The submarine cruiser "Surkuf" is a symbol of French naval power. Surcouf (submarine)

The French submarine was designed for battles on ocean communications. At the time of its creation (1934), it was the largest submarine in the world - a displacement of 4330 tons in a submerged position.
The boat carried 22 torpedoes for 12 torpedo tubes, as well as 2 203 mm guns and a seaplane for reconnaissance. The boat included all the ideas of previous projects of this class. it was also an innovation that the submarine could conduct artillery fire in a positional position, i.e. being semi-submerged.

For the timely detection of enemy raiders, the boat was equipped with a small reconnaissance hydroplane.
Prior to the outbreak of World War II, the Surcouf made a significant number of visits to foreign ports, demonstrating the military power of France.
At the time of the German attack on France in 1940, the boat was still under repair in Brest. With one engine running and a jammed rudder, the boat managed to cross the English Channel and arrive in Portsmouth.

The boat saw combat during the war, but due to non-standard equipment, there were constant problems with the supply of spare parts and repairs.
February 12, 1942 "Surkuf" went to sea and headed for the Panama Canal to go to the Pacific Ocean. Only one engine worked properly on the boat and she could not reach speeds over 13 knots.
The boat did not arrive in the Panama Canal, an official investigation found that the most likely cause of death was a collision with the American cargo ship Thompson Lykes on the night of February 18. The crash site has not been found.

On February 19, an adviser to the British consulate at Colona Port (at the entrance to the Panama Canal from the Caribbean Sea) sent a telegram to the Admiralty through Bermuda with the stamp "Top Secret": "The French submarine cruiser Surcouf did not arrive, I repeat, it did not arrive."
The cable went on to say: “The US Troop Transport Thomson Likes, which departed yesterday with a convoy heading north, returned today after colliding with an unidentified vessel, which apparently sank immediately, at 10:30 pm EST on February 18 at 10 degrees 40 minutes north latitude, 79 degrees 30 minutes west longitude. The transport conducted a search at this point until 08.30 on February 19, but did not find any people or debris. The only trace is an oil slick. The Thomson Likes has severe damage to the lower part of the stem."

“The American authorities,” it was reported further, “studied the report of the captain of the transport ship, a wide search is being carried out by aircraft. According to unofficial information, preliminary investigation indicates that the unidentified vessel was a patrol boat. There is as yet no reliable information about all the US submarines that may have been in the area, but their involvement is considered unlikely.

The main characteristics of the submarine cruiser "Surkuf"

Speed (surface): 18 1/2 knots;
Speed (underwater): 10 knots;
Working depth of immersion: 80 m;
Endurance of navigation: 90 days;
Crew: 8 officers, 110 sailors:
Dimensions: surface displacement - 2,880 tons, underwater displacement - 4,304 tons, maximum length (according to design waterline) - 110 m, hull width max. - 9 m, average draft (according to design waterline) - 7.25 m;
Power plant: 2 diesel engines of 7,400 liters each. s., 2 electric motors of 3,400 hp each. with., two screws;
Armament: 2x203-mm/50 guns in a twin mount; 2x37mm guns; 4x 13.2 mm machine guns;
Torpedo-mine armament: 8x550-mm torpedo tubes and 14 torpedoes; 4x400mm torpedo tubes and 8 torpedoes;
Aviation: 1 Besson MB.411 seaplane

As an epilogue, one can cite the words of one of the officers of the fleet about the Surkuf boat, which could be applied to a greater extent to all submarines of this class.

“The submarine had a turret with two eight-inch guns. In theory, when approaching the target, we had to stick out the muzzles of the guns and shoot while remaining under water. But this did not work out: we had serious difficulties in ensuring the watertightness of the tower. Even worse, everything on the Surkuf was non-standard: every nut, every bolt had to be machined specially. As a warship, he was no good, a giant underwater monster.

Indeed, the idea of an artillery boat, an “underwater monitor”, which originated at the beginning of the First World War, turned out to be very tenacious. and attempts to create such a ship survived until the Second World War.
But time has shown that such a ship, due to its design, loses all the advantages of submarines, and at the same time cannot effectively act against ships on the surface. thus, these amazing and undoubtedly very interesting ships remained in history as an anachronism, a relic of an era when it was believed that only large-caliber artillery could be the main weapon at sea.
Time has shown that the era of "superdreadnoughts" on the surface, and submarine battleships in the depths of the waters, is becoming a thing of the past, giving way to new types of weapons.

Although it is a pity, the design is very unusual and attracts attention with its originality.

Be that as it may, today the disappearance of the Surkuf remains one of the mysteries that the sea has kept in huge numbers since the beginning of time, and we have yet to find out its solution.
Surkuf itself would definitely shed light on what happened, but its wreckage has not yet been found.
In 1965, amateur scuba diver Lee Prittyman claimed to have found the Surcouf at the bottom of Long Island Sound, but the story quickly petered out before going beyond a couple of newspaper articles. To this day, alternative theories of the death of Surkuf are put forward. One of the most popular says that the Surkuf crew nevertheless went on a betrayal, and that a pair of American submarines Mackerel and Marlin found him in Long Island Strait reloading supplies and fuel onto a German submarine, as a result of which the "German ”, and the “Frenchman” were sunk. Variations of this version include a coastal defense airship or a British destroyer instead of American submarines.

True, according to this story, when the cruisers arrived at the appointed place, the Surkuf had already sunk for other reasons. Unlike the previous ones, the version put forward by the British researcher James Rusbridger looks very weighty.

In the documents of the American 6th bomber group, he found a record that on the morning of February 19 near Panama "a large submarine was discovered and destroyed."
Since the German archives did not record the loss of boats in that area at the indicated time, it is logical to assume that it was the Surkuf.
Most likely, the boat's radio was damaged by the collision with the Thomson Likes that took place the day before, and she simply could not let the pilots know that they were bombing their own, and the boat ended up in the Panama area because it was the nearest allied port where one could stand on repair.

I was reminded that there was such a photo. We agreed that it deserves a separate post. There he is.

A French submarine sank in the Caribbean after colliding with the USS Thomson Likes. 130 people died.

In 1942, when Allied convoys plowed the Atlantic Ocean, constantly changing course to avoid meeting with German submarines, the Surcouf, the largest submarine in the world at that time, which was part of the Free French armed forces created by de Gaulle, mysteriously disappeared without a trace. with the entire crew during the transition from Bermuda to the Panama Canal.

According to official figures, she sank on the night of February 18-19, 1942 after an accidental collision with the American military transport Thomson Likes. However, the unusual history of the submarine and the strange reaction of the Western Allied naval command to the tragedy gave rise to rumors that her death was not accidental.

Surkuf left the stocks in 1929. It was conceived and designed as a raider, armed with guns of the largest caliber, which allowed the Five Power Treaty, concluded during the Washington Conference of 1921-1922 on the limitation of naval weapons, Pacific and Far Eastern issues. The Surkuf became the pinnacle of post-war experimental projects that sought to combine the stealth of submarines with the firepower of surface ships. The giant submarine with a displacement of 2880 tons on the surface and 4330 tons in the submerged position had a huge carrying capacity, carried 22 torpedoes and could fire artillery in a semi-submerged position. Its length was 110 meters, cruising range - 12 thousand miles. In 1932, the submarine entered service and was named "Surkuf" in honor of the legendary French pirate.

Robert Surcouf - "King of the Corsairs"

Robert Surcouf (1773-1827) - French pirate and privateer, Breton by origin, nicknamed "The Storm of the Seas".
Surcouf was one of the few pirates who, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, managed to repeat the brilliant career of Francis Drake, favored by the authorities of his country in gratitude for the corsair raids.

Robert was born into a wealthy family of Saint-Malo sailors: his great-grandfather was the famous corsair of the early 18th century, Robert Surcouf, a close relative on the maternal side, the corsair La Barbine. They wanted to give the boy a decent bourgeois education, but in 1788, at the age of fifteen, he signed up for the Aurora ship, which was leaving for the Indian Ocean. The captain of the Aurora, Tardive, transported slaves from Africa to the plantations of Bourbon Island. Not far from Madagascar, the Aurora was caught in a storm and crashed, but the crew escaped. The captain received command of the ship "Revenge", on which Surkuf became the second assistant. But the captain was unlucky, and a year later Surkuf was hired on another slave ship.

