“Battleship X,” the class leader USS South Dakota (BB-57) fires her forward 16-inch guns of Turrets I and II at the Kamaishi Steel Works on Honshu, Japan, 14 July 1945.
Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. Catalog #: 80-G-490175
A young ship turned old pro that saw her first action off Guadalcanal in October 1942, SoDak by this stage of the war was earning her 13th battle star and was an expert at using her radar to target centrally controlled 16-inch guns.
In bombarding the Kamaishi plant, she plastered it with 231 16-inch shells (that’s 219 tons of ordnance!) in 42 salvos between 1211 and 1415, a span of just over two hours. Adding the ship’s on-board Kingfisher spotter planes to the mix to correct shot fall made it cake.
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Warship Wednesday, July 16, 2025: Flat Iron Warrior
Above we see the Norwegian Gor-class gunboat-turned-minelayer KNM Tyr, all 102 feet long with a 4.7″/40 EOC gun forward and mines stowed aft. Downright ancient when the Germans came in 1940, she nonetheless proved a serious thorn in their side.
Norwegian Rendels
Starting in the 1870s, the Norwegians embarked on a program of modern warship construction, including steam engines and iron/steel hulls. Constructed locally at Carl JohansVærns Værft, Horten, they ordered eight 2nd class gunboats (Kanonbåt 2. kl) running between 250 and 420 tons, three first class gunboats of between 720 and 1,280 tons, a 1,045-ton steam corvette, an armed 350-ton minelaying “crane vessel” (Kranfartøy), and 14 assorted (45 ton-to-107 ton) 2nd class torpedo boats by 1902. Meanwhile, four 4,000-ton coastal battleships (Panserskibe) with 8.2-inch guns and up to 8 inches of armor would be ordered from Armstrong in the 1890s.
The eight 2nd class gunboats were all of the “flat iron” or Rendel type, a common format introduced by Armstrong in 1867 and built under contract for or copied by over a dozen fleets around the globe, including Norway’s neighbors Denmark and Sweden. Short and stubby, typically about 100 feet long with a 30-foot beam, they were flat-bottomed and drew a fathom or less, even under a full load. This hull form and their anemic compound steam engines only allowed for a speed in the 8-10 knot region, leaving these as defensive vessels ideal for guarding strongpoints and key harbors.
Armament was typically a single large (8-to-15-inch!) gun that could be lowered and elevated inside a shielded battery but not traversed, with the gunboat coming about to aim the horizonal.
The Norwegian Rendels included KNM Vale and Uller (1874, 1876, 250t); Nor, Brage, and Vidar (1897-1882, 270t); Gor and Tyr (1884, 1887, 289-294t); and Æger (1893, 420t). The first five carried a single Armstrong 26.67 cm (10.5-inch) RML forward and two 1-pounder Hotchkiss guns amidships.
Kanonbåt 2 kl Brage’s crew with her Armstrong 26,7cm RML.
Æger toted a more modern 8.3-inch Armstrong breechloader and three small (one 10-pdr and two 4-pdrs).
Æger. This 109-foot 420-tonner was the pinnacle of Rendel development. A one-off design, she was decommissioned in 1932 and her name recycled for a new Sleipner-class destroyer. NSM.000460
Gor and Tyr each carried a single breechloading Krupp 26 cm (10.2 inch) L/30 gun (606-pound shell, 192-pound charge, m/v 1805 ft/secs), the same model gun used on the 3,700-ton Japanese Armstrong-built protected cruisers Naniwa and Takachiho, backed up, like most of the other Norwegian Rendels, by two 1-pounder Hotchkiss guns.
Kanonbåt 2. kl. Gor (b. 1884, Karljohansvern Verft, Horten), note the large Krupp gun forward. NSM.000459
Japanese officers of the protected cruiser Naniwa posing near one of her 26 cm (10.2″) Krupp guns, 1885
Meet Tyr
Constructed as Yard No. 67 at Horten, Tyr was named for the one-handed Norse god of war who sacrificed his other hand to trap the wolf Fenrir. Laid down in 1884, she launched on 16 March 1887 and, fitting out rapidly, joined the Norwegian fleet shortly after.
Norwegian gunboat KNM Tyr from 1887
After 1900, with the looming formal separation from Sweden on the horizon and the prospect of a possible fight on their hands, the Norwegians upped their torpedo boat numbers rapidly to nearly 30 boats as their four new bathtub battleships arrived on hand from Britain. With that, the Rendels transitioned to more static support roles around this time, such as minefield tenders at strategic coastal fortifications and depot ships.
Around this time, most landed their obsolete main gun in exchange for something more contemporary, with most picking up a trainable QF 4.7″/40 Elswick 20-pounder behind a shield. This allowed the removal of their armored bow bulwark. Gor and Tyr also picked up a high-angle 76mm mount, while some of the older boats received a 47mm mount.
Gor as minelegger with mines aft.
After Norway got into the submarine business in 1909 with the small (128-foot, kerosine-engined) German-built KNM Kobben, Tyr became her tender until 1914.
K/B 2 kl Tyr as tender with Norwegian submarine Kobben alongside. MMU.944062
Tyr plan 1913, slick-decked as tender.
With the mine warfare lessons reverberating around the globe after the Russo-Japanese War, it became obvious how easy these broad-beamed shallow-draft craft could be converted to minelayers. This typically meant installing twin port and starboard rail tracks on deck running about 65 feet to the stern for easy planting either via boom over rail drop. On the Gor and Tyr, this allowed for as many as 55 mines stowed on deck.
Tyr as mine planter with her 4″/40 forward and two 37mm 1-pounders on her amidships bridge deck. Model in the Horten Marinemuseet.
Same model, note the mine arrangement. The model omits her 6-pounder 76mm gun.
mines on converted Norwegian 2c gunboat, pre-1940
Same as above
Same as above
1929 Jane’s abbreviated listing of seven of the old Rendel gunboats, including Tyr. Note that Gor is still listed with her old 10-inch Armstrong. The larger Aegir was listed separately and was disposed of in 1932.
War!
September 1939 brought an uneasy time to Scandinavia. The remaining seven Norwegian Rendals, all by this time working as minelayers, bided their time and clocked in on the country’s Nøytralitetsvakt (Neutrality Watch).
Tyr was placed under the command of Orlogskaptein (LCDR) Johan Friederich Andreas Thaulow “Fritz” Ulstrup and stationed at the outer ring Lerøy Fortress overlooking the narrow Lerøyosen south of Bergen. Ulstrup, 43, was a career naval officer who was minted in the Great War and, having studied in France from 1922 to 1924, was serving as an instructor at the Naval Academy in Bergen when the war started.
Ulstrup, who doubled as fortress commander at Lerøy, also had a flotilla of five small armed auxiliary guard boats– Haus (135grt), Lindaas (138grt), Alversund (178grt), Manger (153grt), and Oygar (128grt)– and an old (circa 1898) torpedo boat, Storm, under his control. However, the fort itself, slated in 1939 to receive a 120mm gun battery with four old L/40 French-built Schneider weapons from the decommissioned border forts of Vardasen and Gullbekkasen pointing toward Sweden, instead only had a couple of 65mm Cockerill guns and searchlights.
On the early morning of 9 April 1940, just after midnight, two cruisers appeared off Bergen and flashed that they were the RN’s HMS Cairo and Calcutta, when in fact they were the German Kriegmarine’s light cruiser sisters Koln and Konigsberg, each with nine 15 cm SK C/25 (5.9-inch) guns, as the Gruppe 3 invasion force under RADM Hubert Schmundt. The cruisers were followed by 600 troops of the Wehrmacht’s 69th Infantry Division on the 1,800-ton gunnery training ship (Artillerieschulschiff) Bremse with four 12.8 cm SK C/34s, the torpedo boats Wolf and Leopard, and the E-boat tender Carl Peters shepherding S19, S21, S22, S23, S24, and naval trawlers Schiff 9 and Schiff 18.
