fleet commander again. Yes, signal Bismarck to take station to port, and fire when clear. But mind your signals flags if we have to maneuver.”
Down in Anton turret, Axel Faust was peering through his range finder, the man who had smashed the Queen Elizabeth senseless in the Med, with a withering blow forward that broke her jaw. His well muscled arms made him look every bit the heavyweight he seemed, and he was already working up a glistening sweat as they sighted for their second salvo.
“Move smartly, boys,” he shouted, urging his men on. “They already sent us to the showers with that first salvo, and we were lucky it wasn’t a rain of steel. Let’s give them hell!”
The guns were primed and re-elevated, the hum of the hydraulics loud in the confined space. The breach was cleared, lights signaling ‘gun ready.’ Faust waited on Fuchs in the forward gun director, his eyes lost behind the cups of his own optical sighting. They heard the soaring whoosh and fall of more heavy rounds, and knew the enemy’s second salvo was looking for them. Faust could feel the ship’s engines rev down as they completed the loading action, and he hoped the brass on the bridge knew what they were doing. He was not disappointed. He could clearly see the rounds falling short by at least 500 meters. The speed change ordered by Lütjens had worked as planned.
But those bastards would have put those rounds much closer if we had kept on at full battle speed. They’re damn good, and so we’ll have to be better.
Anybody could train for this job, but he was not just anybody. He was Axel Faust, the devil’s adjutant, and the best naval gunner in the fleet. Seconds later the order came down to fire, though he was not quite satisfied with the elevation on his guns. He was going to nudge them up another degree, but he heard the booming report of Bruno turret firing, and knew that Hans Hartmann had beaten them to the punch.
No matter, he thought. “Up elevation! One degree. Quickly! Now Fire!” Anton threw the right cross over Hartmann’s left hook, and they waited eagerly to spot the fall of their shot. Thirty seconds later he saw the target erupt with fire, but he knew it was too soon to be a hit from their own shells. The British had just given them a full salvo, something rarely done, as the big ships were more prone to fire half salvos given the jarring concussion of the massive guns.
Squinting through his optics, he soon saw two clear shellfalls short of the target, and slightly wide. Hartmann’s hook had found nothing but seawater, and a few seconds later his own rounds fell slightly long, but one was very close. He saw the tall plume of water just off the starboard side of the enemy ship, and then noted how they responded by making a slight turn away from the round. He’s jogging left, and then right again—a zig-zag approach. And yet he can still fire all three turrets as he comes. Each time he turns he opens the fire arc of that third turret behind the conning tower. This one knows how to fight his ship. In the meantime, none of our rear turrets can get into action, but that will change soon, if we can close the range without serious damage.
The seconds ticked off, agonizingly slow, and the men rushed through their loading evolutions. Then he saw them, evil white geysers dolloping up from the sea, and walking slowly towards the ship. And they were going to be very close…
Chapter 8
Down from the heavens came the demons set loose by the work of Elswick, Vickers, Beardmore and the Royal Gun Factory. They had been blasted into the sky by a 108 ton gun that was over 60 feet long, using 50 pounds of TNT and another propellant charge of 495 pounds. These exploded inside it to create a working pressure of over 21 tons per square inch, and fire a shell weighing 929kg, or 2,048 pounds. It would blast out of the muzzle at a speed of roughly 2600 feet per second, taking all of 40 seconds before it surged down at the targets, which were some 25,000 yards distant.
The rounds of A-turret, or ‘Old Elswick’ on the Invincible would fall in a line off the starboard side of Hindenburg, but those of B-turret would be much closer, with the center gun,