BISMARCK // Sabaton History // Historian Reacts to the story of Germany's Largest Battleship 

I said it once and I will say it every time again: the fastest way to make your ship sink, is by calling it "unsinkable".

To further clarify something I stated in this video: for a brief time Bismarck was indeed, fully loaded, the largest battleship in active service. Yamato was at sea but not yet commissioned and King George V and Prince of Wales were slightly greater standard displacement but not when fully loaded.

They built the Bismarck to take a beating. They just didn't expect the beating to come from damn near the entire Royal Navy.

They swordfish mistook HMS Sheffield as the Bismarck and failed to do damage mainly to their unreliable magnetic torpedoes they were using.

16:18 Actually, when the fighters mistook one of their ships as the Bismarck, and attacked it, they discovered that the torpedoes they had were faulty! That's why the ship didn't take any damage. They returned to their ship and fixed the issue, which allowed them a successful attack on Bismark.

Off topic I recently found an ancestor who fought in King Philip's War. He was killed in an ambush. My 11th Great Grandfather Michael Pierce On March 26, 1676 during King Philip's War, Captain Michael Pierce led approximately 60 Plymouth Colony troops and 20 Wampanoag Indians in pursuit of Narragansetts who had burned several Rhode Island towns and attacked Plymouth. Pierce's troops caught up with the Narragansett, Wampanoag, Nashaway, Nipmuck, and Podunk fighters, but were ambushed in what is now Central Falls, Rhode Island. Pierce's troops fought the Narragansetts for several hours but were surrounded by a larger force. The battle was one of the biggest defeats of colonial troops during King Philip's War, with nearly all killed, including Captain Pierce and the Wampanoags (exact numbers vary by account). The Narragansetts lost only a handful of warriors.

In German, ships are usually referred to as female when using their name. If you refer to a ship in general, it's considered neither masculine nor feminine, but neutral. So it's 'das Schiff', but 'die Bismarck'. e.g.: "Die Bismarck versenkt das Schiff." (The Bismarck sinks the ship.) but: "Die Bismarck versenkt die Hood." (The Bismarck sinks the Hood.)

Extra credits/extra history did a good four part series about the hunt for Bismarck. It's worth a watch if you have a free hour.

So fun fact: The HMS Rodney was confirmed to be the first and only battleship to land a torpedo strike on another capital ship during the Bismarck’s final hours

It's not only that the explosion probably instantly wiped out a significant portion of the crew of the Hood, but you need to remember this was near the Denmark strait. The water was extremely cold, and any crew that did survive the explosion itself, were extremely unlikely to survive the cold water for long

The Swordfish torpedo bombers mistook HMS Sheffield on the first run. But this incident also showed some flaw with their torpedoes and then they changed it before the torpedo run on Bismarck

I found something related to the "he or she" discussion. Burkhard Freiherr von Müllenheim-Rechberg, the highest-ranking officer who was rescued, reports in his memoir that on the orders of Captain Ernst Lindemann, the male article was always to be used ON board the Bismarck. So people on the vessel talked about "der Bismarck/ auf dem Bismarck", people outside of "die Bismarck". Burkard Baron von Mullenheim-Rechberg: "Battleship Bismarck: A Survivor's Story," New and Expanded Edition 2013.

Should keep the naval theme going with Midway and Wolfpack and/or their respective history videos.

no one ever talks about the unsinkable Sam (or Orkar), the Bismarck cat. he survived 3 sinking ... now ... or was he very lucky or did he bring bad luck to those on board? a video about cats on warships would be nice. good video as always, thanks.

I’m very new to your channel and I must say I absolutely love it. my name is Rodney and my grandfather was a commander in the Royal Navy during the Second World War. Just prior to my birth my parents told my grandfather about what they were going to name me and he was delighted and told them that the HMS Rodney was one of the ships that took out the Bismarck.

Love your videos! Been binging all the Sabaton stuff as a start.

