Battle of Atlantic , Black May - Michael Gannon

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At 1602 GST (1402 GMT), Berlin began to reorganize most of the Specht and Star boats into a new reconnaissance line code-named Gruppe Fink (Finch). Ordered to be in place by 1000 GST (0800 GMT) on 5 May, the twenty-seven boats of Fink would occupy stations along a line running from west-northwest to east-southeast, or precisely, from 56°45’N, 47°12’W (AJ 2758) to 54°o9’N, 36°55’W (AK 4944)-When formed, the patrol line would stretch 382.6 nautical miles (nm), with an average spacing of 14.7 nm between the boats. As these boats were moving into position on the afternoon of 4 May, several (U—264, U—628, U—260, U-270) reported sighting destroyers (HMS Offa or HMS Oribi, or both) on southerly courses. Then U-628 (Kptlt. Heinz Hasenschar) in quadrant AJ 6271 (55°40’N, 42°40’W) at the near center of the Fink line reported at 2018 GST the mast tops of a southbound convoy that BdU had been expecting by dead reckoning, that is, by calculation based on a convoy’s course, speed, and elapsed time from a previously determined position.

This was ONS.5 (No. 33), except that BdU mistakenly called it ON.180 (convoy No. 36), which was the convoy that had been trailing ONS.5, but which on 4 May was considerably to the north tracking a WSW course through U-boat quadrants AJ 22 and 23, south of Cape Farewell. BdU was also mistaken in both its dead reckoning and real time calculations, for it expected the convoy reported by U—628 to cross the Fink recco line on 5 May, when, in fact, ONS.5 would reach the center of that line by the late afternoon of the 4th, before Fink was fully formed; and if ON.180 had continued to follow ONS.5’s course it would not have reached the line before 6 May. Apparently assuming that convoy No. 33 (ONS.5) had already passed through the Fink position, BdU’s dead reckoning error with respect to this convoy may have occurred because it was not aware that during the period 0800 GMT 1 May to 0800 4 May, ONS.5 was practically hove to in contrary weather at speeds no greater than 2.7 to 3.1 knots.

As late as 6 May, when BdU did a wash-up (postaction analysis) on this convoy (Abschlussbetrachtung Geleitz. 36), it still identified it as ON.180; but in communications to Fink boats during 5/6 May and in the war diary of 26 May it called it the “Hasenschar convoy,” after the Commander of U-628, who had been the first to sight ONS.5, at 2005 GST, and to report it, at 2018, on the 4th. The BdU practice of identifying a convoy by its shadower was common. Immediately upon Hasenchar’s report that a convoy was southwest-bound on course 200°, speed 7 knots, BdU ordered up the northernmost subgroups Amsel I and II, as well as the independently operating U-258 (Massenhausen), which had sunk McKeesport, and U-614 (Kptlt. Wolfgang Sträter), which had been temporarily hors de combat with engine problems, to join the Fink line. Twenty-seven boats strong on the night of 4 May, Fink would eventually claim a total of forty-one boats, the largest concentration ever arrayed across and around a single convoy. Dönitz and Godt reinforced this fact in a signal to the massing boats: YOU ARE BETTER PLACED THAN YOU EVER WERE BEFORE. But BdU worried that owing to fuel depletion several of the boats would not be able to operate much longer than they had.

Of these changing U-boat dispositions the OIC Submarine Tracking Room in London and thus Western Approaches had no direct knowledge until after GC&CS made a break back into naval Enigma at noon on 5 May. To that point, as Commander Winn lamented, “Nothing is known from Special Intelligence of the operations during this period.” When, however, GC&;CS could read German traffic again, the time lag between interception and decryption was so great— from seventeen hours to twelve days, the norm being four days—the information had no operational value in the battle then joined. It is possible at this date to read the GC&;CS decrypts crafted afterwards of the traffic that had passed during the blackout period. Similarly, one can consult the American decrypts of the same traffic that date from later in 1943 when U.S. Navy cryptanalysts acquired raw Enigma intercept material as well as their own “bombes” (decryption machines), hence an independent capacity to make penetrations into the German naval cipher Triton. But none of that intelligence was available at the time of battle. The principal value of Ultra in the Atlantic struggle had been its strategic disclosure of U-boat positions, and of their operational instructions from BdU. That value was lost on ONS.5. But not everything was lost. Once a close battle was joined, timely and localized intelligence such as that derived from shipborne HF/DF, radar, and asdic was far the more valuable, and that ONS.5’s escorts could collect.

By dusk on 4 May, Sherwood in HMS Tay had ample indication that he was in the neighborhood of a large U-boat formation. His FH3 HF/DF was picking up contacts on the port bow, port quarter, starboard beam, and starboard quarter. He was restricted from gaining accurate fixes, however, by the fact that communications failed between HMS Tay and FH3-equipped HMS Oribi, resulting in HMS Tay obtaining only one cross-cut fix in the next three days, 4 to 6 May. If Sherwood needed any confirmation from afar that he was surrounded, it came from the Admiralty, which signaled him at 1920 about the existence of heavy and continuous W/T traffic in his vicinity on 12215 and 10525 kilocycles. Two sweeps by the Support Group destroyers HMS Offa and HMS Oribi failed to locate any of the sending boats. The convoy was still east of 47°W and north of 4o°N, beyond which boundaries, west and south, the new Canadian North West Atlantic (CinC, CNA) Command governed all surface and air anti-submarine escorts, as decided by the Washington Convoy Conference of 1–13 March 1943. (That conference, attended by senior British, Canadian, and American naval and air representatives, also decided, among other things: that the British and Canadians would share command of the northern Atlantic convoy lanes, while the United States would concentrate her forces in the central Atlantic, including the routes of the tanker convoys between the West Indies and Britain; and that [at last] 255 VLR (Very Long Range B-24 Liberator bomber) aircraft would be delivered to the airfields on both shores of the Atlantic by July.) In the longitudes where ONS.5 sailed during the critical days of 4–6 May her escorts still remained under British operational control, although the Admiralty’s counterpart OIC in Ottawa, employing a high-power, low-frequency transmitter near Halifax, communicated HF/DF-derived U-boat position estimates to convoys, such as SC.128, eastward as far as 30"W.

Whereas SC.128 had been rerouted to evade the DFed Specht line, the suggestion has been made that ONS.5 was not similarly vectored around DFed boats before the evening of 4 May because of the escorts’ low fuel levels, and their need to continue on the shortest possible route to port. But with so many boats in movement across nearly 400 miles of ocean, there is a question if either Liverpool or Ottawa knew what possibly would have been an evasive route. The shore-based HF/DF accuracy was reported by the Admiralty to be no better than within 120 miles. Even the Admiralty message to HMS Tay at 1920 on 4 May expressed itself as being uncertain if it was ONS.5 or SC.128 that was being shadowed, so “very poor” were D/F conditions. Convoy SC.128 at the time was approximately thirty miles north of the Fink line, traversing squares AJ 28–29–34 on a course northeast by east.

Escort Group By now readied itself to run the gantlet. With 30 merchant ships present in ten columns, five cables (3,040 feet) apart, on course 202°, speed seven knots, in very clear weather, wind Force 2—a light breeze, four to six miles per hour—and a slight sea with low, long swell, Sherwood placed his night field as follows: Sunflower on the port bow, HMS Snowflake on the port beam, Tay on the port quarter, HMS Vidette on the starboard bow, HMS Loosestrife on the starboard beam, and Northern Spray on the starboard quarter—although the rescue trawler, which was astern, was delayed in taking up her station. Destroyers HMS Offa and HMS Oribi provided forward cover on the starboard and port bows, respectively, at five miles distance. Pink was leeward at 56°32’N, 40°50’W on course 235° with four stragglers, speed 5 knots; Sherwood recommended that she be separately routed, as was done. No doubt the shore commands that watched this confrontation of forces unfold, whether at Liverpool or London, Halifax or Ottawa, where enemy dispositions could only be guessed at on their wall charts and plotting tables, held their breath as the volume of HF/DF contacts mounted. At sea the incoming Morse traffic was just as ominous. Said Captain J. A. McCoy, SO, EG3 Support Group, on HMS Offa: “During all this time enemy W/T transmissions had become more and more frequent….” There was no doubt on his bridge that a multitude of foes was thickening around them.

One of the Specht boats proceeding to form Fink never made it to the party. It was taken out of the fight earlier in the day to the north-northeast of Fink, or about thirty miles astern of the convoy, by one of two Royal Canadian Air Force Canso A’s (as the Canadians called the PBY-5A amphibious Catalina flying boats) that came from Gander, Newfoundland, to give ONS.5 its first real air cover in two days, although neither aircraft met the convoy as such. The Air Gap had greatly narrowed during April and early May, with the result that on no day during its transit of the gap did ONS.5 miss contact of some kind with aircraft: even on 3 May a U.S. Army Air Force (USAAF) B-17 Flying Fortress from Gander rendezvoused with the convoy at 1538, though, at the boundary of its Prudent Level of Endurance (PLE), it could only remain with the convoy for six minutes. Nonetheless, the flyover must have caused the Specht-Star boats to keep their heads down.

At 1757 on the 4th, after a seven-and-a-half-hour flight out, the gull-gray-and-white-camouflaged Canso A “W” of 5 Bomber Reconnaissance Squadron was patrolling over position 56°35’N, 42°40’W at 2,000 feet, on course 209° True (T), with wind 20 knots from 270°T, in the base of 10/10 clouds, with visibility 5 miles in haze, when the aircraft picked up a blip on its ASV (10-centimeter) radar. The blip, which went in and out at regular intervals of a few seconds, probably as the result of high swells, indicated a target at seven miles, 25° to port. The pilot, Squadron Leader B. H. “Barry” Moffitt of Toronto, homed onto the blip and, at two and a half miles range, the second engineer, Corporal Harry Knelson of Bladworth, Saskatchewan, made a visual sighting from the port blister. The U-boat was 10° off the port bow, fully surfaced, and proceeding in a rough sea with heavy swell at a speed of 6 to 8 knots on a course estimated at 340T, or obliquely across the Canso’s own course. Its hull and tower he described as being gray in color with patches of green. Ten miles dead ahead of the U-boat, Moffitt and his second pilot could see a straggler vessel from ONS.5.

Moffitt pushed the nose down, opened the throttles, and experienced “the fastest ride I have ever had in a Canso.” Fast was a word rarely associated with the Canso. Though powered by two thunderous 14-cylinder, 1200-horsepower Pratt 8c Whitney R1830–82 engines, mounted on a 104-foot-long flexing wing, the flying boat was said by PBY pilots to “climb at ninety, cruise at ninety, and glide at ninety”— an affectionate exaggeration, since the lumbering craft regularly cruised at 110–115 knots, and could build up about 40 more knots in a power glide attack when engines were set to 43 inches manifold pressure and 2,400 rpms. As Moffitt dove out of the cloud base toward the deck, the U-boat sighted him and began an alarm dive. Leveling off at 75 feet with 150 knots indicated, Moffitt attacked from a 12:30 o’clock position, 10° off the submerging U-boat’s starboard bow, catching the target with its decks still awash.

By intervalometer, an electromechanical device that enabled a “stick” of D/Cs to be dropped at specified intervals, or spacings, he and his second pilot adjusted their four wing-mounted 250-pound torpex D/Cs, with hydrostatic fuses set to 22 feet, so that they would drop in train at spacings of 46 feet. At the optimum release point the intervalometer was activated, and the stick of D/Cs separated port and starboard from hard points on the wing, severing their arming wires in sequence: one-two-three-four. No hangups. The first D/C entered the water about 80 feet ahead and to starboard of the U-boat, the second about 40 feet from target. The third and fourth fell fewer than 12 feet off the U-boat’s port side, one forward of the conning tower, the other aft. Unaccountably, for a dive situation, two crewmen were seen on the conning tower bridge.