At seventeen, Surcouf returned to France. Deciding that privateering was a more profitable business, with the help of relatives, he bought a small brig "Creole" and became a captain on it. In 1792 he again went to the Indian Ocean. When Robert Surcouf returned to the island of Bourbon (since 1794 renamed Reunion), the situation in the slave trade changed - the Convention declared it illegal, but this only raised the price of slaves. The English blockade of French possessions in the Indian Ocean and the confiscation of ships were more effective. Surcouf prudently sat out on Bourbon, and did not risk the brig. Under pressure from planters who needed slaves, the governor of Bourbon attacked the British and broke the blockade. Participated in hostilities and Robert Surcouf.

To obtain a patent for privateering, it was necessary to find guarantors and make a deposit, the money for which he earned several more voyages to Africa. But the governor, wanting to demonstrate his official zeal to Paris, detained Surcouf and wanted to arrest him as a slave trader. Surcouf stole the police commissioner and returned him only in exchange for a pardon order, but he was still denied a patent.

However, burdened by the restrictions imposed by privateering, in 1795 he became the captain of the pirate four-gun schooner Emilia (here there is a discrepancy in the sources, some argue that the ship was called the Shy). As a result of bold and decisive actions, he captured rich booty: the English ship "Penguin" with a cargo of teak, the Dutch ships "Russell" and "Sambolasse" loaded with rice, pepper, sugar and gold bars, a caravan of three Indian ships, and, finally, a large ship, the Diana, loaded with rice. After that, he decided to return home, but on the way (in the Bay of Bengal) he captured another ship - the English twenty-six-gun cruiser Triton, which surrendered with the entire crew to the mercy of the winner. There was a lot of valuable cargo on the ship. For a very solid ransom, Surkuf released the captain of the Diana and the crew of the Triton.

The British were enraged by the actions of Surkuf, who inflicted enormous losses on the English merchants by his actions and diverted the royal warships to protect them. In Réunion, on the orders of Governor Malarte, all Surcouf's prizes were confiscated on the grounds that he was not a privateer, although thanks to Surcouf, the colony avoided starvation. Outraged, Surcouf went to France on the very first ship, where he filed a complaint against the actions of the governor. While the trial was going on, Surcouf fell in love with Marie Blaise Masonev, a beauty from a wealthy Breton shipowner family. He took a word from his beloved that she would wait for him. In the meantime, the directory has considered Surkuf's complaint. Contrary to expectations, she treated him favorably and in 1798 awarded him twenty-seven thousand livres from the cost of goods sold and issued a letter of marque.

Surcouf left Nantes on the Clarisse, specially built as a corsair ship. The Clarissa was relatively small, but very fast, armed with fourteen twelve-pounder guns, and her crew consisted of one hundred and forty experienced sailors. However, this time there was no prey for a long time, and Surkuf ordered an attack on the very first English ship encountered off the coast of Africa, despite the fact that it was large and well armed. As a result, "Clarissa" had to leave the battlefield, having lost the foremast, and go to Rio de Janeiro for repairs. There, off the coast, a small brig was captured, which Surcouf sent as a trophy to Nantes. This time, the governor of Reunion, Malarte, was forced to recognize Surcouf's documents as fair. Surcouf cruised off the coast of Sumatra the following year. He captured two English ships, then a Danish ship, a large Portuguese ship with a cargo of spices and went to the Bay of Bengal, where he captured two more ships and sent them to Réunion.

In the end, he was tracked down by the well-armed English frigate Sybil, but the Clarissa managed to escape from the chase. The meeting with the Sibylla took place on December 30, 1799, and on January 1, 1800, the corsair daringly captured the Jane ship in front of several large ships.

The Clarissa was badly battered by the fighting, and Surcouf went to Reunion, capturing an American ship along the way. Having handed over the prizes, he went to sea on the "Confidence", and, in addition to a team of one hundred people, the governor allocated twenty-five of the best shooters to him. This time, Robert went to Ceylon, where he quickly captured several English ships loaded with spices and other goods. The trophies were so great that Surkuf took a ransom from them. In addition, he captured a large, converted from a military frigate and accordingly armed English ship "Kent".

Monument to Surcouf in Saint-Mal

Having sold the goods and received his share, Surcouf went to France on the "Confidence" to ask for the hand of Marie Blaise. The wedding of the corsair, whose capital was two million francs, took place in Saint-Malo. To this celebration, Robert Surcouf received a patent for an officer's rank (at the end of 1800). But the peaceful life did not last long, soon the war began again, and Surkuf was summoned to Paris, where he became one of the first holders of the Order of the Legion of Honor. In 1802, he equipped a squadron of marques, but did not go with them himself.

He went to sea only in 1806, and his arrival in the Indian Ocean was greeted with enthusiasm. The blockade practically cut off ties with Europe, and famine threatened the French possessions. Surcouf single-handedly broke through the blockade and provided the islands with food, capturing fourteen English ships with rice in the three autumn months of 1806. The danger of starvation was eliminated, and Surcouf received his share, increasing his fortune by several hundred thousand francs.

Napoleon I raised him to the rank of baron and offered him a job in the civil service, but Baron Surcouf refused. In the meantime, as a result of the Battle of Trafalgar, the British destroyed almost all French warships, and the governor ordered Surcouf to transfer his ship to the government as a military frigate, and to take more than five hundred Portuguese prisoners to France on the worn-out battleship "Karl". On November 21, 1807, Surcouf went to sea, arrived in France more than a year later, and no longer went to the corsair fishery.

His wife gave him two sons and three daughters. Nineteen of his ships went on pirate raids, and after the conclusion of peace in 1814, Surcouf turned them into merchant ships. When in 1815 Napoleon I escaped from the island of Elba and again proclaimed himself emperor of the French, one of the first letters he received was from Baron Surcouf: “Sir! My hand and sword belong to you!”

The former corsair is appointed head of a military detachment of 4,000 people. Surprisingly, after the restoration of royal power, the baron remained a wealthy shipowner, even loyalty to Napoleon did not hurt him. He died in 1827, surrounded by children and relatives, being one of the richest and most respectable shipowners in France.

But we will continue about the ship. Although it looked great on the drawings, in reality the submarine turned out to be a white elephant. (According to legend, the king of Siam gave the sacred white elephant to the courtier whom he wanted to ruin.) Former captain, Englishman Francis Boyer, who served on the Surkuf as an allied liaison officer from April to November 1941, recalled: “The submarine had a tower installation with two eight-inch guns. In theory, when approaching the target, we had to stick out the muzzles of the guns and shoot while remaining under water. But this did not work out: we had serious difficulties in ensuring the watertightness of the tower. Even worse, everything on the Surkuf was non-standard: every nut, every bolt had to be machined specially. As a warship, he was no good, a giant underwater monster.

In 1940, the Surkuf went to sea during repairs in Brest, so as not to be captured by a German armored column approaching the port. He crossed the English Channel on one running engine. The crew did not know that the Vichy collaborator Admiral Darlan (Minister of the Navy in the government of Petain who collaborated with Hitler) sent the Surkuf an order to go back in pursuit. The submarine arrived at Devonport on 18 July.

Approximately half of the ships of the French navy remained with Admiral Darlan, and the rest went over to the side of the armed forces of the Free French, under the command of General Charles de Gaulle, who had emigrated to England. Most of these ships submitted to the control of the allied forces, but relations between the allies were riddled with suspicion. Although British Prime Minister Winston Churchill sought to consolidate de Gaulle's leadership in the Free French armed forces, he also found the general stubborn and arrogant.

The US government suspected de Gaulle of sympathies for the left and tried to nominate General Giraud, who was on the right, as an alternative leader. (The version about “sympathy for the left” is, of course, absurd and does not explain the situation: it is known that for some time after the entry into the war the United States maintained ties with the Vichy regime, hoping to use it to secure its influence in North Africa and other strategically important areas, and then they began to rely on General Giraud, considering de Gaulle, with his openly declared program to protect the national interests of France, to be an “unsuitable figure” and “intractable partner.” It is also known that de Gaulle himself, in order to put pressure on his Anglo-American the thesis of the "communist danger" and made it clear that it could restrain the development of this "danger" in France.)

There was also a split among the French officers and sailors: many of them, if they did not adhere to openly pro-Vishist views, could not hesitate to decide which side they should be on in a war in which they could be ordered to open fire on their compatriots.

