Why did the British First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Dudley Pound, scatter Convoy PQ17 in the Barents Sea on the evening of 4 July 1942? Two thirds of the merchant ships were subsequently destroyed, yet not a single one of the warships assigned to protect them was lost. Was it just the threat of attack by the German battleship Tirpitz that persuaded Pound to order the escorting men-of-war to leave their charges? Or was there some other, obscure reason? No-one seemed to know why Pound acted as he did and information surrounding the events remained an official secret for a long time. It might have remained so longer but for the revelations of a dead man talking.