Moffitt kicked left rudder and pulled into a climbing turn to port. When the D/Cs detonated in train, sending gray-white water skyward in four violent geysers, Moffitt and his crew watched the U-boat heave to a fully surfaced position for about five to ten seconds, then wallow with no forward motion. After ten more seconds, the boat, still in a motionless horizontal position, sank from view. Immediately, oil appeared in bulk and grew to a slick 200 by 800 feet; four of the Canso crew members could smell its pungent odor through the open blisters. Also sighted were woodplanks with fresh breaks; these would have come from the boat’s upper surface decking, where hardwood was used to retard freezing. No survivors or bodies appeared on the frothing surface. Having reached PLE, Canso A “W” departed the scene for Gander at 1828. Back at base, Moffitt submitted photographs and guardedly reported: “U-boat probably damaged.” In London, however, the Admiralty’s U-Boat Assessment Committee decided, on 28 June 1943, that the U-boat in question, which it identified as U-630 (Oblt.z.S. Werner Winkler), was “known sunk"

Understandably, in the few accounts of ONS.5’s passage that have been written since, that has been the identification and the assessment given. In recent years, however, this and other surface and air attacks on U-boats have received a searching reassessment by Robert M. Cop-pock, Curatorial Officer, Foreign Documents Section, Naval Historical Branch, Ministry of Defence, London (hereafter NHB/MOD). Through careful examination of such factors as U-boat tracks, W/T communications, damage reports, and fuel reserves, Mr. Coppock has concluded that the boat attacked by Canso “W” was U-209 (Kptlt. Heinrich Brodda), which had sortied from Kiel, Germany, on her first war patrol on 6 April. At 1615 GST on 6 May, with her main transmitter out of commission, U-209 reported to BdU via U-954 (Kptlt. Odo Loewe) that she had suffered extensive damage: air-group no. 2 OUT OF ORDER BECAUSE OF AERIAL BOMBS. PRESSURE CONDUIT NO. I OUT OF ORDER. EXHAUST VALVES LEAKING. ONLY PARTIALLY CLEAR FOR SHOOTING. MAIN TRANSMITTER OUT OF ORDER. 29 CBM.

At 1931 GST BdU responded, ordering Brodda to refuel, if necessary, from U-119 (Kptlt. Horst-Tessen von Kameke) and afterwards to make for Brest on the Brittany coast, some 1,500 miles distant. The injured boat did not rendezvous with U-119, and nothing was heard from her again. On 23 May the BdU war diary concluded: “U-209 has been on her return passage since the 6th May. On that day U-954 reported that U-209 was damaged by aircraft bombs and unable to send signals. Fuel which were then 29 cbm must have been used up by now … so she must be considered lost.” The NHB/MOD reassessment concludes that U—209 sank by accident on or about 7 May in the general vicinity of 52°N, 38°W, and that her demise was “almost certainly” the result of the damage she suffered from Canso PBY Catalina flying boat “W” on 4 May. Winkler’s U-630 will be seen later in the narrative.

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Another type of engagement was experienced by the second Canso that approached ONS.5 that afternoon. Piloted by Flight Lieutenant J. W. C. “Jack” Langmuir of Toronto, Canso A “E” of 5 Squadron sighted 15 to 18 miles ahead a fully surfaced U-boat proceeding at about 8 knots on a course of 132°T. He later estimated its position as 55°35’N, 43°14’W. The Canso’s course was 023° at 5,500 feet. The time was 2045. Langmuir turned on a reciprocal course to the U-boat in order to get the sun at his back, and then, at 8 miles distance, he commenced a dive, going to 20 feet off the deck at 155 knots, and aiming almost directly at the U-boat’s bow, hoping for a perfect straddle. During his run in, the “dark brown-green” U-boat, deciding to fight it out on the surface rather than dive, opened up with 20mm anti-aircraft fire from the flak platform aft the conning tower. Pressing on, Langmuir hit the release button and got his perfect straddle, numbers 2 and 3 of the stick entering the water not more than 15 feet to either side of the U-boat’s hull, between the conning tower and stern.

As the Canso banked away to port, her crew observed the U-boat’s bow lifted above the surface by the explosions, showing daylight between the keel and water for about one-third of the boat’s length; yet the boat was still able to maneuver, and did so, making a complete 360° turn to starboard while “pitching and rolling violently” and persisting to offer flak. With all his D/Cs expended, Langmuir moved out of range and ordered the bow gunner, Warrant Officer Clifford Hazlett of Chilliwack, British Columbia, to mount a. 30-caliber Browning machine gun in the bow turret, which took about three minutes. Langmuir then made a second run at the boat. Descending from 200 to 50 feet, he called for fire from both the bow gun and the. 50-caliber gun in the starboard blister, beginning at 400 yards. Two U-boat crewmen on the flak platform were seen to fall, hit, and to crumble over railings into the sea.

After the pass, Langmuir banked to starboard intending to make a third run, but when he looked back he saw only the U-boat’s bow as the craft submerged at an awkward angle. No oil, debris, or survivors were sighted. Having done as much as she could do, Canso A “E” began the long return to base. A large number of photographic negatives were presented at Gander as witness to the action. The assessment from London on 28 June was, “Probably slightly damaged”—a tribute to the integrity of the U-boat’s hull, which took at least two D/C charges within close range. The U-boat was identified later from Enigma intercepts as U-438 (Kptlt. Heinrich Heinsohn), out of Brest, which signaled to BdU at 0608 on 5 May that she had had an exchange of fire with an aircraft and received minor damage: 4 BOMBS FROM CATALINA 15 METERS OFF.… ATTACKED SEVERAL TIMES BY FLYING BOAT. NO. 40 CYLINDER COVER TORN. OTHER DAMAGES SLIGHT. Later that day she reassured BdU: CAN REPAIR DAMAGES TO ENGINE WITH MEANS ON BOARD.

On the cusp of battle, as a five-hour night fell across the bleak dress of the North Atlantic, Admiral Dönitz’s U-Boat Command had every reason to be confident. The initial conditions for a convoy fight had never been so favorable. Forty-one boats were forming the battle line, and a convoy had steamed into their near-middle. At 2213 GST (2013 GMT) Dönitz signaled one last personal exhortation to his commanders:

I AM CERTAIN THAT YOU WILL FIGHT WITH EVERYTHING YOU’VE GOT. DON’T OVERESTIMATE YOUR OPPONENT, BUT STRIKE HIM DEAD!

First out of the box was twenty-eight-year-old Kptlt. Ulrich Folk-ers, commander of the Type IXC U-125, which sortied on 13 April from her home base with 10th Flotilla at Lorient, a name that soon was to have a curious reprise. On his first patrol Folkers had sailed to the U.S. East Coast in January 1942 as a member of Operation Drumbeat (Paukenschlag), during which he sank only one vessel, the 5,666-GRT American freighter West Ivis. In three subsequent patrols, however, he put fourteen Allied ships in the locker and received the Knight’s Cross in March 1943. His actions on the night of 4/5 May are not known with any accuracy because neither his war diary (KTB) nor his torpedo shooting reports (Schussmeldungen) survived the battle. But German message traffic gives him the first trophy of the night, merchantman No. 34 in column No. 3. Her name: Lorient. Built in 1921 by Tyne I.S.B. Co. Ltd., Newcastle, the 4,737-GRT Lorient was transporting trade for the Continental Coal and Investments Company of Cardiff. Captain Walter John Manley commanded her merchant crew of forty-six officers and men. On the night of 4 May, without notice or trace, she simply disappeared, with all hands.

Convoy rules specified that upon being torpedoed, a ship should send up two white rockets and key the emergency signal SSS (Struck By Torpedo) on the 600-meter distress band. Lorient did neither. Unless she was broken in half, a torpedoed ship in ballast, as Lorient was, normally should have had enough buoyancy to stay afloat long enough to make a signal, as well as get her crew away in boats. However, as the next ship to go down demonstrates, that amount of time could be as little as two minutes. In any event, no crewman or debris from Lorient was ever found. Commodore Brook commented simply that Lorient “parted company,” probably indicating no more than that she had become an out-of-sight straggler. The conclusion that Lorient’s end came at the hands of U-125 is based on a signal from Folkers to BdU, repeated by the latter to all northwest Atlantic boats at 0218 on the 5th: FOLKERS REPORTS ON 36 METERS. ON 4 MAY IN QU AJ 6298 [55°33‘n, 41°45’W] INDEPENDENT 4000 TONNER, COURSE 220, SUNK.30 Lorient would be U-125’s only victim in the battle. Fewer than thirty hours later, U-125 would be a victim herself.

Significantly, at this same early hour of the battle, Kptlt. Helmuth Pich, Commander of U-168, reported that he was breaking off the line because of fuel shortage. Just as significantly, BdU, which had fretted over the fuel problem from the time Fink was organized, signaled back that it would not permit it. Pich was to continue operations, and all boats were to remain engaged until their fuel state reached five tons, when they could disengage to resupply from a Milchkuh standing well clear to the east. Pich was back in the line at 2246.31 The second U-boat to take offensive action was U-707, a Type VIIC commanded by Oblt.z.S. Günter Gretschel. At 2153 Gretschel dived ahead of the convoy, intending to attack at dusk:

[Through the periscope] “I can see two destroyers [Offa and Oribi?] zigzagging regularly ahead of the convoy. Asdic is being used only in short spurts. One destroyer is now only 1000 meters distant, dead ahead … ; now it zigzags toward port again. Nothing can be seen of the convoy. I think that all’s clear and that I’m through [the screen] when a destroyer heads right for me again. He must have located me [by asdic] because I’m proceeding at a very low speed. Now his asdic is continuous. I dive deeper to A 20 [a prescribed but varying depth such as 30 meters plus 20 meters]. Eight well-placed D/Cs [Wabos], The convoy passes overhead.”

The D/C attack was made by HMS Tay, which had moved to close ahead of convoy.33 Gretschel continued:

“Surfaced. I am in the rear of the convoy formation. To the front are a few shadows, to starboard a corvette, astern, a large steamer. Battle stations! [Auf Gefechtsstationen!] I attack a modern passenger steamer of the type City of Manchester, with protruding bow and continuous deck, 7500 GRT, on course 210°. I launch a fan shot from Tubes I, II, and IV, bearing 90°, range 1500 meters. After a run of one minute, 34 seconds, an eel hits abaft the mast, causing a high black detonation column. Immediately, the steamer begins sinking by the stern. The upper deck is awash. The vessel remains floating for awhile, then suddenly stands itself up, the bow vertical, and descends into the sea. Time for sinking: 69 seconds. Secure from Battle Stations! Dive to reload.”

This time the sinking was observed by the armed trawler H.M.T. Northern Spray, commanded by Lieutenant F. A. J. Downer, R.N.R. The victim was not the type of passenger steamer Gretschel identified, but a 4,635-GRT freighter of the North Shipping Company in Newcastle. Named North Britain, she had straggled from the convoy in bad weather on Saturday, 1 May, had rejoined on the 4th, but then had straggled six miles astern again with boiler trouble. The record does not state how many of Gretschel’s torpedoes hit home, but is clear that his victim, which was in ballast, sank very quickly, stern first, inside two minutes. The time was 0027 on 5 May. Northern Spray, which was nearby, carried out an “Observant” around the spot of sinking but failed to make asdic contact. No boats or life jacket lights could be seen, and the trawler reported to Tay that there were no survivors of the crew of over forty. Then, at 0055, some lights were sighted, and ten minutes later the trawler discovered a waterlogged lifeboat and a raft. Repeatedly the lifeboat was brought alongside, but the ten exhausted crewmen inside it made only lethargic efforts to get out. Finally, they and an eleventh survivor on the raft were taken on board, and Northern Spray proceeded to the positions of other sinkings.