For two weeks relations between the English and French sailors at Devonport were quite friendly. However, on July 3, 1940, at two o'clock in the morning, having apparently received a message that the Surkuf's engines were in order and he was going to secretly leave the harbor, Officer Dennis Sprague boarded the submarine with a boarding group to capture it. Then Sprague, accompanied by First Lieutenant Pat Griffiths of the British submarine The Times and two armed sentries, descended into the officers' quarters.

Having issued the secondment of the Surcouf to the royal navy, Sprague allowed the French officer to go to the latrine, unaware that the French kept personal weapons there. Sprague received seven bullet wounds. Griffiths was shot in the back as he climbed the gangplank for help. One of the sentries - Heath - was hit in the face by a bullet, and the other - Webb - was killed on the spot. One French officer was also killed.

Later that day, in another theater of operations, the British fleet opened fire on a French squadron stationed off the coast of Algiers and Merseil Kebir, after the Vichy command of this French naval base rejected an English ultimatum, which proposed either to start military operations against Germany and Italy, or disarm the ships. 1300 French sailors died.

The message from North Africa shocked and excited the Surkuf crew: only 14 out of 150 people agreed to stay in England and take part in the hostilities. The rest disabled equipment, destroyed maps and other military documentation, before being taken to a POW camp in Liverpool. The officers were sent to the Isle of Man, and only Louis Blaison remained on the submarine as a senior assistant (he was later appointed commander).

A new crew was recruited from among the French sailors who were in England, who joined the Free French, and the French sailors of the merchant fleet. The task fell on Bleson's shoulders to train qualified submariners from inexperienced volunteers, while every evening they listened to French radio (under Vichy control) broadcasting German propaganda with calls to return home in order to "prevent themselves from being used by the British as cannon fodder" .

The events in Devonport left a characteristic imprint on the further participation of Surkuf in the war. Political considerations demanded that it be manned by Free French forces and fully participate in Allied combat operations, but a premonition told the Admiralty (the command of the British Air Force) that this submarine would become a burden.

On April 1, 1941, Surcouf left Halifax, her new home port, in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, to join convoy HX-118. But on April 10, the order was suddenly changed without any explanation - "follow at full speed to Devonport." This hasty and complete change of plan caused increased rumors in the fleet that the Surkuf had torpedoed the ships it was supposed to guard.

On May 14, the submarine was ordered to leave for the Atlantic and conduct a free search until autonomy allows, and then head for Bermuda. The purpose of the search is to intercept enemy floating supply bases.

Archival documents from the Foreign Office (British Foreign Office) say that in August 1941, the Surcouf arrived triumphantly in the American port of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. In fact, the situation on the submarine was very difficult. More than 10 crew members were under arrest and were taken ashore for disciplinary offences. Crew morale was reported to be "deplorable".

On November 21, Commander Bleson reported from New London, Connecticut, that the Surcouf had collided with an American submarine during maneuvers. The impact caused leaks in the third and fourth bow ballast tanks, which cannot be fixed without dry docking. The Surcouf left New London without repairing these damages, with a new English liaison officer, Roger Burney, on board.

What he saw on the Surkuf horrified him. In his first report to Admiral Max Horton, commander of the submarine force, Burney expressed doubts about the competence of the commander and concerns about the morale of the crew. He noted the strong enmity between junior officers and ordinary sailors, who, although they did not show hostility towards the allies, often questioned the significance and usefulness of the Free French forces in their combat operations, especially against the French. This first report by Burney was hidden by Whitehall (the seat of the British government) from the French.

In addition to Barney (to whose memory the composer Benjamin Britten dedicated his "War Requiem"), there were two more English submariners on board the Surkuf: senior telegrapher Bernard Gough and senior signalman Harold Warner.

At the beginning of 1942, Surcouf received an order to head to the Pacific Ocean to urgently replenish the forces of the Free French. A powerful submarine was needed there after the defeat of the American fleet at Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. But on the way from Halifax to Saint-Pierre, the Surcouf got into a storm, the wheelhouse was damaged by the impact of the waves, and the gun turret jammed. The boat lost seaworthiness in a strong wave, her hatches, deck superstructures and torpedo tubes were damaged. She returned to Halifax, where she unexpectedly received a new task - to follow to Tahiti with a stop at Bermuda. There, the commander-in-chief of the British naval forces in the Americas and the West Indies, Admiral Charles Kennedy-Purvis, at the request of the commander of the submarine forces, Admiral Max Horton, was to receive young Burney for an oral report. Before leaving Halifax, Burney was returning to the submarine with a Canadian naval officer. At parting, Bernie told him: "You just shook hands with a dead man."

"Surkuf" left Halifax on February 1, 1942 and was supposed to arrive in Bermuda on February 4, but arrived there late, having also received new damage. This time, defects were revealed in the main propulsion system, which would have taken several months to eliminate.

In a top secret telegram sent to Horton and then to the Admiralty, Kennedy-Purvis wrote: “The English liaison officer on the Surkuf gave me copies of his reports ... After talking with this officer and visiting the Surkuf, I am convinced that he is in no way exaggerating extremely unfortunate state of affairs."

The two main reasons he noted are the inertia and incompetence of the crew: “Discipline is unsatisfactory, the officers have almost lost control ... At present, the submarine has lost combat value ... For political reasons, it may be considered desirable to leave it in service, but, from my point of view vision, it should have been sent to the UK and written off.

However, "Surkuf" personified the spirit and power of the naval forces of the "Free French". Admiral Horton sent his report to the Admiralty and, consequently, to Winston Churchill: “The commander of the Surkuf is a sailor who knows the ship and his duties well. The condition of the crew was adversely affected by long idleness and anti-English propaganda in Canada. In Tahiti, in the defense of their land, I think the Surcouf can bring significant benefits ... The Surcouf has a special relationship in the French naval forces, and the Free France will be categorically against decommissioning it.

The report on the damage to Horton's submarine did not convince him: "... even if the intermediate repairs in Bermuda turn out to be unsatisfactory, on the way to Tahiti, the Surcouf will still be able to go under water using one engine ..."

February 9 "Surkuf" was ordered to go to Tahiti through the Panama Canal. Burney's last report is dated February 10: "Following my previous report of January 16, 1942, the conversations and events on board that I heard and observed further strengthened my opinion that the failures on the Surkuf were caused more by the incompetence and indifference of the crew than by open disloyalty…”

On February 12, Surkuf left Bermuda and headed through the Caribbean Sea, which was teeming with German submarines. He was only able to go on the surface - Commander Blaison would not risk going under water with a faulty engine. In addition to the calculated coordinates of the alleged location of the Surkuf, there is no more information about it.

On February 19, an adviser to the British consulate at Colona Port (at the entrance to the Panama Canal from the Caribbean Sea) sent a telegram to the Admiralty through Bermuda with the stamp “Top Secret”: “The French submarine cruiser Surcouf did not arrive, I repeat, it did not arrive.” The cable went on to say: “The US Troop Transport Thomson Likes, which departed yesterday with a convoy heading north, returned today after colliding with an unidentified vessel, which apparently sank immediately, at 2230 EST on February 18 at 010 degrees 40 minutes north latitude, 079 degrees 30 minutes west longitude. The transport conducted a search at this point until 08.30 on February 19, but did not find any people or debris. The only trace is an oil slick. The Thomson Likes has severe damage to the lower part of the stem."

In the note that lay on Churchill’s desk, the following words of the telegram were crossed out: “... in the 15th naval region, the United States is clearly not informed about the route and speed of the French submarine cruiser Surcouf and cannot determine its location. The only message I transmitted to the Americans on February 17 was the cipher mentioned.

On March 15, 1942, a closed meeting of the official commission to investigate the incident with the Thomson Likes transport began in New Orleans. From the British side, Captain 1st Rank Garwood, a representative of the submarine forces of the British Navy in Philadelphia, was sent as an observer.

His report to the British Naval Command in Washington stated: “None of the witnesses saw the ship with which the collision took place. About a minute after the collision, a strong explosion was heard under the keel of the Thomson Likes. Extensive damage to the stem of the transport well below the waterline suggests that the ship it crashed into was of a large tonnage and sat low in the water. As ships following opposite routes, they (Surkuf and Thomson Likes) inevitably had to pass at a close distance from each other.

According to Garwood's calculations, the Surcouf was "within 55 miles" of where the Thomson Likes reported the collision.

