‘ TUBBY ’
The loss of HMS Turbulent 80 years ago signalled the end of an extraordinar y career. Steve Snelling charts the life and times of one of the Royal Navy’s greatest submarine aces
JOHN LINTON VC
Linton and ‘Shrimp’ Simpson had a shared
‘Tubby’ history dating back to pre-war days, training together then toiling in the same theatre of war. In the rarefied world of submariners, they had both acquired near-legendary status – Tubby as a master tactician with an outstanding record, and Shrimp as the inspirational leader “imbued with a generous humanity and humour”. During a little over two years’ relentless service in the war-torn Mediterranean, each in their own way had played leading roles in sustaining the strategically important island of Malta at the same time as helping to strangle Axis supply lines to North Africa. But by autumn 1942, when they met for the last time, the strain was beginning to tell.
In a former plague quarantine centre that doubled as Malta’s submarine base, Tubby reviewed his orders for Operation Torch, the impending Allied invasion of Vichy-held northwest Africa, before launching a characteristically blunt attack on the tactics employed by the submar…
