NZHistory, New Zealand history online - navy

Turning point in Battle of the Atlantic

The Battle of the Atlantic was one of the most important campaigns of the Second World War. It was certainly among the longest, lasting 2074 days: from 3 September 1939, the day war was declared, to 7 May 1945, the day Germany surrendered. Allied ships were sunk with loss of life in the Atlantic on both those days, and on nearly every day in between. The Battle of the Atlantic also ranged across vast distances, from South America’s River Plate, where the New Zealand cruiser HMS Achilles helped trap the Admiral Graf Spee in December 1939, to the freezing Arctic Sea, through which Allied convoys shipped vital supplies to the Soviet Union.

Britain was a maritime power with the world’s largest merchant fleet, but its heavy dependence on imported food (including meat and dairy products from New Zealand), fuel and raw materials made it vulnerable to a blockade. Germany’s Atlantic strategy was simple: to starve Britain into submission by destroying merchant ships and their cargoes faster than they could be replaced. As Prime Minister Winston Churchill remarked in 1941, ‘Everything turns on the Battle of the Atlantic.’

Although mines, bombers and surface ships would claim many victims, the deadliest threat was the submarine, or U-boat. The Allies’ defence against, and eventual victory over, the U-boats in the Battle of the Atlantic was based on three main factors: the convoy system, in which merchant ships were herded across the North Atlantic and elsewhere in formations of up to 60 ships, protected, as far as possible, by naval escorts and patrolling aircraft; the painstaking, secret work of Allied signals intelligence, especially the breaking of the U-boats’ sophisticated Enigma code; and, especially from 1943, the deployment of longer-range aircraft and more powerful, better-equipped escort forces.

The campaign took a significant turn on 24 May 1943: the commander-in-chief of the German Navy, Admiral Karl Dönitz, alarmed at the heavy losses inflicted by increasingly strong Allied escort forces (a total of 41 U-boats were sunk that month), ordered the temporary withdrawal of U-boat ‘wolf packs’ from the North Atlantic. The U-boats would soon return, and the threat to Allied shipping would remain until May 1945, but Germany would never regain the initiative.

Although it was waged half a world away from New Zealand, the Battle of the Atlantic was vital to this country’s interests. A German victory would have severed our links with Britain and hugely undermined the Allied cause, with grave consequences for New Zealand. Thousands of Kiwis took part in this bitter struggle, manning the warships of the Royal Navy and Royal New Zealand Navy, the troopships, freighters and tankers of the Merchant Navy, and the aircraft of RAF Coastal Command and the Navy’s Fleet Air Arm. Many served with distinction, including Coastal Command pilot Lloyd Trigg, who won the Victoria Cross in August 1943 for a ‘masterly attack’ which sank U-468. His Liberator bomber was lost with all its crew, and his posthumous VC was awarded on the evidence of survivors from the U-boat.

Image: Merchant ships en route to Britain

Tug of war on HMNZS Leander

Crew on board the HMNZS Leander enjoy a game of tug of war in the Indian Ocean. The Leander-class cruiser Leander was commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1931 as HMS Leander. It became one of the Royal New Zealand Navy’s main combat units when it succeeded the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy on 1 October 1941 (at which point its designation changed from 'HMS' to 'HMNZS'). One of New Zealand's biggest warships, Leander was also to become one of our most famous as it saw action in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.

Credit:

Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War, 1939-45: The Royal New Zealand Navy, 1956.

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Ship's company of HMNZS Kiwi on parade

On 29 January 1943, the Bird class minesweeper HMNZS Kiwi, along with her sister ship Moa, rammed and wrecked a Japanese submarine off Guadalcanal. On return to Auckland, the Kiwi's company marched triumphantly through the city's streets, led by Lieutenant Commander Gordon Bridson on the left.

Credit:

Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War, 1939-45: The Royal New Zealand Navy, 1956.

The image can be found here at the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre.

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Frank Zalot - a survivor's tale

A largely unreported tragedy during the Second World War was the drowning of 10 United States Navy personnel from the USS American Legion during a training exercise off the Paekākāriki coast near Wellington in June 1943. In this film, one of the survivors, Frank Zalot Jnr, finally reveals the true story of the tragedy and its aftermath. Read the full story of the tragedy here.

Frank was interviewed during a visit to New Zealand in 2012 during which he attended the unveiling of a memorial to the US Navy personnel who died.

Mānatu Taonga You Tube channel

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FH6RbMdWKRI

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US Navy tragedy at Paekākāriki

Ten United States Navy personnel were drowned off the Paekākāriki coast near Wellington during a beach landing exercise. A landing craft from the USS American Legion was hit by a huge wave while being towed back out to sea. When the craft capsized, an officer and nine enlisted men died.

Wartime censorship meant that newspapers were not permitted to publicise the American presence in New Zealand. A full account of the incident was not published until one of the survivours, Frank Zalot Jr, submitted his account to the NZHistory website in 2011. Read the full account here.

A memorial to the men who were drowned was unveiled during a Memorial Day ceremony at Queen Elizabeth Park, just north of Paekākāriki, on 28 May 2012.

Image: the memorial at QEII Park.

See coverage of the unveiling of the memorial on TV3 and TV1 news:

US Navy tragedy memorial

The memorial to the 10 US Navy personnel killed in the tragedy off Whareroa Beach on 20 June 1943.

The memorial is located at Queen Elizabeth Park, Mackay's Crossing, just north of Paekākāriki. It was unveiled at a Memorial Day ceremony (part of the Salute 70 celebrations) on 28 May 2012. Among those in attendance was Frank Zalot Jr, whose account of the tragedy, provided to NZHistory by his daughter, added considerably more detail to the public record of what happened.

Credit:

Jamie Mackay, 28 May 2012 and Andy Palmer, November 2012.

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HMNZS Te Kaha

HMNZS Te Kaha entering Wellington Harbour during the Royal New Zealand Navy 70th anniversary celebrations in September/October 2011. Te Kaha is an Anzac Class frigate which was commissioned in July 1997.

Read more about Anzac Class frigates on Naval-Technology.com

Credit:

Melanie Lovell-Smith, 2011

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HMNZS Otago

HMNZS Otago, a Rothesay-class anti-submarine frigate, was completed in 1960. In 1972 it took part in a high profile protest over French atmospheric nuclear testing off Mururoa Atoll.

Credit:

Royal New Zealand Navy Museum
Reference: AAX 0097

Permission of the Royal New Zealand Navy Museum must be obtained before any reuse of this image.

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HMNZS Waikato

The Leander-class HMNZS Waikato joined the Royal New Zealand Navy in 1966. It was the first New Zealand warship designed to embark a helicopter.

Credit:

Royal New Zealand Navy Museum
Reference: AAX 0097

Permission of the Royal New Zealand Navy Museum must be obtained before any reuse of this image.

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HMNZS Black Prince

HMNZS Black Prince entering Grand Harbour, Malta in 1953. This ship and HMNZS Bellona replaced the cruisers Gambia and Achilles shortly after the Second World War.

Credit:

Royal New Zealand Navy Museum

Permission of the Royal New Zealand Navy Museum must be obtained before any reuse of this image.

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