The Battle of the Cigno Convoy (or "Belluno" Convoy) was a naval engagement between two British destroyers of the Royal Navy and two torpedo boats of the (Italian Royal Navy) south-east of Marettimo island to the west of Sicily, in the early hours of 16 April 1943. The Italian ships were escorting the transport ship "Belluno" (4,200 gross register tons) to Tunisia; the torpedo boat , carried aviation fuel. The British force was fought off by the Italian ships for the loss of a torpedo boat. A British destroyer, disabled by Italian gunfire, had to be scuttled after the action when it was clear that it could not make port before dawn.
Background.
After Operation Torch, the Allied invasion of French North Africa (8 November 1942), the Allies began a campaign to achieve naval and air supremacy around North Africa and Sicily to interdict the Axis supply route from Italy. In February 1943, the Allied air and sea campaign inflicted a loss of 20 per cent on Axis merchant shipping. In March the rate of loss reached 50 per cent and by April, Axis merchant ship sinkings averaged of 3.3 per day. The supply route for the from Italian ports to Tunisia was shorter than the previous route to Tripoli in Libya but Allied air supremacy and the attrition of Axis merchant shipping since 1940 made it almost impossible to assemble large convoys, despite the superior port facilities in Tunisia.
A chronic lack of fuel also limited the sailings of Italian escort vessels and led the (Italian Royal Navy) and the (German Navy) to use smaller ships and barges, escorted by small, fast destroyers and torpedo boats. The smaller craft were harder to find when sailing dispersed and quicker to unload. Due to the loss of many faster cargo ships earlier in the war, convoys were only capable of . A huge extension of minefields planted by both sides had limited the scope for Allied surface ships based at Bône in Algeria to attack Axis shipping to a far greater extent than during the Libyan campaign; Malta-based ships also had little success. Allied aircraft had become a greater threat to Axis sea traffic.
Prelude.
On 15 April, the freighter "Belluno" (4,200 gross register tons) departed Naples for Trapani in Sicily, carrying ammunition for the Axis forces (Army Group Africa [/]) in Tunisia. "Belluno" was escorted by the torpedo boats (carrying aviation fuel) and . At Trapani, "Cigno" (flagship, Lieutenant commander Carlo Maccaferri) and "Cassiopea" (Capitano di Corvetta Virginio Nasta) rendezvoused with the convoy to look for British motor torpedo boats (MTB), a force of which had disabled two ships of a convoy off Cani Rocks on 1 April.
During the afternoon of 15 April, the British destroyers and were on an exercise off Malta. A signal arrived from the C-in-C Malta that ships had been sighted off Pantelleria, giving orders to investigate; the ships moved off at 17:45. After eight hours the British destroyers passed Pantelleria at with "Pakenham" in the lead and "Paladin" astern. On 16 April the convoy departed Trapani at 01:00.
At 02:42 "Pakenham" obtained a radar contact at , lost it as "Pakenham" turned and regained it at 02:45. The contact was seen to be two torpedo boats in line ahead, on a reciprocal course at range. The British destroyers turned to starboard to get down moon, silhouetting the Italian ships. At 02:38 "Cigno" spotted shapes in the dark at a range of . "Cigno" turned towards the shapes, switched on its fighting lights and sent recognition signals. "Pakenham" also showed fighting lights and turned to starboard towards the Italian ships, as "Paladin" carried on to the north around the flank of the Italian convoy. "Cigno" and "Pakenham" closed quickly and Maccaferri saw that the shapes were British destroyers.
Action.
At 02:48, after illuminating the foremost Italian ship, "Pakenham" opened fire at . When the range was estimated by "Cigno" at it also opened fire and hit "Pakenham" on the stern with a 100/47 shell, starting a fire and disabling its aft torpedo tubes. "Cassiopea", having steered north north-west to confront "Paladin", opened fire at . As soon as the firing was heard, "Belluno" and its escorts turned for Trapani. "Pakenham" received a second hit at 02:50 which exploded in the lower deck and caused a much bigger fire, leading to Stevens ordering the aft magazine to be flooded.