Hasenschar, the contact-keeper in U—628, was next to open a fighting account. With seven other boats of his knowledge in contact with the convoy by dusk (U-707, U-202, U-264, U-265, U-168, U-732, and U-378), he thought himself free to shed his shadower’s role—Somit ist für mich Angriff freigegeben:

“I move toward the convoy columns [on the surface] so I can attack just at the beginning of night. The sea state is 3–4, moderating with a light swell. Visibility is good. As it gets darker the starboard bow escort steams far off to the west and a second destroyer heads south. I’m successful in getting through the hole between them, and now, at first darkness, I’m in contact with the main body of the convoy. Positioned west of the convoy, I start my attack.… I don’t think it’s advisable to proceed any closer because escorts on the beam can approach me at short range. In spite of the great distance to target I decide to launch exactly aimed individual shots, because I have precisely calculated target data. All Etos are hot and ready.… At 0043–0046 I launch from Tubes I through IV at five [sic] different freighters in a row, range 4000 to 5000 meters, torpedo depth set to three meters.… Then I turn to starboard and make a [single] stern launch, after which I take off on the surface, full speed, toward the northeast because the starboard escorts have moved in my direction again. Calculating from the time of the first torpedo launch, there were four hits, the first after a run of 7 minutes, 58 seconds, the last after 9 minutes, 30 seconds. There was a 3-minute interval between the launch from [bow] Tube I and the launch from [stern] Tube V. We could only observe three hits. The first, which had a high detonation column, was on a large freighter. The others were on two medium-sized freighters. One explosion was very large, so one could assume a sinking. The third freighter hit shoots two white rockets and begins to burn. As we back off from the scene, a muffled explosion is heard at 0105 from the first, large freighter, possibly a boiler explosion. A large black cloud of smoke hangs over the ship for a long time. Then there is nothing more that can be seen of the ship. In the boat we can hear the noises of a sinking ship. The ship sinks. As we continue our withdrawal the rear echelons of the convoy send up illumination flares continuously. Some of the flares are very close, but we are not spotted.… Because I have one eel left I decide to return to the scene in order to sink a ship that might be damaged.… At 0225 I observe a shadow with a weak red masthead light. At first it shows little aim-off bearing. For a short while I pursue it with diesels at slow ahead. Now we recognize it to be a corvette, hove-to, bearing 110°. I approach to a range of 800 meters and at 0302 launch a single eel, set at 4 meters depth, from Tube III. After 28 seconds running time there is a huge tongue of flame, followed by spark showers, then nothing more to be seen. A strong shockwave followed. I guess that the entire D/C stowage exploded. The corvette had literally gone up in thin air.”

Later, in reporting these attacks to BdU, Hasenschar stated that he had sunk one large freighter, probably had sunk a medium-size freighter, had left a third freighter burning, and had blown a corvette to pieces—”Atomisiert.” But the twenty-six-year-old Commander was peering through rose-colored binoculars. Only one ship was hit by his torpedo barrage: the 5,081-GRT freighter Harbury, with a cargo of 6,820 tons of anthracite coal. As for the vaporized corvette, HMS Snowflake, HMS Sunflower, and HMS Loosestrife—Pink was on another course—continued rolling and pitching on their assigned stations, unscathed by anything but weather. Some of the explosions reported by Hasenschar may have originated with torpedo hits scored in the same time period by U—264 (see below). Or they may have been end-of-run detonations.

With a loud explosion, but no flash, one of Hasenschar’s wakeless torpedoes struck Harbury on the starboard side in No. 5 hold, blowing off its hatches and flooding it. The time was 0046 on 5 May. A fracture in the tunnel door allowed water into the engine room, which began to fill with sea water. The Master, Captain W. E. Cook, made his way to the bridge wings, where he saw that the ship was settling by the stern. Third Officer W. Skinner fired the required white rockets. Only twenty-one or twenty-two years old, Skinner had previously gone down once with a mined ship, a second time with a ship sunk by Japanese aircraft off Ceylon, and, after the latter sinking, he had been sunk yet a third time by a Japanese cruiser that shelled the ship that rescued him. Said Cook later about Skinner’s fourth experience, he was “most reliable and cool.”

As the well deck went under water, Cook switched on the red lights to mark his position, stopped engines, threw overside the weighted Confidential Books, directed a distress W/T message to be transmitted, placed a W/T set in one of the main lifeboats, and ordered Abandon Ship. The crew succeeded in lowering the two main lifeboats amidships, but the starboard quarter small lifeboat had been rendered useless by the explosion, and the port quarter boat capsized on becoming waterborne. Several lives were lost when a knot of crewmen stranded aft were forced to jump into the sea. Cook remained on board with two crewmen and searched the ‘midship accommodation to make sure that all fifty-one crewmen, including seven Navy and two Army gunners, had gotten off. Near midnight the ship gave a “grinding and wrenching” sound from aft, leading Cook and the two ratings to think that Harbury was sinking. They hurriedly boarded the forward starboard raft, cast off the painter, and drifted away into a heavy swell and dark night. In the distance they sighted two white lights, which they assumed belonged to the lifeboats.

Around 0320 they observed a shower of sparks and heard a loud explosion, which they interpreted to be an end-of-run torpedo detonation, and an hour and ten minutes later they sighted Northern Spray. Cook attracted the trawler’s attention using a newly issued handheld rocket that threw up five flares. With some difficulty because of the rough sea and the lack of ring bolts or cleats on merchant ship rafts to which lines might have been made fast, the trawler hauled on board the raft’s occupants and, a short time later, those also from the lifeboats, making a total of forty-four men rescued, six of whom were slightly injured. Seven were missing.

In the morning (0900), Cook, with his Chief Officer and the First Lieutenant of the trawler, took a boat to inspect Harbury and to secure flour and potatoes from her pantry to replenish the trawler’s dwindling stock. They found water ten feet high in the engine room, above the dynamos, and saw that the sea was pouring into No. 4 main hold. All indications were that Harbury would sink. At 1000 the boat party returned to Northern Spray. A month and a half later, Cook would say: “I did not see my ship again, but in view of her condition I am certain that she eventually sank. Aircraft were sent out the following day to the scene [55°oi’N, 42°59‘W] but no sign of the ship could be found.”

Hasenschar’s KTB, which has not always been reliable, proved to be correct about the fate of the Harbury wreck. At 1230 on the afternoon of 5 May, while proceeding underwater near the position 55°14’N, 43°02W, Hasenschar sighted a stopped, presumably damaged, freighter in his periscope lens. He surfaced, decks awash, long enough to make an observation from the bridge, then submerged again:

“I approach the freighter with full speed underwater. With the periscope I can see that the steamer has been abandoned. It has a slight list to starboard and it’s down by the stern. Lifeboats hang out of their davit arms. Stairs and lines hang outboard. At 14511 surface and clear the guns at a distance of 300–400 meters. With 40 rounds of 8.8 fire from the forward deck gun and 100 2cm armor-piercing shells we get the freighter to sink.… It lists to starboard and then capsizes.… The vessel displays a repainted shipping company insignia of the “Harrison Line” on the funnel. A drifting cutter with sail nearby carries the name “Harbury”. The freighter fits the silhouette of that type. I assume that this is the damaged ship that we torpedoed the night before.”

He was right. S.S. Harbury was owned by J. & C. Harrison Ltd., of Mark Lane, London. Hasenschar also identified this derelict as Harbury in his Schussmeldungen, unfortunately the only shooting reports to survive in German archives from any U-boat operating in May 1943. The young U-Boat Commander would go down with his boat on 3 July 1943 northwest of Cape Ortegal, Spain.

Hard on the heels of Harbury s torpedo, two more ships took hits, the work of Kptlt. Hartwig Looks in U—264. At 0014, Looks placed his Type VIIC boat ahead of the convoy, on the surface, with the intention of attacking inside the port bow and port beam escorts (Sunflower and Snowflake). A “destroyer” (Tay) visible to the north did not see him in the overcast weather, visibility good but very dark, rough sea with heavy swell, wind from the southwest Force 5. At 0100,14 minutes after Harbury was struck, Looks made his move:

“I have a group of five steamers ahead of me, three at approximately 1500 meters and two behind them at about 2500 meters.… At 0102 I launch two fan shots at the larger two of the three nearest ships, one launch of two eels from Tubes II and III at a 6000-tonner and another launch of two from Tubes II and IV at a 5000-tonner. Range 1500 meters, angle on the bow 3.8° and 3.9°, respectively. Torpedo depth set to 3 meters. I then turn hard-a-starboard and launch a fifth eel from the stern tube at a 4500 GRT freighter. All five eels hit home. The first fan launch at the 6000-tonner detonates after runs of one minute, 22 seconds and one minute, 26 seconds, one hitting amidships and the other 20 meters from the stern. Two high smoke columns can be seen. The second fan launch hits the 5000-tonner at the same locations on the hull after runs of one minute, 47 seconds and one minute, 51 seconds. Again there are two high detonation columns. The single launch from Tube V hit the 4500-tonner amidships under the funnel. There is a very high detonation column topped by a large mushroom cloud. I suspect that all three steamers will sink because of the good positioning of the hits. I take off as fast as I can. A destroyer heads toward me from the north at high speed. The steamers I hit shoot up white rockets.”

Looks’s observations were in the main correct. The larger two steamers were each hit by two torpedoes. But the stern launch at the “4500-tonner” missed, and since no other ship in the convoy was struck within the previous 19 minutes or during the one hour and 17 minutes that followed, there is no accounting for the third explosive scene described by Looks and reported by him to BdU at 0234. The first vessel hit was West Maximus, a 5,561-GRT American Hog Islander general cargo vessel in ballast, with 745 tons of slag, ship No. 22 in column 2 on the port side of the convoy. Twenty-five seconds later, a British freighter, the 4,586-GRT Harperley, No. 13 on the outside port column I, took the first of two torpedoes that would puncture her hull.

Neither of the two merchant seamen lookouts on the bridge nor any of the nineteen U.S. Navy gunners at their stations, sighted a wake from the first torpedo absorbed by West Maximus The explosion, which caused the entire ship to shudder, blew open the port side in the after peak tank and took away part of the stern section. The second torpedo, entering No. 3 hold on the port side, demolished No. 3 aft bulkhead, flooded the fire room, showered the vessel with fuel oil, and buckled the deck plates so badly, said the Naval Armed Guard commander, Lieutenant (jg) J. C. Dea, U.S.N.R., that “it was virtually impossible to walk on the deck.” The Master, Captain Earl E. Brooks, immediately ordered Abandon Ship. Of the sixty men on board—thirty-nine merchant crew, nineteen gunners, and two U.S. Army passengers—all but four made it safely down the nets and ladders into four lifeboats, from which, eventually, they were delivered by Northern Spray. The freighter went down by the bow at 0135, taking with her the Confidential Books, which Captain Brooks had, for one reason or another, neglected to deep-six. Neither had he gotten off a W/T distress signal nor fired white rockets—though, in Lt. Dea’s opinion, “torpedoed ships should not throw out white flares, as they illuminate the area and create visible targets.”

