The captain made what he thought was the right choice, but it didn't go the way he expected. Who would know in advance what would happen later, may his soul rest in peace. Gérard removed the lunch box containing the hot soup and reached out and made a cross on his chest.

"Go on, Gérard, and what happened on this ship." Sergeant Coleman sat across from Gérard, and he shoved a plate of cured meat in front of the French sailors.

"We couldn't wait for the lifeboats to return, and some people started to get anxious." Gérard nodded his head in thanks to the sergeant, and he forked a slice of cured meat from his plate.

"Some sailors who thought they were good at the water were ready to swim to the other side with lifebuoys. Among them was a good friend of mine, whose name was Louis. Noel, from Ainaut, that place is close to São Paulo. I've never seen a stronger sailor than him, he's a who's a who's a who's two heads taller than me. Gérard chewed on the cured pork slices and picked up an aluminum glass of beer with it.

"So did he succeed? This Noel. A young German sailor next to him asked.

"Like everyone else who wants to do this, we are swept away by the current, and you must know that the Loire is not one of the small ditches in the countryside, it was at low tide, and the river itself was very fast, and the channel we were in was dug by hand, so there was a strong undercurrent under the surface. We could only watch them being carried away by the river, and there was nothing we could do. I heard from my commander that these men had at least a fifty percent chance of surviving if they hadn't been washed into the sea, but so far I haven't heard of any of them being found. ”

"It's scary, it's the first time I've heard of anything like this." The young private smacked his tongue.

"You're too young to know that we were in Narvik," said one sergeant, holding a beer.

"Please, don't mention Narvik again."

"It's going to start again."

"We all know that."

"Sergeant Norman, let Gérard finish the story." Several veterans in the dining room were noisy.

"Alright, please move on, Gérard." Corporal Norman said with a smile and shook his head.

"We had considered building a raft with a wooden door in the cabin, but the fate of the sailors had discouraged us. Then your reconnaissance plane appeared in the sky, and the officers asked us to operate the anti-aircraft guns and open fire, but everyone was scared at that time, and no one was willing to obey the orders of the officers.

We thought that this warship was doomed, that everyone would be sent to your prisoner of war camp, that our battle was over, so no one wanted to die at this time.

So we all hid in the cabin, leaving the officers on deck, and after waiting less than a minute, these "brave men" also hurried into the cabin, what a bunch of hypocritical guys. You've all seen one of them, Captain Raoult. ”

"That arrogant grouse in the anti-aircraft artillery command post." A German sailor said with a smile.

"I wouldn't denigrate a French naval officer like that, but you're saying it vividly." Gérard broke off a piece of crusty white bread.

"Don't interrupt, what happened?"

"We didn't dare to go to the deck until it got dark, the power was never restored, and we couldn't even get to the phone in the cabins. We can only rely on manpower to convey the instructions of our superiors, to be honest, few people take these orders seriously, and we can't be said to be cowardly, but what everyone was thinking about at that time was how to survive. Gérard sighed with emotion as he said this.

"I can understand that on a battleship that has lost all power and runs aground, people really don't have much choice." Sergeant Norman nodded.

"By about four o'clock in the afternoon, the Germans had entered the city of Saint-Nazaire, and our lookouts noticed black smoke billowing from the direction of the base, and we later learned that it was a few workers left on the dock who had set fire to a tanker. We heard a fierce exchange of fire coming from the direction of the shipyard. There weren't many weapons of self-defense on Bar, and there weren't even Marines among us.

There were those who felt that we should hoist the white flag and surrender to the German Army, and at that time we were also worried about being bombed by your air force, because there were two planes circling over the harbor all the time, and we believe that they could not have seen this great ship in the middle of the river. Gérard sandwiched a few slices of cured meat and pickled cucumbers into the bread and slathered a spoonful of French yellow mustard with seeds.

"They did see it." A voice interjected, and the sailors looked up to see a German captain standing in the doorway.

"Sir!" Everyone in the cabin hurriedly stood up.

"Sit down, I just passed by the door, and I heard your discussion, and I'm interested in Gérard's story." A sailor gave way to his seat, and Captain Kobisky sat down at the table with a smile.

"Pour the captain a beer." Sergeant Coleman commanded.

"No, I'll be on duty later." The captain politely declined his men's hospitality.

"The reconnaissance plane did spot the battleship, and they also reported it to their superiors." The captain took over the topic of Gérard.

"The problem is that the Army's goal at the time was to capture the city, and they didn't put this piece of information in the category that needed to be prioritized." The captain took the coffee from the sergeant, looked down and sniffed it, then nodded in thanks.