The commission eventually reported only that the Thomson Likes collided with "an unidentified vessel of unknown nationality, as a result of which this vessel and its crew were completely killed."

While the commission was in session, FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover sent a secret memorandum to the Office of Naval Intelligence stating that the Surcouf had in fact sunk several hundred miles further off St. Pierre on March 2, 1942. Perhaps Hoover was referring to the port of Saint-Pierre in Martinique. Did the crew mutiny, as could be assumed from Gough's last message, and didn't he, exhausted by the Allied command, head for Martinique, deciding to sit out until the end of the war in this quiet fascist harbor?

Due to the lack of any reliable information about the fate of the submarine, various theories continue to be put forward to this day. In early 1983, a US Marine corporal who served on the American cruiser Savannah during the war stated that his ship had been ordered to rendezvous with the British cruiser near Martinique and sink the Surcouf, as it was spotted during the attack on one of the Allied ships. But, the corporal added, when they arrived at the place, the submarine had already sunk.

Shortly after the Surkuf's disappearance, Free French representatives demanded first an independent investigation, then permission to attend a commission meeting in New Orleans, and finally, an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the Thomson Likes logbook. All these demands were rejected by Whitehall. And many months and even years later, the families of 127 French sailors and 3 English signalmen did not know anything about the circumstances of the death of their loved ones.

If the Surkuf had to be sacrificed because its crew changed flags and went over to the side of the pro-Nazi Vichy government, which resulted in attacks on allied shipping, then, of course, every effort had to be made to save the reputation of the Free French navy. . Any rumors of a rebellion or the deliberate destruction of the Surkuf by the Allies would provide invaluable propaganda material for the Nazis and the Vichy. The political reputation of the Free French would also suffer if one of its ships voluntarily went over to the camp of the enemy. So the official version of the death of "Surkuf" suited all parties. Moreover, it was necessary to adhere to this version in the future, because the national pride of the French would not allow them to agree that the warship, included in the honorary name list of the Free French, had betrayed de Gaulle.

Characteristics:

General:
Length: 110 m
Width: 9 m
Surface displacement: 2,880 tons
Underwater displacement: 3,250 tons
Cruising surface surface: 10,000 miles
Power reserve underwater: 70 miles
Immersion depth max.:
Crew: 140 people.
Surface speed: 18 knots
Underwater speed: 8.5 knots

Armament:
Guns: 2 203/50 mm
Bow torpedo tubes: 4,550 mm
Rotary torpedo tubes: 4,550 mm; 4 400 mm
Anti-aircraft installations: 2 37 mm; 2 13.2 mm
Seaplanes: 1

Surcouf was the largest French submarine. She served in both the French Navy and the Free Naval Forces during World War II. She was lost on the night of 18/19 February 1942 in the Caribbean, possibly after a collision with an American freighter. The boat was named after the French privateer Robert Surcouf. She was the largest submarine built until it was surpassed by Japan's first I-400 class submarine in 1943.

Historical context

The Washington Naval Agreement placed strict limits on the naval construction of the major maritime powers, as well as the movement and armament of battleships and cruisers. However, no agreements have been made to regulate the performance of light ships such as frigates, destroyers or submarines. In addition, to ensure the protection of the country and its colonial empire, France organized the construction of a large submarine fleet (79 units in 1939). Submarine "Surkuf" was supposed to be the first in the class of submarines. However, it was the only one completed.

Role in the war

The mission of the new submarine model was as follows:

Establish communications with the French colonies.
In cooperation with French naval squadrons, seek out and destroy enemy fleets.
Chasing enemy convoys.

Armament

The Surkuf cruiser had a twin-gun turret with a 203-millimeter (8-inch) gun, the same caliber as the heavy cruiser (the main reason it was called "su-marine cruiser" - "cruising submarine "") with 600 rounds.

The submarine was designed as an "underwater heavy cruiser" intended for search and participation in surface combat. For reconnaissance purposes, there was an observation float aircraft Besson MB.411 on board the ship - in a hangar built at the stern of the combat tower. However, the aircraft was also used to calibrate weapons.

The boat was fitted with twelve torpedo launchers, eight 550 mm (22 in) torpedo tubes and four four hundred millimeter (16 in) torpedo tubes, in addition to twelve spare torpedoes. The 203 mm / 50 guns of the 1924 model were located in a sealed turret. The weapons of the Surkuf boat had a magazine capacity of sixty rounds and were controlled by a mechanical calculating device with a five meters (16 ft) rangefinder mounted high enough to view the horizon of eleven kilometers (6.8 miles) and capable of firing within three minutes of surfacing. Using the boat's periscopes to control the fire of the main guns, the Surkuf could increase this range to sixteen kilometers (8.6 mph; 9.9 mi). The lifting platform was originally intended to raise observation decks fifteen meters (49 ft) high, but this design was quickly abandoned due to the effect of listing.

Additional equipment

The Besson observation aircraft was once used to direct fire to the maximum range of the gun - 26 miles (42 km). An anti-aircraft gun and machine guns were mounted on top of the hangar.

The Surcouf also carried a 4.5 meters (14 ft 9 in) motorboat and contained a cargo hold with provisions for holding 40 prisoners or 40 passengers. The submarine's fuel tanks were very large.

The maximum safe diving depth was eighty meters, but the Surkuf submarine could dive up to 110 meters without noticeable deformation of the thick hull with a normal operating depth of 178 meters (584 feet). The diving depth was calculated to be 491 meters (1,611 ft).

Other characteristics

The first commander was frigate captain (a rank equivalent to commander) Raymond de Belote.

The ship faced several technical problems due to the 203 mm guns.

Due to the low height of the rangefinder above the water surface, the practical range was 12,000 meters (13,000 yd) with rangefinder (16,000 meters (17,000 yd) with periscope sighting), well below the normal maximum of 26,000 meters (28,000 yd).

The submarine cruiser "Surkuf" was not equipped for firing at night due to the inability to track the direction of the shot in the dark.

The mounts were designed to fire 14 rounds from each gun before their power was overloaded.

Appearance

The submarine cruiser Surkuf was never painted olive green, as shown in numerous models and drawings. From the moment she was launched until 1932, the boat was painted the same gray as the surface warships, then "Prussian" dark blue, which remained until the end of 1940, when the boat was repainted in two tones of gray, which served camouflage on the hull and mounted turret.

The French submarine Surcouf is often depicted in 1932 boat condition, bearing the flag of the Free French Naval Forces, which was not used until 1940.

History in the context of war

Shortly after the launch of the submarine, the London Naval Treaty finally placed limits on submarine designs. Among other things, each signatory (including France) was allowed to have no more than three large submarines, whose standard displacement would not exceed 2,800 tons, with guns not larger than 150 mm (6.1 in) caliber. The Surcouf submarine, which would have exceeded these limits, was specifically exempted from the rules at the insistence of the Minister of the Navy, Georges Leig, but other large submarines of this class could no longer be built.

In 1940, Surcouf was based at Cherbourg, but in May, when the Germans invaded, she was transferred to Brest after a mission in the Antilles and the Gulf of Guinea. Teamed with the frigate Captain Martin, unable to submerge under water and running with only one engine and a jammed rudder, the boat drifted across the English Channel and sought refuge in Plymouth.

On July 3, the British, worried that the French fleet would be taken over by the German naval after the surrender of France, carried out Operation Catapult. The Royal Navy blocked the harbors where the French warships were stationed, and the British gave the French sailors an ultimatum: join the battle against Germany, sail out of the reach of the Germans, or be scuttled by the British. The French sailors reluctantly accepted the terms of their allies. However, the North African Fleet at Mers el Kebir and the ships based at Dakar (West Africa) refused. The French battleships in North Africa were eventually attacked and all but one sank at their moorings.

French ships docked in ports in Britain and Canada also took on board armed marines, sailors and soldiers, but the only serious incident occurred at Plymouth aboard the Surcouf on 3 July, when two Royal Navy submarine officers and French ensign Yves Daniel were mortally wounded, and the British sailor L. S. Webb was shot dead by the on-board doctor.

