The Battle of the Denmark Strait was, without question, one of the most famous engagements of World War II. It was also one of the shortest, lasting less than twenty minutes. While its name may be something of a mystery to you, its combatants certainly are not. This is the famed meeting of the German battleship Bismarck (shown to the left) and heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen and the British battle cruiser Hood and the battleship Prince of Wales.
The Germans had sent their ships into the North Atlantic as merchant raiders. Remember that the United States was sending supplies to England which were escorted part of the way by U.S. warships, then picked up by their British counterparts and protected for the rest of the trip. The Bismarck, with its 15″ main guns, would deal with the escorts, while the Prinz Eugen would wreak havoc with the merchant ships…at least that was the plan. The British got wind of the operation and sent their ships in response. Though this was the Bismarck’s first deployment, she already had a solid reputation as being well-gunned, well-armored, and well-manned. So the British took no chances and sent the Hood, the pride of the fleet. For years, the Hood had been the largest “capital” ship (if battle cruisers could be called as such) in the world, so the confrontation would be a good one…at least that was the plan.
Before continuing, let’s have a little geography lesson. The Denmark Strait isn’t anywhere near Denmark. Get a map and locate Greenland. Now find Iceland. See the water between them? That’s the Denmark Strait and the setting for this legendary encounter.
As the two battlegroups closed early in the morning of May 24, 1941, the Hood fired first at 5:52am at a distance of 25,000 yards, with her companion doing the same just a few seconds later. The Bismarck returned fired 3 minutes later at 22,000 yards…her shells landed short. While reloading, a shell from the Prince of Wales struck the Bismarck, causing a fuel leak. Keeping up?…we’re at 5:56am. The next salvo from the Bismarck’s partner in crime, the Prinz Eugen, hit the Hood near the mainmast and started a fairly large fire, at which point the Prinz Eugen turned her attention to the Prince of Wales.
At 6:00am, the Bismarck fired her fifth salvo of the engagement from 18,000 yards. The shell (or shells, no one knows for sure) penetrated the Hood’s armor belt and detonated in the aft ammunition magazine. To say that the resultant explosion was cataclysmic would be an understatement. The 48,000-ton vessel was split in two and sank in 3 minutes, killing all but 3 of the 1418 crew members.
The Prince of Wales became the next target, and was pounded until she turned tail and fled in a smokescreen. By 6:10am, the battleground was quiet again and the Germans had reason to celebrate a tremendous victory. But in some sense, the Prince of Wales would have the last laugh. The hit she scored on the Bismarck (which caused the fuel leak) would ultimately lead to the death of the Bismarck just three days later.