On 12 November 1944 about thirty Lancaster bombers of Nos. 9 and 617 Squadrons RAF attacked the German battleship Tirpitz off the island of Håkøya, near Tromsø in northern Norway. Two or three of their 12,000-pound Tallboy bombs hit, and the ship rolled over and capsized, killing about a thousand or more of her crew.1
A ship that tied down a navy
Tirpitz, the slightly larger sister of Bismarck, was based in Norway, from where she threatened the Arctic convoys to the Soviet Union. In July 1942 the fear that she was at sea led the Admiralty to scatter convoy PQ 17, and only 11 of its 35 merchant ships reached Russian ports.2
British aircraft attacked her again and again from 1940 on, and in September 1943 British midget submarines damaged her. In April 1944 carrier aircraft of the Fleet Air Arm bombed her in Kaafjord, the raid told on our page for 3 April.3
The last raids
On 15 September 1944 Lancasters of Nos. 9 and 617 Squadrons, flying from a Soviet airfield near Archangel because her northern anchorage was out of reach from Britain, hit her with a Tallboy. The damaged ship was then moved south to Håkøya, near Tromsø.4
On 12 November about thirty Lancasters of the same two squadrons attacked her there with Tallboys, the 12,000-pound deep-penetration bombs designed by Barnes Wallis.5
She rolled over
Two or three of the bombs hit, and Tirpitz rolled over and capsized. Estimates of her dead differ: about a thousand in the RAF Museum's account, more than 1,000 in Store norske leksikon and 1,204 in the Australian War Memorial's record. The story of the war at sea is gathered in our guide to the greatest naval battles.6
Also on this day
Battle of the Treasury Islands
12 November 1943 · 82 years ago
New Zealand and US forces, mostly from the New Zealand 3rd Division, landed on the Japanese-held Treasury Islands in the Solomons during the Pacific War. Resistance was overcome and the islands cleared, giving the Allies a radar site and a base for the Bougainville landings.