After the defeat of France

By August 1940, the British completed the conversion of the Surcouf submarine and returned it to the French allies, giving it to the use of the Free Navy (Forces Navales Françaises Libres, FNFL) to guard convoys. The only officer not repatriated from the original crew, the frigate captain Georges Louis Blason became the new commander. Due to tense relations between England and France regarding the submarine, each state made accusations that the other side was spying for Vichy France. The British also claimed that the Surkuf boat had attacked their ships. Later, a British officer and two sailors were sent on board to maintain contact with London. One of the real disadvantages of the boat was that it required a crew of over a hundred people, which represented three crews by conventional submarine standards. This led to the reluctance of the Royal Navy to accept her again.

The submarine then went to the Canadian base in Halifax, Nova Scotia and escorted transatlantic convoys. In April 1941, the boat was damaged by a German aircraft at Devonport.

After the Americans entered the war

On July 28, Surcouf went to the US Navy Yard in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, for a three-month repair.

After leaving the shipyard, the cruiser traveled to New London, Connecticut, possibly to receive additional training for her crew. The Surcouf left New London on 27 November and returned to Halifax.

In December 1941, the ship brought French Admiral Émile Muselier to Canada, arriving in Quebec. While the admiral was in Ottawa conferring with the Canadian government, the captain of the boat was approached by The New York Times reporter Ira Wolfer and asked about the rumors if it was true that the submarine would liberate Saint Pierre and Miquelon for the Free French. Wolfer escorted the submarine to Halifax, where on 20 December they were joined by the Free French corvettes Mimosa, Aconite and Alysse, and on 24 December the fleet took control of the Free French islands without opposition.

United States Secretary of State Cordell Hull had just reached an agreement with the Vichy government guaranteeing the neutrality of French possessions in the western hemisphere and threatened to resign if United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt decided to go to war. Roosevelt did so, but when Charles de Gaulle refused to accept this treaty between the Americans and the Vichys, Roosevelt shelved the issue. Ira Wulfert's stories, very favorable to the Free French, contributed to the severing of diplomatic relations between the United States and Vichy France. The US entry into the war in December 1941 automatically annulled the agreement, but the US did not break off diplomatic relations with the Vichy government until November 1942.

In January 1942, the Free French decided to ship the submarine, named after the pirate Surcouf, to the Pacific theater of operations after she had re-shipped to the Royal Navy Dockyard in Bermuda. Her move south sparked rumors that she was going to liberate Martinique from the Vichy in the name of Free France.

War with Japan

After the start of the war with Japan, the crew of the submarine was ordered to go to Sydney (Australia) via Tahiti. She departed Halifax on 2 February for Bermuda, leaving on 12 February for the Panama Canal.

Submarine "Surkuf". Where did she die?

The cruiser disappeared on the night of 18/19 February 1942, about 80 miles (70 nautical miles or 130 km) north of Cristobal, Colón, en route to Tahiti via the Panama Canal. The US report states that the disappearance was due to an accidental collision with the US freighter Thompson Likes, sailing alone from Guantanamo Bay on that very dark night. The cargo ship reported a collision with an object that scratched her side and keel.

The crash killed 130 people (including four members of the Royal Navy) under the command of Captain Georges Louis Nicolas Blayson. The loss of the Surcouf was officially publicized by the Free French Headquarters in London on April 18, 1942, and was reported in The New York Times the following day. However, it was not initially reported that the cruiser was sunk as a result of a collision with an American ship, until January 1945.

Investigation

A French commission's investigation concluded that the disappearance was the result of a misunderstanding. A consolidated Allied patrol patrolling the same waters on the night of February 18-19 could have attacked the submarine, believing it to be German or Japanese. This theory is supported by several facts:

Testimony from the crew of the cargo ship Thompson Lykes, which accidentally collided with the submarine, described it as being smaller than it actually was. These testimonies are very often referred to in all publications on this topic.
The damage done to the American vessel was too weak to collide with the cruiser.
The position of the submarine, named after Robert Surkuf, did not correspond to any position of the German submarines at that time.
The Germans did not record U-boat losses in this sector during the war.

The investigation into the incident was spontaneous and belated, while a later French investigation confirmed the version that the sinking was due to "friendly fire".

This conclusion was supported by Rear Admiral Aufan in his book The French Navy in World War II, in which he states: "For reasons that do not appear to have been political in nature, she was rammed at night in the Caribbean by an American cargo ship".

Since no one has officially verified the crash site of the cruiser, its whereabouts are unknown. Assuming that the incident with the American freighter really led to the sinking of the submarine, then its wreckage should lie at a depth of three thousand meters (9800 feet).

A monument commemorating the sinking of the submarine rises in the port of Cherbourg in Normandy, France.

Speculation and conspiracy theories

Since there is no definitive confirmation that the Thompson Likes collided with the submarine, and the site of her crash has not yet been located, there are alternative theories about the fate of the Surkuf submarine.

Despite the predictable story that it was swallowed up by the Bermuda Triangle (a fantasy zone that emerged two decades after the disappearance of the submarine), one of the most popular theories is that the submarine was sunk either by the American submarines USS Mackerel and Marlin, or by a coastal airship. US security. On April 14, 1942, a ship fired torpedoes at them en route from New London to Norfolk. The torpedoes passed by, but the return fire did not give any result. Some have speculated that the attack was carried out by the Surkuf, sparking rumors that the submarine's crew had defected to the German side.

In response to the above theory, Captain Julius Grigore, Jr., who has extensively researched and written a book on the history of the Surkuf, has offered a one million dollar prize to anyone who can prove that the submarine was involved in activities damaging to the Allied cause. As of 2018, the prize has not been awarded, because such a craftsman has not yet been found.

James Russbridger outlined some of the theories in his book Who Sunk the Surcouf? He found them all easy to disprove except for one - the records of the 6th Heavy Bomber Group flying out of Panama show that they sank a large submarine on the morning of February 19. Since no German submarines were lost in the area that day boat, it could have been the Surcouf The author suggested that the collision damaged the Surcouf's radio, and the damaged boat drifted towards Panama, hoping for the best.

Pirate Robert Surcouf could not have imagined that a ship destined to give rise to such legends would be named after him.

In Christina Kling's novel Circle of Bones, the fictional story of the loss of the Surkuf is part of a conspiracy by the Skull and Bones organization. The plot was linked to the secret society's attempts to destroy the remains of the submarine before they were found in 2008. There are a lot of such speculations, because "Surkuf" is the tiger of the seven seas, and his strange disappearance was an unpleasant surprise for everyone.

The novel Strike from the Sea by Douglas Riemann tells of the fictional sister ship of the Surcouf named the Soufrière, which is handed over by a French crew to the Royal Navy and subsequently used to defend Singapore, after which it is handed over to the Free French Navy.

French love for submarines

The French submarine fleet of World War II was one of the largest in the world at the time. He played a significant role during World War II, but had a difficult service history due to France's strange posture during the war. During the conflict, almost sixty submarines, more than 3/4 of the total, were lost.

After the First World War, France had a fleet of almost forty submarines of various classes, as well as eleven former German submarines. They were mostly obsolete (all scrapped by the 1930s) and France was interested in replacing them.

At the same time, the major world powers were negotiating an arms limitation treaty at the 1922 Washington Naval Conference. There was talk of a complete ban on submarines, i.e. to ban their use (a course approved by the UK). France and Italy opposed this. However, the conference placed limits on the number and size of warships of various types that countries could build. The offshore submarine was limited to one and a half tons, while the coastal submarine was limited to 600 tons, although there was no limit to the number of these vessels that could be built.

The first submarines built by France after the First World War were three submarines. Originally built to a Romanian order, they were completed for the French Navy and commissioned in 1921.

In 1923, the French Navy placed orders for a series of Type 2 coastal and offshore craft. The order was placed with three different design offices, resulting in three different designs with the same specifications. Known collectively as the 600 series, these were the Sirène, Ariane and Circé classes, for a total of ten boats. They were followed in 1926 by the 630 series, three more classes from the same bureau. These were the Argonaute, Orion and Diane classes, with sixteen more boats. In 1934 the Navy chose the standardized Admiralty design, the Minerve class of six boats, and in 1939 the Aurore class, a larger, much improved version of the Minerve. And another ship with a more extended design was ordered but not built due to the defeat of France in 1940 and the subsequent armistice.

A few words in conclusion

France boldly experimented with the concept of a submarine cruiser, the best in comparison with other fleets of that time. In 1926 she built the Surcouf, for many years the largest submarine ever built. However, the ship played little role in French naval strategy and the experiment was not repeated.

