Fantasque Time Line (France Fights On) - English Translation

[Wings]

August 4th, 1940

Midi-Pyrénées - After Castelnaudary the day before, Carcassonne is reached by German columns.

Roussillon - A handful of volunteers, a mixture of Senegalese and Spanish riflemen, have been fighting for two days in the hills of the Corbières, south and west of Narbonne, to prevent the Germans from reaching the Mediterranean, in the hope of gaining a few hours or days that will allow the last evacuations to be extended... At their head, two officers of the 13th DBLE, who arrived by chance while on a cargo ship diverted to Port-la-Nouvelle to participate in the last evacuations. Are the Spaniards not legionnaires? It is therefore the duty of these officers to go and supervise them. After Norway, Captain Kœnig and Captain Prince Amilakhvari distinguish themselves once again!
This time, it is in front of the first elements of the 5. PzD.

Languedoc - The Germans re-launch the offensive on the Gardon, towards Nîmes and Montpellier.

Provence - Toulon surrenders. More than ten thousand inhabitants and refugees were killed or wounded by the bombardments. The Germans take possession of a military port ravaged by the sabotages and destructions. Of course, there are no ships left, except for half a dozen ships sunk by the Luftwaffe and the old hulls scuttled to block the entrance to the harbor by the last demolition teams, which left the day before aboard two submarines, the Naïade (600 tons) and Aréthuse (630 tons). Useless defenders, the two turrets of Cap Cépet were properly blown up - they are not used by the Germans. They immediately launch motorized columns towards the east, in the direction of Cannes, in order to take control of the last ports on the Provençal coastline.
Meanwhile, the Italians finally manage to break through the defenses of the Armée des Alpes west of Nice.
The last French fighter in the South East, an MS-406 of the GC I/6 operating from a makeshift airfield at Banyuls, is shot down. For several days, the black cross bombers (but also, at present, those marked with beams) have been attacking the ports and roads, causing thousands of victims. The fires that rage in Collioure, Port-Vendres and Banyuls are visible from far off by the ships that come at night to evacuate a few more men.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

Somaliland - On the third day of the Italian invasion, the Bertoldi column is stopped by the French battalion, which firmly holds the passes of Jirreh and Dobo. On the road to Hargeisa, the covering company of the Somaliland Camel Corps, pounded for three hours by artillery, mortars and machine guns, and overrun by a dozen light tanks, has to withdraw.
On both sides, the air force tries to harass the opposing troops. The British base two Gladiators of Sqn 94 in Berbera and two others on the advanced ground of Laferug, just north of Tug Argan. Blenheims from Sqn 8, coming from Aden, attack three times a motorized convoy west of Hargeisa, causing numerous casualties, but one of the aircraft is shot down by a CR.32 of the 410th squadron. On the Italian side, SM.81 and Ca.133 attack Berbera, Aden, Burao and Zeïla.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

NE of Cape Carbon - Sent from Algiers in front of the small convoy made up of the cargo ships Anadyr and Saint-Didier, coming from Casablanca under the escort of the avisos Ailette and Dubourdieu, the barge La Nymphe II (AD204, 385 GRT, 16.5 knots) [1] is sunk by the submarine Argo (L.V. Alberto Crepas) without having been able to give the alert. Emboldened by this success against "a gunboat of about 800 tons" [2], its commander then attacks the convoy. He manages to gain a favourable position and launches two torpedoes.
One passes between the transports and the other, better adjusted, passes under the Saint-Didier, the two cargo ships sailing on the sill. Chased by the avisos, the Argo loses contact and withdraws.

[1] Former German minesweeper M 42 from the First World War, refitted as a yacht
[2] From his patrol report. Submariners of all countries have often overestimated the size of their targets, although their targets, although there have been a few cases of the opposite.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

Sardinia - If the majority of the men and the material transported by the convoy of August 3rd to August 4th has arrived in Sardinia, Supermarina believes that the cumulative cost of the three surface supply operations carried out since the beginning of July is excessive [1]. All the more so since the large island had not yet become defensible. Its leaders therefore decide, just like for North Africa, to resort to submarines to supply Sardinia. The mission falls to the boats of the 12th squadron of La Spezia, which operate in turn: the first transport is carried out by the Mocenigo on August 11th.
Supermarina also orders the permutation of the 4th MAS squadron, which has only one ship left in fighting condition with the 2nd squadron (MAS-424, 509, 543 and 544) from Messina (only MAS-503 will join immediately this port, the MAS-501, 502 and 504 will first have to be repaired in Naples)

[1] Warships: one destroyer sunk, four torpedo boats and one auxiliary cruiser damaged. Transportation: One tanker and five freighters sunk, one freighter badly damaged.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

Rhodes - While waiting for convoy C 14, Cesare Maria De Vecchi di Val Cismon, governor of the Aegean islands and since 1938 commander-in-chief of all the military forces of the region (Egeomil), reports on the forces at his disposal [the Italian names of the islands are indicated between brackets].

