HMS 'Pepperpot' : May 7th 1940

by Chris Drage

Resources

White Ensign Models HMS Penelope kit
Assorted plastic rod and strip 
Assorted brass rod
Polystyrene ceiling tiles
Coal (yes, that's right.. CC!)
Polyfilla plaster
Acrylic paint
Halford's Grey Primer

'HMS Pepperpot' Ed Gordon 1985 Robert Hale Ltd ISBN: 0-7090-2351-0

N.V.T.C. 'Colour Camera at Sea' - about 15-20 seconds of footage shot in Skjelfjord (showing destroyers and the captured S.S. Alster), available from WHITE ENSIGN MODELS

Click on Skjelfjord and Sund for a couple of lovely photos 

Click on the Sk and get map of the fjord

CLICK HERE! For the historic background

Background

HMS Penelope did not make the second battle of Narvik (April 1940). She struck an uncharted rock in Vestfjord and it took eight hours and a lot of swearing and nail biting to get her into the sheltered and remote Skjelfjord in the Lofotens Islands. Here she would have surely sunk and her crew taken prisoner had it not been for the local Norwegians, who not only provided shelter and sustenance for the crew, but organised pumping out, repairs and supplies. The 1920s vintage, salvage vessel, Skaerkodder provided the much needed equipment and expertise to make good temporary repairs, whilst essential supplies, information and transport was provided by the local fishermen in their 'Puffers' (60' long fishing boats). A young Norwegian, Hartvig Sverdrup (or 'Snowdrop' to the crew) was above all others responsible for the success of the operation. Other damaged RN ships came and went during that April , among them Cossack, Eskimo (subject of another diorama) and Punjabi. HMS Jupiter arrived with pumping equipment from the UK. Penelope however, was forced to stay throughout most of April until early May. To aid in maintaining the secrecy of her location, the crew had to paint her in the unique brown and white camouflage scheme to match the surrounding snow covered slopes of the mountains. This had to be repeatedly altered with more brown replacing the areas of white as the surrounding thaw took hold! 

The diorama scene depicts Penelope ready to leave Skjelfjord (about 7th May). Snowdrop's 'puffer' can be seen unloading the last of the 300 barrels of fresh water for Penelope's boilers. Another 'puffer' leaves for the jetty. Just 24 hours later Penelope was discovered by the Germans and JU 88s attacked for the next two days. Penelope and the other ships hiding in Skjelfjord slipped away on the 10th May, having suffered many near misses. 

The Diorama Case

Putting your dioramas into a case is essential in my opinion, keeping the dust factor, cat factor and the little inquisitive fingers factor all at bay. Making your own display cases is not difficult and the process is described in another of my build articles: 'TWO OLD LADIES'. The difference with this particular dio is the depiction of the mountainous, fiord sides. A seascape on its own does little to add a sense of scale to the model. However, as soon as some land, trees, buildings etc are added, the scale simply 'leaps' out. Roughly cut and shaped polystyrene ceiling tiles were glued in layers to a height of about 12cms. Using a knife the polystyrene was shaped into an approximation of fiord-mountain. 

Below: Polystyrene Ceiling Tiles form the base for the sides of the fjord

Above: A plaster coating forms the basis for the "rock" of the fjord side

This base was then covered with Polyfilla plaster. White (PVA) glue was painted liberally onto the dried plaster and coal dust and fragments scattered on. Larger pieces were put on the shore line (to represent landslips) and the whole thing was sealed and set by dropping on a mixture of PVA glue, dish washing liquid and water (model railway folk will recognise this as track ballast 'mix'). Coal makes the most excellent 'rock' in any scale. It shatters in a realistic 'scale' manner. The mountain was sprayed with a dark matt grey and a Halford's grey primer in patches to provide a background 'rocky-look' to the whole thing. Snow was added by another lighter coat of Polyfilla plaster but this time more watered down. To obtain the effect of the thaw with patches of snow lying in hollows and crevasses etc is nothing short of an 'art'. A lot of trial-and-error resulted in my using a white acrylic paint and adding water to the 'fallen' bits to help it settle into the 'natural' hollows and to wash off paint which had got onto the tops of rocky outcrops (normally the first places to thaw). Alternating between adding grey/black paint on the rocks and adding more or less 'snow', I arrived at what you see. I wanted to include HMS Jupiter (adapted from WEM's HMS Kashmir) in the dio but by trying the respective hulls in different positions it became quite obvious that the scene would be too crowded with ships and would lose the 'lonely' feel I wanted to portray (see picture above). 

