Sink the Bismarck Timeline

Germany had long sought control over the Atlantic shipping lanes in their road to total victory in Europe. Perhaps the best known of the German battleships was the KMS Bismarck who, along with the Prinz Eugen and other German naval surface ships, were charged with the destruction of Allied merchant shipping in the North Atlantic.

A cat-and-mouse game eventually ensues with the Royal Navy trying desperately to keep an eye on the Bismarck. The Royal Navy responds to the German aggression by releasing a hunter-killer task force changed with engaging and eliminating the German high-seas menace. What follows is perhaps one of the most famous naval engagement in history featuring torpedo-laden biplanes, massive cannon bombardments and extensive use of naval tactics to bring down one of the greatest warships of all time.

Royal Navy forces land two torpedoes into the Bismarck, the second disabling the rudder forcing her into a turn. From then on, the Royal Navy warships close and unleash hell on the sitting fortress. The end result would see thousands of British and German sailors lives cast about with thousands of shells lobbed back and forth till the might Bismarck finally went silent. At the end of it all, just 115 Bismarck sailors would be recovered while the ship herself would sink to the floor of the ocean well off the western coast of France.

The engagement proved a strategic and morale victory for the British though at the expense of the battleship HMS Hood and her 1,413 souls. Other Royal Navy ships are damaged. The Germans, however, are dealt the first of many deathblows and their containment of Allied shipping would have to rely on the prowess and thievery of the U-Boat scourge.