Tyr, loaded with live and armed mines picked up at Laksevåg, was at the ocean-front fishing village of Klokkarvik, directly in the path of the Germans.
Klokkarvik harbor during the neutrality watch in 1939/40. In the picture, you can see a mine-armed KNM Tyr at anchor with a Draug-class destroyer at the quay. Note the Royal Norwegian Navy’s Hover M.F.11 floatplane in the foreground. (Source: Naval Museum Horten)
When the Germans began to creep into the fjord and with word of other sets of foreign warships in the Oslofjord, Ulstrup, who had been arguing with Bergan’s overall commander, RADM Carsten Tank-Nielsen all day on the 8th to be able to sow his mines, finally obtained clearance at 0030 for Tyr to hurriedly drop eight mines between Sotra and Lerøy, closing Lerøyosen. However, the 10-14-hour time-delay safety features on the magnetic contacts of the mines meant they were still dormant when the German cruisers passed harmlessly over them. Storm, meanwhile, fired a torpedo at Carl Peters at 0220 but missed.
Ulstrup closed to shore so he could place a quick phone call to Tank-Nielsen to apprise him of the situation, then returned to his minelayer to beat feet toward Bjørnefjord, playing a cat and mouse game with German E-boats and reportedly landing a hit from her 4.7-inch gun on one, receiving several 20mm hits from the Schnellbooten in exchange.
Further up the fjord, batteries at the now-alerted Norwegian inner ring Forts Kvarven (3 x 210mm St. Chamond M.98s) and Sandviken (3 x 240mm St. Chamond L/13s) opened up on the passing Germans at 0358 and soon landed hits on both Konigsberg and Bremse in the darkness of pre-dawn, leaving the former adrift with flooded boiler rooms. While Tyr, Ulstrup, and company managed to withdraw further into the fjords– laying another 16 mines in the Vatlestraumen approaches north of Bergen– Bergen itself fell to the German seaborne force just hours later.
Meanwhile, Tyr’s mines near Vatlestraumen sank the packed German HSDG freighter Sao Paulo (4977grt) on the evening of the 9th, sending her to the bottom in 260 feet of water.
The 361-foot Hamburg-Südamerikanische Dampschiffahrts-Gesellschaft steamer Sao Paulo was lost to one of Tyr’s mines.
In trying to sweep the mines, the German naval auxiliary Schiff 9 (trawler Koblenz, 437grt), and the auxiliary patrol boat Vp.105 (trawler Cremon, 268grt), along with two launches from Carl Peters, were lost on the 11th. Some sources also credit the German steamer Johann Wessels (4601grt), damaged on 5 May, and the German-controlled Danish steamer Gerda (1151grt), sunk on 8 May, as falling to Tyr’s eggs.
Withdrawing down the 114-mile-long Hardangerfjord, Ulstrup was appointed the commander of this new sector on 17 April and, moving ashore to Uskedal, left Tyr to her XO, the 47-year-old Fenrik (ensign) Karl Sandnes. Ulstrup, stripping the 37mm guns from Tyr and two 65mm guns from auxiliary gunboats, mounted them on flatbed trucks as improvised mobile artillery.
A 1937 Chevy flatbed with a 65mm L35 Hotchkiss under Ulstrup’s dirt sailors, April 1940
The next two days saw a series of skirmishes around Uskedal, in which Tyr closed to shore to use her 4.7-inch gun against German positions in improvised NGFS, coming close enough to get riddled by German 8mm rifle fire in return.
A naval clash on the 20th involving the advancing Germans in the Hardangerfjord saw Tyr, under the command of Sandnes, shell the German auxiliary Schiff 18, which beached at Uskedal to avoid sinking. The same battle saw the Norwegian Trygg-class torpedo boat Stegg sunk by Schiff 221 while the Norwegian armed auxiliary Smart was sunk by Bremse. The German minesweeper M.1 went on to capture five Norwegian-flagged steamers that were hiding in the fjord.
With Ulstrup and his force ashore getting ready to displace inland under fire, and Tyr trapped in the fjord, Sandnes brought his command to the shallows and, attempting to camouflage her, hid the breechblock for her 4.7 and evacuated the old minelayer. By forced march, they made it to Matre, some 14 miles on the other side of the mountain, and soon rejoined Allied lines.
Meanwhile, Tyr was soon discovered by the Germans, who towed her back to Bergen and, along with her fellow Rendel gunboat-turned-minelayer cousin, Uller, were soon pressed into service with the Kriegsmarine.
On 30 April, Tyr and Uller left occupied Bergen with German crews on a mission to mine the entrance to Sognefjord, barring it to British ships. This service would be short-lived as a Royal Norwegian Navy Heinkel He 115 seaplane spotted the pair, now under new management, and bombed Uller seriously enough to have her crew beach on a reef and evacuate on Tyr. Uller later lifted off the reef and sank near Gulen, becoming a popular dive spot.
As for Tyr, she saw no further direct combat, although the Germans likely continued to use her in some form of coastal service for the rest of the war.
Post-war
Tyr was still afloat in 1945 when the Germans were run out, and was subsequently sold on the commercial market. Her old hull still in good shape, she was converted to an economical diesel plant and sailed for a time as a heavy lift steamship.
By 1951, she had been converted to the car ferry Bjorn West, a task she fulfilled for three decades. Further converted for service in a salmon farming operation.
Found in poor condition ten years ago, she recently passed to a consortium of Vestfold county municipality, the KNM Narvik Foundation in Horten, and the Bredalsholmen Shipyard and Preservation Centre, who, with Tyr safely in drydock in Kristiansand, plan on restoring her to her 1940 condition. At this point, she is believed to be the last Rendel-type gunboat.
They plan to make her sailable, which isn’t that far-fetched.
Epilogue
The Norwegian Navy has recycled our gunboat/minelayer’s name at least twice.
The first was an Auk-class minesweeper, ex-USS Sustain (AM-119), which was transferred in 1959 and served as KNM Tyr (N47). Three Auk-class sisters transferred with her (ex-USS Strive, Triumph, and Seer) were named Gor, Brage, and Uller, in a nod to the old Rendel boats that saw WWII service.
Ex-USS Sustain (AM-119) as KNM Tyr (N47). Commissioned 9 November 1942, she earned eight battle stars for her World War II service from North Africa to France to Okinawa, helping to sink at least one U-boat in the process. She served the Norwegians from 1959 to 1984.
The third KNM Tyr in Norwegian service, N50, was bought commercially in 1995 and spent two decades mapping and filming dozens of historic wrecks in the country’s waters with her ROVs, including Scharnhorst and HMS Hunter (H35).
The intrepid LCDR Ulstrup continued to resist the Germans after leaving Tyr in April 1940. He crafted a makeshift shoreside torpedo battery, the only torpedo available being salvaged from the wreck of an old torpedo boat, and managed to caravan mines from a storage facility in Sogn to Ulvik to surprise the occupation forces. Once the Allies pulled out in mid-June, he was left to his own devices with a resistance group that became known, logically, as the Ulstrup Organisasjon.
With the heat getting too close for comfort, Ulstrup and a dozen other patriots crowded on the sailing trawler MK Måken (M 366 B)on 19 September 1940 and set out from Alesund for the Shetlands, arriving at Baltasound 11 days later. Welcomed as a hero in London, he was soon in command of the old four-piper HMS Mansfield (G76)(former USS Evans, DD-78), which in April 1941 carried commandos for a raid on Oksfjord, Norway, where the herring oil factory was destroyed.
