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R.Smg. ENRICO TOTI |
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Rainbow or Triad? |
By Francesco Mattesini |
RAINBOW |
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According to the Admiralty’s statements immediately after the war, the
“Rainbow” left Alexandria on September 23rd, 1940 with orders to operate in
the Gulf of Taranto, preceding by two days the departure of the submarine
“Regent” (which sailed from Malta after repairs had been performed), also
assigned to the same patrol area off Cape Colonne. The morning of October
16th, 60 miles east of Siderno Marina (Calabria), the “Rainbow” (Lieutenant
Commander Lewis R. Moore) sighted and attacked on the surface the Italian
submarine “Enrico Toti” which was returning to Brindisi after a war patrol
was interrupted due to failure of the electric motors. The “Toti”
(Lieutenant Commander Bandino Bandini) avoided a torpedo of the British
submarine and around 1:40 AM hit the “Rainbow”, which was disengaging with a
rapid dive, first with a shell and later with a torpedo. The British
submarine, bow up, quickly sank with all hands in position 38° 15’ N, 17°
30’ E. This version, which had been accepted by the “Ufficio Storico Marina
Militare (Italian Navy Historical Branch), was reshuffled in the 90 by the
Naval Historical Branch, British Minister of Defense, which provided
additional information regarding the movements of this submarine. |
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H.M.S. RAINBOW |
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On September 30th, 1940 the “Rainbow” received communication that the
Italian Navy had left Taranto and Messina (4 battleships, 11 cruisers and
23 destroyers in total) and was at sea in position 37 42 N, 18 24 E. The
submarine received order to intercept it, but failed to do so. On October
3rd, the “Rainbow” was informed, along with the “Regent” (Lieutenant
Commander H.C. Browne who also was in the Gulf of Taranto, to move to the
Adriatic Sea along the route between Bari and Durazzo. The first boat was
to occupy an area near the Albanian coastline, the second one closer to
the Italian coast. In this area, around 5:00 AM of October 5th and 45
miles from Bari, the “Regent” collided with the auxiliary sailing-ship
“Maria Grazia”, sinking it without suffering serious damage, short of the
removal of the main aerial and failure of the forward hydrophones. Then,
at 7:00 PM on October 7th, in concurrency with a large naval operation by
the Mediterranean Fleet whose units had left Alexandria to escort a convoy
bound to Malta (Operation MB. 8), the two submarines received orders to
return to the Gulf of Taranto to take patrol positions off the Calabria
coast. The last signal sent to the “Rainbow” was to leave the operational area on the afternoon of the 13th and reach Alexandria on the 19th where it was awaited for in vain. Meantime, the submarine “Triad” (Lieutenant Commander George S. Salt) which had left Malta on October 9th, was ordered to a patrol area closer to the Calabria coast than the one of the “Rainbow”. Considering that on the 15th, the day the Toti’s action took place, the “Rainbow” should have been for at least 36 hours already en route to Alexandria, the Naval Historical Branch was certain that the submarine sunk by the “Toti” was the “Triad”. This also because the position assigned to the “Rainbow” was further off shore than the one which was to be taken by the “Triad” and in which the Toti’s fight took place. In Italy, since during the engagement not a single signal was sent by the “Rainbow”, some postulated the hypothesis that this submarine could have been sunk by the steamship “Antonietta Costa” which, en route as part of a convoy bound to Albania, at 3:30 AM on October 4th had hit with the side of her hull a large object in position 41° 28’ N 18° 05’ E, 60 miles northeast off Bari. At the time, the sinking was doubted by the Statistical Bureau of Supermarina (Italian Naval Supreme Command) since in the area of the collision there were no traces of the impact in the form of debris or a diesel fuel spillage. The “Antonietta Costa” suffered a leak in hold N. 5 which was immediately repaired and the ship continued navigation as part of the convoy at the same speed it had before the impact. Upon her arrival in Durazzo, inspection of the hull confirmed the signs of the assumed collision. The events took place at night and the ship might have hit something that at the time was not identified. Further evaluation of the damages, to be performed in dry dock, were made impossible, as the “Antonietta Costa” which had left on ballast as part of a convoy on October 9th to return to Bari, was torpedoed at 17:37 of the same day by the