Convoy SC 94

U-210 photographed from Assiniboine's deck, 6 August 1942

Date	5–10 August 1942
Location	North Atlantic
Result	German tactical victory

Belligerents

United Kingdom

Canada

Poland

Germany

Commanders and leaders

VADM D F Moir
LCDR A. Ayer RNR

Admiral Karl Dönitz

Strength

35 freighters
3 destroyers
6 corvettes

19 submarines

Casualties and losses

11 freighters sunk (50,780GRT)
61 killed/drowned

2 submarines sunk
46 killed/drowned
42 captured

Convoy SC-94 was the 94th of the numbered series of World War II Slow Convoys of merchant ships from Sydney, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, to Liverpool. The ships departed Sydney on 31 July 1942 and were met by Mid-Ocean Escort Force Group C-1 consisting of the Canadian River class destroyer Assiniboine with the Flower class corvettes Battleford, Chilliwack, Dianthus, Nasturtium, Orillia, and Primrose.

As western Atlantic coastal convoys brought an end to the second happy time, Admiral Karl Dönitz, the Befehlshaber der U-Boote (BdU) or commander in chief of U-Boats, shifted focus to the mid-Atlantic to avoid aircraft patrols. Although convoy routing was less predictable in the mid-ocean, Dönitz anticipated that the increased numbers of U-boats being produced would be able to effectively search the area with the advantage of intelligence gained through B-Dienst decryption of British Naval Cypher Number 3. However, only 20 percent of the 180 trans-Atlantic convoys sailing from the end of July 1942 until the end of April 1943 lost ships to U-boat attack.

U-593 reported the convoy on 5 August and torpedoed the Dutch freighter Spar.

Assiniboine's Type 286 radar spotted U-210 in a heavy fog on 6 August. The destroyer closed on the contact and briefly spotted the submarine twice before losing her in the fog. The submarine reappeared crossing the destroyer's bow at a range of 50 yards (46 m), and both ships opened fire. The range was too close for Assiniboine's 4.7-inch guns to engage, but her .50-calibre machine guns shot up the submarine's deck and conning tower. This kept the Germans from manning their 88-millimetre (3.5 in) deck gun, but the 20-millimetre (0.79 in) flak gun was already manned and firing. It punched holes through the destroyer's plating that set some petrol tanks on the deck afire and disabled 'A' gun. The destroyer was unable to ram U-210 until the rear 4.7-inch gun hit the conning tower, killing the entire bridge crew and the .50-caliber machine guns were able to silence the flak gun. This caused Lieutenant Sorber, the senior surviving officer, to order the submarine to dive, but this meant that she had to hold a straight course while doing so. Assiniboine was able to take advantage of this and rammed U-210 abaft the conning tower whilst she was diving. This caused the electric motors to fail, damaged her propellers and led to water entering the submarine, as a result of which Sorber ordered the ballast tanks to be blown and the submarine to be abandoned. The destroyer rammed her again when U-210 resurfaced, dropped a pattern of depth charges set to detonate at shallow depth and hit her one more time with a 4.7-inch shell before the submarine finally sank.

...
Wikipedia