The history of the ship at the British Royal Navy

In April 1941, after the war report of the rear admiral H.T Baillie-Grohman concerning the development of the war in Greece, the advance of the German army, the collapse of the front and the retreat of the allied army in the north, the British chief Andrew B. Cunningham ordered the preparation of evacuating the retreating allied forces from the Greek mainland. This operation, called “DEMON Operation”, had as a purpose the embarkation of almost 47.000 soldiers to allied ships to move them to Crete. Included in the ships that were scheduled to participate in the withdrawal of the allied army were six British TLC of the “First Tank Landing Craft Flotilla” which were also ordered to participate, under the orders of lieutenant Cdr. Peter C. Hutton R.N. These six British TLC were supposed to transfer soldiers from the assembly areas and transferred for embarkation to the bigger ships and transfer to Souda Port.

The main assembly areas and embarkation points of the retreating British forces were Piraeus, Megara, Porto Rafti, Nafplio, Monemvasia and Kalamata. The five out of six TLC (A.1, A.5, A.6, A.16, A.19), accompanied by the ships SOUTHERN MAID and AUCKLAND, departed from Alexandria to Tobruk on 17.4.1941. At night of the same day the four of them (A.1, A.6, A.16, A.19), accompanied by the antisubmarine ship SKUD V, departed from Tobruk with destination the port of Souda where they arrived on 21.4.1941. The fifth (A.5) was ordered to travel alone towards Nafplio. The sixth (A.15) stayed at Alexandria due to engine problems and it was sent later directly to Souda.

On April 22nd 1941, three of the four TLC that had arrived in Crete, were ordered to depart to Attica in order to participate in operation “DEMON” whose startup was set to be on 23.4.1941. The A.1 (Captain Sub Lt. Peters R.N.V.R) and the A.19 (captain Skipper R.S Cooper R.N.R) had final destination Megara, while the A.6 (Captain Sub Lt. Sutton R.N.V.R) was heading to Lavrio.

The A.16 (captain Boatswain E.J Boisell R.N) and while it was located at Souda, underwent some damages by a German air attack and as a result it could not participate in the operation due to an engineering problem that disabled one of the two engines. Despite the fact that the A.16 participated later in the disembarkation of the army that was transferred by the allied ships to Souda, due to its disability to travel autonomously until Alexandria during the evacuation of Crete, it was sank itself by the departing allied army in the bay of Souda. Then, it was floated off by the German occupation army, it was fixed and on February 2nd 1942 it was towed, by the tugboat Irini Vernikou, from Souda to Heraklio where is was used by the German army in order to complete operations at the port of Heraklio. After the war, it was used by the Wreck Floating Organization as a floating winch “Z14” for floating off wrecks.

On 23.4.1941, TLC A.1 and A.19 reached their destination at Megara and A.6 arrived in Porto Rafti. On the same day, A.1 and A.19 were attacked by air by Junkers 87 and as a result A.1 requested help and went to the island of Pachi, Megara. In the afternoon of the next day, 4 Ju 87 detected A.1 at the island of Pachi and attacked her by striking her with five successful shots. Even though the ship sank, a part of its stern stayed above the water surface held by rope. During the night, all useful items were removed from the ship, all documents were destroyed and then A.1 was set with charges and scuttled .

In the night of April 25 to April 26 in 1941, and while she was participating in the effort of embarkation of soldiers onto the ships HMS WRYNECK, DECOY and COVENTRY, first the right propeller of A.19 and then one of her engines were destroyed. As a result, A.19, was flooded and abandoned. The reasons that led to the abandonment of the ship were two: the disability of fixing the engine and of towing it to Crete. At the same time, it was considered the abandoned and quite visible A.19 would be an easy target for the German airplanes and as a result she would be destroyed therefore rendering her useless to be acquired by the German army.

From the four British TLC that participated in the “DEMON” operation, only A.5 was saved and managed to return to Souda on April 29th 1941. Later, she was sunk by the German air forces during the operation of evacuating Crete.

The six TLC of the “First Tank Landing Craft Flotilla” which started from Alexandria met the following end: A.16 and A.6 had the story already mentioned above, A.1 and A.19 were lost in Megara, A.5 was destroyed and sank by a German air attack at Monemvasia and A.15 sank with all the crew on board by Luftwaffe on 28.4.1941 while she was located almost 15 miles east from Monemvasia assisting A.5 that was located there. The commander of the six British TLC, lieutenant Peter C. Hutton R.N was also on board and sank with the ship.