I am sure that to any of us that happened to look at photos of important naval battles and tried to associate them with the chronological series of events, there are inconsistencies in the way the events are portrayed. When I examined photos of the Bismarck taken during the Battle of the Denmark Strait against the Hood and against the Prince of Wales the captions under the photos were often contradictory. One day on the Internet looking at various forums concerning this battle I even read about a theory that assumed some of the photos had always been printed in reverse (1). There seemed to be no sense to what was written. For such an important historical event why are there still so many doubts, errors and approximations. Naval history, the Kriegsmarine and military strategy are my passion, so I decided to re-construct that battle in full detail with all the supporting information from films (2), photos, prints and paint or drawings available (3).
This article, consequently, is not intended to describe the whole of Operation “Rheinübung” (4), but is meant to clarify only the series of events which occurred during the Battle of the Denmark Strait on the morning of Saturday May 24, 1941.
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