23 May 1943 Part 2

23 May 1943 Channel Islands Sea Defence diary

Weather: wind 270°, 3 m/sec. At approximately 06:12, four British aircraft, probably Spitfires, approached the Little Russel of Guernsey from the north-east. North of Bréhon Tower they turned towards the south-east; one aircraft crashed.

A harbour-protection boat of the Guernsey group recovered the pilot and took him to St Peter Port, where he was handed over to the Air Force.

At 0810, a convoy from St Malo was attacked by several enemy bombers and fighters with bombs and aircraft guns in grid square B.F. 3571, near St Martin’s Point, Guernsey. The coastal motor vessel Ostflandern was sunk by two bomb hits, in the hatch and bridge. Her crew, including one wounded man, was rescued. Aircraft gunfire killed three men and wounded two aboard the motor-sailer Meteor; the hits caused small leaks. The superstructure of motor-sailer Verone [name reading uncertain] was lightly damaged by gunfire, with one seriously and two slightly wounded. M 4625 suffered two dead and two wounded.

The anti-aircraft weapons of Battery Strasbourg and harbour-protection boat FK 07 joined the defence. The aircraft engaged by FK 07 crashed in grid square B.F. 3571 upper left. Ammunition expenditure: Battery Strasbourg, 574 rounds 2-cm; FK 07, 99 rounds 2-cm.

T-1022 Roll 2422, PG 37997, scans 0645.