§ The Italian land forces in the Dodecanese are considered an Army Corps, which is probably an exaggeration...
The 50th Infantry Division Regina (Brigadier General Alessandro Piazzoni), with the 9th and 10th Infantry regiments, the 50th Divisional Artillery Regiment and various other detachments, make up the largest part of it. It totals about 11,500 men, with no artillery heavier than a dozen 100 mm howitzers.
It is reinforced by non-endivisional troops representing about 8,000 men and by personnel from the Regia Marina and the Regia Aeronautica totalling 10,000 men. Its only
mechanized unit was the 3rd Compagnia Carri di Guardia alla Frontiera, with 12 (very) light Fiat 3000 (closely related to the Renault FT 17).
These forces are, for the most part, distributed between Rhodes (about 18,000 men), Leros [Lero] (6,000 men) and Kos [Coo] (4,000 men).
Governor De Vecchi is impatiently awaiting the arrival of the 312th mixed battalion (with 4 M 11/39 tanks, 23 L 3 tankettes and 9 Ansaldo-Lancia 1Z machine guns) and that of the CCIe Black Shirt Legion (about 1,500 men).
.........
§§ The Regia Aeronautica in the Dodecanese has six runways, all of them dirt: three in Rhodes [Rodi] (Maritsa, Gadurrà and Cattavia - the use of the latter is difficult for logistical reasons) one in Kos [Coo], one in Karpathos [Scarpanto] and one on Kasos (a small island near Karpathos).
On June 10th were deployed on these airfields the 163rd autonomous fighter squadron (CT), equipped on June 10 with 11 Fiat CR.32, and the 56th and 92nd Groups of the 39th Ground Bomber Wing (BT), equipped with 24 SM.81 in all. These meagre forces were (somewhat) reinforced in July by 9 Fiat CR.32s, which had to be transported in the holds of SM.82s and reassembled on site. The dispatch of other reinforcements, notably CR.42s and SM.79s, was initially cancelled with the situation in Sardinia, Sicily and North Africa. But De Vecchi receives assurances from Mussolini himself: two dozen modern aircraft will soon reach the Dodecanese.
In addition to the land-based aircraft, there are 28 seaplanes based in Leros [Lero], on the seaplane base of Lakki [Porto Lago]: 8 fighter aircraft (Ro.44), 16 reconnaissance aircraft (1 Ro.43, 15 Cant Z.501), 2 reconnaissance and rescue (Cant Z.506), 2 rescue (Cant Z.506).
.........
§§§ The forces of the Regia Marina in the Dodecanese, depending on the Aegean Sea Naval Command (Rear Admiral Biancheri), are as follows:
A) Surface ships
- 4th Destroyer Squadron: Francesco Crispi, Quintino Sella (the other two units of the "Sella" class were sold to Sweden in March 1940).
- 8th Torpedo boat Squadron: Lupo, Lince, Lira, Libra ("Spica" class).
It is planned that the six ships mentioned above will join convoy C 14 when it makes its way back: De Vecchi could not obtain their retention.
- III MAS Flotilla (14 ships): 7th MAS Squadron, with the MAS-430, MAS-431, MAS- 433, MAS-434; 11th MAS Squadron, with the MAS-520, MAS-521, MAS-522, MAS-523; 16th MAS Squadron, with the MAS-536, MAS-537, MAS-542; 22nd MAS Squadron, with the MAS-545, MAS-546, MAS-551.
- Legnano and Lero minesweepers.
- Gunboat Sebastiano Caboto and small gunboat Marzio Sonzini.
Plus the steam launch of the Guardia di Finanza Postiglioni and the oil tanker Cerere.
B) Submarines
5th Group (8 ships)
51st Squadron (in Leros): Delfino, Narvalo, Squalo, Tricheco ("Squalo" class).
52nd Squadron (in Rhodes): Ametista, Zaffiro ("Sirena" class) and Jalea, Jantina ("Argonauta" class).
Reinforcements arrive in July in Leros, in the form of the 13th Squadron from the Ist Group (La Spezia): Berillo, Gemma, Onice ("Perla" class).
On the other hand, after the loss of the Iride, which occurred on August 2nd, it is decided to withdraw the Ametista from Rhodes to dedicate it to special operations.
This leaves ten Italian submarines based in the Aegean Sea.
C) The Regia Marina also contributes to the defence of the islands with coastal batteries, mainly installed in Leros and Rhodes.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