“HNMS Mansfield, Norwegian Town-class destroyer. She is an ex-U.S. destroyer (USS Evans) and is manned entirely by the Norwegian Navy.” Circa 1941. Note her Norwegian flag. Photo by Harold William John Tomlin, IWM A2725
Once Mansfield was passed on to the Canadians in March 1942 after the Norwegians rode shotgun on 17 Atlantic, Ulstrup, promoted to Kommandørkaptein, was given command of the 11th Department in the Ministry of Defense in London, then subsequently placed in command of the Norwegian forces in Iceland, where he spent the rest of the war.
Returning to Norway with a War Cross with Swords, Ulstrup was promoted to rear admiral in August 1952. After escorting Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie on his tour of Norwegian naval bases, including the Horten shipyards in November 1954, he was made a Grand Officer of the Order of the Ethiopian Emperor Menelik II, rounding out his international awards.
Kontradmiral Johan Fredrik Andreas Thaulow Ulstrup, retired, passed in 1956, age 60, having wrapped up a 41-year career.
Tyr’s best-known “kill” of the war, the HSDG steamer Sao Paulo, packed with German military vehicles and stores that never made it to shore, is a favorite of wreck divers.
Meanwhile, in Klokkarvik, a memorial, complete with a mine and a seagull, was dedicated in 2021.
As noted in the town:
The seagull that takes off from the mine is a symbol of optimism. We should be aware of what war brings, but be most concerned with how we can secure peace. We should learn from history, – because it tends to repeat itself. The seagull draws our attention to the sea, the source of everything, our future.
Meminisse est ad Vivificandum – To Remember is to Keep Alive
***
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South Dakota-based Black Hills just picked up a $42 million, five-year contract (below) from Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane for 5.56mm Long Range, Special Ball, MK 262 MOD 1 Ammunition, with the first bite being for the USCG, likely for its MSSF or HITRON guys. This tracks as Black Hills last year got a $30 million contract for 9mm barrier blind cartridges from NSWC Corona.
Introduced in 1999, Black Hills guarantees its 77-grain MK 262 MOD 1, which has a velo of 2750 fps, with sub 2″ groups (.64 MOA maximum/10-shot groups). Commercially packed BH MK 262 rounds “good price” at about $1.42 a round, translating the Crane award to being worth at least 30 million rounds, hopefully more.
The award:
Black Hills Ammunition Inc.,* Rapid City, South Dakota, is awarded a $42,480,300 firm-fixed price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for 5.56mm Long Range, Special Ball, MK 262 MOD 1 Ammunition. This contract does not include options. Work will be performed in Rapid City, South Dakota, and is expected to be completed by July 2030. Fiscal 2025 Ammo Procurement (Coast Guard) funding in the amount of $292,644 will be obligated at the time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was competitively procured on the basis of 100% Small Business Set-Aside and two offers were received via the Procurement Integrated Enterprise Environment Solicitation Module. Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division, Crane, Indiana, is the contract activity (N0016425DJN13).
County Kildare, Ireland. Some 65 years ago this week.
Official period caption: “Following the Security Council resolution of 14 July 1960 authorizing UN military assistance to the Republic of the Congo, soldiers from several nations have been sent to help restore order and calm in the country. One of the countries to send contingents to make up the new UN Force was Ireland. These three members of the Irish contingent are seen waiting with their packed lunches, papers, and magazines, ready to leave from Baldonnel airport. From left to right: Cpls. Michael Kavanagh, Michael Cleary, and Kevin O’Rourke.”
UN Photo # 105685
Note the good corporals wear Ireland’s distinctive zig-zag style of chevrons on their thick “bullswool” tunics and, with tall peaked hats and their slung .303 Enfields, look more ready to fight in 1922 than 1960.
Irish Defence Forces personnel boarding a USAF C-124 Globemaster transport aircraft for the Congo in the early 1960s armed with the Lee Enfield No. 4 Mk 2, Bren, and Swedish Carl Gustaf m/45.
Without doubt, the Congo did spark a modernization of the Defence Forces’ personal equipment and small arms. The first and most discernible example of such modernization was in the uniforms that troops were issued. As a result of the twin effects of the speed of the formation of the first two battalions to serve in the Congo, and years of underfunding, the soldiers of the 32nd and 33rd Battalions were issued with winter Irish uniforms for their tour of duty. These were the notorious so-called ‘bulls’ wool’ tunics which the soldiers wore when they departed Ireland in the summer of 1960. These uniforms were quickly abandoned by the troops once they arrived in the tropical Congo climate. Additionally, the first two battalions were not equipped with mosquito nets and were given winter leather boots. Officers of the 32nd Battalion expected that ONUC would have stores of tropical uniforms, suitable boots, and mosquito nets, but were surprised to discover that ONUC had no such supplies. In an extraordinary demonstration of just how desperate the uniform situation was, officers of the 32nd Battalion commandeered a local textile factory to produce tropical uniforms for the battalion.
On 8 November 1960, the 11-man patrol from A Coy, 33 (Irish) Bn, led by Lt. Kevin Gleeson, was ambushed by Baluba tribesmen on a bridge over the Luweyeye River, resulting in nine Irish peacekeepers being killed. It turned out the Congo was no game.
The Congo deployment resulted in greater investment by the government in contemporary personal kit and weapons, including the rapid adoption of the FN FAL and FN MAG58 in 1961, and the purchase of modern armored vehicles such as Panhard AMLs and M3s.
Here we see Katrín Gunnarsdóttir, the Icelandic minister of foreign affairs, visiting the 688i class hunter killer USS Newport News (SSN-750), while the boat is tied up remote Grundartangi, last week.
Those are some comfortable-looking shoes (USN image)
Newport News was escorted in by the Icelandic Coast Guard cutter Tyr (ICG image)
And assisted by Faxaflóahafnir-owned tugs. Faxaflóahafnir is a government (municipal) owned ports enterprise. (USN image)
(USN image)
Faxaflóahafnir operates Grundartangi as an industrial port some 45 minutes north of Reykjavik by car, while the nearest town, Hvalfjarðarsveit, has a population of about 600.
While it seems like such a small deal, it is big for Iceland, which has notoriously been hands-off when it comes to warships, even those of NATO allies, calling in the country’s ports.
As we’ve previously covered, the country has played host to at least a half dozen Amerian subs since April 2023– including one of SUBRON 12’s Block III Virginia-class hunter-killers, USS Delaware (SSN 791)-– in the waters of Eyjafjordur for partial resupply and crew swaps, becoming sort of a new Holy Loch North. However, this is the first time an SSN has been tied up.
The Navy made sure to note this latest visit as “historic,” and Adm. Stuart B. Munsch, commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa and a career submariner himself, came aboard to pin on new Dolphins on the crew that earned them this deployment.
“Iceland’s support and strategic location are critical to collective defense in the North Atlantic,” said Munsch. “Our submariners stand the watch where few can, providing unmatched undersea dominance and ensuring our nations remain secure and free.”
Meanwhile, Newport News, commissioned in 1989, is one of the oldest boats still active in SUBLANT’s inventory and is slated to begin standing down in FY26. The Icelandic government was quick to note that she “ber ekki kjarnavopn” (does not carry nuclear weapons).
It happened 85 years ago, in London, on 14 July 1940.
Men of the “Free French” 14e demi-brigade de marche de la Légion étrangère (DBMLE), who had participated in the Norwegian campaign and then rallied to General de Gaulle’s cause after the Fall of France, parade through the streets of London on Bastille Day. Note their Adrian helmets, iconic Legionnaire “Cheche” desert scarves, Alpine breeches and boots, and MAS 36 7.5x54mm bolt-action rifles carried with trigger guard out in French fashion.
Réf. : FFL 16-5345 Auteur inconnu/ECPAD/Défense
On July 14, 1940, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who delivered a very Francophile speech in tribute to the French men and women who had not given up fighting, allowed De Gaulle and his forces to celebrate Bastille Day in the English capital, which simultaneously became for a time the capital of Free France. The general laid a wreath at the foot of the statue of Marshal Foch (a ceremony he would repeat on Bastille Day 1942) and watched the (short) parade of the Free French Forces who marched from the Cenotaph in Whitehall to the statue of the marshal in Grosvenor Gardens.