On Harperly, a sister ship to Harbury, the Master, Captain J. E. Turgoose, who was seventeen days into his first command, saw the flashes of the torpedoes that struck West Maximus to starboard and slightly ahead in the adjoining column. Moments later, his own vessel was jarred by two torpedoes that exploded through the half-inch-thick hull almost simultaneously, one entering the vicinity of the engine room, the other in the way of the foremast. Turgoose, who was in the wheelhouse at the time, was surprised that the explosions were muffled—more like dull thuds, he said later—and that there were neither detonation flashes nor columns of water that he could see, though survivors from another ship told him afterwards that they saw the flashes. Equally surprising to Turgoose was the fact that at first there was little visible damage—the windows of the wheelhouse were unshattered, for example—but reports came into him thereafter that Harperly was listing heavily to port, and for that reason she was hiding broad sea-sucking holes in the ship’s side.

Turgoose had the rockets fired—one failed to function—and had an SSS transmitted. The engine room telegraph was jammed, but the engines had already been stopped by the first torpedo, which also took the lives of the Second, Third, and Fourth Engineers. The Second Engineer, W. J. Gilbert, had only moments before volunteered to give up his off-watch time to help with the engines. With the ship’s list increasing, Turgoose ordered Abandon Ship. One of the port lifeboats had been destroyed, but the crew successfully launched three serviceable boats and made clear of the ship within the space of eight minutes, Turgoose having to jump to join one of the boats. Ten to fifteen minutes later, he watched his ship disappear by the head. Two men were heard “moaning and shouting” in the water, and by hard pulling on the oars, Turgoose’s boat managed to rescue one of them. Two other men clinging to the bottom of a small lifeboat that had capsized went under before they could be reached.

After three and a half hours Northern Spray answered the emergency W/T and lights. Thirty-eight survivors were lifted on board the trawler to join fifty-one from West Maximus, forty-three from Harbury, and two from North Britain. Lt. Downer wondered where he would put them if he had to pick up any more. Every open space on his small 150-foot vessel, including the mess decks, ward room, and cabins, was jammed with damp bodies, panic bags, and (from West Maximus) American luggage. The trawler’s cook, Herbert Arthur Damsell, contrived somehow to serve up meals for everyone, using, among other provisions, the providently salvaged flour and potatoes from Harbury. Damsell refused the help offered by cooks from the other ships, saying, “I don’t want any strangers in my galley.” Northern Spray was ordered by Sherwood to St. John’s, which was reached without incident at 0750 on the 8th. Any further survivors would have to be rescued by B7’s warships.

[merdiolu]

6 THE FOG OF WAR

The Battle for ONS.5

It was the job of the little ships and lonely aircraft, a hard, long and patient job, dreary and unpublicized, against two cunning enemies—the U-boat and the cruel sea.CAPTAIN GILBERT ROBERTS, C.B.E., R.N.

A war of groping and drowning, of ambuscade and stratagem, of Science and Seamanship.WINSTON S. CHURCHILL

BOTH BEFORE AND DURING the two and three-quarter hours when five ships of Convoy ONS.5 went to the seabed, Lt.-Cmdr. Sherwood and his escorts were urgently hunting their German adversaries, in line with a principle contained in the Tactical Policy issued by Admiral Horton on 27 April, viz., that U-boats were most successfully detected and destroyed prior to their attacks. Fittingly, it was HMS Tay that was first to take the fight to Fink. At 2247,3 in her night station on the port quarter, Tay obtained an asdic contact at 400 yards. She promptly attacked with a ten-pattern. There was no visible result, and Sherwood judged that his contact was not a submarine, since there were “many Non-Sub echoes” in the vicinity. The NHB/MOD reassessment, however, concluded that there had been a submarine present, and identified it as U-707 (Gretschel), which was not damaged.

Second to make an attack that night was Lt. Raymond Hart in HMS Vidette. The thirty-year-old destroyer captain had joined the Royal Naval Reserve in 1931 after two years with the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, and served six months on the battle cruiser HMS Hood. When his merchant navy junior officer’s position fell victim to Depression-era cutbacks in 1934, he moved to Canada, where he took up lumbering. In 1937 he returned to the sea as a probationary sublieutenant in the RN, and when war broke out he was serving on the destroyer HMS. Hasty, on which he later took part in the battles of Calabria and Cape Matapan and won the D.S.C. in an action off Tobruk. During Operation Vigorous to revictual Malta in June 1942, HMS Hasty was damaged by a German torpedo boat (S-boat) and had to be sunk by another destroyer. From June to October of that year Hart commanded a demolition team called the Hornblowers whose job it was to destroy stores and disable the port facilities at Alexandria should that base be threatened by German occupation. In December 1942, he was given his first sea command in the elderly HMS Vidette and assigned to B7. Gifted with intelligence, judgment, and sound seamanship, he has been described as “good-looking” and “dashing.”

At 0020 on 5 May, HMS Vidette was stationed in position “D,” 6o° and 5,000 yards on the starboard bow of ONS.5, when her Type 271 radar set picked up a pulse echo bearing 205°, 3,600 yards. Increasing speed to 22 knots, Hart sighted the U-boat five minutes later. At 700 yards the U-boat dived, and at 0030 HMS Vidette’s D/C team fired and dropped a fourteen-charge pattern at shallow, or ramming, settings over its swirl. The attack damaged the Type IXC U-514, whose Commander, Kptlt. Hans-Jürgen Auffermann, reported to BdU that the charges put his fixed periscope out of order and placed the flange of his starboard stern tube beyond repair; not until the early hours of the 7th, when the battle for ONS.5 was over, would he report that he was capable of further operations.

After opening range to 2,000 yards, Hart returned at a new angle to the attack position hoping to get asdic response, but there was none, and he commenced an operation “Observant.” During the second leg of that maneuver, at 0050, another radar contact was acquired bearing 285°, 3,600 yards, and HMS Vidette chased up the new bearing, sighting a U-boat known today to have been U-662 (Kptlt. Heinrich Müller), range 1,000 yards. Electing to attempt an attack before the enemy had a chance to dive, Hart ordered full ahead both engines and Stand By to Ram. The 20mm Oerlikon gunss opened fire, but while their tracers illuminated the U-boat’s conning tower, they also temporarily blinded the destroyer’s bridge personnel. Oddly, the U-boat appeared to be “reluctant to dive"; that may well have been because U-662 at that same time was attempting a stern attack on HMS Vidette. Finally, she did flood tanks and dive. HMS Vidette was able to approach to within 80 yards before the conning tower fully submerged, but not in time to ram. The destroyer proceeded through the swirl and, at 0059½, fired a fourteen-charge pattern in what Hart thought was “an accurate attack.”

Though it was not, it turned out, as accurate as he thought, it had the serendipitous effect of rattling a nearby boat, U-732 (Oblt.z.S. Klaus-Peter Carlsen), which recorded being depth-charged at the same time. Already nursing earlier injuries, U-732 was forced by the Wabos to move off for Rückmarsch (return voyage) to Brest. Following his procedure in the previous attack, Hart opened the range, this time to 1,700 yards, and returned seeking asdic contact; again there was none, and again he commenced “Observant.” At 0125, however, the asdic recorder traced the presence of a U-boat in almost the same position of the last attack, and at 012½= Hart fired twelve charges (two more intended D/Cs not being set in time). No visible signs of success followed, and at 0150 Sherwood ordered HMS Vidette to resume her station (Offa had been covering).

Hart’s aggressive spirit was matched by that of Lt. Chesterman on HMS Snowflake. When convoy ships Harbury, West Maximus, and Harperley were torpedoed within nineteen minutes of one another (0046–0105), Sherwood ordered operation “Half-Raspberry.” In a full Raspberry maneuver, all close escorts initiated triangular searches employing starshell illumination rockets. The various triangular patterns to be followed as well as the individual escort sweep speeds and time durations were carefully spelled out in the Atlantic Convoy Instructions. In a “Half-Raspberry” the Senior Officer could modify the maneuver, for example by holding some escorts in place. We know from HMS Snowflake’s report that at 0055 she participated in the Half-Raspberry by turning hard-a-starboard to course 335° and proceeding to carry out a 12-knot triangular starshell sweep at the port quarter of the convoy.

At 0104 she fired starshell illuminating an arc 030° to 150°, and at 0108, following the maneuver diagram, she altered course to 210°. One minute later, she received a radar blip bearing 255°, range 3,000 yards, which she pursued at full speed, soon sighting a U-boat on the surface by light of the starshell. At 0111 the corvette’s hydrophone picked up the sound (compressed air release) of a torpedo being launched at close range. HMS Snowflake continued the chase, but there was little chance of catching up since the Flower’s top speed of 16 knots was below that of the U-boats’ top surface speeds of 17 (Type VIIC) and 181/4 (Types IXB and IXC) knots. Accordingly, when HMS Snowflake picked up an asdic bearing of 170°, range 300 yards, indicating a possible submerged U-boat, Chesterman elected to attack that target instead, firing a ten-charge pattern of light D/Cs set to 50 feet and heavy D/Cs set to 140 feet. Fired by stopwatch at 0116, the attack produced no evidence of a hit (it is now concluded by the NHB/MOD reassessment that no submarine was present), and the blast effect of the charges set shallow had the unfortunate effect of fracturing the leads to HMS Snowflake’s asdic motor alternators and blowing the bridge fuses.

Instead of returning to the swirl position, Chesterman renewed his pursuit of the surfaced U-boat he had sighted earlier, harrying it with starshell and four-inch gunfire. Finally, he was relieved to see it dive and thus place itself for the time being out of the game. Passing over the swirl at 0127 Chesterman dropped five light charges set to 100 feet. A minute and a half later, his lookouts sighted a torpedo passing 150 yards ahead from port to starboard. Even though he had forced a dive, Chesterman was not pleased with the surface chase sequence. “Consider I was bluffed by the U-boat into wasting charges,” he entered on his report. The boat has been identified by the NHB/MOD reassessment as U—264 (Looks), which was not harmed.

After having resumed station on the port beam, course 260°, HMS Snowflake received a radar return bearing 175°, 3,400 yards, and so informed HMS Tay at 0322. The corvette pursued the bearing and when range closed to 2,000 yards she gained the hydrophone effect of highspeed diesels. Chesterman needed faster horses. “Chasing U-boat, unable to overtake,” he called to HMS Tay by TBS (Talk Between Ships) radio telephone (R/T) at 0339. Sherwood passed the word to Support Group senior officer McCoy, in HMS Offa, which resulted in the following exchanges:

OFFA TO ORIBI [0341]: If in vicinity assist Snowflake to chase U-boat.

SNOWFLAKE TO ORIBI [0345]: My position one-two-zero-Z-Z-nine.Are you joining me?

ORIBI TO SNOWFLAKE [0351]: Am proceeding to help you.

SNOWFLAKE TO Oribi [0352: Course one-seven-zero. U-boat half-a-mile ahead of me.

At this point HMS Snowflake found that she was gaining on the U-boat, which apparently was not proceeding at highest speed, and at 0358 she opened up with starshell, four-inch projectiles, and Oerlikon fire. HMS Oribi came up from astern, also firing starshell. At 0359 Chesterman called: “U-boat dived, dropping charges.” With “firm contact” by asdic, at 0400 Chesterman fired five light charges set to 100 feet. He maintained asdic contact until 0414, when he dropped four heavy charges set to 225 feet, after which, anxious about running short of D/Cs, he asked HMS Oribi’s captain, Lt.-Cmdr. J. P. A. Ingram, to take over the attack. HMS Oribi, which earlier, at 0247, had dropped two single D/Cs on what turned out to be a false radar contact, attacked the asdic position held by HMS Snowflake with two ten-charge patterns, at 0445 and 0508. The two attacks were handicapped by defective gyro compass repeaters, and at 0417 Oribi had had to ask HMS Snowflake to be the directing ship, passing ranges and bearings, which she did until 0520, when Chesterman laid course to rejoin the convoy. HMS Oribi also abandoned the search at 0554 on orders from HMS Offa, without having seen any evidence that would enable him to know that his first ten-pattern had caused heavy damage to the Type VIIC U-270 (Obit. z.S. Paul Otto).

