PQ 17 was the code name for an Allied Arctic convoy during the Second World War. On 27 June 1942, the ships sailed from Hvalfjörður, Iceland, for the port of Arkhangelsk in the Soviet Union. The convoy was located by German forces on 1 July, after which it was shadowed continuously and attacked. The First Sea Lord Admiral Dudley Pound, acting on information that German surface units, including the German battleship Tirpitz, were moving to intercept, ordered the covering force built around the Allied battleships HMS Duke of York and the USS Washington away from the convoy and told the convoy to scatter. Because of vacillation by Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, the Tirpitz raid never materialised. The convoy was the first large joint Anglo-American naval operation under British command; in Churchill's view this encouraged a more careful approach to fleet movements.
USS Fairfax (DD-93) was a Wickes-class destroyer in the United States Navy during World War I, later transferred for World War II service first to the Royal Navy as HMS Richmond (G88), a Town-class destroyer, and then to the Soviet Navy as Zhivuchy.
The Arctic convoys of World War II were oceangoing convoys which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland, and North America to northern ports in the Soviet Union – primarily Arkhangelsk (Archangel) and Murmansk in Russia. There were 78 convoys between August 1941 and May 1945, sailing via several seas of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, with periods with no sailings during several months in 1942, and in the summers of 1943 and 1944.
Operation Sportpalast, also known as Operation Nordmeer, was a German naval raid between 6 and 13 March 1942 against two of the Allied Arctic convoys of World War II as they passed through the Norwegian Sea. It was conducted by the battleship Tirpitz, three destroyers and eight submarines. The German ships were unable to locate either of the convoys but sank a merchant vessel that was sailing independently. The Allies attempted to intercept the German force, also without success.
HMS Onslow was an O-class destroyer of the Royal Navy. The O-class were intermediate destroyers, designed before the outbreak of the Second World War to meet likely demands for large number of destroyers. They had a main gun armament of four 4.7 in guns, and had a design speed of 36 kn. Onslow was ordered on 2 October 1939 and was built by John Brown & Company at their Clydebank, Glasgow shipyard, launching on 31 March 1941 and completing on 8 October 1941.
PQ 13 was a British Arctic convoy that delivered war supplies from the Western Allies to the USSR during World War II. The convoy was subject to attack by German air, U-boat and surface forces and suffered the loss of five ships, plus one escort vessel. Fifteen ships arrived safely.
HMS Forester was one of nine F-class destroyers built for the Royal Navy during the early 1930s. Although assigned to the Home Fleet upon completion, the ship was attached to the Mediterranean Fleet in 1935–36 during the Abyssinia Crisis. A few weeks after the start of World War II in September 1939, she helped to sink one German submarine and then participated in the Second Battle of Narvik during the Norwegian Campaign of 1940. Forester was sent to Gibraltar in mid-1940 and formed part of Force H where she participated in the attack on the Vichy French ships at Mers-el-Kébir and the Battle of Dakar between escorting the aircraft carriers of Force H as they flew off aircraft for Malta and covering convoys resupplying and reinforcing the island until late 1941. During this time the ship helped to sink another German submarine.
HMS Marigold was a Flower-class corvette of the Royal Navy. She was launched on 4 September 1940 and was sunk by an Italian air-dropped torpedo on 9 December 1942.
Prior to World War II, the Indian Ocean was an important maritime trade route between European nations and their colonial territories in East Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, British India, Indochina, the East Indies (Indonesia), and Australia for a long time. Naval presence was dominated by the Royal Navy Eastern Fleet and the Royal Australian Navy as World War II began, with a major portion of the Royal Netherlands Navy operating in the Dutch East Indies and the Red Sea Flotilla of the Italian Regia Marina operating from Massawa.
HMS Mahratta was an M-class destroyer of the Royal Navy which served during World War II. Begun as Marksman, she was damaged while under construction, and dismantled to be rebuilt on a new slipway. She was launched as Mahratta in 1942, completed in 1943, and quickly pressed into service. After a short but busy career in the North Atlantic and Arctic, largely guarding merchant convoys, she was torpedoed and sunk on 25 February 1944.
