I'd've put the battery at the Teahouse instead of Third Beach, but that's a minor one. Pretty decent job so far.Not being a local puts me at a slight disadvantage in my research and awareness of the area
Remember the Rainbow Redux: An Alternate Royal Canadian Navy
The Battery at the Teahouse, Ferguson Point, dated from 1939. It mounted 2 x 6" (later swapped out for 4.7") guns and fire control equipment. Along with the battery of 3 x 6" guns at Point Grey and 2 x 12pdr. anti-torpedo boats guns at the First Narrows, under the Lions Gate Bridge, they comprised the World War Two fixed defences of Vancouver. This would have made a hostile environment indeed for Leipzig.
World War One coastal artillery was a much more improvised thing, with 2 x 4" naval guns from HMS Shearwater bolted down to some steel plates on Siwash Point, as @RelativeGalaxy7 describes.
I suspect everybody's careers are over - at least among the "Please, we don't need a navy, we've got Britain!" faction.
Correction in Regards to Submarine Torpedoes
Hello everybody, I just have a very brief but important update to make. I have came across new information in regards to the journey the 18" torpedoes took from Halifax to Vancouver. Previously, I was completely unaware of when they left and was only vaguely aware of when they arrived, that has changed. My new information states that the train carrying only 9 18" torpedoes from HMCS Niobe in Halifax departed at midnight on August 9 and the submarines were labeled as "fully operational and provisioned with torpedoes" as of August 20. I have made the following edit to the chapter "Unprepared for the Unknown" to rectify this.
To clarify this, the submarines as of the current chapter "Ain't No Rest for the Restless" have yet to receive their torpedo armament, meaning they are effectively useless as direct combatants. The date in which they will arrive will be addressed within the story itself soon enough and may not match with the above mentioned August 20, as that seems be only an approximate date. Thanks for the understanding and I apologize for any confusion suffered by the change. I am striving to keep the timeline as realistic as possible, even if that means retroactively adjusting when new details become available to me
To clarify this, the submarines as of the current chapter "Ain't No Rest for the Restless" have yet to receive their torpedo armament, meaning they are effectively useless as direct combatants. The date in which they will arrive will be addressed within the story itself soon enough and may not match with the above mentioned August 20, as that seems be only an approximate date. Thanks for the understanding and I apologize for any confusion suffered by the change. I am striving to keep the timeline as realistic as possible, even if that means retroactively adjusting when new details become available to me
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Coulsdon Eagle
Monthly Donor
I think we all appreciate your efforts in making this TL as detailed as possible. Don't let it cause you any concern. It is a marvelous work already.
In my TL, the torpedoes arrive in Esquimalt on August 15th, and I gave them 22. Probably too many to equip the Niobe, but I guess Halifax could keep a stock for training and rotating out for maintenance, even though that does not sound like the Royal Canadian Navy of the day. I never saw the OTL number of torpedos that you just discovered. The torpedoes then needed to be “modified” to fire from a submarine, although no source I found said what the modifications were. I feel free to change a few details here and there, if they really get in the way of the storytelling.Hello everybody, I just have a very brief but important update to make. I have came across new information in regards to the journey the 18" torpedoes took from Halifax to Vancouver. Previously, I was completely unaware of when they left and was only vaguely aware of when they arrived, that has changed. My new information states that the train carrying only 9 18" torpedoes from HMCS Niobe in Halifax departed at midnight on August 9 and the submarines were labeled as "fully operational and provisioned with torpedoes" as of August 20. I have made the following edit to the chapter "Unprepared for the Unknown" to rectify this.
To clarify this, the submarines as of the current chapter "Ain't No Rest for the Restless" have yet to receive their torpedo armament, meaning they are effectively useless as direct combatants. The date in which they will arrive will be addressed within the story itself soon enough and may not match with the above mentioned August 20, as that seems be only an approximate date. Thanks for the understanding and I apologize for any confusion suffered by the change. I am striving to keep the timeline as realistic as possible, even if that means retroactively adjusting when new details become available to me
Getting the submarines seaworthy and on a war footing in early September as OTL was incredible, seeing as the Canadian Submarine service was starting from zero on August 5th. OTL the subs may have technically been operational on August 20 but they were still janky and the crews needed to train. Getting them ready to fight on August 21 as in my TL pushes things father. I accelerated the training harder, but that might be some handwavium, OTL the training regime was described as just training and sleeping, into September and even October.