submarine “Regent”, 21 miles off Durazzo. Abandoned by her crew, the steamship was later assisted by the tugboat “Sant’Andrea” and beached near the Durazzo jetty where, despite efforts to save her, she was lost forever. Also, remains a fact that the captain of the “Toti” affirmed having attacked a submarine of the “Perseus” (1,475 t.) class to which the “Rainbow” belonged. The “Triad” was smaller, being of the “Triton” (1,090) class and with a hull and cunning tower of different shapes, and smaller sizes. Lieutenant Commander Bandini, an officer of great expertise, could not have mistaken its identification because the fight between the two submarines, which took place in very poor visibility, came to take place at very close range, estimated by the Italian crew at less than 50 meters (54 yards). |
TRIAD |
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Historical Branch of the Royal Navy gave the following version about the
loss of this submarine: the “Triad” (Lieutenant Commander George S. Salt)
left Malta on October 9th, 1940 with orders to patrol along the Libyan coast
and then reach Alexandria, base of the 1st Submarine Flotilla, on October
20th. After its departure, the “Triad” failed to communicate and London
assumed that the boat had sunk on a minefield in the area of Benghazi. This
because in the correspondence exchange with the “Ufficio Storico marina
Militare”, the Italians failed to receive positive elements to determine the
cause of the loss of the submarine and the position where it might have
taken place. The recent and not convincing hypothesis released by the Naval
Historical Branch is that the “Triad”, sent to operate north of Malta in the
area off Calabria of the Gulf of Squillace, was sunk by the Italian
submarine “Enrico Toti”. This is in clear opposition to the initial version
of the Historical Bureau in which it was affirmed that the route of the
“Triad” to reach Alexandria was to pass north of Cyrenaica, thus in an area
radically opposite to the Gulf of Taranto. For this reason, the only
submarine that could have been sunk by the “Toti” was the “Rainbow”. This,
despite the Historical Bureau, to make its theory plausible, specified that
the “Triad” , on October 13th, had received orders to leave the patrol area
and return to Alexandria going through position 32 12 N 25 08 E,
corresponding to a position north of the Gulf of Sollum. |
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It is necessary to reiterate that none of the signals sent to the “Triad”
received acknowledgment. In our opinion, knowing the operational details
of the “Triad”’s patrol, it is impossible to think of a mistake in the
destination of the submarine so far north as the Gulf of Squillace
relative to the patrol area assigned north of Cyrenaica. To prove our
assertions, and to confirm our suppositions, is what was published by the
Historical Bureau of the British Admiralty in its book for internal use
only, “Submarines”, Volume II (B.R. 1736 (52) (2) RESTRICTED), and
especially in the exchange of correspondence between the British and
Italian historical bureaus. It is not reasonable to think that for so many
years, between 1950 and 1980, the information received in Rome from London
could have been so imperfect, also because they were corroborated by maps
indicating the position of the sinking of the “Triad” possibly due to an
Italian antisubmarine action or mines northeast of Benghazi. Seconding our opinion, even in regards to the sinking of the “Rainbow” by the “Toti” is the British historian A.S. Evans in his very detailed book “Beneath the Waves”. A history of HM Submarine Losses 1904-1971”, William Kimber – London, 1986, the result of in depth researches in the Italian and British archives. At this point, to unbundle the mystery and construct the true version of the loss of the “Triad”,( which during its patrol had never communicated) official, we are left with another hypothesis which to us appears plausible. The [British] submarine was lost on October 9th, the same day of its departure from the port of La Valletta, in the Italian minefield M 3 (made of 174 weapons) positioned south of Malta, thus on the route that the submarine had to follow for 50 miles. Minefield M3 had been laid the day before, on October 8th, at about 30 miles south of Point Dalimara, at the southernmost part of Malta, by the destroyers of the 14th Squadron “Vivaldi” (Lieutenant Giovanni Galati), “Da Noli” (Commander Zoli) and “Tarigo” (Commander Pietro De Cristofero). On the same minefield in the morning of October 11th ended up the destroyer “Imperial” which due to the explosion of a mine had its stern warped, but was able to reach La Valletta despite the extensive damage. |
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