Libya - Major Leclerc gathers the men of his battalion - at least, all those who were able to advance as far as El Machina - at the vanguard of the French advance, in the
Libyan desert. All of them swore that they would not stop fighting until the tricolor flag was flown again over the Strasbourg cathedral.
The news of what will very quickly be called the "Libyan Oath" will spread at lightning speed. The example of the men of "Leclerc" will be followed by all French units, with some variations.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

Saint-Jean-de-Luz - "Lieutenant Jacquemet testifies to the last moments of the GC II/8:
"This time it is the end, Bayonne has fallen, the whole coast will soon be in the hands of the Boche.
Two of our brave fighters, transformed into sieves, were still in Biarritz, but with the buddies, we set them on fire, to the great despair of the mechanics who still thought they could put them back in the air. Our mechanics were formidable throughout these three months of uninterrupted battle and the last few days were terrible.
On August 1st, we barely had time to celebrate Nicole's Ace title and paint his fifth victory mark on his aircraft.
On the 2nd, new missions - we had no more orders, we were taking off and we went to strafe everything we could. In the evening, we had only four machines left in flying condition. The advantage is that four zincs are easier to camouflage than 20, and the Boche never found us! But Dutey-Harispe, acting as commander of the Group, received an evacuation order. Nicole, Marchais, Pelletier and I begged him to leave us behind with four volunteer mechanics, since we still had four planes! He allowed us to do so, but it was obvious that he would have preferred to evacuate us and stay.
On the 3rd, the four of us went out to shoot at the Boche who were massacring this good city of Bayonne and its inhabitants - I learned that they had refused to have their city declared an open city. No victory that day, but we gave the Heinkel a hard time. Alas, they called for help, 109s arrived and I had to let mine go with a smoking engine full of holes. My plane was turned into a skimmer, I'm not sure how I got it back. Marchais took a shell in the wing, and his cab was knocked out too. Our two comrades came back unharmed, which allowed them to sign the last missions of our cabs over our poor France.
On August 4th, after two days of marauding at low altitude, strafing a few columns here and there, Pelletier and Nicole courageously went to face new bombers, but they were closely escorted. Pelletier was shot down and killed, but the lucky Nicole survived. With his plane on fire, he headed for the sea and landed on the water a few meters from the beach. He escaped with burns on his hands.
And here is our group without planes, what sadness! We had to think about our evacuation too. No question of being taken prisoner, especially as we were still burning to
to fight! So seven of us left for Saint-Jean-de-Luz.
Tonight, we boarded an English destroyer - every evening, there was one to pick up stragglers like us.
We are heading for Africa. But we hope to be back soon!
(Excerpts from "Le Groupe de Chasse II/8 dans la défense de l'Ouest - D'après le journal de marche de l'unité", Editions Ouest-France, 1990)

Roussillon - In the Corbières, the resistance becomes impossible for lack of ammunition, and henceforth without great objective. The last legionnaires and riflemen silently leave the camp shortly after sunset and take a truck to Port-la-Nouvelle, where fishing boats take them to the destroyer Guépard, which sails away before dawn...
In Algiers, Kœnig and Amilakvari learn that they had been given eight days' detention for having disobeyed their orders and that they were promoted to commanders.

Languedoc - The Germans of the 20. ID cross the Gardon river and seize Nîmes, before continuing towards Montpellier.

Cote d'Azur - The German motorized columns coming from Toulon meet almost no resistance. They reach Cannes and make their junction east of the city with the Italian forces arriving from Nice. The entire coastline of Provence is controlled by the Axis forces.

 

[Wings]

August 5th, 1940

Gulf of Lion - From the Spanish border to the edge of the German advance, a crowd of boats of all sizes are frantically active as soon as night falls. But very often, small ships
overflowing with unfortunate people, unable to get far enough away from the coast before daylight, are machine-gunned without mercy by German or Italian planes.
This is how the fishing boat Saint-Bernardin is sunk, with twenty-one German Jews on board, all women and children, who had come from the notorious Milles internment camp. The men having been enlisted in the Legion, Commander Perrochon was responsible for the evacuation of the 1,500 women, children and elderly. One after the other, he took them to Africa. The 21 passengers of the Saint-Bernardin were the last... There are five survivors. Charles Perrochon, who accompanied his last protégés, is not among them.
His memory will be doubly celebrated. In 1995, the film Les Milles, by Sébastien Grall, earned Jean-Pierre Marielle the César for best actor. The following year, the title of Righteous Among the Nations was awarded by the State of Israel to Major Perrochon.