The ships were very close and both fired with every weapon that could be brought to bear, filling the air with multi-coloured tracer ammunition. "Pakenham" hit "Cigno" in the forward boiler just to the rear of the bridge at 02:53, releasing a large cloud of smoke and steam over the ship as it came to a stop. While drifting, "Cigno" fired torpedoes at "Pakenham" to no effect and "Pakenham" replied from its undamaged forward torpedo tubes and struck "Cigno" amidships, breaking the ship in two. The stern quickly sank but the forward section of the ship stayed afloat; its gun-crew continuing to fire.
"Pakenham" turned north towards "Cassiopea" but just after 03:00, one or two shells, fired from the forward half of "Cigno" as it was sinking or from "Cassiopea," hit on the waterline cutting the boiler tubes and causing the engine room to flood; the steam forcing the engine-room crew to evacuate. "Pakenham" listed 15° to port, electrical power was lost and stopped in the water, fires burning. "Cassiopea" and "Paladin" had not been hit until "Paladin" raked "Cassiopea" with a burst of QF 2-pounder pom-pom fire, which jammed the rudder and started a big fire forward and a smaller one aft. The crews of the two guns to the rear remained in action and at 03:06 "Cassiopea" fired a torpedo at to no effect.
At 03:08 "Paladin" doused its lights and ceased fire, which misled the crew of "Cassiopea" into claiming a hit. "Paladin" was taking evasive action and broke away to the south-east, after its captain mistook "Cassiopea" for a Capitani Romani-class cruiser, because Italian shells exploding in the water caused unusually large splashes. "Pakenham" had regained power and continued north, achieving a hit on "Cassiopea" at ; "Cassiopea" returned fire from its rearward guns and scored two hits on its stern pom-pom mounting and searchlight at 03:13. "Pakenham" ceased fire and turned to follow "Paladin"; "Cassiopea" was badly damaged, with two large fires onboard and did not pursue.
Aftermath.
Analysis.
In 2009, Vincent O'Hara wrote that the Battle of the Cigno Convoy was a rare occasion when Italian naval escorts defeated a night attack by British ships. The British thought that they had been engaged by two fleet destroyers and believed that they had sunk them, putting the loss of "Pakenham" down to an unlucky hit and the lack of experience of both British crews. O'Hara wrote that experience had more influence on the result; the British ships had recently been transferred from the Indian Ocean and Rich deciding to turn away was "unusually cautious". The two Italian crews were veteran and spotted the British ships before the British opened fire but for the Italians to call the engagement a success when one ship was saved for the loss of one escort and another seriously damaged showed the extent of the British ascendancy in night-fighting.
Casualties.
"Cigno" suffered the loss of 103 crew. "Pakenham" suffered nine crew killed and fifteen wounded; one of whom died on 18 April.
Subsequent operations.
"Cassiopea" was towed back to Trapani by "Climene" and later to Taranto for repairs. "Belluno" and "Tifone" sailed from Trapani at 05:45 and reached Tunis; "Tifone" unloaded its cargo of aviation fuel at Bizerte. "Pakenham" and "Paladin" made for Malta at but high-pressure steam leaking into "Pakenham"'s engine room made it impossible for the crew to remain. Jones could shut off the steam and wait for the engine room to cool before making repairs but this would take two hours or keep going until the boiler feed-water ran out and the ship stopped in the water. With Axis airfields so close, Jones continued and made another before losing power, stopping at 03:50. "Paladin" was able to tow "Pakenham" at . At 06:00, as dawn rose, two aircraft were spotted; the ships dropped the tow as they engaged the Axis aircraft, which were followed by two more, which failed to damage the ships. The tow was resumed at 06:20 but the cable broke after a few minutes; the ships were too far from Malta for Allied fighters to keep a standing patrol over the ships, when they could make only at best. Orders were received from Malta at 06:30 to sink "Pakenham"; as a dogfight went on overhead, Jones ordered the destroyer scuttled. "Paladin" took on the crew and returned to Malta at .
Footnotes.
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References.
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