About 23.45 hours on 23 February 1945, the Free French escort destroyer La Combattante hit a mine while on patrol on the inside of the Outer Dowsing Shoal covering the swept channel from a point level with East Dudgeon lightvessel (off Cromer), northwards to the Humber Estuary, and broke in two. The forepart sank immediately in position 53º22'N, 01º01'E, about three miles northeast of East Dudgeon buoy. The other part drifted away on the tide and sank shortly afterwards.
68 of the 185 officers and men on board were lost. The survivors were picked up by the British motor torpedo boats MTB-763 and MTB-770.
The minefield F6/OMS-101 (consisting of 24 LMB ground mines) had been laid in bad weather during the night of 29/30 January 1945 by the German 2.Schnellboot-Flottille (Korvettenkapitän Opdenhoff) off the Humber estuary.

For years it was believed that she was torpedoed and sunk east of Dungeness by the German (Seehund) midget submarine U-5330 (Lt. Sparbrodt) but the ship sunk by this midget submarine was the British cable layer Alert (941 BRT).
The forepart of La Combattante lays in 11 meters of water in position 53º22'13"N, 01º01º40"E, the afterpart lays in 25 meters of water in position 53º20'52"N, 01º01'33"E.