Languedoc ports - During the final evacuation operations, the patrol boat A.6 of the Belgian Marine Corps hits a magnetic mine off the coast of Collioure and sinks with almost all its crew.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Somaliland - In spite of the harassment led by the Camel Corps, which multiplies its attacks on the Italian vehicles, the town of Hargeisa is taken by the De Simone column, in the center of the Italian Italian force. However, the latter stops its advance to give the quartermaster's office time to follow. Further east, the town of Odweina, evacuated by the elements of the Somaliland Camel Corps who were defending it, is conquered by the Bertello column.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Dakar, 02:15 GMT - Training completed, the HMS Illustrious leaves the great port of French West Africa to reach Gibraltar, accompanied by the destroyers HMS Encounter, Gallant, Greyhound and Hotspur, while the French organize seaplane and ASW vessel patrols on the carrier's way.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Alger - The hospital-ship Sphinx, designated to participate in Cordite, leaves for Alexandria to join the ships already on site or in the vicinity [1]. In accordance with international
rules, it sails without escort and brightly lit at night: the Italians have been warned of its departure and its route.

[1] In addition to Admiral Godfroy's squadron, the avisos Elan and Lassigny, the liners Patria, Providence and President Doumer as well as the cargo ships Calédonien, Capo Olmo and Saint-Edmond.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Strait of Sicily - During the night of August 5th to 6th, the Italians place the 6 AN and 6 ANbis, two of the five other offensive fields (in addition to the LK) whose installation between Pantelleria and the Tunisian coast had been planned before the war. In view of the turn taken by the war, the operation is not entrusted to a mixed formation of light cruisers and destroyers, but only to fast destroyers of the Navigatori class. For this purpose, are sent from Taranto to Augusta, where they had to load the mines, three units of the 14th CT squadron (Ugolino Vivaldi, Leone Pancaldo, Antonio Pigafetta) and two from the 15th (Nicolò Zeno, Alvise Da Mosto). In fact, only four ships sail out, escorted until nightfall by four torpedo boats provided by the 11th (Cigno, Climene, withdrawn from ASI), 12th (Aldebaran) and 14th squadrons (Pleiadi): the Da Mosto is held up in port by a damaged engine. The two fields, placed on either side of a line joining the northern end of Pantelleria to Ras Mamour, will total, at a rate of 92 devices per destroyer, only 368 mines are laid (and even 367 due to a premature explosion) instead of 460.
Once they have finished laying mines, the four destroyers set out to bypass Sicily by passing to the west. At the exit of the Messina Strait, the three units of the 14th squadron
set course for Taranto, while the Zeno joins Augusta.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Western Mediterranean - Fearing a forthcoming Franco-British intervention against the Dodecanese islands, Supermarina asks Maricosom to re-launch offensive mine anchorages in front of the main enemy ports in the region. In view of the problems encountered during the pre-war exercises and the moorings carried out in June [1], these operations had been suspended (when they had begun) and some mine-laying submarines were assigned, not without losses, to supply operations in Libya. Admiral Mario Falangola, commander of the submarines, therefore decides to carry out a test with the three units available. This is why three units leave Messina on this day: the Bragadin (for Limassol), the Corridoni (for Alexandria) and the Foca (for Haifa).