Below: The fjord side completed with toothpaste "wash" at the waters edge and oal forms the basis for very realistic rock

The sea condition in the fiord at the time depicted was of a light chop (small wavelets). To achieve this required giving the base board a light covering of Polyfilla applied with a 'wodge' of kitchen paper. This gave a stippled effect not unlike an Artex ceiling. I covered the whole of it with baking foil making sure to fold it over the edges and carefully rubbing out any trapped air bubbles. Leaving this overnight to completely dry out, the next step was to draw an outline of the hull and the area of sea so enclosed, hollowed out a little in order to recess each ship 'into' the seascape. I use artist's acrylic paints, some of which are called sculpture paints, as these have a greater viscosity and won't flatten out. Having done one fiordic scene, I roughly knew the shades I wanted to achieve. The bow wave and wake of the fishing boat were modelled with artist's acrylic gel (fine). 

The Model

The WEM kit of Penelope is a much-improved casting from a new master. The details are crisp and there is virtually no clean up apart from the runners. I started by drilling out the hawse holes for the anchors and constructing these and the anchor chains. There is no photo evidence as to the attitude of the anchors so in absence of evidence I decided to have them in the raised position. Before you start any dio which is to have any degree of historical accuracy it is important to get as many original photos as possible. It is important to be able to gauge the attitude of the guns, radars, directors, crane(s) etc. Only a few exist of Penelope at this time and they are all in the above book. It was apparent that the crane was in constant use but most other equipment was idle. The next step is to paint all the decking. For the wooden decking, I have arrived at a mixture of Humbrol 122, 94 and 147 which gives that slightly cream, light grey look of bleached teak. 

Below: Deck painted, Galley flues added to funnels

Above: Superstructure and resin details added

Most of the build progresses as per Dave Carter's instructions. I prefer the photo-etched brass versions of the 0.5" machine guns, rather than the cast resin ones also provided, so I opted for these (available separately as WEM PE 720). It is essential to wear a magnifying visor when building at this scale. Not only will you be able to work far more accurately, but there is a rule-of-thumb here: if it looks good under magnification, then it looks even better with the naked eye. Thus it was that I ended up with two splendid machine guns. At this time Penelope's aircraft had been landed but the catapult and cradle were still in place. Again, photo references are vital. The crane jib was placed in the fully elevated position as per the photo (and WEM's painting diagram). Painting the ship's boats prior to installing is vital. Here photo evidence shows that the interiors were in fact white (not brown) as in the diagram. 

Below: Etched brass catapult added and superstructure painted

I construct the masts and booms entirely from brass rod. You do need a variety of sizes but 0.015", 0.008" and 0.006" are essential. These I purchase from railroad model suppliers in the States. Using the templates included provides a sure means of getting the positions and sizes right. However, when it comes to alignment, nothing beats sizing it up with your eye to ensure alignment is correct through the whole model. This is essential for masts and funnels. There is nothing worse than to find your funnels leaning one way, and your crane jib and masts the other! At anchor you would expect a warship to have the boarding ladders down and booms out. However, there is no photo evidence of Penelope doing so in Skjelfjord and so I have not depicted these items. However, the boat booms are made from 0.010" plastic rod and rigged in typical fashion with 0.004" wire. 

Below: The etched brass railing had to be added prior to painting in order to get the "B" turret into place

Above: All etched brass details now in place. Awaiting funnel caps and masts

Below: Awaiting the masts, crane added

Above: Brass masts and details added

Below: Masts and mast details added

As I said previously, I wanted to depict the arrival of Jupiter on the scene but couldn't. An alternative was to try and scratch build the Skaerkodder, which was in attendance throughout most of the month that Penelope was laid up. However, although she appears in a couple of photos and briefly on the video, to try and gauge dimensions was nigh on impossible so I needed to think again. The 60' fishing boats looked prime candidates. I thought I could base the hulls on an existing model launch or open pinnace. Nothing in1:700 approached the dimensions required. However, 1:600 scale launches from an old Airfix Belfast kit fitted the bill perfectly. A lot of filing and shaping resulted in a reasonable hull shape. The cuboid-like bridge and hatches were constructed using various plastic rodding. The mast height was gauged from a photo in the book that shows a 'puffer' next to the S.S. Alster. These were 0.012" brass rod with 0.008" booms. The two fishing boats produced were painted in 'typical' fishing boat appearance: black and white hulls, white topsides and stained, wooden decking. The white hulls are, in fact, H147 to provide a 'weathered' white. Barrels were made from plastic rod and placed on the deck of 'Snowdrop's' puffer and on Penelope's deck. Using a small square etch brass 'netting' I made a sling containing two barrels for Penelope's crane to give the impression that loading was in progress. Similarly, although I don't normally include crew members, it looked a bit odd not having any crew around the busy loading area. Thus, I included several from GMM's 1:700, P.E. crew set. 

