour. The Hood’s armour was strengthened on her sides but not on her decks; they were her Achilles’ heel.

Between the wars, when a quar­ter of the globe was still coloured pink for Britain, the Hood showed the flag, as they used to say, to the Empire and the world. Her 1923-24 world tour in company with the Re­pulse and five cruisers was described as “the most successful cruise by a squadron of warships in the history of sea-power.” Their arrival any­where caused huge crowds to gath­er and filled the pages of the local Press. Millions saw the Hood, hun­dreds of thousands came on board.