by Gordon Smith

Introduction

In June 2003, cruise ship MV Discovery, carrying a number of Russian Convoy veterans made a  'RETURN TO MURMANSK, A CRUISE BACK IN TIME", and I was fortunate to be invited as guest speaker. We sailed from Harwich for the Kola Inlet and Murmansk, visiting a variety of Norwegian ports both on the voyage out and back. The North Sea and the Norwegian coast had all played significant parts in both World Wars, and I took the opportunity to cover elements of the First World War, as well as the Norwegian Campaign in the Second as background to the Russian convoys themselves.

Showing how the campaigns of the Russian Front related to the ups and downs of the Russian convoys was an interesting challenge, before tackling some of the major convoy events - PQ.17, PQ.18, Battle of the Barents Sea and the sinking of Scharnhorst and Tirpitz. Finally, these same waters would have seen even more activity had the Cold War between the West and the then Soviet Union hutted up, and so a brief mention was made of what might have become World War 3! This then is the material I prepared.

Photographs are mainly courtesy of Steve Johnson of Cyberheritage (CH), Michael Pocock of Maritime Quest (MQ), David Page of  NavyPhotos (NP), Peter Swarbrick of Ships Pictures (SP),  US Naval Historical Centre (US) and their contributors. (Each image is acknowledged by the abbreviation for the main source and name of the individual contributor if appropriate). My thanks to all of them.