It involved two British Chariot manned torpedoes that were transported close to the battleship's anchorage in Trondheimsfjorden (the Trondheim Fjord) in occupied Norway, by a Norwegian-crewed boat between 26 and 31 October 1942.

The Allies considered Tirpitz to be a major threat to their shipping, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill directed that priority be placed on destroying the battleship.

[5] After the German invasion of the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 the Allies began sending convoys loaded with supplies through the Norwegian Sea and Arctic Ocean to ports in northern Russia.

[6][7] Harsh weather conditions, including extreme cold, heavy seas and gales, made air and naval operations in the area difficult for all of the combatants.

[14] The Allies needed to keep a powerful force of warships with the Home Fleet to counter the threat Tirpitz posed and capital ships accompanied most convoys part of the way to the Soviet Union.

The defences against air attack included anti-aircraft guns on nearby ships and batteries on the shore as well as equipment that could quickly generate a protective smoke screen.

These convoys were escorted by elements of the British Home Fleet, and planes operating from the aircraft carrier HMS Victorious made an unsuccessful attack on Tirpitz on 9 March.

[21] After Tirpitz arrived in Norway the British deputy commander of the Shetland Bus covert transport unit, Sub Lieutenant David Howarth, developed a proposal to attack the battleship.

This force was jointly administered by the British MI6 and Special Operations Executive (SOE) intelligence agencies, and comprised small Norwegian-crewed ships that smuggled personnel and supplies between Norway and the UK.

The Shetland Bus force's commanding officer Major Leslie Mitchell submitted the plan to the Admiralty (the government department which oversaw the Royal Navy), but nothing came of it.

The head of the Royal Navy, Admiral of the Fleet Dudley Pound, ordered the ships sailing in the convoy to scatter and proceed to the USSR individually after learning of the German force's presence.

One proposal involved the craft and their crews being parachuted from Handley Page Halifax bombers, but this was ruled out due to the difficulty of the crewmen being able to locate their Chariot after being dropped into the sea at night.

The Chariots would then be attached below the waterline of a boat provided by members of the Norwegian resistance, which was to bluff its way through the German defences of Trondheimsfjorden and sail to the island of Tautra to the north of Fættenfjord.

This included information on the documents that ships travelling in the waters around Trondheimsfjorden were required to carry by the German occupation authorities, with the resistance agents offering to provide copies.

The two other operators who travelled on board Arthur, Able Seamen Billy Tebb and Malcolm Causer, were to help the Chariot crews to don their bulky Sladen Suits and serve as spare crewmen if needed.

Forged registration papers for Arthur were also needed, along with a certified crew list, a fishing permit, a pass to enter the waters near Trondheim and a document stamped by each of the German harbourmasters in the ports the ship had purportedly visited over the previous three months.

All of the forgeries needed to be prepared to a high standard, as it was expected that Arthur would be stopped and inspected by German security forces as it entered Trondheimsfjorden, with the papers coming under close scrutiny.

[60] These documents were based on papers collected by the resistance which the Norwegian agent Odd Sørli had smuggled from Norway to Sweden and then to London a month after Christiansen's visit to Trondheim.

[61] The forgeries were completed shortly before the ship departed to ensure that the faked signatures on the papers were for the German officers responsible for the region through which the attack force would pass.

[59] This marked the start of the most dangerous part of the trip to Norway, as Arthur did not have papers giving it authority to sail outside Norwegian coastal waters and German aircraft regularly patrolled the area.

[68] Before reaching Trondheimsfjorden Larsen intended to visit the small town of Hestvik to meet with the storekeeper Nils Strøm, who was to provide information on German activities in the region.

[71] As the waters between the town and Trondheimsfjorden were regularly patrolled by German security boats and it was expected that Arthur would be stopped for questioning, the British personnel hid below decks with a machine gun at the ready.

[82] The British historian Sir Ludovic Kennedy has written that Evans told the Gestapo "everything he knew about the Chariots and their functions" while under interrogation and this helped them to investigate the wreckage of Arthur.

On 19 January 1943 he was shot in the Trandumskogen forest alongside several British soldiers captured during the Operation Freshman raid on the Vemork Norsk Hydro hydrogen electrolysis plant.

[87][88] The murder of Evans was personally authorised by Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, the chief of the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (the German military's high command).

[85][89] The supreme commander of German forces in Norway at the time of Evans' murder, Colonel-General Nikolaus von Falkenhorst, was also prosecuted for this killing and the deaths of other Allied prisoners.

[87] After their return to the UK the Vice-Chief of the Naval Staff Admiral Sir Henry Ruthven Moore sent the participants in Operation Title a message congratulating them for their bravery.

[78] During a 1973 television interview Brewster attributed Operation Title's failure to the 24-hour delay caused by Arthur's engine problems, and observed that the weather might have been better on the night of 30/31 October.

Niklas Zetterling and Michael Tamelander wrote in 2009 that the Chariot teams were likely to have severely damaged or sunk Tirpitz if they had been able to attack, and Operation Title failed due to "a brief change of weather and a weakness in the mountings of the [human] torpedoes".

[101] In October 1943 two Chariots were infiltrated into Norwegian waters near Askvoll on board a motor torpedo boat to attack German shipping; this operation was unsuccessful.