Hello everybody,
it is very easy to realize that both Churchill as well as Adm Tovey correlated that message being sent and received on the elapsed timeframe between the 18:21/26 fuel shortage message sent by Adm Tovey at containing his intention to disengage at midnight in case, ... and the Bismarck damage reducing her speed that was resolving the matter, ... until the 00:09 message sent by Adm Tovey where he declared his intentions to engagé the Bismarck in the coming morning.
To have 2 persons, ... Sir Churchill and Adm Tovey, ... with memory problems but both remembering exactly the same situation is at least suspicious.
If that was the case, it is for sure that Adm Tovey memory was directed to remember the event incorrectly by Churchill book declarations.
This is a point that Sir Ludovic Kennedy knew very well, ... but he intentionally avoided to declare it on his book Pursuit, ... choosing the more comfortable and easy " Paffard way " to try to resolve the mattter only accusing Tovey for a potential " memory problem " and not Sir Winston Churchill that did it at first and forced Tovey to declare it in compliance.
Just this act is dismantling Sir Kennedy version of the story, ... invented by him on purpose using both Paffard and Tovey for his convenience avoiding to list Sir W. Churchill.
Sir Churchill in this case was surely the main and first responsible of the memory failure, ... just as Stephen Roskill perfectly realized and suggested to Kennedy that intentionally avoided to list the Prime Minister as responsible for the memory failure.
But as Stephen Roskill stated, there is the very high possibility that this point will never be firmly resolved.
If the message on the 26th evening was sent and received and later expunged by the records just like Adm Pound told to Adm Tovey, ... then both Churchill and Tovey were remembering well the story and simply the message that was surely coded and cyphered at the higher level ( coded higher then every ship Commander and/or every Flag officer ) is no longer available on the summary list's we have available today.
This version of the story is more in line to the workroom controls, directions and message reactions at every message received we are seeing all the way thru this operation being done by the RN Admiralty after a certain point.
We have examples of messages missing on many list's, ... and several official documents intentional alteration and modification, ... so it is not going to be a big surprise.
Any average historian at this point must explain the above on a footnote, ... and not write an invented shortcut version of the story like Sir Kennedy did on his book looking for a scoop., ... intentionally accusing somebody ( Tovey ) but carefully avoiding to accuse somebody else ( Churchill ) because it was not convenient for him.
Now it should be finally clear to everybody that Tovey memory and brain were perfectly working, ... just like Stephen Roskill underlined to Kennedy, ... since we have a second source for the Court Martial Story he remembered very well, ... and we have here the evidence that in case of a memory failure, ... it was Churchill the first to fail and in this case Adm Tovey can only be accused of having followed his incorrect ( not demonstrated yet, and they can be correct ) declarations, ... and nothing else.
Again, ... most likely we will never be able to resolve this one ... but at least we now know that Sir Kennedy was inventing things for his convenience/book, ... and this is not a new discovery, ... and Tovey memory and brain were perfectly working.
Bye Antonio
In order to honor a soldier, we have to tell the truth about what happened over there. The whole, hard, cold truth. And until we do that, we dishonor her and every soldier who died, who gave their life for their country. ( Courage Under Fire )