Navies in exile and Malta
National War Museum curator CHARLES DEBONO writes about warships from European countries occupied by Germany during the early years of World War II, which operated from Malta or were connected with the island.
A number of naval units from European countries escaped to Britain or to other harbours of the British Empire when their countries were invaded and overrun by the Germans. With them were added other naval units loaned by the British to these navies in exile, which operated in association with the Royal Navy from British bases.
The crews of these warships were very enthusiastic to carry the war against Germany, which was occupying their countries, and were very keen to bring to an end the German Reich. Some of these warships operated from Malta during short periods of the war.
The first of these was the Free French Requin class submarine FFL Narval. After the announcement of the Armistice between France and Germany on June 25, 1940, the commanding-officer of the Narval, Commander Francois Drogau, decided to escape from his base at Sousse, Tunisia, and take his submarine to Malta, from where he could continue to fight against the Germans.
The following day, June 26, at about 4am, the Narval surfaced about 35 miles west of Gozo and proceeded towards Filfla, where she began to send radio messages requesting permission to enter Grand Harbour. About four hours later, the British destroyer HMS Diamond approached the submarine, with her guns pointing at the French submarine. After an exchange of signals, where the situation was clarified, the Diamond escorted the Narval to Grand Harbour, where they arrived at 10.30am.
The submarine moored at French Creek, where she was boarded by two officers from the British submarines HMS Olympus and HMS Otus, who asked Commander Drogau to go with them to the office of Vice-Admiral (Malta) Wilbraham Ford.
After a discussion between Ford and Drogau, where the latter agreed to give the French naval vipher-book to the British, a radio message was sent to General Charles De Gaulle, who was the head of the Free French forces, informing him about the arrival of the Narval at Malta and Drogau’s intention to join the Free French forces.
Drogau explained the situation to his crew and told them that those who were unwilling to continue the war against Germany were free to return to France. A total of 21 sailors decided to remain on the Narval.
The Narval began to operate from Malta after the arrival of some volunteer ratings from the French warships interned at Alexandria. She sailed on her third patrol on December 2, 1940, after which no more was heard from her. The mystery of her loss was solved in 1957 when the wreck of the submarine was discovered off Kerkennah island, near Sfax. The submarine had been sunk by a mine.
Two other French warships which later had a connection with Malta were the La Fantasque-class large destroyers FFL Le Fantasque and FFL Le Terrible. These two destroyers had initially operated with the Vichy French government − the French government that ruled the part of France that had remained unoccupied by the Germans. They were based in Dakar, West Africa.
When Vichy France was occupied by the Germans on November 11, 1942, the two destroyers joined the Allies in the war against Germany. A year later, when Italy surrendered on September 8, 1943, the Italian fleet was ordered to sail to Malta. A British squadron escorted the Italians to Malta and these Le Fantasque and Le Terrible formed part of this escorting squadron. In the autumn of 1944, the French submarine FFL Curie operated from Malta for a few weeks.
Poland, another country overrun by Germany, was represented for many months at Malta by two submarines, the ORP Sokol and ORP Dzik. The Sokol was originally a British “U” class submarine, built by Vickers-Armstrong at Barrow-inFurness.
She was built as the British HMS Urchin but, upon request by the Polish navy, she was loaned to Poland shortly before completion and was renamed Sokol (meaning falcon).
The submarine was commissioned by the Polish navy on January 19, 1941, under the command of Captain Marynarki Borys Kamicki. She was initially based at Portsmouth from where she carried out patrols in the Bay of Biscay and at the approaches of Brest harbour. In September 1941, she was ordered to transfer to Malta as a unit of the 10th submarine flotilla, based at Lazaretto Creek. She arrived in Malta on October 1, 1941, and set out on her first patrol on the 9th in the Central Mediterranean and in the Ionian Sea.
On October 28, 1941, west of Ischia island, the Sokol fired torpedoes at the Italian auxiliary-cruiser Città di Palermo (5,413 GRT) but missed. On November 2, she torpedoed and sank the Italian freighter Balilla (2,469 GRT) about 20 nautical miles north-west of Capo San Vito, Sicily. On November 19, after she managed to penetrate past the anti-submarine boom at the entrance of Navarino harbour, Greece, she attacked the Italian destroyer Aviere (1,645 tons) but failed to hit her because Sokol’s torpedoes exploded against the sea bottom.
After this episode, she was attacked by Italian motor-torpedo boats (MTBs), which dropped numerous depth charges, but the Polish submarine managed to make good her escape. On November 21, she torpedoed and damaged the Italian tanker Berbera (2,093 GRT), which was beached near Navarino. The tanker was, however, sunk by air attack on November 28. On
“The crews of these warships were very enthusiastic to carry the war against Germany
February 12, 1942, she sank by gunfire the Italian motorschooner Giuseppina (392 GRT) about 30 nautical miles southsouth-east of Sfax, Tunisia.
For almost a month, from February 23 to March 17, 1942, the Sokol was under the temporary command of Captain Jerzy Koziolkowski while from March 18 to July 29, 1942, she reverted to the command of Captain Karnicki. Meanwhile, during an air attack on March 18, 1942, she was damaged at Lazaretto Creek and entered HM Dockyard for emergency repairs. She departed Malta on April 17, with only one propeller working, and went to Blyth for permanent repairs.
From July 29, 1942, until December 12, 1944, the Sokol was under the command of Captain Jerzy Koziolkowski. She returned to Malta on May 12, 1943. On September 12, 1943, she rammed and sank the Italian motor-boat Meattini (AS71) (36 GRT) near Brindisi. She also carried out patrols off Naples and Pola.
On October 7, 1943, the Sokol sank the Italian but Germanmanned freighter Eridania (7,095 GRT) off Cape Promontore. She departed Malta on October 22, 1943, and went to operate from Beirut. She ended her deployment in the Mediterranean in February 1944 and returned to Britain. En route, she stopped briefly at Malta from February 25 to March 6, 1944.
To be continued next week