In his KTB, Otto described how the first barrage sent his boat plunging toward the bottom with a forward list of 20°: “The depth-pressure gauge is maxed out.” By running the E-motors at full emergency reverse (A.K.-zurück) he managed to slow the descent, and by pumping all available trim water to the stern tanks as well as by sending every crewman climbing into the aft torpedo room he got the boat righted, and was able to begin blowing the ballast tanks to reach a safe depth. As the boat rose, it remained bow-heavy from sea water that was pouring through fractures in the hull forward at a rate of one to two tons per hour. Finally, at 1024 GST, Otto was able to surface. After studying the damage reports, he listed seven categories of Ausfälle (breakdowns) in his KTB. There was no alternative but Ruckmarsch.

Unfortunately for ONS.5, her few defenders could not keep the entire German host submerged and thus for the most part, neutralized. At 0144, Kptlt. Rolf Manke in U—358 could see several steamers from the bridge of his conning tower. They were on course 200°, passing through the position of a sinking, where, Manke noted, “at least ten lifeboats with lights were floating about.” (West Maximus and Harperley had been torpedoed 42 and 39 minutes before.) “The first of the steamers stopped to take on board the occupants of one of the lifeboats.” Manke chose that one for a fan shot from Tubes II and III. The Pi 2 pistols that would detonate the Torpex warheads of the torpedoes were adjusted to accommodate the high swells, and the torpedoes’ depth mechanisms were set to run at four meters.The target ship lay hove-to at a range of 1,500 meters. That number, together with the target’s speed, o knots, and bearing, Red [port] 8o°, was fed into the electromechanical deflection calculator (Vorhaltrechner), and the trigonometric solution of the aiming triangle (a simple calculation, since the target was stationary) was transmitted by it to the torpedo launch receiver (Torpedoschussempfänger) in the forward torpedo room, which in turn fed the heading into the guidance systems of torpedoes II and III. When the Petty Officer (Bootsmaat) at the torpedo station acknowledged completion of the process by the word Following! (Folgen!), Manke’s first watch officer (I.W.O.) gave the launch order at 0222: “Launch fan shot!” (“Fächer los!”)

Manke described the result in his KTB:

“Two explosions were heard in the boat after the 113 seconds run, so perhaps both torpedoes hit. A violent explosion could be seen midships. The steamer broke apart in the middle and sank within one minute. Because of the vessel’s length (150 meters) and its 5½ hatches, I judge the steamer to be 8000 GRT. According to Gröner [merchant ship silhouette identification handbook] she belongs to the Port Hardy class (8700 GRT).At 0248 Manke ordered the launch of a single eel against the next freighter in line, range 1,600:Launch order given. But the torpedo stuck in the tube. A Mechanikersmaat [Machinist’s Mate] prodded it out with a mine ejector and it hit the target after a run of 118 seconds. A large explosion resulted amidships on the target and the steamer broke apart and sank in a matter of seconds. From Gröner we judged the vessel to be of the Clan Macnab class, 6000 GRT.… Only a destroyer and another escort could now be seen. We pursued the convoy, whose position was obvious from the frequent shooting of flares, but then, because of the sea force and swell, we dived in order to reload in a stable environment.”

Manke hit his ships all right, but their tonnages and fates were not as described in the rather inflated account he leaves us, for neither sank “within one minute” (versank innerhalb einer Minute) or “in a matter of seconds” (versank in wenigen Sekunden). The first vessel hit was the freighter Bristol City, bound for New York with a 2,500-ton cargo of China clay (also called kaolin, used in the manufacture of china or porcelain) and general goods. Her GRT of 2,864 tons hardly measured up to Manke’s estimate of 8,000. And in her stricken condition she survived well beyond a minute.

At the time of U-358’s first torpedo, Bristol City was in position 54°oo’N, 43°55’W (AJ 6517), heading column No. 1 on the extreme port bow of ONS.5, steering a course of 197° through a sea with heavily confused swell; a southwest wind was blowing Force 5; and the overcast night was very dark, though with good visibility. No one on board sighted the torpedo before it exploded in No. 4 hold on the freighter’s port side. Her Master, Captain A. L. Webb, who was on the bridge, stated later that: “The explosion was dull, much quieter than I would have expected. I saw a flash, and a huge column of water was thrown into the air, which cascaded down and flooded the decks.” One immediate result of the blast was the collapse of the main topmast and the blowing off of hatches and beams. So much debris fell on the deck that it was difficult for Webb to assess the exterior damage, although he specifically observed that the port lifeboat and after rafts were wrecked. More serious was the flooding below of No. 4 hold and the engine room. Webb rang for the engines to be stopped.

“A few minutes later,” he remembered, a second torpedo struck his ship, with no flash, in No. 1 hold. But he also miscalculated times. The interval between torpedoes II and III of Manke’s fan shot should have been no more than seconds. A Facherschuss, such as Manke employed, was a simultaneous spread of two or more torpedoes; it differed from a Mehrfach, which was a multiple, though not simultaneous, launch. In any event, the second eel compounded the damage to Bristol City, collapsing the fore topmast, destroying the windlass, blowing off one of the forward rafts and hatches from Nos. 1 and 2 holds, and flinging China clay into the air. Webb was unable to get rockets off, but M.V. Dolius in the adjoining column to starboard sent up two. Nor was Webb able to get an SSS off, since the wireless room had been wrecked. He did see to it that the Confidential Books, which included the Wireless Codes, were secured overboard in weighted boxes. Then, recognizing that there was no hope for Bristol City, he ordered Abandon Ship.

Twenty of his crew of forty-four, which included four Navy and two Army gunners who never saw their assailant, jumped from the main deck into the sea to join the starboard lifeboat. A jolly boat with five occupants capsized on reaching the water, casting the crewmen overside; three of them were lifted into the lifeboat, while two floated off and were not seen again, despite the fact that all the crew wore life jackets with red lights. Webb was the last to leave the ship, which was not broken in two, as Manke observed, but had settled by the head and was steaming under; the Master was waist-deep in water before he swam off into the swells, where the lifeboat found him. When the ship finally disappeared it was nine minutes (not one) after the first torpedo had struck. A little more than an hour later, the survivors, three of them injured, were rescued by the corvette HMS Loosestrife. Fifteen of the crew were missing, presumed killed by the torpedoes, or drowned, or carried off in the swells.

The second ship, which was hit by Manke’s single torpedo launch, was S.S. Wentworth, a 5,512-GRT freighter of the Dalgleish Steamshipping Company, bound for New York in ballast. She occupied the third position in column No. 3. Her Master, Captain R. G. Phillips, had learned of Bristol City s misfortune from the Second Officer, and had hurried from his cabin to the bridge. Shortly afterwards, his own vessel was struck by a torpedo on the port side amidships, in the stokehold where the ship’s furnaces opened. There was no flash or flame that anyone could see, nor was there much of a noise. Only a modest amount of water was thrown up. But the ship’s hull was punctured to form a hole about twelve feet in diameter, with about three feet of its jagged dimensions showing above the water line. The main deck cracked amidships, and both the funnel and wireless room collapsed.

Since the W/T aerial had been carried away, too, the Wireless Operator was not able to send the requisite distress signal. Nor could the rockets be fired, because their sockets had been blown apart. The Third Engineer stopped the engines and Phillips, facing what he thought was certain and imminent sinking, ordered Abandon Ship. By 0330 three of the four lifeboats were waterborne and clear of the ship. Phillips could not get the forward raft to release, but at 0350, when he heard the hull splitting, he abandoned and joined the port motorboat. It was then early morning daylight.

Some of Wentworth’s crew were picked up from the sea, but altogether five of the forty-seven-man crew were missing, one from drowning, the rest from the torpedo’s blast through the stokehold or engine room. Among the survivors were three Navy and three Army D.E.M.S. gunners, who had been no more able to get a shot off than had their counterparts on Bristol City. By 0550 the survivors were lifted on board Loosestrife, which Phillips in his report called the Bluestrife, and now, by any name, was swollen with bereft humanity. Obstinately, the broken Wentworth continued to float well beyond the few seconds that Manke had allotted her. When HMS Loosestrifes Captain, Lt. H. A. Stonehouse, R.N.R., learned that Phillips had failed to toss overside the Confidential Books, he knew he had to sink the derelict. Accordingly, he steamed along her port side and fired a D/C close to the hull. Then, on the starboard side, he put two shells into No. 2 hold. At 0700, over four hours after Wentworth was hit, Stonehouse sent word to Phillips, who had gone below, that his ship had finally gone down.

Before HMS Loosestrife had steamed to the rescue of the Bristol City and Wentworth survivors on orders from HMS Tay, she had on her own energetically raced after U-boat targets detected by radar and asdic. On one chase she dropped a ten-charge pattern at 0517 on a U-boat that dived after being sighted on the surface, range 1,200 yards; the impact of the charges damaged her asdic recorder. During a second pursuit of a target detected first by radar at 0524, then by eye, HMS Loosestrife opened fire with one four-inch high-explosive round (H.E.) and with port and starboard 20mm Oerlikons, scoring what he thought were numerous hits with the 120 Oerlikon rounds fired. No effort was made by the U-boat to offer return fire, and after one minute it dived. At 0527 Stonehouse threw a nine-charge pattern about 100 yards ahead of the diving swirl, the last D/C of an intended ten-pattern getting jammed in the rails. Stonehouse was confident that his pattern was very well placed and a “likely kill.” The NHB/MOD reassessment has identified the target of HMS Loosestrife’s first attack as U—264 (Looks), which was undamaged; and the target of the second attack as U-413 (Kptlt. Gustav Poel), which received superficial damage. Poel, in fact, says he was not hit by any of Loosestrife’s gunfire. As for the D/Cs: “Heavy tremors in the boat, damage is slight, everything can be repaired immediately except for the main transmitter. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief!”

During the dark hours of 4/5 May, Convoy ONS.5 had passed through a Werner Henke Night, as five U-boats accounted for seven ships sunk, matching the number sunk by Henke alone on the night of 30 April/1 May. That the slaughter had not been worse, with (now) thirty-six boats assembled for attack instead of Henke’s single U-515, owed in great part to the spirited and intimidating defense mounted by the B7 defenders. Though Lt.-Cmdr. Sherwood would have no way of knowing it when he and Commodore Brook took stock in the morning—whereas in Berlin Donitz and Godt were fully aware of it from anxious W/T traffic—his band of escorts had so far damaged three boats so gravely that they made for home: U-332 (Junker), U-732 (Carlsen), and U-270 (Otto).13 These, it could be argued, were equivalents to kills so far as ONS.5 was concerned.

The escorts had severely handled two other boats, which suffered slight damage, U-314 (Auffermann) and U-413 (Poel), and they had driven off or forced to dive six more: U-264 (Looks), U-707 (Gretschel), U-168 (Pich), U-662 (Kptlt. Heinrich Müller), U-584 (Kptlt. Joachim Deecke), and U-260 (Oblt.z.S. Hubertus Purkhold). To have damaged a U-boat, even in cases where the boat was not forced to retire, was effectively to take that boat for a time out of the convoy battle, since the damaged boat had to tend more to her injuries than to her potential targets, which were passing away at seven or more knots. And to have driven off a boat, or to have forced one to dive, was also effectively to neutralize that boat’s usefulness temporarily in a night battle. It is instructive to note that none of the boats damaged, driven off, or forced to dive after 0105, when Looks got lucky, subsequently sank or damaged a ship of ONS.5. In a signal sent to the Fink boats during the forenoon of 5 May, Dönitz and Godt showed their impatience at the meager returns obtained thus far in exchange for damage. Urging the boats to use the long daylight hours for submerged attacks and for getting as far ahead of the convoy as possible before nightfall, the two German admirals urged their distant Commanders:

IMMEDIATELY AFTER NIGHTFALL THE DRUMBEAT [PAUKENSCIILAC] MUST BE TIMED TO BEGIN. HURRY—THERE ARE 40 OF YOU— OTHERWISE YOU WILL LOSE THIS CONVOY. THE BATTLE CAN’t LAST LONG SINCE THE SEA SPACE LEFT IS SHORT, SO USE EVERY OPPORTUNITY TO THE FULLEST WITH ALL YOUR MIGHT [MIT ALLER ENERGIE.]