Painting the ship was quite straightforward. I avoided using pure white but adopted H147 + H34 mix instead. This offers a slightly 'weathered' appearance. The brown is H29 which match S&S paint chips extremely well. Dave's colour guide is quite accurate and comparisons with the only full, port side photo reveal only minor 'inaccuracies'. As painting seemed to be progressive as the thaw took hold, there is room for interpretation. The paint guide depicts the ship as she would have been prior to departure in early May. The starboard side poses a problem - there is one photo (probably mid-April) which reveals part of her starboard side and I based my paint scheme on this. The rest of the hull simply matches the port side. I use 00000 brush and brush paint everything, using another 00000 brush and clear spirit to wash off. Warships, unlike aircraft were never spray-painted and thus have hard edges to the paintwork. Although some details can be painted prior to assembly, on the whole, a camouflaged ship has to be painted when all the major components are in place. After the final coat had dried, the windows/portholes were added with a 0.25mm Rotring pen. This technique is an easy and very effective means of adding portholes. These pens are excellent for the job. 

Etch brass railings really give a model ship character and 'complete' the upper decks. I never add the P.E. railings until the main painting is complete. I always spray the P.E. sprue with Halford's grey primer thus all the parts have a sound undercoat. I never have any problems painting or attaching P.E. after that. The technique I use is to measure the required length with a pair of dividers, then cut the etch brass accordingly with a Xacto #17 blade. I use gripping tweezers to hold the railings still whilst running a thin application of water-based contact adhesive (Evostick Impact 2) along the edge to applied. While this is drying I add a similar line of adhesive to the relevant section of deck. When both are dry, the railing is applied to the deck. The advantage of this method is that it is very forgiving. Any sections not adhering properly get a dab of CA glue to ensure placement. 

For rigging I use steel wire for most rigging and Dai Riki 0.002" filament for the wireless aerials. I use 0.01mm multicore wire (eight strands). I strip and burn off the insulation to bare the wire core then unravel it and roll each piece under a metal ruler on a perspex sheet to straighten it. The overall result is a medium, which is quite forgiving. If you do bend it then just straighten it with the ruler again and reapply. I use CA glue for fastening all rigging with a 'smell' of CA accelerator to ensure quick setting. The hot tip of a dentist's probe cleans up any over-long, nylon, aerial wires. 

Completing the Diorama.

I came to a bit of a quandary when it came to placing Penelope on the seascape: was she lying at anchor? Or was she fore an aft moored?  The evidence from the one-and-only photo reveals nothing!  So  I decided that she was doing neither but preparing to get underway as this was the last shipment of barrels and the air raids were hotting up. Can anyone elucidate?  The water was given a last thin coat of dark green, allowing the darker shade of the previous coat to show through in places then each vessel was placed on the 'water' and glued firmly into position. Toothpaste was stippled on along the shoreline to depict breaking wavelets. Toothpaste was also added round each hull at the water line to represent 'slop' and for the wake of the 'puffer' in the fiord. It is important not to overdo the white water effect. If you want to create dense white water apply the toothpaste with a dry brush - use an old one cut down to short bristles. For spume or foam, use a lot of water and let the toothpaste bubble. When dry it gives a convincing spume effect. Again, it is an 'art' getting the right amount of white water, foam etc., characteristic for a particular vessel's hull shape and its progress through the water. Nothing beats good observation and photographs. All acrylic paint and toothpaste were given a coat of gloss varnish to seal it all. I wanted to make the seagulls, so characteristic of the fiords and fishing boats in particular, but sadly all attempts using White-Tak failed to produce a decent looking flock. This would be easier in 1:350 or large scales. 

So the dio is finished. The brown of the hull doesn't really match the rocks of the mountainsides. I suspect that that was the darkest colour they had in the paint locker at the time. All the present day colour photos show the rocks looking grey in appearance. However, in a misty fiord in early spring the camouflage must have been quite effective.

It was a trigger-happy rating on AA duty on one of the destroyers who gave the game away when he opened up on a German reconnaissance aircraft on the 8th. After that the peace and quiet of Skjelfjord was shattered by constant air raids. By the 10th Penelope and the other RN vessels had to leave. 

Below: The diorama complete

Below: Aerial view

Above: Detail shot of the rigging. "Snowdrop's" puffer unloads the last of the 300 barrels of fresh water

Below: Close-up of the 4.5" gun dedk

Above: A puffer heads back to the jetty in Skjelfjord

Below: Stern View

Above: Bow view

Below, the photograph at the top of the page converted to greyscale.  Not much here to tell you it's NOT the real thing from a recon point of view!!

Thanks for stopping by,

Caroline Carter