4 Nov 1940 | World War II Database

4 Nov 1940

German submarine U-99 attacked British armed merchant cruiser HMS Patroclus 150 miles west of Ireland while she was rescuing survivors of HMS Laurentic, which was disabled by U-99 at the end of the previous day. U-99 fired torpedoes at 0022 hours, 0044 hours, and 0118 hours from the surface, and then dove to avoid attacks. At 0435 hours, U-99 resurfaced, sinking HMS Laurentic with a torpedo which detonated Laurentic's depth charges. Patroclus was sunk at 0525 hours, killing 56. British destroyers HMS Hesperus arrived and chased away U-99 with depth charges. ww2dbase [CPC]
The Italian Julia Division continued to be trapped in the Vovousa valley in northern Greece, incurring heavy casualties as Greek troops mounted repeated attacks in an attempt to eliminate this pocket. Further west, Italian troops established a bridgehead across the Kalamas River, but failed at their first attempt to break out. ww2dbase [Balkans Campaign | CPC]
Adolf Hitler met with his top military leaders in Berlin, Germany to explore the possibility of attacking Gibraltar, Azores Islands, Madeira, and Portugal as means to block the British Royal Navy from entering the Mediterranean Sea. ww2dbase [Adolf Hitler | CPC]
British convoys A. N. 6 and M. W. 3 set out from Port Said and Alexandria in Egypt for the Aegean Sea and Malta. The ships were covered by the anti-aircraft cruisers Calcutta and Coventry with the destroyers Dainty, Vampire, Waterhen, and Voyager. ww2dbase [Malta Campaign | HM]

Timeline Section Founder: Thomas Houlihan
Contributors: Alan Chanter, C. Peter Chen, Thomas Houlihan, Hugh Martyr, David Stubblebine
Special Thanks: Rory Curtis

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