May 15, 1943 – 0545 hours – The convoy

The radioman came to the bridge of the Dorthy with the message. The captain read it and swore. Could the radioman have made a mistake? The radioman shook his head. He handed the captain two additional messages. The message had been sent three times to allow the radioman to confirm its contents. The Admiral knew it would be hard for the captain to comply.

The radioman looked at the captain, “Sir?” He could not frame a question. He could only look at the captain quizzically.

“Are you sure this message is authentic?”

“Yes, but why?”

“Son, I’m sure those guys back home know more than we do. Go ahead.”

“Sir. Could you sign the receipt of the message and note that you are ordering me to comply? For us to send a message and to give away our position is nearly suicidal. I will be on the air more than six minutes. No enemy ship or post can miss that.”

“Yes, son, I’ll sign it and I hope you are wrong.” the captain replied and signed the order. “Leave one copy here and get on with it. Come back as soon as you’re done.” The radioman left the bridge, entered the radio room and turned on the high power transmitter. He tuned it to 7.376 megacycles and looked at the message he had been instructed to send. He began the message and sent it three times as requested with a thirty minute pause between the transmissions. Each transmission took over two minutes.

The captain shook his head. The admiral had ordered him to turn south just after sending his message. Two escorts would be detached and continue along the convoy’s course until just after sunset then they too would turn south at high speed to rejoin the convoy. The captain signaled to the two designated ships by flashing light and they confirmed the message. He looked away as they confirmed. They may never see these ships or men again. They would most likely be in combat by nightfall and be grossly outnumbered. He hoped the admiral knew what he was doing, if not, a lot of good men were going to die for nothing and the convoy, marginally defended now, would be even more exposed. The convoy was notified to turn a 0600.

May 15, 1943 – 0552 hours – Iceland

Bill Jarvis was about to go off duty when the message came in. He recorded the signal strengths and the time differentials for the message on each frequency. As he did the Lt. came in to pick them up. Somehow he knew the message was coming. That message confirmed the location of the convoy but more important it gave what the engineers called a delta, the distance between two points. Right now the delta was over 140 miles and the change of course would hopefully increase the time it would take for the U-boats to catch the convoy till long after darkness. The British now knew accurately where the U-boats were because they knew how far they were from the convoy and in what direction. The message from the convoy had enabled them to more accurately pin-point the convoy and the U-boats.