The unit was originally formed as the two-battalion 13e DBMLE under the bespectacled Lt. Col. Raoul Charles Magrin-Vernerey in February 1940 in preparation for a planned Franco-British expeditionary force to initially intervene in Finland. Importantly, they were given a crash course in mountain operations, equipped with skis, and given the uniforms of the famed “Blue Devils,” the Chasseurs Alpins.
However, Finland’s peace with Moscow on 12 March put its operations on ice.
Literally.
Re-tasked to the Franco-British expeditionary force to Norway in April, the legionnaires helped liberate first Bjervik and then Narvik from the Germans before being withdrawn in early June.
April 23, 1940 – Brest. Troops stand by during the departure ceremony of the 13th Foreign Legion Marching Brigade (DBMLE) towards Norway. Ref. : NAVY 224-3148 Jammaron/ECPAD/Defense
The brigade lost eight officers and 93 legionnaires in combat in Norway, including its 2nd battalion c/o, Maj. Albéric Joseph Calixte Guéninchault. Their dead remain in a military cemetery in Narvik, a plot of land that will forever be French.
Returning to France, they landed at Brittany on 4 June but, with the country rapidly collapsing to the Germans, elected to be taken off by British ships to Scotland on the 8th, to continue the fight. After all, most of the Legion was back in French North Africa, which was not under German occupation.
Following De Gaulle’s appeal on 18 June to join his forces, the choice was put to the men of the 1,619 remaining officers and men of the 13th DBMLE and, by sundown on the 30th, 25 officers, 102 NCOs, and 702 other ranks, led by Lt.Col. Magrin-Vernerey had elected to remain in exile and cast their lot with the Allies. The rest were repatriated to Vichy French-held Morocco, taking their flags with them.
As the “old” 13th DBMLE had returned home, the men left in Britain became the brand-new 14th DBMLE on 1 July 1940. Fighting under that designation, they served on Operation Menace, the botched landing in Senegal in October, and then in the more successful Gabon campaign in November.
Hearing that the “old” 13th DBMLE had been disbanded under pressure from the Germans to draw down Vichy French forces in November 1940, the 14th adopted the name of the 13th, becoming the “new” 13th DBMLE.
As such, they continued to serve as renowned fire eaters, earning honors at Keren-Massaouah (1941), Bir-Hakeim and El-Alamein (1942), Rome (1944), Colmar and Authion (1945), covering 20,000 miles in the process, spanning from Norway to Egypt and Syria, and back to Europe, fighting up the “Boot” in Italy to landing on the shores of the Riveria and driving to the Alps.
They later added Indochina (1945-54) and Algeria (1955-62) to the list.
They endure today, stationed at Larzac as part of the 6th Armored Brigade.
It wasn’t just the “combat con artists” of the Ghost Army that put excellent work into tactical deception. Check out this bad boy, some 80 years ago this week, a great mock-up of an Aichi E13A (Allied reporting name: “Jake”), or possibly a later E16 Paul.
Official period caption: Balikpapan “Operation July 1-31, 1945-A Japanese decoy seaplane on a seaplane ramp in Balikpapan Harbor. There were two of these planes made out of wood and palm mats. 5 July 1945.”
(U.S. Air Force Number 63174AC)
You know, you just know, that some unit disassembled this thing and took it back to their camp until they went back home. Then, perhaps, it made it back to the States or Australia as unit cargo, only to go on to a second life in someone’s man cave.
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Warship Wednesday, July 9, 2025: Gravity Boat
Koninklijke Marine image via the Netherlands Institute of Military History (NIMH) file no. 2173-223-109
Above we see the Dutch Navy’s fully-dressed K XIV-class colonial submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII arriving in Surabaya, Java in what was then the Dutch East Indies, some 90 years ago this week, on 11 July 1935, to a welcome from several Dutch warships, including the destroyer Hr.Ms. Van Galen in the background. Our subject submarine had left Den Helder some eight months and 22,710 miles prior. For reference, the circumference of the Earth around the Equator is approximately 24,901 miles.
At the time, it was the longest unescorted journey by a submarine, just besting a 1926 cruise by another Dutch sub. Shipping aboard the boat was one Prof. Felix Andries Vening Meinesz– a Dutch geophysicist and geodesist known for his work in the field of gravimetry– packing his “Golden Calf,” which was beloved by the crew for reasons we will cover.
Don’t let her bookish origins fool you, K XVIII proved to have teeth when the war started in the Pacific just seven short years later.
The K XIV-class
Paid for by the oil-rich government of the Dutch East Indies in 1930 to serve as “colonial” submarines with the “K” for “Koloniën,” the five K XIV-class boats were designed by Dutch Navy engineer J. J. van der Struyff, who already had the smaller 0 9 and K XI-classes under his belt. A bit larger and more modern than previous Dutch classes, they leveraged input from across Europe. Using a pair of 1,600 hp German-made MAN diesel engines and two 430 kW domestically built Smit Slikkerveer electric motors lined up on two shafts, these 1,045-ton vessels could push their 241-foot welded steel hulls at speeds approaching 17 knots on the surface (they made 19 on trials) and nine while submerged. The plant enabled them to cruise at an impressive 10,000nm at 12 knots, ideal for West Pacific patrols.
Using double hulls with a test depth of 250 feet, they carried both search and attack periscopes provided by Stroud and a periscopic radio antenna that could be used while submerged. Ideally, for their intended use around the 18,000-island East Indies archipelago, they could float in just 13 feet of water and submerge in anything over 50.
When it came to armament, they were outfitted with help from the British, including tubes for a batch of 200 Weymouth-built dialed-down Mark VIII torpedoes (dubbed II53 in Dutch service) that could hit 42 knots and carry a 660-pound warhead– not bad performance for the era.
A British-made II53 torpedo on board the destroyer Hr.Ms. Evertsen in 1929. The Dutch used these on both surface ships and subs. NIMH 2173-224-077
The torpedo tube layout in the class was interesting and not repeated in another Dutch class. They mounted eight 21-inch torpedo tubes–four bows (two on each side of the hull), two in the stern, and a twin external trainable mount forward of the conning tower– with room for 14 fish.
Hr.Ms. K XIV, seen in a Colombo drydock in December 1942, shows a good view of her bow tubes and the inset cavity forward of the fairwater for her trainable twin tubes.
A good view of the twin tubes mounted outside of the hull under the deck, prior to installation in 1931.
Besides their torpedoes, they were armed with a Swedish 88mm/42cal Bofors No.2 deck gun and two British Vickers 2-pdr QF Mark II (40mm/39cal) large-bore AAA machine guns, the latter contained in neat disappearing installations, a novel idea for guns that weighed over 500-pounds including a water-cooled jacket.
The crew of the Dutch submarine Hr.Ms. K XV with her 40mm Vickers “ack-ack” machine gun in position and 88mm Bofors gun pointing over the bow. Note the mixed crew, common for boats in the colonies. Circa late 1930s. NIMH 2158_005757
The first three boats– K XIV,K XV, and K XVI— were ordered from Rotterdamsche Droogdok Maatschappij on the same day in 1930 as Yard Nos. 167-169. The final two– K XVII and K XVIII— were ordered in 1931 as Yard Nos. 322 and 322 from neighboring Wilton-Fijenoord, Schiedam. All five were complete and ready to deploy by early 1934.
Dutch submarine Hr.Ms. K XV central control 1935 NIMH 2158_005759
Dutch submarine K XV at Rotterdamsche Droogdok Maatschappij Jan 1931 NIMH 2158_008934
Dutch submarine K XV at Rotterdamsche Droogdok Maatschappij Feb 22 1934 NIMH 2158_008935
With the class complete, they typically self-deployed some 9,000 miles to the East Indies, stopping along the way at Lisbon, Cadiz, Palermo, Port Said, Suez, Aden, and Colombo. In theory, they could have done this on one tank of diesel oil without having to refuel.