The Bismark islike a juggernaut in the heaviest armor imaginable. But the first hit is an arrow throu the 1cm eyeslit and an instantkill.

Nice this is one of the most favorite military events of WW2, awesome reaction

A youtuber put together an explanation of what happened to the hood. It’s amazing. Very scientific but great

My favorite Sabaton song. I love the story of the Bismarck. Sank on its maiden voyage but is still a legend to this day.

One thing they didn't mention in the video is that the Bismarck did indeed lose the British ships just south of Greenland IIRC. The only reason they were able to relocate the Bismarck before he made it to France is because they didn't know they had shaken off the British and continued using their radio. If they had remained radio silent until they were within range of land based Luftwaffe support, they likely would have been fine.

Finally had chance to watch full video! Really well done and I enjoyed Your reactions too, especially in some moments You were more correct than Indy :) I really enjoy his way of presenting the stories and respect him as very good popularizer of history, but here he went sometimes too far in dramatization of the story ;) For example, Hood had more-less same main armament as Bismarck (8x 15`inch vs. 8x 38`cm, almost same caliber) and was weaker only in secondary armament, which would make a difference in really close combat. Also Hood was not do badly armoured as some may say, of course not to the most modern standards, but still, without lucky shot, would be very hard nut to crack. About the fear of Bismarck - Drachinifel addressed this issue somehow in one of his latest Drydocks - in fact Royal Navy would have enough ships to engage Bismarck in gun duel, even if it sailed with Scharnchorst and Gnisenau (maybe even Tirpitz), but not enough to catch it and force it to battle; only Hood, Repulse and Renown had enough speed, even KGV was too slow (28 knots), not mentioning Nelson or Rodney (23 knots, Rodney chasing Bismarck almost blew up its boilers, forcing 25 knots!) or old R class BB`s. Also, having so many duties on so many fronts, RN just simply couldn`t be certain, it could muster enough ships to counter such battlegroup. Moreover - at that moment, with main focus on Mediterranean area, they could count only on two carriers, freshly put into service HMS Victorious in Home Fleet and eventually experienced HMS Ark Royal from Force H in Gibraltar… damn small number and not in one place! Also its armour and protection - although heavy, was very old-modelled. It gave the ship incredible floatability, but also left many vital elements, especially of communication systems very ill or almost non-protected. It wasn`t mentioned literally in the video, but low effectiveness of Bismarck fire in his last battle was caused, apart of quick death of her gunnery officer, also by quick destruction of gunnery control system, causing its turrets to fire independently, usually with only local aiming systems… Still, she put hell of a fight, which was appreciated also by British. Also pity that Indy didn`t mention truly “soldierly” words of Bismarck commander during battle of Denmark Strait :)

in Germany we also call it "Die Bismarck" so yes: it's a she

You should check out their song White Death, and the Sabaton History video about it. It's about arguably the deadliest sniper in all of military history, Simo Häyhä.

02:17 - sorry to be a bit picky 😉 but this statement may be correct for most navies, although not all, especially those with languages fron non roman or germanic families. For example in Polish Navy military vessel is officially referred as „he” (there are different words for military or civilinan ships, but both male). Unoficially though it may happen (pretty often in fact) that crews refer to their ship as „boat”, „old boat” etc. which usually is „she”, something like „our old boat”, with love and sympathy. You can also refer to the ships name, and than depending on gender of the name You may refer to it as he or she, but this is again unofficial. I know this is a bit aside from main subject 🙂 but thought it may be something interesting to note.

It once wanted to be called "Loretta" Never assume a ship's gender :P

It’s nice you do videos like this...it’s what makes us Historians and History Lovers make us more motivated to never forgetting what had come to the past. PS: this is why I love looking and reading the past. Because I am also like a Historian Person of my own.

