 |
| 05/01/1944 |
The last of four German blockade-runners
from Japan are sunk in the South Atlantic. |
| |
 |
| 07/02/1944 |
The first operational ‘Schnorkel’ U-boat
arrives in the Atlantic. |
25/02/1944
|
Convoy JW-57 (43 ships
and 19 escorts) sailing the Loch Ewe to the Kola Peninsula,
is attacked on 25 February off Norway. One destroyer, HMS Mahratta,
is sunk by U-990 for 1,920 tons. |
| |
 |
04/03/1944
|
Convoy RA-57 (31 ships)
sailing the Arctic route from the Kola Peninsula to Loch Ewe,
is attacked off Norway. The steam merchant Empire Tourist is
sunk by U-703 for 7,062 gross tons lost. However, the convoys
escorts sink 3 U-boats en-route. |
| |
 |
| 03/04/1944 |
Forty-two Royal Navy,
fleet Air Arm Barracuda torpedo-bombers hit the Battleship
Tirpitz 14 times in a daring raid on the Alten Fjord, in Norway. |
| 27/04/1944 |
German planes spot an Allied convoy
west of Start Point along the Channel Coast. The convoy is
actually making a practice run ('Operation Tiger') for the
planned invasion of Normandy on a stretch of coast very much
like that found in the Normandy region of France. The 5th and
9th Schnellbootflottillers are directed to attack at night,
which they do with the following boats: S100, S130, S138, S138,
S140, S142, S143, S145, S150. They engage the convoy, consisting
of 8 landing craft and protected by the lone English Corvette
Azeala at Lyme Bay. The result is that LST 507 was set on fire
and had to be given up, LST 531 was sunk and LST 289 received
a torpedo hit which killed many soldiers. Total Allied losses
were 197 seaman and 441 soldiers lost. |
| |
 |
| 16/05/1944 |
Aircraft of RAF Coastal
Command sink 5 U-boats off the Norwegian coast. |
| 29/05/1944 |
The U.S. escort carrier Block Island
is sunk by U-549. |
| |
 |
| 04/06/1944 |
U-505, patrolling off Cape Blanco
on the West African coast is forced to the surface by depth-charges
from the U.S. destroyer escort Chatelain and is captured intact
and towed to Bermuda by the escort carrier Guadalcanal. |
| 06/06/1944 |
The Royal Navy loses
the Destroyers Wrestler and Svenner, which was Norwegian. |
| |
 |
| 05/07/1944 |
German U-boats begin
operations off the Normandy coast, sinking 4 small allied warships
and damaging the British cruiser Dragon. |
| |
 |
| 22/08/1944 |
The Royal Navy Fleet
Air Arm begins four days of attacks on the German Battleship
Tirpitz and other shipping in the Alten Fjord, Norway. |
| |
 |
| 15/09/1944 |
Twenty-eight RAF Lancaster
bombers from Russia pound the Battleship Tirpitz with 12,000lb ‘Tall
Boy’ bombs in Kaa Fjord, Norway, scoring direct hits
right throughout the ship. |
| |
 |
| 29/10/1944 |
RAF Lancaster's attack
the Battleship Tirpitz again with 12,000lb, ‘Tallboy’ bombs,
this time off Tromso. |
| |
 |
| 12/11/1944 |
Heavy bombers of the RAF, after several
previous attempts, succeed in sinking the battleship Tirpitz,
the sister ship of the Bismarck, which is lying at anchor in
a fjord near Tromso in Norway. Over 1,000 men of her crew trapped
in her capsized hull are lost. |
| 27/11/1944 |
The German ship ‘Rigel’ is
sunk. Over 2,570 are drowned, most of them prisoners of war. |
| |
 |
| 01/12/1944 |
Princess Elizabeth launches
HMS Vanguard, the last and biggest battleship ever built in
Britain. |
| 23/12/1944 |
A German E-boat force is routed off
the Scheldt Estuary. |
| 24/12/1944 |
In the English Channel, U-486 (Oblt.z.S.
Gerhard Meyer) sinks the allied troop carrier SS Leopoldville
with the loss of 763 men of the US 66th Infantry Division.
All news and information on this incident is suppressed by
orders of SHAEF headquarters. |
| 31/12/1944 |
Allied merchant shipping sunk by U-boats,
world-wide from January to year's end 1944 is 251 ships, equaling
978,892 gross tons. 252 U-boats were lost worldwide in the
same period. |