"We were also surprised that the Germans did not send anyone on board until dark, as if they had not seen the ship at all. You must know that this is a 38,000-ton battleship, and the bridge is thirty meters high, floating on the river like a hill. In the presence of the officers, Gérard stopped his dinner.

"In fact, it is very simple to say, the army thought that there was no one on board, because they got the information that the warship had been sunk by the French Navy, and the facilities on board had been destroyed, and it was already a useless scrap ship. In addition, the military task at that time was very urgent, and they did not have spare personnel to come on board to check, so they put the matter on hold in a hurry. The captain said as he sipped his coffee.

"Where did they get the information?" Coleman asked curiously.

"A reconnaissance battalion captured four lifeboats on the shore, and the captured sailors confessed. It looked like they wanted to protect the personnel left on board, so they deceived the Army Scouts. Kobisky said, shaking his head.

"It's the first time I've known about this, and we've always wondered why the four lifeboats didn't come back. It was because of their lie that we were trapped on the ship for six days. Gérard looked at him with a look of abrupt realization, then shook his head with a wry smile.

In order to save weight, let. The Barr set sail with only two hundred men for two days, as the original plan was for them to reach Bordeaux in just one day, where they would be replenished with supplies and fuel.

The two tugboats had fled, and Lieutenant Commander Berdychick couldn't find a reason to stop them from doing so, and the astronomical tide that night had not been able to lift the ship off the reef, and even if it had been successfully lifted, they would not have been able to start the power. The bilge lines were flooded, the entire power system collapsed, the two diesel generators stopped working, and the electrically powered fuel and boiler pumps were no longer operational.

With no chance of escaping the ship completely lost, Berdychick's mentality changed, and he was no longer in a hurry to destroy the ship, and the lieutenant commander began to plan for his future.

The next day, from daytime, the sailors and cadets on this warship tried every means to attract the attention of the Germans on shore.

The main forces of the army forces that occupied Saint-Nazaire had already left the port and began to accelerate their march towards the south of France. Only a few logistics and guard units remained in the city, and because of the lack of troops, they did not send people to defend the riverbank at all. This meant that all the efforts of the French naval sailors on board were done for the blind to see.

Although there were less than half of the people on board, they were carrying daily food, and after losing power, it was impossible to store it for a long time in the hot summer months. The temperature in the cabin quickly rose to 40 degrees in the sun, there was no electric drive, and the ventilation system stopped working, so personnel could not stay in the closed bilge, otherwise there would be a risk of suffocation.

The sailors hung a string of white sheets on the mast and watched the traffic on the road on the bank of the river, but simply turned a blind eye to them.

By the third day, the last bit of food on board had been eaten, and the French officers and men were in danger of famine. Although there was a lot of water in the fresh water tank, there was no pump to pump fresh water into the water supply system, so they had to open the bolted hatch cover and use buckets to extract drinking water, because the weather was hot and the water quality began to deteriorate rapidly.

They hung the distress flag on the mast and even lit a bonfire on the deck, but it was still to no avail, no one paid attention to them, as if the whole world had forgotten about the battleship.

It wasn't until the fifth day that a cargo ship sailed down the river from Nantes from Jean. Barr passed by and spotted the French sailors frantically waving flags on board, and the captain docked and reported the unexpected discovery to the German commander in the city of Saint-Nazaire, which finally attracted the attention of the German Army.

It was then that the Germans realized that such a big fish was hiding under their noses, and it was absurd that during the five days of occupation of Saint-Nazaire, not a single person offered to inspect it. The commander of the garrison hurriedly reported the situation to his superiors, saying that there was still a French battleship in his jurisdiction that had not been disarmed.

"When the German Navy speedboat approached the side of the ship, it was as if we were seeing our loved ones. I never thought I wanted to see the Germans so much, and I remember giving the sailor who boarded the ship a big hug and kissing him on the cheek, which startled the fellow on the spot. Gérard scratched his head in embarrassment.

"It wasn't just the sailors who were frightened, as we found out that the ship was largely intact when we boarded the ship, and the commander of the garrison at Saint-Nazaire was commended for breaking the record for the most ships captured by the Army to date, but I think this is more like a cover for the intelligence service's negligence." Kobisky drank the coffee in his cup, then stood up to say goodbye to the sailors.

"I'm on duty on the bridge, and I'm glad to hear Gérard's wonderful story, sorry to disturb your dinner." The captain walked over to the hatch.

"It's all in the past, Gérard, Jean. The Barr has been given a new look. However, I suggest that you should record your experiences on this battleship, and I am sure that our younger generations will find it interesting when they read this history. ”

The captain returned a military salute to the sailors, turned and walked out of the hatch. (To be continued.) )