The departure of the submarine Hr.Ms. K XIV and sister Hr.Ms. K XV from Den Helder, Holland, for the Dutch East Indies, 7 February 1934. In the background can be seen sisters K XVI and K XVII, waiting offshore. NIMH 2158_008920
Dutch submarine K XV on the Tagus River, Lisbon, likely on her way to East Asia. Photo via the Direcção-Geral de Arquivos of Portugal.
The arrival of Hr.Ms. K XV in Surabaya, April 1934. In the background is the destroyer Hr.Ms. Van Nes, which would be lost in February 1942, was sunk by Japanese aircraft. The white ship in the distance is Hr.Ms. Koning der Nederlanden, a 70-year-old 5,300-ton ramtorenschip ironclad that had been disarmed and turned into a barracks ship in 1920. NIMH 2173-223-089.
DOZ 3 (Divisie Onderzeeboten), consisting at this time of the colonial submarines Hr.Ms. K-XIV, Hr.Ms. K-XV and Hr.Ms. K-XVI, seen here in anti-aircraft exercises ca 1938. Note, you can see both Vickers 40mm being extended from the sail. You have a good view of the trainable twin external torpedo mounts via the opening just under the deck forward of the 88mm gun and the large escape hatches (drägervests) near the bow and aft of the sail. NIMH 2158_019998
Dutch submarines, including sisters K XVI, K XIV, K XII, and K XV (1933-1946,) along with the older (circa 1925) and smaller (216-feet/688 tons) Hr.Ms. K XI, alongside the supply ship Hr.Ms. Zuiderkruis, circa 1936. Of note, the obsolete little K XI, armed with more primitive Italian-made I53 torpedoes, would complete seven war patrols in WWII. Meanwhile, the 2,600-ton Zuiderkruis would escape from Java in February 1942 and spend the rest of WWII in Ceylon, operating as a depot ship and transport for the British Eastern Fleet. She would return home in 1945 and go on in 1950 after Indonesia’s independence to become the flagship of the Indonesian Navy (as Bimasakti) and President Soekarno’s yacht. NIMH 2158_019986
Circa 1931 scale model of Hr.Ms. K XVIII, a K XIV-class submarine. Note her main deck gun before the fairwater with her AAA gun atop, hull mounted diving planes, net cutters on the bow, extensive running lines, forward trunk, upside down ship’s dingy aft near its crane, and twin screws on either side of a centerline rudder. 2158_054141
A similar model endures today in the collection of the Dutch Marine Elektronisch en Optisch Bedrijf. Note the arrangement of the four periscopes and aerials, but no AAA mount and a torpedo on deck over her external tubes. 0075_15_N0007294-01
A cutaway model gives a better look at her twin stowed AAA guns on either side of the conning tower, and her external tubes are shown forward between two trunks, placed between the deck and pressure hull. NIMH_2024-033_0003
K XVIII’s forward four-pack of torpedo tubes before installation in 1932. 2158_009163
Meet K XVIII
Ordered at the Wilton-Fijenoord shipyard in Rotterdam, the future K XVIII was laid down on 10 June 1931.
Construction of the K XVIII at the NV Dock and Yard Company Wilton-Fijenoord. 2158_009140
Launched 27 September 1932, by the next July, she had completed fitting out and was conducting her first of two months of trials.
K XVIII’s Langroom. Note the ornate brass fan on the bulkhead and wooden cabinetry. 2158_009184
The officers’ quarters. Note the rugs. 2158_009181
The non-commissioned officers’ quarters are seen forward, complete with padlocked lockers, with the firing installation of the deck tubes and one of the four periscopes, probably the antenna array, in the middle. 2158_009186
Construction of the K XVIII at the NV Dok en Werf Maatschappij Wilton-Fijenoord, July-August 1933. The K XVIII is undergoing a sea trial on the Nieuwe Maas. Note her telescoping radio mast and DF gear. 2158_012445
23 March 1933. Her plankowners assembled on deck in winter dress uniforms. Note the main deck gun is not fitted yet, but the forward submergible AAA is stowed with its hatch closed and the wheel on the flying bridge. 2158_009187
Construction of the K XVIII at the NV Dok en Werf Maatschappij Wilton-Fijenoord, July-August 1933. The K XVIII is undergoing a sea trial on the Nieuwe Maas. Note that her main gun has not been fitted. 2158_012442
Having been accepted and delivered, she was commissioned into service on 23 March 1934.
Hr.Ms. Submarine K XVIII, cruising in the North Sea shortly after completion. 2158_005746
Beginning on 20 June 1934, she underwent a six-week summer voyage with a squadron from Nieuwediep through the Baltic and back. The squadron included her sistership, Hr.Ms. K XVII, the old coastal battleship (pantserschip) Hertog Hendrik, and the destroyers Evertsen and Z 5. They called at several ports including Danzig, Konigsberg in East Prussia, Riga, and Copenhagen.
Crew of the submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII at Königsberg during the squadron voyage to the Baltic Sea in 1934. The old (circa 1917) destroyer Hr.Ms. Z 5 is moored behind the K XVIII. 2158_012382
Arrival of submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII in Danzig during the voyage to the Baltic Sea in the summer of 1934. Behind K XVIII, the destroyer Hr.Ms. Z 5. 2158_012405
20.000 Mijlen over Zee!
Returning home in the tail end of August 1934, our brand spanking new submarine was ordered to her intended duty station, with the fleet in the Dutch East Indies.
However, it was determined that this outbound sortie would be a bit more of a slow boat to (Indo)china so to speak, as she was tasked with a series of international port calls and put at the disposal of Prof. Vening Meinesz, who taught geodesy, cartography and geophysics part time at Utrecht University.
Why part-time?
Well, that’s because the good professor, under the auspices of the KNMI (Royal Dutch Meteorological Institute), had been tagging along on Dutch submarines for over a decade on a mission to measure the gravity field of the Earth. You see, it was in the subsurface dives that he could get the best readings, and almost every existing gravity reading up to that time had been done on dry land.
Before arriving on K XVIII, the professor had already shipped out several times on at least five other Dutch subs. The longest of these had been a six-month (27 May-13 December 1926) outward-bound cruise on the older K XI class boat Hr. Ms K XIII, when she deployed from Den Helder for the Dutch East Indies, via the Panama Canal and Hawaii.
Vening Meinesz’s primary instrument was one of his designs, a bronze-cased, wool-packed pendulum apparatus termed a gravimeter for obvious reasons. While the workings of his machine are beyond the scope of this post, the story goes that, to isolate its readings from the activities of working submariners, the best solution was to halt the work of said bluejackets, sending them to their racks, and halting the motors.
Rig for silence indeed.
As compensation for having to put up with the yo-yo work cycle when the professor was doing his thing, the Dutch admiralty authorized an extra guilder per man per dive when the gravimeter required them to secure stations. Thus, the machine became known to the submarine crews as Het Gouden Kalf (the Golden Calf).
The pendulum apparatus of Vening Meinesz, “Slingerapparaat van Vening Meinesz,” also known as “the Golden Calf. Positioned on the left side is the protective casing with the recording instrument on top. On the right side is the pendulum apparatus with the three pendulums at the back. Built in 1923, the instrument has been in the collection of the Delft University of Technology since 1966 and, in its time, had made over 500 submarine dives
The route from Holland to Java would be accomplished in 12 legs, the shortest just 1,200 miles, and the longest running 3,520 miles.
The end of each leg would be rewarded with a liberal port call (sometimes as long as three weeks) to show the flag, refresh supplies, and interact with the locals– with the side benefit of allowing the professor ashore to confer with regional scientific types and take gravimeter measurements in strange new places.