Thus, in 1939, France had a fleet of 77 submarines, making it the fifth largest submarine force in the world at that time. Destroyers of the Surkuf type played a huge role in her fleet.

The naval battles of the First World War clearly showed the highest ranks of the naval headquarters of the whole world what a formidable weapon submarines are. Before the volleys of the August cannons in 1914, the doctrine of the actions of the navy of almost every state on the planet was based on the active use of dreadnoughts - heavily armed armored ships, the pinnacle of the development of a battleship as a class. According to the idea of the admirals, the mere appearance of these huge monsters in the sea, lined up according to the principle of "all-big-gun" - "only big guns", should have determined the outcome of any battle. However, the Battle of Jutland on May 31-June 1, 1916, when the dreadnoughts of the fleets of the two warring countries - the British Grand Fleet and the German High Seas Fleet - met for the first time in battle, revealed a paradox: the dreadnoughts did not sink each other, moreover, the lion's share of the battle and losses fell more light cruisers and destroyers of both squadrons. And pulling these voracious mastodons out of their bases in the sea turned out to be a monstrously costly undertaking. At the same time, small, nimble submarines with small crews (for example, the German U-29 had only 35 people, while the British seven-tower (!!!) dreadnought "Agincourt" ("Agincourt" / "Agincourt" - named in honor of the victory of the British over the French at Agincourt in 1415) the crew included 1267 people) inflicted such significant losses on the enemy that even the most recent skeptic had to admit through his teeth that the submarines are a formidable and dangerous force.

Of course, this opinion was well founded. For example, the submarine U-29 of Otto Weddigen, already mentioned above, on September 22, 1914, sent three sentinel British armored cruisers to the bottom within one hour - Abukir, Hog and Cressy. On May 7, 1915, Walter Schwieger's U-20 launched the luxurious ocean liner Lusitania to the bottom. On June 27, 1915, the Russian submarine "Crab" - the world's first underwater minelayer - installed a minefield near the Bosphorus, on which the Turkish gunboat "Isa-Reis" was subsequently blown up. Such examples of the productive activity of submarines during the First World War significantly raised their significance in the eyes of admirals and politicians. During the period of Interbellum (the time interval between the First and Second World Wars), the leading maritime powers of the world carried out active work on the construction of strong submarine fleets, experimenting with the contours of boat hulls, materials, power plants and weapons. Perhaps the most unusual can be called the British underwater monitors of the "M" type, laid down during the First World War. The main weapons of these boats were not torpedoes, but one 305-mm gun mounted right in the wheelhouse. It was assumed that these strange boats would fire from a semi-submerged position - only the cannon barrel would stick out from under the water. However, the high cost, problems with tightness and dubious efficiency did not allow us to fully appreciate the potential of these submarines. In the 1920s, the guns were removed from them.

However, such a strange English project could not but find a response among shipbuilders. Inspired by the underwater monitor, the French in 1927 laid down at the shipyard "Arsenal de Cherbourg" three huge "sous-marin de bombardement" - "submarines for artillery shelling" of the Q5 type at once. Of the three, only one was completed. Artillery titan entered service under the name "Surkuf".

The Surcouf, named after the legendary French privateer Robert Surcouf, was the pinnacle of attempts since the end of World War I to combine the stealth of a submarine with the firepower of a surface ship in one ship. The displacement of the "Surkuf" was 2880 tons in the surface and 4330 tons in the submerged position. The length of the submarine is 110 meters, the cruising range is 12 thousand miles.

"Surkuf" in the sea

"Surkuf" was intended for cruising operations on ocean communications and, in addition to the torpedo weapons common to submarines, was armed with two 203-mm guns. These guns corresponded to the armament of heavy cruisers and were located in a twin turret in front of the submarine cabin. Fire control was carried out using a mechanical computer and an optical rangefinder with a five-meter base, which provided measurements at a distance of up to 11 km. For reconnaissance and fire adjustment at long distances, the boat carried a Besson MB.411 seaplane in a sealed hangar behind the wheelhouse. The aircraft was designed specifically for "Surkuf" and built in two copies. Two 37-mm anti-aircraft guns and four 13.2-mm machine guns were installed on the roof of the hangar. Also, "Surkuf" carried 22 torpedoes in its womb.

Cannons of the submarine "Surkuf"

Seaplane Besson MB.411 - assembled and aboard the "Surkuf", as well as a view of the hangar for the aircraft

Just six months after the Surkuf was launched, in April 1930, the London Naval Treaty was signed, Article No. 7 of which contained restrictions on the construction of submarines - in particular, the maximum displacement on the surface was set at 2845 tons, and the caliber of artillery should not exceed 155 mm. The Surcouf of France was allowed to remain in service by a separate clarification in the contract, but the construction of two other boats of this type had to be forgotten.

Computer image of the hangar of the submarine "Surkuf"

After the construction of "Surkuf" was widely advertised by the French press and repeatedly visited foreign ports in order to demonstrate the naval power of the state. No wonder - the world's largest submarine, armed with guns worthy of a heavy cruiser, a whole battery of anti-aircraft guns and carrying a hangar with an aircraft, looked very impressive, like a real masterpiece of shipbuilding of those years.
However, there were also skeptics. “... Perhaps no one could say with certainty,” wrote one of the British experts, “for what purpose it was built. True, she was considered capable of winning an artillery duel with a destroyer of that time. But if at least one shell, she could not already sink, and a fast destroyer would certainly take over her ... "
Although the Surkuf looked great on the drawings, in reality the boat turned out to be much less suitable for real service than for propaganda photo shoots. It was noted that the boat has significant problems with stability: when it is rough, it sways very strongly on the surface, and when immersed, it hardly maintains a roll and trim within an acceptable range. The time for preparing the boat for diving turned out to be prohibitively long - even under ideal conditions, it took more than two minutes to go under water, which in a critical situation could easily lead to the destruction of the boat by the enemy. Aiming guns at a target from a submerged position, which looked so advantageous on paper, turned out to be impossible in practice - the engineers failed to ensure the tightness of the movable joints.

The tower of the submarine "Surkuf" was mobile, but because of the disgusting tightness, it almost never turned. Screenshot from the computer game "Silent Hunter"

The former captain, Englishman Francis Boyer, who served on the Surkuf as an Allied liaison officer from April to November 1941, recalled: “The submarine had a turret with two eight-inch guns. In theory, when approaching the target, we had to stick out the muzzles of the guns and shooting while remaining under water.But it didn’t work out that way: we had serious difficulties with ensuring water tightness, every time we tried to rotate the artillery turret, water entered it. as a warship, it was no good, a giant underwater monster.

Submarine interiors

Surkuf met World War II in Jamaica, and almost immediately began preparations for returning to his homeland. He was included in the escort forces of the British convoy KJ-2, and on September 28, 1939 he left for the Old World. The ship met the New Year of 1940 in Cherbourg, and in May, with the beginning of the German invasion, it was sent to Brest, where it stood in dry dock for repairs. The Blitzkrieg developed rapidly, and by the time the German tanks approached Brest, the boat was still out of order, but thanks to the decisive actions of the captain and the Surkuf team, they managed to escape from the enemy literally from under their noses. Despite the fact that the boat had only one engine running and the steering wheel was faulty, she was able to cross the English Channel and reach Portsmouth. The crew did not know that the collaborator Admiral Francois Darlan sent an order to follow the Surkuf to return, but the dispatch was not accepted. The submarine arrived in the British port of Devonport on 18 July.

Submarine "Surkuf" in the dock

After the capture of the country by Germany, the French navy found itself in a strange situation: about half of the ships remained with Admiral Darlan, and the rest went over to the side of the armed forces of the Free French - the French army "in exile" under the command of General Charles de Gaulle who emigrated to England.
Most of the Free French ships submitted to the control of the allied forces, but relations between the allies were riddled with suspicion. Although British Prime Minister Winston Churchill sought to consolidate de Gaulle's leadership in the Free French armed forces, he also found the general stubborn and arrogant. The US government suspected de Gaulle of sympathies for the left and tried to nominate General Giraud, who was on the right, as an alternative leader.
There was also a split among the French officers and sailors: many of them, if they did not hold openly pro-Vichy views, could not hesitate to decide which side they should be on in a war in which they could be ordered to open fire on their compatriots.