Having the subs ready join the action on August 16, as things seem to be going down in your timeline, would be really hard. So wow, with the Rainbow already sunk the West Coast is really wide open.
Ming777
Monthly Donor
Honestly, at this point, Canada's biggest hope is if the IJN and IJN North American Task Force (遣米支隊, Kenbei Shitai) is in range.
en.wikipedia.org
North American Task Force - Wikipedia
Yes, but they are too far away and Japan does not enter the war until their ultimatum expires at noon on August 23 Tokyo time, which is actually 1900 hours August 22 on the West Coast of Canada. Unless Japan jumps the gun. The Izumo was stationed off Mexico at this time, and arrived in Esquimalt August 25 OTL.Honestly, at this point, Canada's biggest hope is if the IJN and IJN North American Task Force (遣米支隊, Kenbei Shitai) is in range.
North American Task Force - Wikipedia
it makes me wonder who will end up receiveing the brunt of the blame, it seems like the britain would be an easy scape goat but biting the hand that feeds you might not be a good idea. i dont think pinning the blame on the canadian navy itself would go over very well with the public, sounds like parliament will have to face the issue regardless.
ALL STATIONS
The following excerpt has been taken from Leipzig: The Coastal Raider by Fregattenkapitän Johann-Siegfried Haun.
“Our journey up the internal waters of the Vancouver area had been largely uneventful throughout the early morning hours of August 16. Various vessels of the United States Revenue Cutter Service watched our progress with interest as the daylight grew stronger, but it seemed that they were content to simply uphold American neutrality and keep us in Canadian waters. The unpleasant weather of the previous night had burned off into a picture-perfect morning on the water, which in turn was being enjoyed by a multitude of small rowboats, pleasure craft and the occasional small sailing ship. None of these civilian boats interested us, the lack of any major movement of shipping meant we had little reason to delay our move towards Burrard Inlet and the undefended port of Vancouver. With the expert direction of Manfred Baumann, our navigator had plotted a course to take Leipzig through the channel known locally as the ‘First Narrows’, after which we would be able to wreak havoc on any targets of importance with little chance of repercussions. Shortly after 0600 hours, one of the lookouts spotted a vessel bearing down on us from roughly 10,000 yards. As I was personally on the bridge at the time, I trained my binoculars onto the oncoming craft and after some initial difficulties due to the angle of approach, I would describe her appearance as follows.
Restless in her pre-armed tug configuration.
The vessel is question was flying the Red Ensign from her single mast forward from the large deck house while a single funnel sat directly astern the superstructure. The hull very clearly possessed the squat and stocky silhouette of a working tug, likely approximately 70 feet long and perhaps 60 to 70 gross registered tons. Most important though, it seemed from the few men assembled at the fore of this tug, she must have been armed. Likely with whatever the hard pressed Canadian Navy had on hand, not a serious threat on her own. The tug was rapidly sending a flurry of semaphore and signal light messages our way, it seemed that our rather poor disguise of a Japanese Ensign had actually confused them somewhat. They repeatedly inquired in regards to our identity and without any reason to lie at this point, we simply did not respond to the hails. We had already essentially arrived at our intended location and given the much more believable disguise of Algerine still making her way up the coast, there was little reason to continue the charade. The tugs repeated threats to stop for inspection fell of deaf ears as we closed the range to just under 7,000 yards and hauled down the Japanese Ensign, quickly replacing it with that of Kaiserliche Marine.
