Operation Zitronella depicts the German battleship Tirpitz during the 8 September 1943 raid on Allied installations in the Svalbard archipelago. It was one of the few occasions on which the battleship fired its main battery in an offensive surface operation.
The Tirpitz Relic
The relic comes from aluminum ductwork recovered from the wreck of Tirpitz during a June 1974 British Sub-Aqua Club expedition. The divers were searching for remains of the X-5 midget submarine from the 1943 attack on the battleship but also recovered material from Tirpitz and X-7.
Aluminum ductwork recovered from the wreck of the German battleship Tirpitz.
The Raid on Svalbard
Tirpitz spent much of its career in Norwegian waters, where its mere presence forced the Royal Navy to devote major resources to containing the threat it posed to Arctic convoys. During Operation Zitronella, Tirpitz and Scharnhorst supported a German landing force attacking Allied positions on Spitsbergen.
The operation caused damage ashore but did little to change the strategic situation. Later that month, British X-craft midget submarines attacked Tirpitz at anchor and inflicted serious damage. The battleship was ultimately sunk by RAF bombers near Tromsø in November 1944.
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