HMS Glowworm makes smoke moments before ramming the German heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper.
HMS
Glowworm was a
G-class destroyer built for the
Royal Navy in the mid-1930s. During the
Spanish Civil War the ship spent part of 1936 and 1937 in Spanish waters, enforcing the arms blockade imposed by Britain and France on both sides of the conflict.
Glowworm was transferred from the
Mediterranean Fleet shortly after the beginning of
World War II to the
British Isles, to escort shipping in local waters. In March 1940, she was transferred to the
Home Fleet, just in time to participate in the opening stages of the
Norwegian Campaign. On 8 April 1940
Glowworm encountered German destroyers transporting troops to invade Norway in
Operation Weserübung. The destroyers attempted to disengage while calling for help from the
heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper.
Glowworm was heavily damaged by
Admiral Hipper, but still attempted to torpedo the German ship. In chaos of the battle, the heavily damaged
Glowworm ended up ramming
Admiral Hipper, which broke the bow off
Glowworm, and she sank shortly afterwards.
On the morning of 8 April 1940
Glowworm was on her way to rejoin
Renown when she encountered the German destroyers
Z11 Bernd von Arnim and
Z18 Hans Lüdemann in the heavy fog before 8:00 a.m. The destroyers were part of a German naval detachment, led by the heavy cruiser
Admiral Hipper, on its way to land troops at
Trondheim as part of the German invasion of
Norway (
Operation Weserübung).
Glowworm opened fire and the German destroyers attempted to disengage, signalling for help. The request was soon answered by
Admiral Hipper which spotted
Glowworm at 09:50.
Hipper initially had difficulty in distinguishing
Glowworm from
von Arnim, but opened fire eight minutes later at a range of 8,400 metres (9,200 yd) with her 20.3-centimetre (8.0 in) main guns.
Glowworm was hit by
Hipper's fourth
salvo and she started making
smoke. She turned into her own smoke in an attempt to break visual contact with
Hipper, but the cruiser's radar-directed guns were not affected by the smoke. When the destroyer emerged from her smoke the range was now short enough that the cruiser's 10.5-centimetre (4.1 in) guns could fire.
Glowworm's radio room,
bridge, and forward 4.7-inch gun were all destroyed, and she received additional hits in the engine room, the captain's day cabin, and finally the mast. As this crashed down, it caused a short circuit of the wiring, causing the ship's siren to start a
banshee wail.
At 10:10,
Lieutenant Commander Gerard Broadmead Roope fired five torpedoes from one mounting at a range of 800 metres (870 yd), but all missed because Captain
Hellmuth Heye had kept
Hipper's bow pointed at
Glowworm throughout the battle to minimise his risk from torpedoes. The destroyer fell back through her smoke screen to buy time to get her second torpedo mount working, but Heye followed
Glowworm through the smoke to finish her off before she could fire the rest of her torpedoes. The two ships were very close when
Hipper emerged from the smoke and Roope ordered a hard turn to starboard to ram the cruiser.
Hipper was slow to answer her
helm and
Glowworm struck the cruiser just
abaft the anchor. The collision broke off
Glowworm's bow and the rest of the ship scraped along
Hipper's side, gouging open several holes in the latter's hull and destroying her forward starboard torpedo mounting. One German sailor was knocked overboard by the collision.
Hipper took on some 500 tonnes (490 long tons) of water before the leaks could be isolated, but was not seriously damaged.
Glowworm was on fire when she drifted clear and her boilers exploded at 10:24, taking 109 of her crew with her.
Admiral Hipper hove to in order to rescue her man overboard and
Glowworm's survivors. The German sailor was not found, but 40 British sailors were recovered, although at least six later died of their wounds. Lieutenant Ramsay, the senior surviving officer, told his rescuers that neither the helm nor the emergency
rudder were manned when the ships collided so the destroyer's turn towards
Hipper was probably accidental. German accounts only mention four torpedoes fired by
Glowworm, but British accounts say all ten were fired. This was confirmed by photographic evidence taken after the collision showing all of her torpedo tubes empty.
Roope, who drowned when he could no longer hang on to a rope whilst being pulled up the side of the cruiser, was posthumously awarded the
Victoria Cross, thus becoming the first VC recipient of the Second World War. The award was justified, in part, by the recommendation of Heye, who wrote to the British authorities via the
Red Cross, giving a statement of the valiant courage Roope had shown when engaging a much superior ship in close battle. Ramsay was also awarded the
DSO. Both awards were made after the end of the war.
HMS Glowworm on fire in the ongoing battle against Admiral Hipper, an unknown photographer, possibly a sailor from the Admiral Hipper with HMS Glowworm drifting away after the collision with Admiral Hipper.