It wasnt inrushing water that jammed the rudder, an expedition by james cameron showed one of the rudders was blown clean off and the other was jammed into the center screw

To clarify: Hood did not have more guns, and even their armor was fairly similar. Prince of Wales had more guns, but they were about an inch smaller. To be honest, you cannot really protect a rudder. You can only put in more rudders or put them further from each other. However, Bismarck´s problem was that due to his basically WW1 design, his propeller shafts were so close to each other that the ship couldnt be maneuvered by turning one screw in opposite direction (you need to have the screws further from each other to do that effectively). To further clarify - Bismarck´s gun were one of the biggest on german battleship, but some german battleships in WW1 had the same calibre guns some 20 years before Bismarck. And to even further clarify, hardly any part of Bismarck´s armor was made from Wotan steel (super hard alloy). Thats due to the fact that such steel (with chrome, nickel) was too expensive, too heavy and too difficult to face harden. Bismarck´s main armor (main deck and belt) was made from standard Krupp steel, which was still really good, but it wasnt anything magical. One more thing to clarify: The recoil problem with Bismarck´s gun was not due to the guns being too big (some ships had even bigger guns and none of those problems). The problem was that Bismarck was too wide and due to that too stable. You know, when ship fires a full broadside, it swings left and right before it corrects itself, thats pretty normal. But Bismarck due to being too wide didnt swing, but instead shook violently. And precise machinery really doesnt like being shaken. Germans knew this, but with the enormous displacement of the ship, the only alternative was to make its draft bigger, which they could not due to the maximum depth of the Kiel cannal.

This beautiful beast of a lady is what got me into military history as a very young boy where I spent a lot of my childhood reading and watching videos about all of the pacific naval history and some of the atlantic. I recall having a book with illustrations of the fight with prince of wales and hood and how fasinated and in awe of the idea of one lucky shot being the kill blow to this long serving battleship hood. Last year I ended up running across the footage (13:16) taken from prince eugen of the fight and the smoke ploom that was once the hood rising into the sky. The bismarck was a truly fearsome beast that could have been a nightmare if the torpedo didn't get lodged in it's rudder and it got back to nazi air cover.

One of the surviving crew members was a cat named Unsinkable Sam, who survived 2 more sinkings before being retired from service

It's like a game of salty fps Someone asks for a 1v1 (bismark v hood in this case) You clap them Then they get their friends to gang upon you and clap you instead.

I watched a detailed video on how likely was the chance of the hood detonating. Logically - it was impossible to ammorack her - though as she was turning hard the waterline shrunk exposing the weak lower part of the ship. The shell hit the water - traveling through the weak amor and detonating. Nothing major yet - but there was fire. And nearby was the main ammunition. The expanding explosion created the beam of heat before completly exploding and breaking the ship in 2. A very interesting analysis. And would make sense. Conclusion: It was luck on the germans side. Tho - the win was still secure even without the ammo hit. Though they would have probably turned back - as they would've recieved major damage in that fight.

16:04 they attacked the Sheffield by mistake, but none of the new magnet detonated torpedoes worked, so the ship was unharmed.

The Bismarck is a He because of Otto Von Bismarck. Classically ships are She's when named after towns and general terms i.e surprise. Ships named after People are referred to by the gender of the person they are named for. One of my buddy's dads was a former Coast Guard Captain and he goes into it all the time.

One thing you might like to think on , the Bismarck was started in 1936 launched in 1939 ,Krupps were working on a heavy tank in 1922 in secret , so was germany rearming before the nazi`s came to power considering the time it takes to design a warship and build it , the shipyard must of had designs before hitler took power , just to add look at the ships designed and launched and the timeline

There is some more interesting stuff to mention in this story. After the battle of Denmark Strait Bismarck and Prinz Eugen did maneuvers to split from each other as they knew they were shadowed by cruisers. During these maneuvers, the Royal Navy lost contact to the german ships for a long time (which the germans didn’t know). Their commanders already believed they had lost track of the germans so they managed to escape to France. But then out of nowhere Lütjens on Bismarck (who still thought he was shadowed) decided to send a terrible long and unnecessary radio message to Berlin, so the Britains could track down Bismarck again. In the final battle Bismarck almost immediately took a hit from Rodney straight into the artillery control center. The shell couldnt‘t penetrate the armor, but it is said that the shock wave killed everybody inside (including artillery officer Schneider). Examinations on the wreck showed that while receiving over 500 hits from all calibers only 4 managed to penetrate Bismarcks main belt armor. Appreciate your content, keep up the good work and stay healthy!

