The War at Sea:
The Battle of the Atlantic
What was the
Battle of the Atlantic?
The Battle of the Atlantic is the name given
to the battle for control of the North
Atlantic Ocean. It lasted 6 years,
from 1939 until 1945.
Why was the fight for the Atlantic
so important?
Why was the Atlantic so
important to the Allies?
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Britain is a small island nation and relies on food
and other supplies from other countries
The Allies depended on ships to take troops, war
supplies, and food from Canada and the USA
across the ocean to Britain
Britain could not carry on the war without this
lifeline, her survival and ability to fight depended
on it
Why did the Germans want
control of the Atlantic?
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The Germans knew the British needed
the supplies sent over to keep her
troops supplied and people fed
they could starve Britain of these
necessities if they sank the ships
Germans set out to cut the lifelines to
Britain by preventing supplies and
support from reaching Europe
Sinking of the SS Athenia
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First UK ship that Germany sank in the
Second World War
On 3rd of September 1939, the passenger
liner Athenia was torpedoed by a German
submarine
Occurred a week before Canada declared
war
200 of the 1500 passengers were Canadian
Several Canadians killed including ten-yearold Margaret Hayworth from Hamilton, ON
A state funeral was held
Convoys
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To make it more difficult for the Germans, the
Allies sailed in convoys
This called for the formation of a group of ships
to sail together as a group and under the
protection of escort ships
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An aerial view of a convoy of ships, 1940
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Until 1942, it seemed that the Allies would
lose in the Battle of the Atlantic
German submarines were doing serious
damage to the convoys
Convoy assembled in the
Bedford Vasin, Halifax NS,
April 1942
The German U-boat menace
How were the German U-boats (submarines) able
to get the upper hand in the early stages of the
Battle of the Atlantic?
The German “wolf-pack”
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Mass attack tactics against convoys used
by German U-boats during the Battle of
the Atlantic
Idea: attack in packs and overwhelm
defending warships
No long-range aircraft
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Air craft lacked the range to
cover the central part of the
Atlantic ocean
Had to turn back
this area or gap became
known as the “black pit”,
because of the heavy losses
the U-boats were able to
inflict there
Supermarine flying boat of the
RCAF Escorting Convoy, April
1941
Other reasons
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Lack of training
Ships and equipment inadequate
Too few ships – the Allies could not
produce new ships at the pace needed
to replace those being lost
In 1939, Canada
had only a few
dozen Canadian
registered merchant
ships, six
destroyers, five
small minesweepers,
two training vessels
and 3500 personnel
How did the Allies win the Battle
of the Atlantic?
Intelligence
Aircraft
Technology
Shipbuilding
Ships and training
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The Royal Canadian Navy
continued its rapid
expansion, but now with
better equipment and
improved ships
Corvette HMCS Kamsack in the
North Atlantic, December 1943
This, plus improved
By end of war, Canada
training, enabled the Allies had the 3 largest navy
with 375 ships and 110
to take the lead in the Atlantic 000 personnel
Soon the Allies were making Canadian shipyards
produced 403 merchant
more ships than the Germans ships, 281 fighting
ships, 206
were sinking.
minesweepers
rd
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Better Aircraft/ Aircover
The Royal Canadian Air Force received better
aircraft including very long-range Liberator
bombers that could fly far enough to protect
the entire convoy route
 This helped to close the “black pit”
A consolidated VLR Liberator
provides air-cover for a
transatlantic convoy
New technology-Radar
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Scientists worked desperately to design
new methods of locating and destroying
the U-boats
escorts were equipped with radar, which
could detect surfaced U-boats even in
dense fog.
New Technology - Radio
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Radio Directional Finding techniques such
as HF/DF (high frequency direction
finding) were perfected. They could pick
up radio signals from U-boats. The
location of wolf packs could be accurately
determined using U-boat radio
transmissions
Intelligence – code breaking
developments
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From late 1941 onwards, British
code-breakers got better at
decoding German codes. If they
broke the German code, they
knew where the U-boats were and
so could guide the convoys away
from groups of U-boats.
British cryptographers solved the
German naval Enigma code, giving
Britain the advantage
Canadian Sacrifice
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Royal Canadian Navy (RCN), Canadian Merchant Navy
and Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) were all key in
the Battle of the Atlantic
A large majority of 2000 members of RCN who died
during war were killed during Battle of the Atlantic
752 members of the RCAF
1600 Merchant Navy seamen from Canada and
Newfoundland killed
Civilian casualties: On October 14, 1942, 125 people
died when the ferry named the Caribou was sunk as it
headed from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland
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Merchant Marine
Civilian sailors
Rear-Admiral Leonard Murray, commander-in-chief
Canadian Northwest Atlantic “The Battle of the Atlantic was
not won by any navy or air force, it was won by the
courage, fortitude and determination of the British and
Allied Merchant Navy.”
Wartime Minister of Transport declared “merchant seamen
virtually form the fourth arm of the fighting services”
Casualty rate was 1 in 7, a higher percentage of total
casualties than those suffered by any of Canada’s fighting
services
Merchant navy veterans denied benefits and official
recognition for decades
http://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/video-gallery/video/4556
https://legionmagazine.com/en/2010/07/canadas-merchantnavy-the-men-that-saved-the-world/
The Battle’s Significance
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In a memoir written after the war,
Britain’s wartime prime minister, Winston
Churchill, summed up the importance of
this sea battle. “The Battle of the Atlantic
was the dominating factor all through the
war,” Churchill wrote. “Never for one
moment could we forget that everything
happening elsewhere, on land, at sea, or
in the air, depended ultimately on its
outcome, and amid all other cares we
viewed its changing fortunes day by day
with hope or apprehension.”
Enigma Machine
Enigma Wiring
Number of Possibilities
 158
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962 555 217 826 360 000
158 quintillion, 962 quadrillion, 555 trillion,
217 billion, 826 million, 360 thousand
Some say that the breaking of the German
Enigma code shortened the war by 2 to 4
years
Alan Turing (1912-1954)
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Played pivotal role in cracking of Enigma
at Bletchley Park
Arrested in 1952 for homosexual acts
Rather than go to prison, he accepted
injections of oestrogen to neutralise his
libido (sex drive)
Death by cyanide poisoning ruled a suicide
Battle of the Atlantic Game
Play the
game to see
how the
battle was
played out.
Follow the
instructions
on the game
sheet
John Tovey, Vice Admiral,
Allied Commander
Karl Donitz, Chief Admiral
German Commander