HMS Edgehill (X39) is a Royal Navy Q-ship, a heavily armed decoy vessel disguised as a merchantman, sailing with the North Atlantic convoys with the intention of luring U-boats into exposing themselves in surface attacks.
At 00.12 hours she is torpedoed amidships by U-51 but her specially designed buoyant cargo prevents her from sinking. The U-boat surfaces at 01:06 hours to deliver the coup de grace but a third torpedo is required to finish her off at 01:24 hours. Fifteen of her crew of thirty nine died.
Nine Q-ships were commissioned by the Royal Navy for North Atlantic operations but none were able to sink a U-boat. U-51 was a type VIIB U-boat commanded by Kapitanleutnant Dietrich Knorr. Edgehill was sunk on his third patrol and on his fourth, on 20 August 1940, U-51 was sunk by a torpedo from the British submarine HMS Cachalot in the Bay of Biscay with all hands lost, 43 men. Knorr was 28 years old.
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