I suggest if you haven't already watch "The greatest raid of all" with Jeremy Clarkson all about trying to stop the Turpitz from having a base in France, it's a well told story.

Hi 🤚 Greetings from the bottom of the Denmark Strait! :D

Only now I remembered a story of a cat named Unsinkable Sam: firstly the cat was on Bismark. When Bismarck sunk, it was taken by British sailors from "Cossack" battleship, but at that time he was called Oscar. When "Cossack" was sunk because of a German torpedo, and the cat stayed alive once again, it was rescued by British "Arc Royal" and re-named into Unsinkable Sam. Later, when "Arc Royal" sunk, and the cat was rescued once again, it was sent firstly to Gibraltar, and then to Belfast, where Unsinkable Sam died in 1955.

Sabaton fan AND makes a Star Wars reference while watching said amazing band? Welp, subbed.

It's funny that you mention Star Wars, because the "Malevolence" arc of the clone wars TV show is directly based on the hunt for the Bismarck.

RU-vidr- **Doesn't pronounce Sabaton correctly** **Into the comment section, the sabaton fans march**

My favourite naval restriction arising from treaty is how the treaty of Ghent made the Great Lakes a demilitarized zone.

Bismarck was the largest ship build at that time , over 40% of its total weight was armour. Yamato was not finished at the time bismarck was operational. Also its sister ship survived tallboy bombs the most powerfull and heavy bomb of that time. it was not seaworthy any more but it still posed a threat.

Greatest mistake was overconfidence. To send a capital ship of that size all alone without an escort of Destroyers in addition to the Prinz Eugen, it was ruling out the unlucky possibility to be harmed by a British submarine.

I had put it in your other video as well, when they talk about writing the song they mention that the older sailor in the video was the last surviving sailor from the Bismark at over 90 years old. He ended up dieing later after the video was filmed.

I suggest reacting to "attero dominatus" an amazing song by sabaton but unfortunatly not so known

I think the reason they said it was the largest battleship is maybe because it was the largest battleship of the time, but later on in the war something like the USA and Japan would make bigger battleships and also did you know "the hunt for bismarck" was also inspiration in star wars the clone wars where the seperatist had developed a superweapon in the ship malevolences and it just took out republic ship all he time

"Bismarck; Germanys Largest Battleship" Tirpitz: Am i a joke to You?

I would recommend the next song To Hell and back. It tells the story of the most decorated US soldier, Audie Murphy

Like the ground for that killed the red baron. The golden bbs can mean life or death. In both sides Hood and Bismarck. As they say it's better to be lucky than good

Funny thing is there was an ocean liner that was called the S.S Bismarck that got handed over to Britain's White Star Line as a war reparation for the loss of the Britannic in WWI, the Bismarck would later be renamed the R.M.S Majestic

Well, Tirpitz was a great example of the battleship "psychological warfare". Bismarck's brother was feared by the allies but it was kept away from fighting.

if i had a time machine, i would like to witness that follow up talk with Raeder :D

the 1st torpedo reaid hit their own ship, and they found a flaw with their payload trigger, something that the then fixed for the bismarck raid

im a bit disappoint that indy didnt mention u-556 when he talked about bismarcks history. only game/video i know of that does reference the relationship between u-556 and bismarck is azur lane, they had made an agreement where bismarck would save u-556 in case of danger and u-556 would defend bismarck. during the last moments of bismarcks life, u-556 was there, in the depths below bismarck, couldnt do anything as she had submerged due to ark royals planes and with rodney and sheffield above around bismarck, it would have been suicide to re-emerge.