HMS Wrestler (D35) was a V and W-class destroyer built by the Royal Navy during the First World War and active from 1939 to 1944 during the Second World War. She was the first Royal Navy ship to bear that name, and the only one to do so to date.
Operation FB took place as part of the Arctic Convoys of the Second World War. The operation consisted of independent sailings by unescorted merchant ships between Iceland and Murmansk. In late 1942, the Allies had taken the offensive against Germany but the dispatch of supplies to the USSR by convoy via the Arctic route was suspended, due to the demands of the Mediterranean campaign. Convoy PQ 19 was cancelled because the Home Fleet diverted ships to the Mediterranean for Operation Torch which would have had to be postponed for three weeks had ships been provided for PQ 19.
Convoy PQ 15 was an Arctic convoy sent from Iceland by the Western Allies to aid the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The convoy sailed in late April 1942, reaching the Soviet northern ports after air attacks that sank three ships out of twenty-five.
Convoy PQ 14 was an Arctic convoy sent from Britain by the Western Allies to aid the Soviet Union during the Second World War. Convoys from Britain had been despatched since August 1941 and advantage had been taken of the perpetual darkness of the Arctic winter. German operations against the convoys had been muted due to the need to support Operation Barbarossa, confidence in imminent victory and the small size of the convoys. In late 1941 and early 1942 the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine had reinforced Norway with aircraft and ships.
Convoy PQ 8 was an Arctic convoy of the Western Allies to aid the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The convoy left Iceland on 8 January 1942. On 12 January the convoy had to turn south to avoid ice; the weather was calm, visibility was exceptional, with a short period of twilight around noon. and arrived in Murmansk nine days later.
Z24 was one of fifteen Type 1936A destroyers built for the Kriegsmarine during World War II. Completed in 1940, the ship spent the first half of the war in Norwegian waters. She was very active in attacking the Arctic convoys ferrying war materials to the Soviet Union in 1941–1942, but only helped to sink one Allied ship herself.
Convoy QP 10 was an Arctic convoy of World War II, consisting of empty merchant ships returning from the Soviet Union after delivering their cargo there. The convoy consisted of 16 merchant ships and an escort of nine warships. The convoy departed Murmansk on 10 April 1942 and arrived in Reykjavik on 21 April. The convoy was attacked by German U-boats and aircraft, resulting in the loss of four merchant ships. Another ship, Stone Street, was damaged by air attack and forced to turn back to the Kola Inlet. The convoy's escorts shot down six German planes and damaged another during the course of the voyage. Later, six merchant ships from Convoy PQ 14 joined QP 10.
HMS Zephyr was a Z-class destroyer. She was launched on 13 July 1942 at Vickers-Armstrongs' High Walker shipyard and commissioned on 6 September 1944. She was 'adopted' by the civil community of Doncaster, replacing the destroyer HMS Lightning, which had originally been adopted during Warship Week in 1942.
Gremyashchy was one of 29 Gnevny-class destroyers built for the Soviet Navy during the late 1930s. Completed in 1939, she was assigned to the Baltic Fleet and was later transferred to the Northern Fleet in 1941.
Operation Orator was the code name for the defence of the Allied Arctic convoy PQ 18 by British and Australian air force units, based temporarily in North-West Russia, against attack by the German battleship Tirpitz and other Kriegsmarine surface vessels. The wing, known as the Search & Strike Force, was commanded by Group Captain Frank Hopps and its maritime strike element was the Leuchars Wing, comprising No. 144 Squadron, Royal Air Force (RAF) and No. 455 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) equipped with Handley-Page Hampden TB 1 torpedo bombers.
Germany 
Finland (until 1944)
United Kingdom 
Soviet Union 
United States 
Canada 
Norway 
Poland 
Denmark 