For two weeks relations between the English and French sailors at Devonport were quite friendly. However, on July 3, 1940, at two in the morning, having apparently received a message that the Surkuf's engines were in order and he was going to secretly leave the harbor, Officer Dennis Spraig boarded the submarine with a boarding party to capture it. Then Sprague, accompanied by First Lieutenant Pat Griffiths of the British submarine The Times and two armed sentries, descended into the officer's mess, where he announced the secondment of the Surcouf to the fleet of His Majesty King Edward VIII.

Having arranged for the Surcouf to be seconded to the Royal Navy, Sprague allowed the French officer to go to the latrine, unaware that the French kept personal weapons there. Sprague received seven bullet wounds. Griffiths was shot in the back as he climbed the gangplank for help. One of the sentries - Heath - was hit in the face by a bullet, and the other - Webb - was killed on the spot. One French officer was also killed.

On the same day, in the Mediterranean, the English fleet opened fire on the French squadron stationed off the coast of Algiers and Merseille-Kebir, after the Vichy command of this French naval base rejected the English ultimatum, which proposed either to start hostilities against Germany and Italy , or disarm the ships. As a result of Operation Catapult, 1,297 French sailors were killed by the British shooting at ships anchored in the base. This massacre infuriated the French sailors and soldiers who had escaped from German captivity. As a result, only 14 out of 150 people from the Surkuf team agreed to stay in England and participate in hostilities. The rest disabled equipment, destroyed maps and other military documentation, before being taken to a POW camp in Liverpool. The officers were sent to the Isle of Man, and only Louis Blaison, who became commander, two sailors and a British communications officer assigned to the submarine, remained on the submarine as a senior assistant.

A crew of French sailors who joined de Gaulle's "Free France" movement and French sailors of the merchant fleet was assembled for the "Surcouf" from a pine forest. A significant part of them had previously served only on civilian ships, and even military sailors for the first time had to deal with such an unusual and difficult-to-handle design as the Surkuf. The lack of training was aggravated by the difficult morale of the sailors.
The task fell on the shoulders of Commander Bleson to train qualified submariners from inexperienced volunteers, while every evening they listened to French radio (under Vichy control) broadcasting German propaganda with calls to return home in order "to prevent the British from using themselves as cannon fodder (which vividly illustrates the desire of the French to fight).

The events in Devonport and Mers-el-Kebir left a characteristic imprint on the further participation of "Surkuf" in the war. Political considerations demanded that it be manned by members of the Free French forces and fully participate in Allied combat operations, but a premonition told the RAF Admiralty that this submarine would become a burden.
The British Admiralty was also in a difficult position. On the one hand, the submarine had a significant combat value and, moreover, thanks to pre-war propaganda, the French associated it with the power of their country, so it was worth using it - this would allow inflicting damage on the Germans and their allies, while at the same time increasing the morale of the fighters of the Free France". On the other hand, the design flaws of the boat, the poor training of its new crew and its unreliability led to the fact that many members of the Admiralty considered releasing the Surkuf into the sea a useless and potentially dangerous business. As a result, from April 1941 to January 1942, the boat was taken to combat missions only twice, both times without any success. The condition of the crew was deplorable, the sailors often found themselves under arrest or were written off to the shore for inappropriate behavior and various violations. Relations between officers and lower ranks were strained and reached the point of outright hostility, many members of the team openly expressed doubts about the usefulness of the Free French forces as such.

"Surkuf" in the sea

On April 1, 1941, Surcouf left Halifax, her new home port, in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, to join convoy HX 118. But on April 10, the order was unexpectedly changed without any explanation - "follow at full speed to Devonport." This hasty and complete change of plan caused increased rumors in the fleet that the Surkuf had destroyed the ships that it was supposed to guard with its guns.
On May 14, the submarine was ordered to leave for the Atlantic and conduct a free search until autonomy allows, and then head for Bermuda. The purpose of the search is to intercept enemy floating supply bases.

"Surcouf" off Halifax

On November 21, Commander Louis Bleson reported from New London, Connecticut, that the Surcouf had collided with an American submarine while maneuvering. The impact caused leaks in the third and fourth bow ballast tanks, which cannot be fixed without dry docking. The Surcouf sailed from New London without repairing these damages, carrying new Englishmen on board: communications officer Roger Burney, chief telegrapher Bernard Gough and chief signalman Harold Warner. What Bernie saw on the Surkuf horrified him. In his first report to Admiral Max Horton, commander of the submarine force, Burney expressed doubts about the competence of the commander and concerns about the morale of the crew. He noted "strong enmity between junior officers and ordinary sailors", who, although they did not show hostility towards the allies, often questioned the significance and usefulness of the Free French forces in their combat operations, especially against the French. This first report by Burney was hidden from the top of the Free French.

Painting "Surkuf" in the fleet of the "Free French"

December 20 "Surcouf", along with three French corvettes, took part in the operation to liberate the archipelago of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon. On the way from Halifax to Saint-Pierre, the Surcouf got into a storm, the wheelhouse was damaged by the waves, and the gun turret jammed. The boat lost seaworthiness in a strong wave, her hatches, deck superstructures and torpedo tubes were damaged. She returned to Halifax, where she unexpectedly received a new task - to follow to Tahiti with a stop at Bermuda. There, the commander-in-chief of the British naval forces in the region of America and the West Indies, Admiral Charles Kennedy-Purvis, at the request of the commander of the submarine forces, Admiral Max Horton, was to receive young Barney for an oral report. Before leaving Halifax, Burney was returning to the submarine with a Canadian naval officer. At parting, Bernie said to him: "You just shook hands with a dead man."
"Surkuf" left Halifax on February 1, 1942 and was supposed to arrive in Bermuda on February 4, but arrived there late, having also received new damage. This time, defects were revealed in the main propulsion system, which would have taken several months to eliminate. On the way, she was battered by bad weather several times, due to which the wheelhouse, gun turret and several torpedo tubes were damaged, some hatches on the deck lost their tightness. The plane had to be left ashore due to malfunctions even earlier. The condition of the crew did not improve, moreover, it was incomplete. As a result of the transition, the British observer concluded that the cruiser was completely incapacitated. The Admiralty, however, was more inclined to believe that the degree of damage by the boat commander was exaggerated, and this was simply sabotage stemming from an unwillingness to fight.

Submarine "Surkuf" in the base

In a top secret telegram sent to Horton and then to the Admiralty, Admiral Kennedy-Purvis wrote: "The English communications officer on the Surkuf gave me copies of his reports. After talking with this officer and visiting the Surkuf, I am convinced that he in no way exaggerates the extremely unfavorable state of affairs. The two main reasons, he noted, are the inertia and incompetence of the crew: "Discipline is unsatisfactory, the officers have almost lost control. At present, the submarine has lost its combat value. For political reasons, it may be considered desirable to leave her in service, but, from my point of view, it should have been sent to the UK and scrapped."
However, "Surkuf" personified the spirit and power of the naval forces of the "Free French". Admiral Horton sent his report to the Admiralty and, consequently, to Winston Churchill: “The commander of the Surkuf is a sailor who knows the ship and his duties well. Long idleness and anti-English propaganda in Canada negatively affected the condition of the crew. I think the Surcouf can bring significant benefits ... The Surcouf has a special relationship in the French navy, and the Free France will be categorically against decommissioning it."

View of the cabin "Surkuf"

The report of the damage to the submarine did not convince Horton: "Even if the intermediate repairs in Bermuda turn out to be unsatisfactory, on the way to Tahiti, the Surcouf will still be able to go under water using one engine ..."
February 9 "Surkuf" was ordered to proceed to Tahiti through the Panama Canal. On February 12, he left Bermuda and hit the road. The route was extremely dangerous, since the boat could not follow in a submerged position due to damage, and therefore could easily become the prey of its German colleagues, who literally swarmed in this region. Burney's last report is dated February 10: "Following my previous report of January 16, 1942, the conversations and events on board that I heard and observed further strengthened my opinion that the failures on the Surkuf were caused more by the incompetence and indifference of the crew than by open disloyalty..."
On February 12, Surkuf left Bermuda and headed through the Caribbean Sea, which was teeming with German submarines. He was only able to go on the surface - Commander Blaison would not go under water with a faulty engine. In addition to the calculated coordinates of the alleged location of "Surkuf", there is no more information about him.