Ships and boats were always called "she" regardless of the ship/boat name.

When he said, "Gnisanou" and"Prinz Eugen" he meant to say "Gnisanou" and "Sharhorst" Because that's why Bismarck met up with Prinz Eugen, because Sharhorst and Gnisanou where out of service.

it't not just bad luck, it is worst luck ever happened, Bismark had two weaknesses, and both were hit

Hey! You should watch DOGFIGHTS: HUNT THE BISMARCK I think you';d really like it. Plz see this... WOuld be an epic reaction. Can get to see just how destructive the HMS Hood explosion was

Raeder(points at Bismarck):"I want to play with that thing." Adolf:"nnnnNoo you can't have that thing..." Raeder picks up Bismarck Adolf:"nnnok... you can have that thing, but be carfull with it" Raeder waves arms in the air:"How about No?" British press:"gg" Adolf:"we need to talk.come quick. :*" Raeder... *surprised pikachu face

There is a scene from the movie "The Kings Choise" called "The Sinking of Blücher" that I would love to see your reaction to.

KGV was not bigger. It was a treaty battleship. So it was 45 000t

Admiral 'Raeder' should be pronounced Raider not Rader. And yes, the Bismarck's guns damaged her fire control/radar systems. Check out Drachinfel's channel for more information on what destroyed the Hood. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Vqnk2-noeUY.html Swordfish attacked HMS Sheffield, I believe, with magnetic fuses which failed. 'Sink the Bismarck' is one of my favorite WWII movies.

Bismarck collapsed on the sides of torpedoing from Dorsetshire, due to the explosion of the Kingstones by the Germans themselves, commander Ernst Lindemann ordered, because a lot of people were killed by cruisers and battleships, and the main battery turrets were also put out of action , if not for the blowing up of the engine room and the opening of the Kingston, then Bismarck would be afloat. When examining the Bismarck hull at the bottom of the Atlantic by James Cameron, it was found completely intact, without serious damage, the PTZ fulfilled its purpose.

"The Hood has more guns than the Bismarck". No it didn't. Hood has 8 x 15" main guns like Bismarck, but they were of a slightly shorter caliber. Bismarck also had a more powerful secondary battery.

you are correct they did almost attack a American cruiser I think that was helping with Radar for the British if I remember correctly the Amercan couldn't help in the fire fight but their was nothing saying they could report the bismarks position

Well, in here in Germany all ships are usually female, even if they carry a male name. So "she" is totally fine and also correct.

Wait did he just say @13:00 that Hood had more Guns than Bismarck??? I didnt knew that 4x2(4 turrets 2 guns each) is more than 4x2 lol

React to Sabaton Ballad of Bull . It's a very nice and immotional song

Are you using Filmora. I recognize the way those subtitles came up on the screen cause i use Filmora. If not then it's pretty close.

Try, "Canadians Change when they hear the word 'war'" by The Front. Good little video

Imagine what would have happened if Prince Eugen hadn't broken off an thus would have been able to tow Bismark to safety maybe as they still had the whole british fleet hunting it

15:55 They attacked the Sheffield 😅😉

well the Hood hadn't fired a shot at a fair target as their forgetting Mers El Kever

The Titanic’s sister ship Olympic rammed a u-boat in WW1 and it survived the entire war

You need to react to sabaton last stand

The Swordfish mistook first the HMS Sheffield for the Bismarck within 20 minutes of takeoff, despite being smaller, having a different profile, different number of guns on the turret, and a “Union Jack bigger than the Queen’s own rear end” (as said by a Brit I know)... after this, apparently, they then found a US Coast Guard Cutter to harass... why in God’s name it was on the wrong end of the Atlantic, we don’t know... torpedoes actually struck both ships, but none went off because of the crap magnetic detonators that had a basic +110% bonus to failure rate. The irony of this is that it showed they would need their torpedoes set to contact detonation, and having hit the Sheffield and extremely lost US Coast Guard cutter, they were able to return to Ark Royal, rearm, and fly out again while able to see... had they reached Bismarck instead in the estimated 90-120 minutes, none of torpedoes would have worked, and by the time they got back to the Ark Royal it would have been too dark to fly for the next 10 hours... meaning the 1-in-a-million hit to the rudder would have never happened... The Beast would have escaped to the air cover of German bombers and fighters.

