But the British had just rejoiced for a minute, the gunpowder catapult of the seaplane on the battleship Prince of Wales was hit by a large-caliber armor-piercing shell, and the shell penetrated the deck and drilled into the powder magazine below to detonate it, and the second half of the Prince of Wales suddenly burst into flames, seeing that the spreading fire was gradually approaching the rear main turret that had been blown open before, but fortunately, the experienced captain made a quick decision and ordered in advance to inject water into this turret and eliminate the hidden danger.

However, although this prevented the shells in the main turret from exploding and sinking the warship, the maximum speed of the Prince of Wales dropped further to 24 knots, and seeing that the German ships were chasing closer and closer, especially the heavy cruiser Prince Eugen, which was bullying the Prince of Wales and could not return fire, it actually approached within 12 kilometers and was ready to lean up and launch torpedoes, which made the British officers and men on the battleship Prince of Wales all feel desperate, just when they were about to turn around and prefer to "fight and die" rather than "flee and die". Six British destroyers in the vicinity finally arrived at the battlefield

These six destroyers rushed over immediately after receiving the telegram from the two heavy cruisers, but they did not expect that the task of beating the water dogs in Jihua turned into rescuing their own capital ships, but they still bravely rushed towards the German ships. Fight for your capital ship a chance to escape.

Since the range of British torpedoes was far from being comparable to that of oxygen torpedoes, the destroyers needed to get closer to pose even a mere possible threat to the two German battleships, and as they approached the German ships, the battleship Prince of Wales was hit by five large-caliber armor-piercing shells. Except for one dud, the other 4 rounds caused a lot of trauma to the giant ship, and the Prince Eugen because of the closer rush and the higher rate of fire of the ship's guns, the shells that hit the Prince of Wales were several times more than the two battleships combined, although the 203mm caliber armor-piercing shells could not penetrate the thick main armor of the King George V-class battleship, but the superstructure of the Prince of Wales was still bombarded by it.

By the time the six destroyers finally crossed the Prince of Wales, the battleship had been bombarded to shreds and its maximum speed had dropped to 18 knots, but it was still unsunk, much to the disappointment and frustration of the officers and men of the three German ships. And the officers and men on the six British destroyers were rejoicing. Torpedoes were also fired at three enemy ships at once. With the performance of British torpedoes, it was almost impossible to hit at a distance of 8,000 meters, but as long as they could force the German warships to make evasive maneuvers, their attack on the Prince of Wales would have been interrupted for at least several minutes. Because every time you turn, you have to readjust the fire control parameters

And this time. The two British heavy cruisers, which had been approaching the battlefield, finally caught up. Eager to relieve the battleship Prince of Wales, they opened fire at a maximum range of 26,000 meters, but naturally missed, but this completely dispelled the Germans' illusions of chasing and destroying the Prince of Wales. With the interference of a full 8 warships, it is almost impossible to catch up and sink the Prince of Wales who is bent on escaping, rather than wasting time on this, it is better to knock out a few more of these small ships that are rushing to their deaths, and it can be regarded as relieving a little pressure on the Empire's submarine forces.

However, the reluctant captain of the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen, Helmut. Admiral Brinkmann nevertheless ordered the firing of torpedoes at the battleship Prince of Wales, which was fleeing at full speed, and as a result, none of the 12 torpedoes hit the chosen target, but accidentally sank a British destroyer that appeared in its path

Although the destroyers were close and the heavy cruisers were far away, because of the higher value of the latter and the larger target, the two German battleships still chose two heavy cruisers as the primary target for attack, while the six destroyers (before the torpedo had sailed to the position of the British destroyers) were left to the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen and the secondary guns and even large-caliber anti-aircraft guns on the two battleships.

After 3 rounds of test firing, the 4th salvo of the Bismarck's 8 main guns finally hit the British heavy cruiser Norfolk, and it was two rounds at once. One of the shots pierced the deck and detonated after burrowing into the hull, causing severe damage to the power system of the heavy cruiser Norfolk and a significant reduction in speed; The other shot pierced the top armor of one of the main turrets and caused the shells inside the turret to detonate, which was later considered a fatal wound that caused the ship to sink, and the only significance of the three large-caliber shells that later hit was to make it sink faster

At the same time, in addition to one of the 6 destroyers was accidentally sunk by a torpedo, another was sunk by the sharp artillery fire of three German warships, but one of the dozens of torpedoes they fired before hit the battleship Bismarck, although the British torpedo is not as powerful as the oxygen torpedo, but after all, it is also a 533mm caliber ship's heavy torpedo, even if it did not hit the vital part, it still caused a lot of water ingress, so that the maximum speed of the Bismarck dropped to 27 knots, This was the biggest victory of the British Royal Navy in the Battle of the Danish Strait

The captain of the Bismarck, Admiral Lindemann, did not change his target out of anger, because he knew very well how long it would take for the torpedo to be reloaded, and no matter how many torpedoes the British destroyers fired in this round, the threat of British destroyers had been greatly reduced in the period after that, and it would be wiser to take out the more threatening heavy cruiser Suffolk, and the heavy cruiser was also equipped with torpedo tubes, and it was actually just as dangerous to let it approach

But at this time, the only bomber squadron of the British Royal Air Force stationed in Iceland arrived on the battlefield, although due to the presence of proximity fuses, artillery sight radars, gyro sights and phalanxes, all 6 British torpedo bombers were shot down, and only two of the 12 dive bombers flew back to Icelandic airfields, but the forced maneuver to avoid torpedoes caused the fire control parameters of the two battleships to need to be readjusted, and the battleship Bismarck was also hit by three 227 kg aerial bombs, The first two fell on the roof of the main turret and on the horizontal deck, respectively, and did not cause substantial damage due to the fact that 227 kg of aerial bombs were not enough to penetrate the thick armor, but the third blew up a twin 105-mm anti-aircraft gun

What made the German officers and men even more depressed was that due to the interference of these British planes, it took them almost three times the time to deal with the heavy cruiser Norfolk before sinking the heavy cruiser Suffolk, and at this time the battleship Prince of Wales had already run away, and after there was no target to protect, the three remaining destroyers at that time immediately and decisively took advantage of the speed advantage to withdraw from the battlefield, while the three German warships were worried about the arrival of the air force from the British mainland, and the destroyers were really not a worthy target, so he didn't take the initiative to evacuate the battlefield (to be continued......