I had fully expected the officer in charge of the tug to be a sensible man and throw his rudder hard over upon the raising of the Imperial Ensign but it seemed like the suicidal bravery of the Royal Navy was no less strong even in these remote corners of the world. Through the black smoke of the tugs laboring machinery, the muzzle flashes from her forward deck cracked across the inlet. Our return fire was initially not particularly accurate given the slim target of the tug approaching directly ahead of us however, Leipzig swung her broadside out and unleashed peals of fire from her sides. While the gunnery engagement was still ongoing, the wireless room picked up a call for help from the tug and in accordance with the standing orders I had given, the operators attempted to jam the signal. This seemed to work initially until our jamming was completely overpowered by a nearby source, very likely from a land based wireless station. The station quickly repeated the tugs signal far and loud, we had completely lost the element of surprise at that point. I still remember being handed the message they sent as I stood alongside the helmsman, watching as our shells splash all around the seemingly helpless tug.
ATTENTION ALL STATIONS THIS IS POINT GREY WIRELESS STATION. PATROL VESSEL RESTLESS UNDER FIRE BY GERMAN CRUISER OFF BURRARD INLET.
It took a rather embarrassingly long time to actually hit the tug named Restless, the helmsman seemed to be rather adept at maneuvering his ship even at such short ranges. As much as my crew prided themselves on being rather skilled in terms of gunnery, it seems we may have underestimated such a miniscule vessel. A handful of shells from the enemy managed to strike our ship around the anchor capstans and send a barrage of shrapnel backwards at the forward gun crews, who were fortunately protected from behind their gun shields. As the range came down and our broadside mounted 3.7cm Pom Pom guns entered into the action, the tugs luck quickly came to an end. Its wooden upper works resembled kindling as the cannon shells walked their way along it, causing her to veer off to starboard out of control. A few moments later, she slowed to a stop as a direct hit from a main battery shell crumpled her hull inwards. The resulting explosion from the ship’s boilers ended the engagement then and there although tragically, it seemed to also leave no survivors for us to rescue. Such are the cruelties of war; brave men seem to usually be the first ones to die. Communications were flooding out from the surrounding area at this point, some civilian but mostly the encoded military type. We had kicked the hornets nest, even if it was seemingly devoid of stingers. I ordered engineering to bring us back up to our most comfortable top speed as we entered Burrard Inlet, making around 22 knots as we blazed a wake past what was described by Mr. Baumann as Point Atkinson Lighthouse to our port side. As we passed I distinctively remember catching eyes with what must have been the lighthouse house keeper, both of us staring rather intently through our binoculars at one another. That exchange did not last very long as the collection attention of everybody on the bridge changed to the pair of shell splashes that had just appeared a few hundred yards off our bow. It seemed that our intelligence regarding the lack of port defenses in Vancouver were not particularly accurate, that fact changed the rules of engagement rather quickly."
View of the second Point Atkinson Lighthouse, this hexagonal light was constructed using concrete in comparison to its wooden slab sided predecessor.
“Our journey up the internal waters of the Vancouver area had been largely uneventful throughout the early morning hours of August 16. Various vessels of the United States Revenue Cutter Service watched our progress with interest as the daylight grew stronger, but it seemed that they were content to simply uphold American neutrality and keep us in Canadian waters. The unpleasant weather of the previous night had burned off into a picture-perfect morning on the water, which in turn was being enjoyed by a multitude of small rowboats, pleasure craft and the occasional small sailing ship. None of these civilian boats interested us, the lack of any major movement of shipping meant we had little reason to delay our move towards Burrard Inlet and the undefended port of Vancouver. With the expert direction of Manfred Baumann, our navigator had plotted a course to take Leipzig through the channel known locally as the ‘First Narrows’, after which we would be able to wreak havoc on any targets of importance with little chance of repercussions. Shortly after 0600 hours, one of the lookouts spotted a vessel bearing down on us from roughly 10,000 yards. As I was personally on the bridge at the time, I trained my binoculars onto the oncoming craft and after some initial difficulties due to the angle of approach, I would describe her appearance as follows.
Restless in her pre-armed tug configuration.