[1] The minelaying system of the "Bragadin" wasn't giving any satisfactory result, but the main problems were with the "Foca" system with premature mine explosion during minelaying operations.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Libya (Cyrenaica) - The British launch limited attacks once again to test Italian defenses.
On this front, the Allies are faced with General Mario Berti's 10th Army, which numbers 60,000 men.
.........
General Lorenzo Dalmasso's XXI Corps (62nd ID Marmarica and 63rd ID Cirene) defends Bardia and the northern part of the border.
The XXII Corps of General Enrico Pitassi-Mannella (64th ID Catanzaro and 4th Division CC.NN. III Gennaio) is in retreat, near Tobruk.
The 1st Libyan Colonial Division of General Luigi Sibille, forming the Army Reserve, very tired by the border fighting of June and July with the British, is brought back to rest in Benghazi (which is far from the front, but where General Berti's HQ is located...).
To these forces must be added the two battalions of the parachute school of Barce: 1o Battaglione Nazionale Paracadutisti and 1o Battaglione Allievi Paracadutisti Fanti dell'Aria (student paratroopers of the air).
.........
The main victims of the Allied attacks are the border guards of the 30th Settore di Copertura: 30A (HQ in Bardia), 30B (HQ in Amseat, better known as Fort Capuzzo) and 30C (HQ at Giarabub, at the southernmost point of the front, on the edge of the Qattara Depression). Sub-sector 30B even loses its HQ, which fell to the British in June.
To face these attacks, the creation of mobile columns is decided. They are inspired by the defunct D'Avanzo Group, which had been destroyed on June 16th, but the Italian general staff, learning from this failure, improves the model by adding anti-tank and anti-aircraft guns. These columns will hardly have time to demonstrate their efficiency...

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Languedoc and Roussillon - In the morning, the Germans resume their progression and seize Narbonne and then Béziers. There, the 5. PzD makes the junction with the vanguards of the 20. ID mot which arrived from Nîmes via Montpellier, occupied in the morning. Agde is reached at the end of the day.
Perpignan, the last capital of metropolitan France, falls in the evening.
On the coast, the aerial attacks calm down due to the lack of targets. During this campaign, despite the absence of aircraft and crews specialized in the attack of ships, despite the ultimate opposition of the French fighters and flak, the Luftwaffe's kill board is well stocked: about 36 cargo ships and liners, 12 to 14 auxiliary auxiliary patrol boats and several dozen small boats sunk; to this must be added about as many damaged ships.

 

[Wings]

August 6th, 1940

Perpignan - The last member of the French government to leave for North Africa was not General de Gaulle, as many will assert. De Gaulle left Perpignan by plane in the early hours of August 6th, but the young Jules Moch (Minister of Labor since June 11th), left Collioure by seaplane during the night of August 6th to 7th, while Perpignan had fallen, after having organized the very last evacuations. Moch took with him, in extremis, the famous German socialist economist, Rudolf Hilferding, exiled in France since 1934.
"Hilferding, who represented the moral authority of an SPD in exile, itself very divided, was to influence Moch on his violently anti-communist post-war positions. Indeed, for several years, Hilferding had progressively developed an "economic theory of totalitarian states", among which he ranked Nazi Germany as well as the Soviet Union. The debate on the difference or identity of the two systems was to take on a truly international character from 1946 onwards, with contradictory articlesfrom the Englishman Maurice Dobb, the Pole Michal Kalecki (who was to return to Poland in 1947) and a young French economist who had written his thesis in 1939 on the Soviet economy, Charles Bettelheim.
Hilferding worked until the beginning of 1941 with the French planners in Algiers, before taking over as head of the German Anti-Nazi Committee, which was formed in Algiers in the summer of 1941. This committee, largely supported by the SFIO against the indifference of Reynaud and the hostility of Mandel, had itself a turbulent existence. The personal opposition of Hilferding to the entry of the communists in its midst from the end of May 1942 provoked a crisis that led him to resign from the presidency of the Committee at the end of the year.
Hilferding left Algiers at the beginning of 1943 to go to New York at the invitation of Erich-Maria Remark. In the United States, he met again with Wassily Leontieff and Michal Kalecki, who constituted what became the United Nations Economic Commission after the war. Hilferding, who had by then abandoned Marxism and repudiated part of his work, found himself very isolated among the economists working at the future United Nations.
He returned to Algiers at the beginning of 1944, at the request of Jules Moch and Léon Blum, to form the Committee for Franco-German Friendship, whose post-war role was to be decisive for the establishment of the European institutions. This committee settled in Marseille in March 1944; Hilferding then had the opportunity to meet General de Gaulle. Weakened by health problems and probably by what his friends described as a chronic depression, Hilferding gave up almost all political activity from the beginning of early 1945, except to write his Manifesto for a Free Germany (Paris, Les Iles d'Or, August 1945), in which he called on German socialists to unite with liberals and Christian democrats to forge the future Germany.
Rudolf Hilferding died in Paris of a heart attack in July 1945, in Léon Hilferding's apartment on the banks of the Seine, without having seen Germany again.
A character visibly inspired by Hilferding, embodying the fate of Austrians and anti-Nazi Germans who were scattered to the four winds during the French Campaignn appears in Austrian director Alex Corti's remarkable film, Dieu Croit-Il Encore en Nous? (the first part of a trilogy based on the work of G.S. Stroller), which won the Special Jury Prize at Cannes in 1986. The seaplane of Jules Moch is replaced by a fishing boat leaving the port of Collioure as the first German tanks arrive.
(Extract from the Grand Larousse de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale - Edition 2000, Paris, 2001).

