Bismarck vs. Hood: How Hitler's Most Deadly Battleship Sunk the Pride of the Royal Navy

CW5 Jack Cardwell A Most Notable Naval Battle.

The problem is, she didn't sink her. The British met Bismarck and Prince Eugen (PE) with PE ahead. The Brits assumed the lead ship was Bis and opened fire. British are trailing with Hood in lead, followed by Prince Of Wales (POW). Admiral Lutjens is force commander and Captain Lindemann is Bis' skipper. Lutjens' orders are to run and that is what he is planning to do. Lindemann argues and overrides. While both German leaders are arguing over whether or not to stay or fight, POW has a failure and goes from ten guns down to one. PE notices and starts firing at Hood. PE gets Hood's range and starts a fire in her ready use ammo lockers which illuminates her nicely. British figure out that PE is really the ship they are shooting at and Hood switches fire to Bis. By this time, Bis joins the battle just as PE fires her fourth salvo. This salvo hits Hood as Hood is turning.

Ship stats:
Bismarck - hole in bow fuel tank.
Prince Of Wales - armored bridge penetration.
Prince Eugen - shrapnel damage.
Hood - sunk by plunging fire to magazine.

Well as Prince Of Wales' guns are not working, the only source of Bismarck's and Prince Eugen's damage has to be Hood.

Prince Eugen has 8 inch guns which will not penetrate POW's armored bridge. POW reports her hit coming as Hood explodes so unless Eugen and Bismarck fired at the same time (they didn't), one ship couldn't have taken out Hood plus penetrated POW. So Bismarck gets credit for POW's bridge hit.

Prince Eugen is already firing at Hood and already has her range and has hit her. An 8 inch plunging fire shell will kill anything. Also note positions: Prince Eugen, Bismarck, Hood, Prince Of Wales. In order to hit Bismarck's bow, Wales would had to have shot over Hood with her one working, rearward firing gun(!) - ain't happening. In order for Bismarck - wildly turning to join battle - to have hit Hood, she'd have had to stolen Eugen's coordinates. German ships can't share target info. So no way Eugen could have said to Bismarck, "here's her range and targeting; you sink her..."

The movie "Sink the Bismark" came out in 1960, I remember my mother took me to see it, we travelled on the local bus route to the theatre, I was 7 at the time. Very interesting chapter in history.