By 0700 on the 5th, Sherwood had B7 in day stations. The convoy, now twenty-six ships in ten columns, was steering on course 202°, speed seven and a half. The weather was overcast with good visibility, the sea was moderate with swell, and the wind was westerly Force 4. In those conditions HMS Offa attempted to oil from Argon and HMS Tay from British Lady, with HMS Oribi scheduled to follow HMS Tay at the same nozzle. But at 0947, as HMS Offa closed the U.S. tanker, the Argons captain signaled that he would not be prepared to discharge fuel for another hour; and when the destroyer returned alongside at 1100 the Argons hose parted after only one gallon had passed! HMS Tay had better luck with British Lady, and HMS Oribi was able to follow at 1420. Not until 1730 in the afternoon was HMS Offa able to begin drawing 30 tons from the British tanker, slipping the tow at 1930.

These were not the ONS.5 screen’s only daylight activities. Numerous HF/DF contacts in all quadrants were acquired beginning at 0654, indicating that ONS.5 was still surrounded. We know from intercepts that the following U-boats were in contact with the convoy or its escorts during the forenoon hours: U-618, U-584, U-438, U-531 U-264, U-260, and U-378. One result was that HMS Oribi became particularly busy, followed by HMS Vidette. At 1010, HMA Oribi, in station bearing 160° 5 miles from the port wing ship of the convoy, was instructed to investigate a first-class bearing of 155° to a distance of 12 miles. Forty-seven minutes later, HMS Oribi sighted, first, diesel smoke haze, and then the conning tower of a U-boat. Increasing her speed to 30 knots, the destroyer sighted within the next 13 minutes two additional U-boats proceeding away in what seemed line abreast with the first boat. Apparently aware that they were being overhauled, all three boats dived.

HMS Oribi gained a definite asdic contact at 800 yards and attacked with four charges of a ten-pattern, the remainder being checked when the recorder tracing showed that the U-boat was passing down the port side, hence the six D/Cs left would have fallen progressively astern of it. When contact and a good trace were regained at 1243, a ten-pattern was fired by recorder and stopwatch at 1247, two minutes after which “a slight explosion followed by a heavy underwater explosion was heard, producing a bubbly eruption of water.” The quarterdeck then reported what appeared to be a periscope proceeding away from the center of the D/C scum. A third attack with five charges was carried out at 1254, with negative results, after which HMS Oribi, thinking it essential “to conserve supplies of depth charges for attacks in the vicinity of the convoy,” rejoined to fuel from British Lady and, at 1740, to resume station. In this event HMS Oribi had been in contact with four U-boats, since identified as U-223 (Oblt.z.S. Karljüng Wächter), U-231 (Kptlt. Wolfgang Wenzel), U-621 (Oblt.z.S. Max Kruschka), and U-634 (Oblt.z.S. Eberhard Dahlhaus).

HMS Vidette was stationed in position “B,” off the convoy’s starboard bow, when at 1542 she acquired an asdic contact at very close range, bearing 090°. Lt. Hart altered course to intercept the contact, which quickly was classified a submarine. Reaching the target’s position at 1544, he fired a five-pattern set to 100 feet. After opening range to about 900 yards, he swept back through the attack position, but received no further contact. HMS Vidette conducted an Observant until 1633, when she was ordered to rejoin. Hart’s assessment of his action read: “Although there was no evidence of damage to the U-boat, in my opinion the counter attack delivered probably prevented an attack on the Convoy.” The NHB/MOD reassessment doubts that a U-boat was present.

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Meanwhile, despite these efforts, another convoy ship was torpedoed. The victim was M.V. Dolius, ship No. 21 on the port-hand easterly wing. Professor Jürgen Rohwer conjectures that the assailant was U-638, commanded by Kptlt. Oskar Staudinger. A native of Löbau who had earlier (1938–1941) served in the Luftwaffe, Staudinger was one week away from his twenty-sixth birthday. We know nothing of the details of this attack, since the boat’s KTB and Schussmeldung, if one existed, did not survive the battle. The “KTB” that one does find in the archives for his second Atlantic patrol out of La Pallice, 20 April to 5 May 1943, is a reconstruction done in Berlin on or about 7 May based on his F.T.s (wireless messages), both incoming and outgoing. There is no direct evidence in the F.T.s to show that U-638 sank a ship on 5 May, and the KTB-BdU does not acknowledge receipt of such a report.

Whatever U-boat was responsible, the Dolius, a 5,507-GRT freighter of the Blue Funnel Line, was torpedoed on her starboard side at 1240. Since she was the lead ship in column No. 2 on the port-hand easterly wing, the torpedo would have had to come from very slightly ahead or from within the formation. The Master, Captain G. R. Cheetham, judged that the torpedo had been launched from close range between his vessel and the two ships, Ottinge and Baron Graham, to his starboard. With what Cheetham called a “dull” explosion with no flash, the warhead opened a 30-foot-long hole extending some 15 feet above the waterline. The concussion stopped the engines and the engine room promptly flooded, as did No. 4 hold. The Fourth Engineer and Junior Assistant Engineer were killed at their stations. The ship at first listed slightly, then came upright and began to settle by the stern. Cheetham ordered his crew to stand by the lifeboats. It was an unusually large crew: thirty-nine British and twenty-two Chinese, plus five Navy and four Army gunners.

Some of the Chinese, panicking, began lowering one of the three serviceable boats—No. 3 starboard had been destroyed—but stopped when Cheetham shouted at them. After making a thorough search for any injured, Cheetham disposed of the Confidential Books and gave the command Abandon Ship. Every man behaved with well-ordered discipline, including the Chinese, and the boats were successfully manned and lowered. As the Third Officer’s boat pulled away from the vessel, its occupants sighted a crewman still on board waving his arms for assistance. The boat returned to rescue him and another crewman was found lying unconscious below. Twenty-five minutes after the torpedo’s explosion, all the known survivors were clear of the wreck. Two engineers and one gunner were dead, one gunner died in the lifeboats, and two gunners were injured.

Two minutes after Dolius was hit, Sherwood ordered “Artichoke.” HMS Sunflower and HMS Offa responded, the corvette turning from her port bow station and charging down between columns 2 and 3 at emergency full speed. Slightly astern of the derelict, HMS Sunflower picked up an asdic contact in the center of the convoy formation, range 1,200 yards. The captain of HMS Sunflower Lt.-Cmdr. Plomer closed the position and dropped a ten-pattern D/Cs with 150-feet settings. The blasts did some damage to his own ship, but there was no sign that he had done any to a U-boat. Contact was lost, and when HMS Tay joined she could not regain, either. From circumstantial evidence, however, the NHB/MOD reassessment has concluded that HMS Sunflower s attack resulted in the sinking of Staudinger’s U-638 with all hands, at 54°12’N, 44°o5’W—swift retribution, indeed, for the loss of Dolius, and proof again of the effectiveness of Artichoke. HMS Sunflowers was the first kill made by the close escort. HMS Offa, meanwhile, obtained a doubtful contact at 1301, threw a ten-charge pattern, and rejoined the convoy.

Between 1320 and 1400 HMS Sunflower swept a circle around the sinking Dolius, then, on orders from Tay, began rescuing survivors while HMS Snowflake provided cover. Once on board, the Dolius officers, ratings, and apprentices did whatever they could to make themselves useful, serving on lookout watches, performing deck tasks of various kinds, and cleaning quarters. Plomer said later, “The ship was sorry to see them go in spite of the overcrowding involved.” As HMS Sunflower set course to rejoin the convoy, the D.E.M.S. rating who died in a lifeboat was buried overside with a short service.

Since 2244 on the 4th, the corvette HMS Pink, rather neglected in this narrative of late, has been trundling along faithfully as lone escort to a separately routed convoy of four stragglers: the American West Madaket, the British Dunsley and Director, and the Norwegian Gudvor. At 1150, ”Pink’s Party,” as the tiny fleet came to be called, was in position 54°56’N, 43°44’W, some 80 miles astern of the main body, making about 8 knots on the course, 240°, assigned by CinCWA. Twenty-seven-year-old Lt. (now Sir) Robert Atkinson, commanding Pink, was zigzagging ahead, his four charges in line abreast about 3,000 yards astern. With only 30 percent of his fuel remaining, with no chance to overtake the main body and refuel, and with a separate route that increased the distance to be steamed, Atkinson was proceeding on only one boiler, the second being banked, and had shut down one dynamo and rationed water. If an attack situation developed, he knew that the higher speeds required by those maneuvers would make greater than usual demands on his fuel reserves. But he did not quail before that prospect: not having seen any action during the voyage to date, he badly wanted a go at the enemy.

Long experienced in the North Atlantic, Atkinson had served in the Merchant Navy since 1932, and since 1937 as an officer, beginning as probationary sublieutenant, in the Royal Navy Reserve. He was called to duty in September 1939 and given command of the yacht Lorna, which, operating off Gibraltar, seized an Italian tanker when that country entered the war. He took the tanker, which was filled with seven and a half million gallons of petrol, back to England, where he asked for a “more active state of war.” Accordingly, he was sent for ASW training at HMS Osprey in Portland. That completed, he was named First Lieutenant of the corvette H.M.S. Rhododendron, which, on 21 November 1940, one month after her commissioning, became the first ship to sink a U-boat (U-104) at night. His next ship, and first corvette command, HMS Snowdrop, was detached to the “White Patrol” that ran between the northwest cape of Iceland and the packs and growlers of Greenland. There, well before Pink’s Party, he experienced the trials of a lonely vigil.

The corvette’s mission was to travel back and forth across the Denmark Strait in order to detect a breakout of the German heavy battleship Bismarck, though, as he said to the writer over a half-century later, there was not anything his “little pea shooter” could have done about it except report. “There was darkness day and night, wind and cold, a lot of frostbite seasickness all the time, poor food.” The loneliness of HMS Snowdrop’s solitary watch was deepened by the fact that “We never went ashore; the Icelanders weren’t very hospitable.” On another occasion he said: “I was always vulnerable to seasickness strangely enough, having been at sea all my life, and I recall on one occasion having so many clothes on and being so weak from seasickness, I could hardly mount the companionway to get on to the bridge, I was so physically weak.” After one month of shore duty to help him get over his seasickness, Atkinson was given command of the newly commissioned (2 July 1942) corvette HMS Pink, named after the fragrant flowers of the genus HMS ianthus. The corvette joined B7 when Peter Gretton assumed command of the Group.

HMS Pink , Flower class corvette , Flower and River class escorts were workhorse of Royal Navy and Royal Canadian Navy in Battle of Atlantic

Now, at 1154 on 5 May 1943, toward the end of the starboard leg of a zigzag, HMS Pink obtained a first-class asdic contact bearing 310°, range 2,200 yards. The echoes, Atkinson said, were “by far the clearest and sharpest I have ever heard.” The event confronted him with two conundrums: (I) Should he expend perhaps an unacceptable amount of precious fuel in making an attack, which might or might not succeed, or should he husband his oil in a simple defensive mode and thus extend his capacity to provide “scare tactic” cover for the stragglers? (2) Should he seize this opportunity to destroy one U-boat, or would his absence in so doing, whether successful or not, expose his small convoy to the torpedoes of another U-boat? The Atlantic Convoy Instructions permitted him to attack, “provided this duty can be undertaken without undue prejudice to the safety of the convoy.” Atkinson decided to attack.