The port calls would include Funchal (Madeira), Saint Vincent (Cape Verde), Dakar, Pernambuco (Suriname), Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo/Buenos Aires/Mar del Plata, Tristan da Cunha, Cape Town (Kaapstad) and Durban in South Africa, Port Louis (Mauritius), and Fremantle in Western Australia before heading north to Surabaya.
NIMH_2024-033_0002
Under 43-year-old Luitenant ter zee 1e klasse (LCDR) Dirk Christiaan Marie Hetterschij, a career officer who joined the Dutch navy as a midshipman in 1910 and held his first seagoing command in 1922, K XVIII made ready for her epic voyage to East Asia. He knew the vessel well, having previously supervised the construction of the submarine.
With a wardroom of five junior officers led by 30-year-old Penang-born LTZ2 Max Samuel Wytema and Officer Marinestoomvaartdienst C. van der Linden (both of whom had sailed with Vening Meinesz previously on K XIII in 1926), a goat locker of eight petty officers, and 20 enlisted, the boat had an all-up complement of 34, skipper included.
The ship’s officers on the eve of leaving Den Helder, with Professor Vening Meinesz dutifully attired in white tropical mufti to match.
And with the whole crew. 2158_012351
13 November 1934. Submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII before departure for the world voyage of 1934-35. Prof. Vening Meinesz foreground. 2158_012349
Submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII leaves the port of Den Helder for her world voyage, 14 November 1934, before an assembled crowd of well-wishers. 2158_012347
The submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII stands out, moored in the harbor of Funchal, Madeira, on 24 November 1934, some 1,680nm down on the initial leg of her 1934-35 cruise. 2158_012354
However, before leaving the Atlantic, she had a side quest.
The Snip
Dutch airline KLM in 1934 was the only operator of a precious group of five triple-engine Fokker F.XVIIIs. With an 80-foot wingspan and 9-ton maximum takeoff weight, they could carry a crew of three and a dozen passengers on convertible sleeping berths on long-range flights, able to span 950 miles in six hours before needing to refuel. They were put into service on epic 7,000-mile Amsterdam-to-Batavia (now Jakarta) runs, once making it in just 73 flying hours.
One of the five KLM Fokker XVIIIs, PH-AIS “Snip” 2161_026829
Named after birds, in December 1934, one of the five F.XVIIIs, PH-AIS “Snip” (Snipe), set out on a history-making flight, KLM’s first transatlantic service to colonial Suriname and the Antilles from Holland.
Unable to make the flight non-stop, it accomplished legs from Amsterdam to Marseille, Marseille to Alicante, Spain; Alicante to Casablanca, and Casablanca to Porto Praia in the Cape Verde Islands. Waiting for the weather to clear to hop the Atlantic and packed with extra fuel, Snip and her four-man crew set out for Paramaribo in Suriname from Praia on 19 December, making the South American strip 17 hours and 35 minutes later, by far the longest leg.
Refueling once again, it went on to Curacao, where it landed on 22 December before a crowd of thousands at Hato airport, covering the 6,516nm from Amsterdam in just under 56 flying hours. While the extra fuel tanks had taken up the normal passenger space, she had carried a cargo of 233 pounds of Christmas mail containing 26,521 airmail letters and at least one bottle of beer.
It was midway on its 2,236nm Atlantic crossing from Praia that K XVIII was waiting, surfaced, lit up, and broadcasting weather conditions and forecasts as a beacon to point Snip in the right direction and be the first on the search should she not make it. While the Dutch KNSM merchant steamships Stuyvesant and Van Rensselaer were nearby, K XVIII was the only naval vessel tasked with support, and her crew heard the plane cross over on the night of the 21st in thick cloud cover.
Snip’s 1934 flight
On December 12, 1934, the Fokker F.XVIII “Snip” departed for KLM’s first transatlantic flight to Suriname and the Antilles. The plane arrived in Curacao 10 days and 6,500 air miles later without an issue, spotted along the way by K XVIII. 2161_026836
K XVIII underway on the surface in rough seas of the Atlantic. Note the barrel of her deck gun. 2158_012391
Anyway, back to our trip
On the way to Dakar in West Africa, the crew and the professor celebrated a somber Christmas on board before a paper tree while three musically inclined crew members formed an ersatz jazz band with a couple of horns and an accordion. They would cross the Equator just after New Year’s 1935 and hold the traditional crossing the line ceremony, dubbed Neptunusfeest in Dutch parlance.
Groot Feest means “big party.” 2158_012387
At each port, K XVIII picked up staged mail and supplies, dropped off beforehand by Dutch merchant vessels. Note the “Por K XVIII, Dakar” stencil on these boxes.
The shortest stop would be an overnight anchor on 22 March 1935 at the lonely island of Tristan da Cunha, a romantic harbor for Dutch mariners as it was where Pieter Groen from Katwijk had famously lived as an uncrowned king for years, becoming the paterfamilias of the largest family on the remote South Atlantic colony. Rarely visited, the crew passed on food and medical supplies to the colony.
Arriving in Cape Town (Kaapstad) on 2 April 1935. Note the deck awning and table forward, as well as the well-mixed uniforms of the crew, all veteran subjects of Neptune Rex (and almost blue noses), some 13,190 nm into her world cruise. 2158_012377
Twin stops in South Africa at Cape Town and Durban brought extensive interaction with the colony’s Dutch expatriates, and the ship’s officers made a pilgrimage to the statue of Jan van Riebeek to adorn it with a wreath. During her call, she was the first submarine to enter False Bay and the first to use the RN dry dock at Simon’s Town, where she was hurriedly scraped and repainted in five days, with her crew pitching in to meet the scheduled ship’s movement.
Then came the longest, 27-day stint across the Indian Ocean from Mauritius to Fremantle. Three dozen men in a 261-foot tin can for 3,520 nautical miles. Importantly, they would skirt a gravitational feature known today as the Indian Ocean Geoid Low (IOGL), a gravity “hole” that formed around 20 million years ago and is the deepest one known to man. Professor Vening Meinesz would only identify the IOGL in 1948 when looking at past data.
The home stretch arrival off Java coincided with the 339th anniversary celebration of the July 1596 arrival of Dutch merchant mariner Cornelis de Houtman in his VOC ship Mauritius after a 15-month voyage from Amsterdam, an expedition that began Dutch influence in the region.
Over the course of the voyage, Vening Meinesz had made 240 measurements while submerged.
Hr.Ms. Submarine K XVIII arriving in Surabaya after her “world voyage,” July 1935. She is being escorted in by a flight of three big Dornier Do J Wal seaplanes while her crew is assembled on deck. Do you have any idea how hard it would have been to keep those whites, white after eight months on a “pig boat?” 2158_005745
The Dutch Marineluchtvaartdienst, or Naval Aviation Service, bought five distinctive twin-engine push/pull Do J Wals from Dornier’s Italian factory in Marina di Pisa in 1926, then purchased a license to assemble a further 41 domestically at Aviolanda’s facility. Able to carry two machine guns and 2,200 pounds of bombs to 500nm, the “Whales” served in the Far East in rescue, reconnaissance, transport, and patrol roles for over a decade. They were replaced in MLD service by 1941 by 34 Dornier Do 24K flying boats and 25 Consolidated PBY Catalina flying boats.
Submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII in the Dutch East Indies, decorated and on parade duty, 11 July 1935. 2158_012424
K XVIII settles into the sheltered submarine docks in Surabaya, Dutch East Indies, after arriving. The Dutch would operate over a dozen subs from the port in the 1930s and early 1940s. Sadly, these were not hardened pens. 2158_012434
Crew members of the submarine Hr.Ms. K XVIII gathered for a welcome speech during Alle Hens, after arriving in Surabaya, Dutch East Indies, 11 July 1935. The suited Professor Vening Meinesz stands out, literally, between grinning skipper LTZ1 Hetterschij and his XO, LTZ2 Wytema. Note the white gloves and (usually German-made) Model of 1882 swords of the Dutch officers. For those curious, Dutch ships carried a very functional Model of 1911 Klewang profile naval cutlass through the 1950s, for enlisted use. 2158_012429
All the crew were presented with a special silver medal (the Draagpenning van de Rijkscommissie voor graadmeting en waterpassing) for the occasion, with Wytema and engineering officer Van der Linden earning a second award as they had earned one previously in 1926 on K XIII.
