Rodney closes to torpedo Bismarck

Rodney opened fire first, straddled Bismarck by the third salvo, and scored damaging hits with the fourth after intensive long-range training prompted by the earlier Gneisenau escape. Tovey explicitly gave Dalrymple-Hamilton freedom to maneuver, and he turned toward Bismarck's fall of shot so her fire-control team repeatedly had to recalculate while Rodney closed. At about 3,000 yards the battleship fired her 24-inch torpedoes, handling the action with the aggression of Dalrymple-Hamilton's destroyer commands. Rodney fired hundreds of 16-inch and 6-inch shells, and the blast and shock of her own low-elevation fire damaged decks, fittings, and structure before she withdrew for fuel and repair. His message to his son in King George V's fire-control team captured the career arc: the younger officer had seen such a battle after eighteen months, whereas his father had waited thirty-five years.