Military history of Gibraltar during World War II

The Royal Navy's Force H, under the command of Vice-Admiral James Somerville was based in Gibraltar and had the task of maintaining naval superiority and providing a strong escort for convoys to and from the besieged island of Malta.

Additionally, the fortress was the focus of underwater attacks by the Italian Royal Navy (Regia Marina) commando frogman unit (Decima Flottiglia MAS) and their human torpedoes.

[4] Following the successful completion of the North African campaign in May 1943 and the surrender of Italy in September 1943, Gibraltar's role shifted from that of a forward operating base to that of a rear-area supply position.

[5] The decision to enforce mass evacuation in order to increase the strength of the Rock with more military and naval personnel meant that most Gibraltarians (some for up to ten years) had nowhere to call 'home'.

[5] Although Crichton was unable to obtain permission to clean and restock his ships (and contrary to British Admiralty orders which forbade the taking on of evacuees), when he saw the mass of civilians pouring through the dockyards, he opened up his gangways for boarding.

However, when they arrived at Gibraltar, the governor would not allow them to land, fearing that once the evacuees were back on the Rock, it would be virtually impossible to evacuate them a second time.

[6] Crowds gathered in John Mackintosh Square in the centre of Gibraltar as the news broke, speeches were made and two city councillors accompanied by the acting president of the exchange and commercial library went to see the governor (Sir Clive Liddell) to ask that the evacuees be allowed to land.

[7] After receiving instructions from London, a landing was allowed as long as the evacuees returned when other ships arrived to take them away from the Rock, and by 13 July the re-evacuation back to Gibraltar had been completed.

[7] British conservative politician Oliver Stanley agreed to accept the evacuees in the United Kingdom, but he argued with Gibraltar over the number of people involved.

[7] Concern for them in Gibraltar mounted as the air raids against London intensified, coupled with the arrival of harrowing letters, describing the circumstances in which the evacuees were living.

Nothing came of these threats as Spain realised how well defended Gibraltar was and the economic effects of a blockade of Spanish ports, especially on oil imports, so they pulled back the offer of being willing to enter the war with the Axis forces.

[16] On 24 September, the Italian Stefani news agency reported: "As a reprisal for the bombardment of Dakar yesterday morning, one-hundred-and-twenty French aircraft based in Morocco attacked Gibraltar."

[23] Diplomatic failure at the highest levels of government (Meeting at Hendaye) prevented the operation, which had been drawn up in detail by the Wehrmacht in the summer and autumn of 1940, from occurring at the beginning of 1941.

[23][24] Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine would cooperate by using U-boats to interfere with British naval movement and emplacing coastal batteries to further discourage the Royal Navy.

[4] Lesser known than the Italian actions were the sabotage operations and limpet-mine attacks carried out by Spanish and Gibraltarian agents recruited in the Campo de Gibraltar by the Germans.

In March 1942, a Gibraltarian, José Key, one of the most prominent agents working for the Germans, responsible for the collection of information on military movements for the Abwehr was arrested and executed in Wandsworth Prison in late 1942.

[37] By September 1942, Plazas, whose activities were closely monitored by the British at that time, resigned and left Carlos Calvo, his second in command, in charge of the operations.

A Spaniard working on the Rock, José Martín Muñoz, was responsible for the explosion and fire at a large fuel tank at Coaling Island on 30 June 1943.

This mission, however, would be the first and the last for Muñoz, because he was cornered and arrested by British authorities in August, when he tried to smuggle a bomb into a weapons magazine inside Ragged Staff Cave.

He would be a free man again in December, when he rejoined the Abwehr in Madrid, under direct orders of Wolfgang Blaum, aka Baumann, head of the sabotage section in Spain.

[41] As the threat of invasion was clearly felt in late 1941, an idea for a series of secret observation posts (first in Gibraltar and later in other places like Malta and Aden) was put together under Operation Tracer.

[41] In November 2006 Jim Crone and Sergeant Major Pete Jackson, senior tunnel guide with the Royal Gibraltar Regiment, met possibly the only member of Operation Tracer still alive when they travelled to meet Dr. W. A. Bruce Cooper at his home in England.

[41] Cooper, 92 at the time, provided an opportunity to shed light on the operation with his direct involvement in the mission as a Surgeon-Lieutenant in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve (RNVR).

[43] Devised by President Franklin Roosevelt and Churchill and code named Operation Torch, the plan was to occupy French North Africa: Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia.

[43] In his memoirs General Eisenhower wrote: The subterranean passages under the Rock provided the sole available office space, and in them was located the signal equipment by which we expected to keep in touch with the commanders of the three assault forces.

[46] On board was General Władysław Sikorski, Prime Minister of Poland's London-based government in exile and Commander-in-Chief of its armed forces, returning from visiting Polish troops in the Middle East.

[47] After a Requiem Mass, the bodies were carried in procession to H.M. Dockyard with full Military Honours to be shipped to London in anticipation that General Sikorski's remains would one day be returned to a liberated Poland.

[47] In 1943 a British Court of Inquiry investigated the crash of Sikorski's Liberator II AL523, but was unable to determine the probable cause, finding only that it was an accident[48] and the "aircraft became uncontrollable for reasons which cannot be established".

[49] Despite the court's finding, the political context of the event, coupled with a variety of curious circumstances, immediately gave rise to speculation that Sikorski's death had been no accident, and may in fact have been the direct result of a Soviet, British or even Polish conspiracy.

[44] Although the governor, Lt. General Sir Noel Mason-MacFarlane, fought valiantly on behalf of the evacuees and did not accept the lack of accommodation as a sufficient reason for the delays.