At her maximum speed available on one boiler, 11 knots, HMS Pink held the contact to 150 yards, and at 1159 dropped three D/Cs, two set to 100 feet and one to 250. More were not dropped owing to Atkinson’s concern that at her low speed and with D/Cs set shallow, HMS Pink would not get beyond the blast effect. When contact was regained, HMS Pink commenced a second run in, during which her hydrophones picked up the sounds of the U-boat’s hydroplanes and/or rudder, indicating a depth change or a turn. At 1207, increasing for safety to 15 knots by getting her second boiler “flashed up,” she fired ten charges set to 150 and 385 feet. No signs of damage appeared on the surface. One minute later, a “moderately high echo” was obtained again. In setting up for a third attack, Atkinson deduced from the movements of the U-boat that it was endeavoring to put its stern and cavitation turbulence to him. As the target moved to starboard, HMS Pink followed, and at 1216, with the range at 250 yards, he ordered the firing of twenty-four Hedgehog bombs with 4° of right deflection because of wind. To his extreme disappointment, the Hedgehog mechanism misfired.

It took eleven minutes of following the plot to acquire a new contact, which was “firm and metallic,” at 1227. Two minutes later, the asdic echo was bearing 0°, range 1,400 yards. Good hydrophone effect was also heard on that bearing, and at 1233 Atkinson fired a ten-pattern set to 250 and 385 feet. With no evidence of damage, and not expecting to see any appear right away from that depth, Atkinson’s asdic team kept their sound pulses glued to the U-boat’s hull, and at 1241 contact was again “sharp and firm.” Hydroplane and/or rudder noises picked up by hydrophone suggested that the U-boat might be diving deeper. At 1244 HMS Pink made her fourth attack, ten charges set to 350 and 550 feet. This time Atkinson felt confident that he had made an accurate and successful drop. He was confirmed in that confidence during HMS Pink’s run out by hydrophone reports of blowing tanks. Then, about 500 yards astern, three huge bubbles followed by numerous smaller ones broke the surface of the water. HMS Pink turned back and closed the position to observe the “boiling”:

“… The water in the vicinity [was] considerably aerated in appearance and green and white like shallow water. Tangible evidence of destruction was greedily and most enthusiastically searched for, but nothing further was seen. It was realized that my little convoy was drawing away and was now some distance ahead and also unprotected, but I decided to risk this and to continue with the hunt.”

With asdic showing that the U-boat was quite deep and practically stationary, Atkinson decided on a second Hedgehog salvo, which was fired at 1302. But, again, the Hedgehog disappointed as all twenty-four projectiles exploded on striking the water (!) Giving the hunt one last go, Atkinson set up for another deep ten-pattern drop, commencing his run in at 1307, course 110°, speed 13 knots, eight light D/Cs fused for 350 and 550 feet, and two heavy charges with Mark VII pistols to give extra depth fused for 700 feet. (The depths were all guesses, since the Type 145 asdic then in use on corvettes did not indicate the target’s depth. The first operational depth-determining asdic, Type 147, would not be available until September 1943. It was not known that a U-boat could dive deeper than 700 feet [213 meters] until June 1943.)

Opening the range to 1,500 yards, HMS Pink listened for an echo, but there was none. Nor was there any evidence on the surface, which Atkinson returned to inspect. At 1325 he abandoned the hunt and shaped course for 240° at 15 knots to rejoin his convoy 10 miles ahead. Fourteen minutes later, HMS Pink was shaken by a powerful underwater explosion, “like a deep grunt,” which left Atkinson “in no doubt as to the fact that the U-boat was destroyed.” He was sorely tempted to turn back and see what the surface might reveal, but since his convoy had been unprotected for an hour and a half, he decided that to do so was not prudent.

Atkinson’s report on his five-pronged attack was reviewed by the Admiralty’s U-Boat Assessment Committee on 28 June 1943, and the conclusion was drawn that “this attack was probably successful and it is assessed as ‘Probably sunk.’ ” By 20 July 1943 the Admiralty was convinced that it knew the identity of the U-boat sunk: “The sinking of this submarine, which was U-192, has since been confirmed.” In the subsequent literature from Roskill to Syrett, U-192 (Oblt.z.See Werner Happe) has been identified as the fatal victim of HMS Pink on 5 May. We know little about Happe’s boat, which had sortied from Kiel on 13 April, because she was lost at some point in the battle and her documents went down with her. A KTB based on messages sent to her was reconstructed in Berlin, but it is not revealing; no response was heard by BdU since 3 May, from qu AJ 3757, and on 6 May (again on 9 May) she was declared a total loss. It is now clear that U-192 succumbed on 6 May (see below), in a sad finish to her first and only patrol.

The better fit as HMS Pink’s target is U-358 (Manke), the slayer of Bristol City and Wentworth. Analysis of the KTBs of the participating boats shows that U-358 was in the approximate same position as HMS Pink, astern of ONS.5 (U-358 at 1000: 54°52’N, 43°3o’W; Pink at 0954: 54°56’N, 43°44’W), and that over a period of one hour and a half she experienced a prolonged pounding from “69 well-placed depth charges.” HMS Pink, in fact, dropped forty-three D/Cs and twenty-four Hedgehog rockets; the latter may have sounded like D/Cs when they exploded on contact with the surface, but they would have gone off with near simultaneity. In his description of the event, Manke was not certain about the number of escorts present or about the category of his pursuer, mistaking HMS Pink for a destroyer, but he correctly cited a separate “small convoy”:

“At 1042 we sighted a small convoy: 3 steamers, 1 destroyer, and 1 corvette. The boat was heard [asdic] by the destroyer. Then 1½ hours of depth charges followed: 69 well-placed depth charges [Wabos]. The destroyer criss-crossed above the boat continuously. He must have a good hydrophone because he used asdic only for a short time before attacking. In addition, he employed doppler effect, and 50 seconds later the depth charges came.”

Afterwards, Manke surveyed the damage: diving cells Nos. 1 and 5 were out of service; the tower hatch leaked badly; there were numerous electrical breakdowns; four battery cells were cracked; there was leakage in the cooling jacket of the outer exhaust cutout; torpedo Tube 5 was inoperable for underwater launches; the stern hydroplanes could not be moved beyond 10 degrees; and the boat produced loud noises throughout the interior. After he surfaced to make what repairs he could, Manke discovered that his diesels could not produce more than 10 knots speed. He signaled a report on his condition to BdU, and at 1731 the next day he received a response: RETURN DIRECTLY TO BASE WITHOUT REPLENISHING.

It was not a kill. But it was as good as a kill. In judging U-358 to have been the U-boat involved, it is useful to note both that no other B7 or Support Group escort made a sustained attack during the time period when HMS Pink was attacking, and that no other U-boat reported being attacked during the one hour and thirty minutes when U-358 was absorbing her punishment.

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For Atkinson, elation quickly turned to ashes: “At 1453, my worst fears materialized.” About three miles astern of his small convoy, augmented since noon by the arrival of a fifth straggler, S.S. Yearby, the corvette Captain saw a “huge column of smoke” rising from the port wing ship, West Madaket, which immediately began to settle by the stern. Only one ship was sunk, but it was misfortune enough. The “another U-boat” in Atkinson’s conundrum was U—584, commanded by Kptlt. Joachim Deecke. This Type VIIC boat was a veteran of several North Atlantic patrols; had sunk a Soviet submarine (M-175) on 10 January 1942; and on 17 June (GST) of the same year had deposited four German saboteurs (all of whom were captured and executed) on the beach at Ponte Vedra, Florida. Now U-384 was submerged at 1400 on 5 May in qu AJ 5695 (5447’N, 44°12’W) :

“Enemy is in sight [by periscope], course 250°, speed 9 knots, 4 steamers, 3 of them overlapping. Enemy zigzags 20° to 230°. At 1443 I launch a 4-torpedo fanshot—Tube 4 fails to launch—at 2 overlapping steamers, bearing right 85°, range 2000 meters. The freighter in front is 5000 GRT. The one behind it is larger, and possibly, to judge from its long fo’c’s’le, is a tanker. In the foreground is a small vessel, possibly a corvette. After 4 minutes, 48 seconds, and after 4 minutes, 52 seconds, there are 3 torpedo detonations. 5 minutes and 20 minutes later there are two additional detonations, most likely boiler explosions followed by the bursting of bulkheads. After 44 minutes the first steamer sinks, and after 90 minutes the second goes down. The sinking noises are clearly made out [inside the boat]. A corvette drops warning depth charges [Schreckwasser-bomben], but they are far off.”

By this point the reader may have come to suspect that U-boat Commanders, as a species, were uncommonly given to observation errors, if not to self-deception. With claims of two sinkings instead of one, Deecke was the latest in a line that included Junker (U-332), who claimed two hits (that subsequently were credited him by BdU) when he had made none; Hasenschar (U-628), who made four claims, including a “vaporized” corvette, but had only one actual hit, plus an artillery coup-de-grace to Harbury; and Looks (U—264), with three claims and two actuals. Further, as we have seen, there have been reporting errors in ship types, in times required for vessels to sink, and in the quantity of tonnage destroyed.

Endemic to U-boat claims throughout the war were euphoric tonnage figures, as in Manke’s (U-358) claim of 8,000 tons for the 2,864-GRT Bristol City. Although Dönitz had urged his Commanders to “estimate cautiously and accurately—we are an honest firm!", they nonetheless sometimes inflated their figures either through mistaken observation, or misinterpretation of an end-of-run detonation for a Treffer (hit), or old-fashioned wishful thinking. Yet the reader would want to know that all these same defects characterized reporting by U.S. Navy submarine skippers in the Pacific war being conducted at the same time against Japan. A postwar analysis by the U.S. Joint Army-Navy Assessment Committee (JANAC) drastically reduced the number of sinkings and tonnage sunk by U.S. submarines from 4,000 enemy ships and 10 million tons claimed to 1,314 ships and 5.3 million tons actually sunk. In one individual example, the leading U.S. submarine ace of the war, Richard H. O’Kane, had his numbers reduced from thirty-one ships and 227,800 tons claimed to twenty-four ships and 93,824 tons actual.

There was only one ship torpedoed by Deecke on 5 May 1943, and it was West Madaket. A sudden jar was felt by those on board the vessel, and the Officer of the Watch and several crew members saw a large geyser of water rise on the port quarter. The torpedo must have penetrated a good distance into the hull, survivors said, because a 5-by-2½-foot hole was torn in the starboard side. Almost at once the stern sagged. Inspection of the deck, where there was a large crack in the plating amidships, convinced the ship’s Master, Captain H. Schroeder, that the freighter’s back was broken, and he ordered Abandon Ship. The entire crew of sixty-one, including twenty-two D.E.M.S. gunners, who never saw a target, made it into boats safely. In the interim, the other four merchantmen turned to starboard and performed what Atkinson called “some remarkable and spectacular zigzags.”

When HMS Pink caught up to West Madaket, he carried out an Observant, dropping D/Cs intermittently to keep the U-boat down. These were the “warning charges” heard by U-584. The lifeboats were widely scattered and Atkinson endeavored to muster them so that he could make a pickup of survivors while hove-to in the shortest possible time, knowing full well that Pink would make an inviting target during the operation. When he approached the boats and found them filled with as much luggage as humanity, he ordered the men out and the luggage left. Then he told the Oerlikon crews to use the boats and luggage for practice fire. Finally, by 1600, without hindrance, he had everyone on board, and could turn his attention to the canted hulk of West Madaket.

