Battle of the Duisburg Convoy
1941 CE.
Shown on the map at 37.133°, 18.150°.
The Battle of the Duisburg Convoy (Battle of the BETA Convoy) was fought on the night of 8/9 November 1941 between an Italian convoy, its escorts and four British ships. The convoy was named BETA (Duisburg refers to the largest ship) by the Italian naval authorities and carried supplies for the Italian Army (Regio Esercito) civilian colonists and the Afrika Korps in Italian Libya. Force K of the Royal Navy, based at Malta, was sent to attack the convoy based on information gleaned from decrypts of Axis signals coded on the Enigma machine, covered by the fortuitous flight of a reconnaissance aircraft. The convoy was annihilated and the destroyer Fulmine was sunk, with no loss and almost no damage to Force K. The Maestrale-class destroyer Libeccio was sunk next day by the British submarine HMS Upholder, while picking up survivors. The Italians were severely criticised by the German naval attaché and pressured to accept liaison officers at Supermarina (headquarters of the Regia Marina) and on its ships.
Text from the Wikipedia article Battle of the Duisburg Convoy, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.