Tbh the fair point about Bismarck is you can call her a him, but Tirpitz is The Queen of the North making Tirpitz of course a she soo Tirpitz sister ship to Bismarck = Bismarck is a she or thats the way i like to explain it to my friends

So why was the ship in the thumbnail not Bismarck?

Similarly to English ships and boats are female in German too. So calling the Bismarck "she" is a-ok in my opinion. A native German speaker would use the feminin article "Die Bismarck" to describe her.

7:36, couldn't the British just hunt them down with carriers? I mean the aircraft carriers are the reason why battleships became obsolate in the first place? Correct me if I am wrong but Germany didn't have any carriers to counter that right?

the funny thing is the Bismarck's aa was to good, also the British didn't sink it, it was the Germans as they scuttled it, the torpedoes did not sink it

Germany would have been far better putting the resources used in building their capital ships into U-boats. Numerous extra U-boats at the start of the conflict would have been far more dangerous. Yes maybe the 4 could have sortied together once, they would have potentially caused havoc but the chances of this are slim. It was the RAF that pretty much kept them penned with a lot of time and effort expended in trying to keep them repaired. Air power had surpassed surface naval power as was shown in the pacific, Britain was an unsinkable aircraft carrier that dominated most of where the German ships would have to sail with her own carriers able to cover the rest. The comparison with the High Seas fleet in WW1 is a fair one. People argue at length who won the Battle of Jutland and tactically this might be justified, strategically however there is no debate, couple of days later Jellicoe reported the Grand Fleet ready for sea, the High Seas fleet never again significantly ventured from port. In both World Wars the German surface fleets were really vanity projects.

In polish language, a ship is always he, not she.

It's interesting talking about the pronouns for the ship because we have to remember that German has feminine, masculine, and neutral genders, and while the ship might have informally been referred to as "der" or "die," it's official designation would have been "das Schlachtschiff Bismarck" because "Schiff" is neutral in gender. That would have largely carried over even when the name was in it's shortened version, so it would have in any official usage, at least, have been "das." Makes me wonder if this discussion about the pronoun might come down to English not really having a neutral term.

Can you react to sabaton Smoking Snakes next? It's a really important song to me and my nation, probably the only song that cover the battle of the FEB ( Forças Expedicionárias Brasileira [ Brazilian Expeditionary Forces] ) on WWII And if already did react to that, sorry for wasting your time

Vary interesting

how about Hearts of Iron by Sabaton?

Wasn't tirpitz equally big?

I think the takeaway here is that if you say your boat is unsinkable, then the universe will take that as a dare.

i thought they would call it a he because it symbolizes the fatherland of germany.

so what? even if all german battleships where in a group together, against the british fleet, the best that they could hope for, was a second battle of jutland.

Well the ship Bismarck was named after the politician von Bismarck Who was a he.

Maybe they meant the largest german ship

Does no one remember the Iowa class battleship's?

Also, Hood didn't have "more" guns than Bismarck. They both had 8 15inch guns. But Bismarck had newer guns that could fire faster. And it was Bismarck's 5th salvo that destroyed Hood.

King George V was much smaller than Bismarck. But had the same firepower, which is why it was a better ship. There was also the case of Bismarck's communication was not protected by armour, and... there is more; Drachinifel summs it up. The Versailles' Treaty took the ability to keep up with modern battleship construction from Germany, for they were not allowed to construct any.

King George V didn’t have bigger displacement than Bismarck.