Blood in the Sea: HMS Dunedin and the Enigma Code (Cassell Military Paperbacks) [Paperback]

Stuart Gill (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2005 | Series: Cassell Military Paperbacks

Over 300 men died when the light cruiser Dunedin went down in the South Atlantic, victim of two torpedoes fired from the German submarine U124. For the 250 or so who managed to escape the ship, the next seventy eight hours were to be a nightmare of torture and slow death. Some men died of their injuries, some died of exhaustion, some went insane, others were drowned, some were bitten and killed by vicious fish. Only six Carley rafts were left afloat when rescue arrived in the form of an American merchantman, who lifted 72 men to safety: five died before they made it to port. This moving, intensively researched book is an account of life and death at sea, and tells also the story of how the Dunedin came to be where she was, looking for a U-boat wolf pack as a result of information received from the Enigma codebreakers in Bletchley Park. Amazingly, the story of the Dunedin has never been told before in any detail. This book has it all.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'Written by the son of one of the (very few) survivors, this book tells the gripping story of the fate of HMS Dunedin and her crew when they were hit by a U-boat torpedo in 1941.' LIVING HISTORY (January 2004) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Stuart Gill is a career diplomat now working on British/EU legislative issues in Brussels. His father, Bill Gill, still alive and well, was one of only 67 survivors from the sinking of the cruiser Dunedin in the South Atlantic, November 1941. That extraordinary episode was the inspiration for Stuart Gill's first book.

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Cassell (March 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0304366919
• ISBN-13: 978-0304366910
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,308,901 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Poignant Tale of World War 2 and Modern Memory, April 6, 2004

By 

"stevepeterson6" (Chicago area, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blood in the Sea: HMS Dunedin and the Enigma Code (Hardcover)

Author Stuart Gill succeeds in doing something very rare among the thousands of WW2 books in print: juggle several points of view to tell a fast-moving story of a largely unknown tragedy. Like a good film director, Gill cuts back and forth between the British warship on patrol, the British cryptographers using the captured Enigma code to track the enemy's moves, and the German U-boat that is first hunted, then becomes hunter.

The tragedy that ensues is simply and unsparingly presented. The reader is then cast forward in time to share the heartbreak of loved ones as they receive the news and live with the loss for decades to come. No reader can be untouched by the passage of the young woman who lost her fiance on HMS Dunedin only to find, years later, the love poem he marked just for her.

Although the war action of the book is during the 1940-41 period when Britain stood alone, American readers will appreciate Blood in the Sea for the way history often throws us signs. The survivors of HMS Dunedin are picked up by an American merchant ship on Thanksgiving Day, 1941. Those survivors were disembarked at a friendly port on Sunday December 7th. Anglo-American friendship was to endure.

5.0 out of 5 stars Make a Movie, October 17, 2010

By 

C. Maguire "soxfan" (Colorado) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Blood in the Sea: HMS Dunedin and the Enigma Code (Hardcover)

Someone needs to make this gripping story into a movie! Well written book and amazing story of loss as well as survival.

5.0 out of 5 stars A fairly ordinary ship with extraordinary sailors, May 4, 2008

By 

David W. Lang "David Lang at Advance Book Review" (Santa Clara CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Blood in the Sea: HMS Dunedin and the Enigma Code (Cassell Military Paperbacks) (Paperback)

Naval stories do not get more gripping than the tragedy of HMS Dunedin, a British light cruiser sunk by a German U-boat in 1941, and seldom are the stories better told than the one related in Blood in the Sea: HMS Dunedin and the Enigma Code.

The author Stuart Gill uses the experiences of his father, Marine William Gill, one of only sixty-seven survivors (out of 486 crew and officers) to construct a history of the ship, and the result is one terrific read.

The ship had seen twenty-four years of fairly ordinary service (in the words of Gill's father, the cruiser "was a bit player on a large stage") when it went down far off the Central Africa coast. Broken by two torpedoes fired from U-124, the Dunedin sank so quickly that over 200 men were trapped below.

The ship had no time to report its position--or even that she was going down. There was not enough room in the seven rafts for all those still alive. Those still in the water soon realized they were surrounded by sharks. The tropical air temperature was unmercifully hot. There was no water. There was no food. The rafts were taking on water. These sailors knew they were as alone as men had ever been on the sea. The moment called for ordinary men to become something extraordinary.