November 12, 1944: The German battleship Tirpitz was sunk at Sørbotn off Håkøy near Tromsø, Norway. Tirpitz, sister to the Bismarck, was launched on Apr.1,1939 at Wilhelmshaven. Tirpitz was to be used as a commerce raider and not to square off against the battleships of the Royal Navy. This ship was as large a threat to the British as the Bismarck was and she had to be dealt with accordingly. Before Tirpitz was even commissioned the British attacked her from the air.

Tirpitz carried out her sea trials in the Baltic sea until Jan. of 1942. Tirpitz was finally ready, and she departed from Kiel on Jan.12,1942, she was headed for Norway. Tirpitz would never return home. Even though Tirpitz was a huge threat, it turns out she was almost a paper tiger. Tirpitz never fired a shot against another warship or a transport. The only action her guns ever saw was against aircraft, and once against the X-craft. What the Tirpitz did do was to keep British resources tied up for years. The British attacked her over 30 times, and the Russians attacked her at least once.

Tirpitz was almost always under repair, but she did manage to attempt at least two war patrols. Both were failures in so far as no ships were engaged. However, Tirpitz played a roll in the destruction of convoy PQ-17. It was the fear the British had that Tirpitz was on the loose that caused the miscalculations and the eventual catastrophe of the doomed convoy. This would be the greatest success the Tirpitz ever had.

The final attack was made by Lancaster bombers of 9 and 617 squadrons (the famous dambusters) on Nov.12,1944. The bombers found the Tirpitz, which put up heavy anti-aircraft fire, and scored at least three direct hits with tallboy bombs. Tallboy's weighed 12,000 lbs., the largest bombs to date in the British arsenal. Very soon after the hits, Tirpitz rolled over and the threat was vanquished.

In total 971 of the over 1700 men on the Tirpitz were killed. Over the course of her career 1120 crew members were killed. The British lost over 100 men in the attacks. But their sacrifice was not in vain. They managed to keep the Tirpitz from completing the mission she was designed for, and they finally sank the second nightmare of Churchill's dreams.

© 2005 Michael W. Pocock
MaritimeQuest.com

Tirpitz