Convoy PQ 15 was an Arctic convoy sent from Iceland by the Western Allies to aid the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The convoy sailed in late April 1942, reaching the Soviet northern ports after air attacks that sank three ships out of twenty-five.
HMS Punjabi sunk after collision
Arctic convoys of World War II
The Arctic convoys of World War II were oceangoing convoys which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland, and North America to northern ports in the Soviet Union – primarily Arkhangelsk (Archangel) and Murmansk in Russia. There were 78 convoys between August 1941 and May 1945, sailing via several seas of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, with periods with no sailings during several months in 1942, and in the summers of 1943 and 1944.
View from the cruiser HMS Sheffield as she sails on convoy duty through the waters of the Arctic Ocean. In the background are merchant ships of the convoy.
Ice forms on a 20-inch (51 cm) signal projector on the cruiser HMS Sheffield, part of an escort of an Arctic convoy to the Soviet Union.
Routes of the northern allied convoys. 1941-1945
A British wartime poster about the Arctic convoys