I agree with you Les, seems as though the Admiralty and the RAF did everything they could to protect the convoy.

So so much for:

"The Admiralty said "it's a matter of pride
We don't give a damn for your coal"

I take it that the coal was needed down there in Dorset and it couldn't be sent by road or rail. In 1940 I do not believe thet that number of ships would just be "thrown away" as seems to be the inference with this song.

"The rest were the victims of the Admiralty's pride
Shot to hell or lying under the Main"

"T'was a hell of a price for the Admiralty's pride
That was paid by CW-9"

Are both examples of emotional twaddle.

My Uncles were Chief Engineers in the Merchant Navy during the war and they sailed in Atlantic; Arctic; Mediterranean; East Coast & Channel convoys during their time. In 1940 the Channel convoys were the worst particularly in daylight one of my uncles used to tell me about standing watches while under attack from aircraft listening to the cannon shells and machine gun bullets thumping into the deck plates.

Biggest ship killers on the coastal convoy routes were mines not E-boats; submarines or bombers.