The vessel is question was flying the Red Ensign from her single mast forward from the large deck house while a single funnel sat directly astern the superstructure. The hull very clearly possessed the squat and stocky silhouette of a working tug, likely approximately 70 feet long and perhaps 60 to 70 gross registered tons. Most important though, it seemed from the few men assembled at the fore of this tug, she must have been armed. Likely with whatever the hard pressed Canadian Navy had on hand, not a serious threat on her own. The tug was rapidly sending a flurry of semaphore and signal light messages our way, it seemed that our rather poor disguise of a Japanese Ensign had actually confused them somewhat. They repeatedly inquired in regards to our identity and without any reason to lie at this point, we simply did not respond to the hails. We had already essentially arrived at our intended location and given the much more believable disguise of Algerine still making her way up the coast, there was little reason to continue the charade. The tugs repeated threats to stop for inspection fell of deaf ears as we closed the range to just under 7,000 yards and hauled down the Japanese Ensign, quickly replacing it with that of Kaiserliche Marine.
I had fully expected the officer in charge of the tug to be a sensible man and throw his rudder hard over upon the raising of the Imperial Ensign but it seemed like the suicidal bravery of the Royal Navy was no less strong even in these remote corners of the world. Through the black smoke of the tugs laboring machinery, the muzzle flashes from her forward deck cracked across the inlet. Our return fire was initially not particularly accurate given the slim target of the tug approaching directly ahead of us however, Leipzig swung her broadside out and unleashed peals of fire from her sides. While the gunnery engagement was still ongoing, the wireless room picked up a call for help from the tug and in accordance with the standing orders I had given, the operators attempted to jam the signal. This seemed to work initially until our jamming was completely overpowered by a nearby source, very likely from a land based wireless station. The station quickly repeated the tugs signal far and loud, we had completely lost the element of surprise at that point. I still remember being handed the message they sent as I stood alongside the helmsman, watching as our shells splash all around the seemingly helpless tug.
ATTENTION ALL STATIONS THIS IS POINT GREY WIRELESS STATION. PATROL VESSEL RESTLESS UNDER FIRE BY GERMAN CRUISER OFF BURRARD INLET.
It took a rather embarrassingly long time to actually hit the tug named Restless, the helmsman seemed to be rather adept at maneuvering his ship even at such short ranges. As much as my crew prided themselves on being rather skilled in terms of gunnery, it seems we may have underestimated such a miniscule vessel. A handful of shells from the enemy managed to strike our ship around the anchor capstans and send a barrage of shrapnel backwards at the forward gun crews, who were fortunately protected from behind their gun shields. As the range came down and our broadside mounted 3.7cm Pom Pom guns entered into the action, the tugs luck quickly came to an end. Its wooden upper works resembled kindling as the cannon shells walked their way along it, causing her to veer off to starboard out of control. A few moments later, she slowed to a stop as a direct hit from a main battery shell crumpled her hull inwards. The resulting explosion from the ship’s boilers ended the engagement then and there although tragically, it seemed to also leave no survivors for us to rescue. Such are the cruelties of war; brave men seem to usually be the first ones to die. Communications were flooding out from the surrounding area at this point, some civilian but mostly the encoded military type. We had kicked the hornets nest, even if it was seemingly devoid of stingers. I ordered engineering to bring us back up to our most comfortable top speed as we entered Burrard Inlet, making around 22 knots as we blazed a wake past what was described by Mr. Baumann as Point Atkinson Lighthouse to our port side. As we passed I distinctively remember catching eyes with what must have been the lighthouse house keeper, both of us staring rather intently through our binoculars at one another. That exchange did not last very long as the collection attention of everybody on the bridge changed to the pair of shell splashes that had just appeared a few hundred yards off our bow. It seemed that our intelligence regarding the lack of port defenses in Vancouver were not particularly accurate, that fact changed the rules of engagement rather quickly."
View of the second Point Atkinson Lighthouse, this hexagonal light was constructed using concrete in comparison to its wooden slab sided predecessor.
Although, with a 6 pounder, (or 3 pounder?) that right spot would be pretty hard to find. All of the ships vitals are under a 3" armoured deck. Maybe a vision slit on the conning tower?
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it seems like victoria crosses will be handed out like participation awards if events like these keep up although i wonder what award would be given to any civilians acting similarly?