The Battle of the Atlantic: Britain's Longest Campaign

The Battle of the Atlantic was the longest continuous military campaign of the Second World War, running from September 1939 to May 1945. It was the struggle to control the sea lanes between North America and Britain. German U-boats, surface raiders, and aircraft sought to cut off the supplies of food, fuel, and war materials that Britain desperately needed to survive. At its worst, in 1942-43, the U-boats sank ships faster than they could be replaced. The campaign involved thousands of merchant ships and their naval escorts crossing the Atlantic in convoys. Losses were staggering: over 3,500 merchant ships and 175 warships were sunk, along with around 36,000 merchant seamen and 36,200 Royal Navy personnel killed. Many of the veterans in our registry served in this campaign. Alfie Jones from Liverpool was killed during Operation Torch, Angus MacLeod survived the sinking of HMS Edinburgh on Arctic convoy duty, and Leonard Marsh commanded a corvette that sank a U-boat. The Battle of the Atlantic was, in Churchill's words, "the dominating factor all through the war." Without victory in the Atlantic, D-Day could never have happened.