Skipper Dirk Hetterschij also picked up the Gold De Ruyter medal and was knighted, made an Officer in the Order of Orange-Nassau. He would similarly be made an Officer in the Belgian Ordre de Léopold II in 1936.
The chapels at the submarine barracks in both Surabaya and Den Helder received a stained-glass window with a tribute to the cruise of K XVIII. Painted by Willem Mengelberg in Zeist, it was paid for by the Stichting Algemeen Nederlandsch Comité “Onze Marine” association and includes a panel with Houtman’s circa 1596 VOC ship Mauritius. I believe they were both lost during WWII. 2158_012437
K XVIII’s XO during her 1934-35 cruise, LTZ2 Max Wytema, would go on to write two different submarine works, Klaar voor onderwater (“Clear for diving”) and, with Van der Linden, Met Hr. Ms. K XIII naar Nederlandsch-Indie (“With Hr. Ms. K XIII to the Dutch East Indies”) about their 1926 cruise. Wytema also shot several hours of amateur film footage during the cruise, which would later be edited by Brand D. Ochse, founder of Filmfabriek Polygoon, into an exotic 96-minute travel documentary, 20.000 mijlen over zee De wereldreis van onderzeeboot K XVIII (“20,000 Leagues of the Sea, The World Voyage of the Submarine K XVIII”).
Carrying a music arrangement by Max Tak, it showed many the first known moving images from such far-off locations as Tristan da Cunha, in addition to stirring sea shots of diving operations of a submarine underway, accompanied by dolphins.
Released in Dutch cinemas with the admiralty’s blessing and approval, the film was well-received and shown in several European countries, reportedly doing well for months in England and Spain.
I managed to find the first reel, which covers up to March 1935, leaving Argentina, in the NIMH, and have uploaded it, below.
Her film and book-worthy cruise behind her, K XVIII got to work as a normal Dutch fleet boat. She spent the next four years in a series of peacetime exercises and maneuvers, the highlight of which was the 23-ship September 1938 fleet review off Surabaya for (but not attended by) Queen Wilhelmina to celebrate her 40th anniversary.
War!
September 1939 brought an uneasy time to the Dutch East Indies. With Japan openly pressuring the colony, the local governor and his forces stepped up preparations to repel what was felt to be a looming invasion. Once metropolitan Holland was occupied in May 1940 by Germany, the DEI, still loyal to Queen Wilhelmina’s government in exile, sent its naval forces on patrol for Axis vessels in the region.
When the Pacific War with Japan kicked off in December 1941, K XVIII was in refit at Surabaya. One of 15 Dutch boats in the Pacific at the time (along with O-16, O-19, O-20, K-VII, K-VIII, K-IX, K-X, K-XI, K-XII, K-XIII, K-XIV, K-XV, K-XVI, and K-XVII), K-XVIII was soon back in the water, making war patrols and pumping torpedoes in the Emperor’s ships, one of the brighter moments in a campaign that was otherwise dark for the doomed ABDA Allies.
Her wartime skipper, LTZ1 Carel Adrianus Johannes van Well Groeneveld, had taken her sister, Hr. Ms K XIV, whose c/o was sick, on two short patrols while K XVIII was in refit in December. During which he torpedoed four Japanese steamers, sinking three for some 23,000 tons, a great start to the war!
With K XVIII back in the water in early January 1942, Van Well Groeneveld rejoined his command and departed Surabaya on his boat’s 1st war patrol on the 14th. After scuttling the evacuated Balikpapan light vessel Orion with gunfire so that it could not function as a beacon to the expected Japanese landing force, K XVIII spent the night of 22/23 January on a series of attacks on said force.
Narrowly missing the Japanese Sendai-class light cruiser Naka with four torpedoes, he sent the transport Tsuruga Maru(7289 GRT), carrying elements of the Sakaguchi Detachment (56th Regimental Group), to the bottom with a second load of four fish.
Tsuruga Maru was built down at Mitsubishi Shipyard as Yard No. 250, a 7,289-ton cargo ship for Nippon Yusen Kaisha (NYK), K.K. (Japan Mail Steamship Co.) in 1916. K XVIII sent her to the bottom in January 1942.
It was while avoiding depth charges from the responding Japanese submarine chaser Ch-12 that K XVIII bottomed and was extremely damaged, cutting her war patrol short. Returning to Surabaya by the 27th, she was still in repair when the Japanese neared the strategic port in March and was ordered scuttled along with 120 assorted Allied vessels in the area.
Before she was set ablaze, her deck gun was used to scuttle the unseaworthy Dutch Admiralen-class destroyer Hr. Ms Banckert.
K XVIII’s wartime boss, the budding sub ace Van Well Groeneveld, while in charge of the Torpedo Works at Surabaya in March 1942, went missing and was believed killed while inspecting faulty demolition charges with two other men during the destruction of the port, just shy of his 36th birthday. Besides a Dutch MWO.4, he earned the British DSO, although he was never able to receive it.
Ignoble service under the Setting Sun
With Surabaya under new management for the next five years, the Japanese had a chance to raise and repair several of the ships that were hastily scuttled there. One of these was K XVIII. Patched up to a degree, she was put into service as an unnamed and lightly armed air warning picket hulk in the shallows of the Madoera Strait in 1944. She was sent to the bottom a final time by HM Submarine Taciturn (P334) on 16 June 1945 alongside the Japanese auxiliary submarine chaser Cha 105 (130 tons). Taciturn described the action with the former pride of the Dutch submarine service as
“A K-16 class Dutch submarine covered with yellow lead and rust, she was very high in the water…Several hits were obtained and the hulk was seen listing shortly afterwards..” Before turning to sink Cha 160. Then, “target was now shifted to the rusty submarine hulk whose machine gun fire became annoying as the range closed. A considerable number of 4″ rounds were fired against her before she was seen to be sinking in position 06°52’S, 112°48’E. One of the hits was a direct hit on her gun.”
Of her four sisters, all gave hard service in East Asia in WWII, opposing the Japanese invasion of the Dutch East Indies. Two were lost during the conflict.
Hr.Ms. K XVI sank the Japanese Fubuki-class destroyer Sagiri on Christmas Eve 1941, then was, in turn, sunk by the Japanese submarine I-66 on Christmas Day, lost with all hands.
Hr.Ms. K XVII was believed lost in a newly laid Japanese minefield on or about 21 December 1941 in the Gulf of Siam and is still on patrol with 38 crewmembers. There are wild rumors she was lost in the “cover-up” in the Pearl Harbor advance-knowledge conspiracy theory, but they are, most assuredly, groundless.
Class leader Hr.Ms. K XIV (N 22), as we touched on above, was the most successful when it came to chalking up “kills,” is credited with three Japanese troopships — SS Katori Maru (9,848 tons), SS Ninchinan Maru (6,503 tons), and SS Hiyoshi Maru (4,943 tons)– sunk along with a fourth — MS Hokkai Maru (8,416 tons)– damaged in late December 1941 alone. Updated in America, she spent the rest of the war in Fremantle and would damage the 4,410-ton Japanese minelayer Tsugaru and bag numerous small vessels. She was retired in 1946, having completed nine war patrols. Also, like K XV, she languished in Soerabaja during the Dutch war against Soekarno, then was towed out and sunk in deep water following independence.