Sectional model of the submarine "Surkuf"

On February 19, an adviser to the British consulate at Colona Port (at the entrance to the Panama Canal from the Caribbean Sea) sent a telegram marked "Top Secret" through Bermuda to the Admiralty: "The French submarine Surcouf has not arrived, I repeat, it has not arrived." The cable went on to say: "The US Troop Transport Thomson Likes, which departed yesterday with a convoy heading north, returned today after colliding with an unidentified vessel, which apparently sank immediately, at 10:30 pm EST on February 18 at 10 degrees 40 "North latitude, 79 degrees 30 minutes W. The transport searched this point until 0830 February 19, but found no people or debris. The only trace is an oil slick. The Thomson Likes has severe damage to the lower part of the bow."

“American authorities,” it was reported further, “studied the report of the captain of the transport vessel, an extensive search is underway by aircraft. According to unofficial information, preliminary investigation indicates that the unidentified vessel was a patrol boat. There is still no reliable information about all US submarines that could be in the area, but their involvement is considered unlikely."
Thus, the report about the loss of the boat immediately contained a version of its death, which later became official - in the darkness of the night, the boat, about the location and course of which the Americans were not warned, collided with the Thomson Likes transport and sank with the entire crew.
The official version is quite plausible, but it has many questions and ambiguities. For example, no one from the Thomson Likes team saw what exactly their ship collided with, and representatives of the Free French were not allowed to attend meetings of the commission investigating the collision and were not allowed to familiarize themselves with its materials. In addition, it was clearly difficult not to notice a huge submarine 110 meters long, following in the surface position.

In the note that lay on Churchill's desk, the following words of the telegram were crossed out: "... in the 15th naval region, the United States is clearly not informed about the route and speed of the French submarine Surcouf and cannot determine its location. The only message , handed over by me to the Americans on February 17, was the mentioned encryption.
On March 15, 1942, a closed meeting of the official commission to investigate the incident with the Thomson Likes transport began in New Orleans. From the British side, Captain 1st Rank Harwood, a representative of the submarine forces of the British Navy in Philadelphia, was sent as an observer, in whose report to the representation of the British naval command in Washington it was said: "None of the witnesses saw the ship with which the collision occurred. Approximately a minute after the collision, a strong explosion was heard under the keel of the Thomson Lykes. Extensive damage to the stem of the transport well below the waterline suggests that the ship into which it crashed was of a large tonnage and sat low in the water. Like ships following oncoming routes, they ("Surkuf" and "Thomson Likes") inevitably had to pass at a close distance from each other. According to Garwood's calculations, the Surcouf was within 55 miles of where the Thomson Likes reported the collision.

The commission did not make an unequivocal conclusion that Thomas Likes collided with Surkuf. She only stated that the transport collided with "an unidentified ship of unknown nationality, as a result of which this ship and its crew were completely killed." However, subsequent studies did not cast doubt on the fact that it was Surkuf who died. While the commission was in session, FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover sent a secret memorandum to the Office of Naval Intelligence stating that the Surcouf had in fact sunk a few hundred miles further off St. Pierre on March 2, 1942. Perhaps Hoover was referring to the port of Saint-Pierre in Martinique. Did the crew rebel, as might be assumed from Gough's last message, and did he, exhausted by the Allied command, go to Martinique, deciding to sit out until the end of the war in this quiet harbor?

Some believe that the sinking of the "unreliable" "Surkuf" was planned by the allies in advance, but was not made public so as not to spoil relations with the "Free France". In 1983, a former marine who served on the cruiser Savannah in 1942 stated that his ship received an order in mid-February to join forces with a certain English cruiser, and then find and sink the Surkuf, as it fired on allied ships. True, according to this tale, when the cruisers arrived at the appointed place, the Surkuf had already sunk for other reasons.
For some time, there were rumors in the ports of the Caribbean Sea that the Surkuf was seen in different parts of the sea after the date of the official death. The veracity of these rumors is being questioned. The submarine is gone...

Shortly after the disappearance of the Surcouf, the Free French demanded first an independent investigation, then permission to attend a meeting of the commission in New Orleans, and, finally, an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the Thomson Likes logbook. All these demands were rejected by Whitehall. And many months and even years later, the families of 127 French sailors and 3 English signalmen did not know anything about the circumstances of the death of their loved ones.

If the Surcouf had to be sacrificed because its crew changed flags and went over to the side of the pro-Nazi Vichy government, which resulted in attacks on allied ships, then, of course, every effort had to be made to save the reputation of the Free French Navy. . Any rumors of a rebellion or the deliberate destruction of the Surkuf by the Allies would provide invaluable propaganda material for the Nazis and Vichyists. The political reputation of the Free French would also suffer if one of its ships voluntarily went over to the camp of the enemy. So the official version of the death of "Surkuf" suited all parties. It was necessary to adhere to this version in the future, because the national pride of the French will not allow them to agree that the warship, included in the honorary name list of the "Free France", has betrayed de Gaulle.

Unlike the previous ones, the version put forward by the British researcher James Rusbridger looks very weighty. In the documents of the American 6th bomber group, he found a record that on the morning of February 19 near Panama "a large submarine was discovered and destroyed." Since the German archives did not record the loss of boats in that area at the indicated time, it is logical to assume that it was the Surkuf. Most likely, the boat's radio was damaged by the collision with the Thomson Likes that took place the day before, and she simply could not let the pilots know that they were bombing their own, and the boat ended up in the Panama area because it was the nearest allied port where it was possible to stand on repair.

There is another unproven, but interesting version:
the captain of the "Thomas Likes", who suddenly saw an unknown submarine in front of him, who had no warning about the presence of his ships in the area and who knew about the huge number of submarines in the area, Admiral Doenitz, could well consider it necessary to drown the unfamiliar vessel with a ramming blow.
During the work of the commission investigating the circumstances of the Thomas Likes accident, the head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, sent a secret memorandum to the US Navy Intelligence Directorate, in which he reported that the Surcouf sank off the island of Martinique on March 3, 1942, i.e. almost 2 weeks after the Thomson Likes collided with an unknown object.

The death of "Surkuf" in the representation of the artist Roberto Lunardo. If the boat caught fire or exploded, then it would definitely be seen from the side of the Thomson Likes transport

Charles de Gaulle wrote in his memoirs: “At the end of December, the threat loomed over New Caledonia. The situation was further aggravated by the fact that New Caledonia covered Australia, the main object of the enemy’s offensive. Meanwhile, on December 22, anticipating the Japanese occupation of our islands in Oceania, Vichy appointed Admiral Deco High Commissioner of the French Possessions in the Pacific, wishing, no doubt, with the support of the aggressor, to return our possessions to his rule. The Admiral did not cease to call on the Saigon radio the population of New Caledonia to revolt against the Free French. At the same time, d' Argenlier, who had to overcome all kinds of difficulties and endure unpleasantness, sent me reports full of energy, but not very encouraging.As for me personally, without ceasing to express to him my confidence that he could at least save the honor of France, I gave the order send to Nouméa some of the reserves we had at our disposal: command staff, naval guns, auxiliary the cruiser Cap de Palme; and, finally, Surcouf, from which one could expect effective operations in the Pacific Ocean due to its qualities as a long-range submarine. But, alas, on the night of February 20, at the entrance to the Panama Canal, this largest submarine in the world collided with a merchant steamer and sank with its commander, Captain 2nd Rank Blezon, and a crew of 130 people "

Surkuf itself would definitely shed light on what happened, but its wreckage has not yet been found. In 1965, amateur scuba diver Lee Prittyman claimed to have found the Surcouf at the bottom of Long Island Sound, but the story quickly petered out before going beyond a couple of newspaper articles. To this day, alternative theories of the death of "Surkuf" are put forward. One of the most popular says that the Surkuf crew nevertheless went on a betrayal, and that a pair of American submarines Mackerel and Marlin found him in Long Island Strait reloading supplies and fuel onto a German submarine, as a result of which the "German ", and the "Frenchman" were sunk. Variations of this version include a coastal defense airship or a British destroyer instead of American submarines.

If we accept the official version of the death of the Surkuf as a result of a collision with the Thomson Likes, then its wreckage should lie at a depth of about 3000 meters (9800 feet) at a point with coordinates 10 ° 40 "N 79 ° 32" W. However, this point of the seabed has not yet been explored with the help of underwater vehicles, and the exact place of the death of the Surkuf cannot be considered established. Huge submarine with powerful artillery weapons. pride of the french navy

P.S.: memory of "Surkuf"

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