 

[Wings]

August 7th, 1940

Somaliland - The Senegalese riflemen of the RTS-CFS still hold their positions on the Jirreh and Dobo passes. The 3/15th Punjab completes its deployment at Tug Argan.
The Italians redeploy two CR.32s from the 410th Fighter Squadron to the Hargeisa airstrip. This forward position will allow them to be more present over the battlefield.

 

[Wings]

August 7th, 1940

Mer-el-Kébir - Around 00:30 GMT, three SM.82 bomb the port. A lucky hit sinks the auxiliary patrol boat Terre-Neuve.

 

[Wings]

August 7th, 1940

Strait of Sicily - South-east of Cape Bon, the destroyer HMS Hostile explodes on one of the mines of the 6 AN minefield the day before by the Italians. The ship was part, with the 27th Division (Janus, Jervis, Juno, Nubian and Mohawk) and the Dainty, Decoy and Hero, of a group of nine destroyers sent by the Mediterranean Fleet to Gibraltar as part of Operation Hats (transfer of the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious and the battleship HMS Valiant to Alexandria). However, its loss allows the Franco-British to locate and neutralize the minefield responsible.

 

[Wings]

August 7th, 1940

Aegean Sea - "In those first days of August, even more than among their comrades in the Western Mediterranean, a feeling of frustration dominated among the submariners of the Levant. No doubt, after nearly two months of war against Italy, they had not had to deplore any losses - although in July, on the return from a patrol, the Protée (C.C. Garreau) had to make a quick maneuver to escape the torpedoes of an enemy ship (today identified as the Tricheco). But they were still waiting for their first
success. It was not for lack of having, starting from Beirut, stubbornly criss-crossed the maze of the Aegean islands, the hunting ground that was assigned to them by the Franco-British agreements. But the preys were all the more rare that, like their English comrades, who occasionally pushed their way to the entrance of the Dardanelles,
they had received formal orders to attack only ships duly identified as Italian: it was imperative to avoid upsetting the neutrals and, above all, the Greeks and Turks. In any case, the Italian merchant fleet in the region consisted of two or three coasters and a few fishing boats which resembled like two drops of water to their colleagues coming from the Kingdom of the Hellenes, even from the coast of Asia Minor, and for which prudence commanded to abstain. The only clear targets in the area were the ships of the Regia Marina. But these were generally agile targets: the Phoque had launched two torpedoes against a Spica-class torpedo boat (the Lince, according to the archives) in July, but in vain. In short, staffs and crews were all hoping for better days.
Finally, on 7 August, at 22:00, the Achéron (C.C. Alliou), sailing on the surface not far from the southern coast of the island of Astypalea (Stampalia), spotted two silhouettes, one of which appeared to be immobile and the other moved at low speed. It was the auxiliary minesweeper Lero, which was completing the first part of a defensive field under the escort of the torpedo boats Lira, which the Achéron had seen, and Lupo, then hidden from the eyes of the submarine's lookouts by the small island of Saint-Cyriaque. The Achéron was able to get closer to less than 1,200 meters and gain a favorable position as its target was moving again.
The submarine launched three torpedoes from its forward tubes at the Lero before diving. A minute later, at least one of them hit the target. The stern of the Lero, which still had some of its mines on board, was disintegrated by a violent explosion and the front part of the ship soon sank. The Achéron was able to escape the reaction of the two torpedo boats and returned to Beirut victorious.
[Note to 2nd edition - In fact, the Lero did not lay mines but, on the contrary was taking them out from on one of the fields laid in June in front of Stampalia. It was then to go in front of Karpathos (Scarpanto), which was neglected in the initial mining plans but which the Italians had decided to improve its defense. All the stock of mines of the Dodecanese having been consumed in June, the only solution was to recover some mines on each of the dams anchored in front of Stampalia, Cos and Rhodes. After the loss of the Lero, the task was completed by the Legnano].
The submarines of the Levant were soon to be engaged in a larger operation, the hunt for convoy C-14."
(Excerpt from Soldiers of the Deep - The submarines of the French Navy in the war, by Commandant Henri Vuillez - 2nd edition, completed by Claude Huan, Paris, 1992.)