Hr.Ms. onderzeeboot K XIV (1933-1946) z.g.n. getrimd dieselen. NIMH 2158_005756
The K XIV class Bloedvlaggen, with K XVIII on the far right.
In all, wily “Free Dutch” submarines with nothing to lose accounted for at least 168,183 tons of enemy shipping and warships between May 1940 and August 1945, sinking no less than 69 ships– a figure that doesn’t count the myriad of small craft they also sent to the bottom. They also lost 16 boats, with seven still on eternal patrol.
In an ode to these old K boats, Indonesian rice (Indische rijsttafel) is a staple meal on Dutch submarines today, especially for service in the wardroom as a Blauwe hap (Blue Snack).
Epilogue
Little tangible remains of K XVIII. Her hulk was later raised (again) and scrapped in the 1950s after the Dutch had left. With so much war wreckage around Surabaya post-war, and with an active civil war going on in the islands until Indonesia’s independence in 1949, there was little appetite to set aside the relics of the once-famous submarine.
She is remembered in maritime art, such as on a recently released stamp from Tristan da Cunha.
Incidentally, when 20.000 mijlen over zee hit the theatres, it sparked a shoe drive in Holland for the island’s moccasin-wearing population, which ultimately received 760 assorted new pairs of wooden clogs for its 200 inhabitants. Unsuited for use in the rocky islands, the locals instead appreciated them as they kept the islanders in firewood for six months. K XVIII’s circa 1934-35 skipper, Dirk Hetterschij, after the legendary voyage to East Asia, became commander of the Dutch submarine service in Surabaya for two years, then returned home just in time for the German invasion. During WWII, he remained in the occupied Netherlands, where he played a key role in the Dutch resistance and was later arrested by the Germans for a time, but was released for health reasons. Placed in command of the Loodswezen, the Dutch Pilotage Service, post-war, he was made a rear admiral in 1947, but died in poor health the following year, just 57 years old.
RADM Dirk Hetterschij completed 38 years of honorable service to the Dutch Navy, most of it in submarines, with a dash of science and espionage behind enemy lines when needed. He is buried in Rhenen, with his wife joining him in 1974. As a side note, she had been the third wife of the swashbuckling late Dutch RADM Kaarel Doorman of Java Sea fame.
K XVIII’s multimedia talented XO during her 1934-35 cruise, LTZ2 Max Wytema, likewise continued to serve. The Dutch Naval Control Officer in San Francisco during WWII, he was recognized with a Legion of Merit by the U.S. Navy in 1942. While in California, he settled down and retired there, with his wife Annette passing in 1979. He joined her at age 78 in 1982.
In 2016, Dutch TV network VPRO released a digital version of 20.000 mijlen over zee in two parts. The website is kind of funky and takes a while to build, but it’s interesting to view once you get it going.
And finally, Professor Vening Meinesz, who became akin in his time to a Dutch Neil deGrasse Tyson after 20.000 mijlen over zee, continued his gravitational quest. He shipped out on four further Dutch subs in the late 1930s, including a three-month trip on Hr. Ms. O 16 in 1937. Teaching part-time both at the University of Utrecht and the Delft University of Technology, like his old pal Dirk Hetterschij, he rolled up his sleeves during the German occupation and helped organize the Resistance movement. Post-war, he took students and his instruments aboard a further six Dutch submarines, sailing as late as 1959.
Professor Vering Meinsez passed in 1966, aged 79. Utrecht University has the Vening Meinesz Research School for Geodynamics in his honor, while a crater on the moon also carries his name. Though he never wore a uniform, he earned his dolphins for sure.
The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships. With more than 50 years of scholarship, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO, has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject. PRINT still has its place.
If you LOVE warships, you should belong. I’m a member, so should you be!
Best known in the West as the Freedom Fighter or Tiger II in later models, the Northrop F-5 in Taiwan, the Republic of China, will always be remembered as the Tiger, a 60-year love affair that ended last week.
The first seven F-5As and two F-5Bs, shipped to Taipei under the U.S. Military Assistance Program in 1965, entered service with the RoCAF in 1965, serving as frontline air defense fighters.
This ultimately led to a force of 83 F-5A/Bs by the early 1970s (of which half were loaned to the South Vietnam Air Force and never returned, backfilled by aircraft from the USAF).
Local assembly of E and F-models began under the “Tiger Peace” Project in 1973, with Taiwan’s Aerospace Industrial Development Corporation (AIDC) eventually assembling 308 aircraft domestically, making the country the world’s largest F‑5 operator with over 336 operational aircraft in 1986 when the AIDC assembly line closed.
It was the stuff of recruiting posters.
Relegated to secondary tasks after the mid-1990s as the RoCAF obtained F-16s, Mirage 2000s, and domestic AIDC F-CK-1 Ching-kuo fighters, the F-5 E/F endured as a trainer and reserve fighter while some were converted to RF-5E Tigergazer recon aircraft.
In late 2024, the training aircraft mission was taken over by the AIDC T-BE5A Brave Eagle (an updated Ching-kuo) while Tigergazers were replaced by dedicated AN/VDS-5 (later Phoenix Eye and MS-110) recon-pod carrying “Leo Gazer” RF-16As as the last 46 F-5/RF-5 frames were cued up to withdraw from service. This capped 40 straight years of F-5E/F service with the RoCAF alone.
To commemorate the occasion of the type’s retirement, last week on 4 July, five Tigers (F-5F: 5398 and 5413, RF-5E: 5504, 5505, and 5507) took to the skies from Hualien Air Base for a last flyby over and along Taiwan’s east coast, the end of an era.
As noted eloquently by the RocAF last week:
Some voices fade away with the curtain.
Some spirits live on through the years.
The F-5E/F and RF-5E are not just the names of aircraft models,
but also the epitome of a period of the Air Force.
They have accompanied us through the forefront of combat readiness and have also entered the deepest part of the memories of the Chinese people, and are deeply rooted in the hearts of every comrade who has driven, maintained, and guided them.
Pilots guard the nation. Iron wings defend the skies.
This haunting polyptych, courtesy of the Australian War Memorial, depicts the final moments of RAF 7 Squadron Pathfinder Force Avro Lancaster JA853 MG-L, bound for Berlin, but instead was downed over Holland by night fighter pilot Oberleutnant Heinz-Wolfgang Schnaufer in a Messerschmitt Bf 110 G-4 (G9+DZ) of 12./NJG 1. JA853 took all seven of her crew with her.
As described by the AWM:
A memorial dedicated to five Australian and two British airmen was unveiled at Follega, in the Netherlands, last weekend. The seven men were amongst more than 55,000 lives lost in Bomber Command during the Second World War and were tragically shot down in Avro Lancaster JA853 MG-L in December 1943.
The establishment of this memorial, more than six years in the making, was an initiative undertaken by Diana Bentley, the niece of pilot Wallace Watson RAAF, and Melvin Chambers, who works to preserve the memory of Australian Dambuster pilot, Les Knight, DSO.
JA853 is also featured in a short film that depicts the incident in which these young men were killed, which was enabled through communication between Memorial staff and 7 Squadron (PFF) RAF Association in the UK.
These four still images from the short film sequence, which will soon be displayed in the Bomber Command gallery of Anzac Hall, accurately portray the event in which top German night-fighter ace, Heinz Schnaufer, shot down the Australian-British flown Lancaster bomber, using vertically firing ‘jazz music’ cannons.
Six of the seven crew members of Lancaster JA853 MG-L had previously flown the Memorial’s own ‘G for George’ when they were serving with 460 Squadron (RAAF). For their skill, they were chosen to join the elite Pathfinders with 7 Squadron RAF, marking targets for the main Bomber Command force.
While Schnaufer survived the war, with the record of the most successful night fighter pilot in the history of air warfare with 121 victories, the RAAF captured his plane in 1945, and one of its rear stabilizers hangs in the AWM.
