There's a new theory on the Hood disaster

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Q.� Background please

A.� It was a terrible time in the Second World War. Britain was struggling, alone against terrible odds. Then on Empire Day, 24 May, 1941, the Hood was sunk in the north Atlantic by the German battleship Bismarck with enormous loss of life.

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Q.� It was awful, yes - but why such a terrible blow

A.� London had been enduring nightly bombing. The British population was also subject to strict rationing. Now the Bismarck seemed poised to destroy the vital Atlantic supply ships. Britain could be starved to death. The mighty battle cruiser Hood had been seen as our only hope of stopping the Bismarck.

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Q.� What happened

A.� The Hood, built in Clydebank, Scotland, was 860ft long, 48,360 tons, and launched in 1918. She was considered virtually unsinkable, but steel armour around her aft deck was light. That improved her speed but left her vulnerable to heavy shells plunging from a great height. Two Admiralty inquiries found that a shell from the Bismarck had indeed penetrated the Hood's armour and detonated her aft magazines.

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Q.� The battle itself

A.� When Hitler realised that the blitz had failed to sap Britain's will, he planned to cut the country's supply lines from Canada and the United States. On 19 May his navy dispatched the Bismarck into the Atlantic. Four days later, the Bismarck and her escort cruiser, the Prinz Eugen, were sighted in the Denmark Strait between Iceland and Greenland. Early the next day the Hood and her escort, the Prince of Wales, sighted the Bismarck at 17 miles and immediately engaged the enemy.

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The Hood's captain, Vice-Admiral Lancelot Holland, knew her vulnerability and moved in close to avoid plunging shells. Hood opened fire first. Holland attempted to outpace the German ships so he could turn broadside and bring her full complement of guns to bear. With only its fifth salvo the Bismarck hit the Hood's aft deck. Within minutes, she had sunk. Only three of the 1,418 on board survived. Prime Minister Winston Churchill later wrote that the Hood was 'one of our most cherished naval possessions. Her loss was a bitter grief'.

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Q.� So what has now challenged the conventional theory

A.� A mission led by the American deep-sea explorer David Mearns funded by Channel 4 has found the remains of the Hood. The debris almost two miles down shows that the Hood in fact blew up twice. The fatal shell from the Bismarck ignited the aft ammunition magazines, starting an inferno that spread below decks to set off the forward magazines, too. The entire ship exploded - which explains the massive death toll.

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Q.� And what happened next

A.� Oh come on - you must have seen the film! Two hours after receiving news of the disaster, Churchill issued his famous command: Sink the Bismarck.

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Two days later, an aircraft spotted the Bismarck heading to France for repairs. Swordfish torpedo bombers launched from the Ark Royal hit the Bismarck three times, jamming her rudders. After bombardment from the Norfolk, King George V and Rodney, the paralysed Bismarck remained defiantly afloat. Eventually, boat-launched torpedoes and her crew's attempts to scuttle her sent Hitler's most fearsome ship to the bottom. Only 115 of her 2,246 men survived.

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Steve Cunningham