Although her Confidential Books were safely overboard in a metal container, Atkinson decided to assist the broken merchantman to sink, which he accomplished by firing down her side two D/Cs set to 50 feet from his starboard throwers. “The result was devastating,” he stated four days later. “She split as if cleaved by an ax amidships, sinking in two separate pieces and turning turtle as she sank.” (To the writer he said, dryly, “That U-boat didn’t sink West Madaket. I sank her.”) Atkinson was surprised that she left no trace of her passing despite the fact that her bunkers contained 540 tons of oil. Now Pink set course to catch up with her remaining four charges while her crew busied themselves making room on the tiny corvette for threescore American passengers.

During the daylight hours of 5 May, two functioning merchantmen, Dolius and West Madaket, were torpedoed. But in exchange, the Germans took a beating of their own. HMS Sunflower sank U-638 (Staudinger), and Pink mauled U-358 (Manke), which was compelled to move off for return passage. On the same day, in a reprise of the U-439/U-639 collision on 4 May, U-600 (Kptlt. Bernhard Zurmühlen) slammed into U—406 (Kptlt. Horst Dieterichs) at 0905 in qu CG 1746, off the coast of Spain, necessitating the return of both boats, which, like U-439 and U-639, had occupied adjacent stations in Group Drossel. The accident took place with the two boats on the surface in good visibility (gute Sicht), seas Force 3–4 with medium swell. Unaccountably, U-600 came into view on U-406’s port side and took a collision course toward the latter boat, which frantically flashed a recognition signal (Erkennungssignal) and turned hard-a-starboard, both engines emergency full (äußerste Kraft voraus!). Without deviating, the bow of U-600 rammed into U-406’s hull just forward of the port diving tank. Both boats were compelled by the damages inflicted to make a Rückmarsch, U—600 to La Pallice, U-406 to St.-Nazaire.

The first U-boat kill by a surface escort had been posted, and the list of damaged and retreating U-boats was lengthening. So, too, was the list of sunk merchantmen, of course, but the ONS.5 hemorrhaging was about to stop, following one last, and spectacular, U-boat success. Three weeks into her second North Atlantic Feindfahrt, the Type VIIC U-266 launched four torpedoes in rapid succession at 1950 on the 5th. We have no details of her attack because the boat, with her documents, was destroyed later in the month. A KTB reconstructed in Berlin based on F.T.s received cites this signal from boat commander Kptlt. Rolf von Jessen:

“Sank one [ship] of at least 5000 GRT and a second, based on sinking noises, probably also 5000 GRT. Two further detonations were definitely heard. At 2150 [GST] the enemy was positioned at AJ 8359, course 200°, speed 7 knots.”

Three ships were hit in this action: British steamers Selvistan and Gharinda, followed by the Norwegian steamer Bonde, at 1,750 GRT the smallest ship in the convoy. What Sherwood called “reliable survivors” from the British vessels reported that the torpedoes were seen approaching from port. Since the three victims were positioned toward the starboard side of the convoy, indications were that U—266 had penetrated inside the columns. That Bonde was two columns farther toward the convoy’s center, and that her survivors sighted and engaged a periscope on the starboard beam, persuaded Sherwood that the U-boat torpedoed the British vessels with his bow tubes and the Norwegian with his stern.

First hit was the 5,136-GRT Selvistan, owned by the Hindustan Steamship Company of Newcastle, whose First Officer, Mr. C. D. Head, was on the bridge at the time. To port side he sighted something moving near the surface that he took to be a porpoise, since it was “spouting water.” It crossed in front of Argon’s bow in the adjoining column and then, halfway to Selvistan, it leaped above the surface, revealing itself to be a torpedo. Head described it as “silvery grey,” and thought that because of its slow speed, perhaps 10 to 12 knots, it was nearing the end of its run (G7a torpedoes normally ran at 40 knots, G7es at 30). Though he rang Full Speed Ahead and put the helm hard to port, the ship lacked sufficient speed to swing clear and the torpedo impacted the port side with a dull explosion in No. 5 hold, showing no flash, but sending hatch, beams, and ballast skyward. No more than five seconds later, a second, unseen torpedo punctured the No. 4 hold with exactly the same effects and result.

Quickly, the steamer settled by the stern, and in a matter of only two minutes submerged from view. In that fractional amount of time it was not possible to lower either of the two main lifeboats, but the Master and crew did manage to launch two small bridge boats and the forward starboard raft, on which, or clinging to which, they floated off. Five crewmen were declared missing and one other man, a D.E.M.S. gunner, had a grave head wound from which he would die before rescue. First Officer Head stated later that the Indian firemen, who were the only men to share his boat, “were simply no use at all; they just sat in the boat, praying to Allah to save them, but not attempting to do anything to save themselves.” Fortunately, after three-quarters of an hour, the forty men who survived were lifted on board the frigate Tay. Since HMS Tay’s asdic was inoperable, Sherwood had assigned his own vessel to the rescue mission while directing HMS Offa and HMS Oribi to carry out Observant around the sinking position.

Second to be hit by U-266 was the 5,306-GRT Gharinda, owned by the British India Steam Navigation Company of Glasgow. This freighter, with a large crew of ninety-two, including six Navy and four Army gunners, had straggled on 3 May, owing to heavy weather, and had not regained contact with the convoy until 1100 on the 4th. “About two minutes” after Selvistan was torpedoed, Gharinda s Master, Captain R. Stone, estimated, this second British vessel was struck by a torpedo in No. 1 hold on her port side. There was a flash, a very loud explosion, and a towering column of water that rained down on the bridge, carrying with it the hatches of No. 1 hold. The force of the explosion twisted both derricks and blew them over to starboard. Since the ship began to settle rapidly by the head, Stone threw overboard the Confidential Books and rang Abandon Ship. Five of the six lifeboats were successfully lowered except that, owing to a crewman’s error, one of the five nose-dived into the sea and swamped.

Stone made a quick inspection of the ship to make sure no one had been left behind, then joined one of the boats. A short time later, he entertained the notion of returning to his ship to see if she could be saved, even though the propeller and rudder were out of the water. The notion, however, was doused by Tay, which arrived on the scene and began “hauling up” the survivors; Stone related tersely that he had been “hauled up by the scruff of my neck.” Sherwood told Stone that he could not indulge him in his desire to return, because he had to go after the survivors of Bonde, which also had been torpedoed. Bereft because of the loss of his ship, Stone could have drawn comfort from the fact, had he known it, that his was one of only two ships torpedoed in ONS.5 that did not lose a single man. If First Officer Head was disappointed with the performance of his Indian crewmen off Selvistan, Stone was favorably impressed by his own sixty-eight Indians, of whom he said:

“I am extremely pleased with the native crew, because they showed no sign of panic at any time. I think this is partly due to the fact that on board my ship no English is spoken, all orders are given in the language of the natives, which I consider helps them to understand what is going on, and therefore they are not liable to panic. I would specially like to mention the Indian Quarter Master, Shareatullah, son of Aboth Allee, who in spite of the debris which was falling on the Bridge, remained at his post at the wheel until ordered to his boat by me.”

The thirteenth and final ONS.5 merchantman to die at sea was bantam Bonde in column 8. Chief Officer M. MacLellan of S.S. Baron Graham remembered:

“The Bonde was the little ship we all admired so much in that convoy. In such a vast expanse of sea, she looked so tiny as she courageously battled through the heavy weather, frequently disappearing from view completely in the heavy seas and swells. The first thing I used to do as daylight broke in my morning watch was to look for our little friend, and if she was still bobbing along the day was made.”

To Captain Stone of Gharinda we owe our knowledge of what happened to Bonde. Just after his own ship was torpedoed, Stone was on the bridge about to throw his Confidential Books overboard when he saw the Oerlikon gunners on Bonde open 20mm fire against a periscope sighted close on her starboard beam. It was the first time in ONS.5’s voyage that D.E.M.S. gunners engaged a U-boat. Stone ordered his own Oerlikons to fire in the direction where Bonde s shots were splashing. A few seconds later, he saw and tracked a torpedo wake approaching Bonde s starboard side. The nearby Vidette also reported seeing torpedo tracks on the steamer’s starboard beam. “Then,” said Captain John Gates of Baron Graham, who was also watching, “there was an explosion and [Bonde] seemed to jump up in the water. When the smoke and spray of the explosion had cleared away, the Bonde was already standing on her end with her bow and foredeck vertically out of the water. I looked away for a few seconds and in that time the ship sank.” There had been no time to lower boats or rafts. When Tay came around to pick up survivors she found only twelve men from the crew of thirty-eight.

Alarmed by the sudden loss of three ships, Commodore Brook ordered an emergency turn of 90° to port, which was executed successfully beginning at 1950. He would resume base course at 2045, at which hour Sherwood ordered the escorts to resume station, excepting HMS Offa and HMS Oribi, which had been conducting Observant around the sinkings. At 2039 HMS Offa gained a firm asdic contact and during the next hour and 38 minutes made five large-pattern attacks. HMS Oribi joined in the hunt but was unable to acquire contact. McCoy’s onslaught resulted in extensive damage to U-266, the slayer of Selvistan, Gharinda, and Bonde. Kptlt. von Jessen reported suffering damage to diving tank No. 3, trim cells, Junkers air compressor, and starboard dynamotors. Forced to move off for repairs, the boat never rejoined the Fink line, eventually being sunk by an aircraft on 15 May. With no evidence of a kill or damage, HMS Offa broke off the action and shaped course for the convoy, taking Oribi with her. Explained McCoy: “Heavy W/T activity indicated that the convoy was threatened with annihilation and I considered it imperative to return to it before dark.”

In the meantime, at 1954, a VLR (Very Long Range) B-24 Liberator, Aircraft J/120 from RAF Coastal Command came out from Reykjavik, appeared overhead and made R/T contact with Sherwood. Its appearance gladdened everyone in the convoy. Sherwood asked the pilot to search astern for stragglers and wrecks. This the Liberator was able to do for only 45 minutes until, reaching PLE, the pilot and Sherwood had this exchange: Aircraft: “Don’t want to go, but have to.” Tay. “Thank you for your help.” Commodore Brook observed that this Iceland-based bomber was the first air escort he had seen since 2 May, “though air support was so sadly needed.” (He must have missed seeing the B-17 Fortress from Gander on the 3rd; the two Cansos (PBY Catalina flying boats) from Gander on the 4th were too distant to be seen.) He might have wondered, though, why he was not seeing aircraft from Newfoundland at this hour late on the 5th, when Gander and Torbay were not far distant. An RCAF Canso of Eastern Air Command did sight four “single vessels,” probably stragglers, between 0810 and 0845 earlier in the day but made no contact with ONS-5’s main body. A second Canso intended as escort for the convoy crashed on takeoff from Gander, killing five crew members. According to a message from RCAF headquarters in Ottawa on 7 May, a B-17 Fortress from Gander met ONS.5 during a ten-hour sweep on the 5th, though its presence was not observed by either Sherwood or Brook. The message containing this information about the Canso and the Fortress was sent to Washington to counter “comment” in the U.S. Navy Department that, “Apparently there was no air support for ONS.5 on 5 May and this [was] assumed to be due to weather.” The RCAF response essentially agreed that foggy weather was the reason.

At ONS.5’s position the Atlantic surface was calm, there was no wind, and the air was heavy with drizzle and mist. The convoy ships in contact with the Commodore numbered twenty-three in ten columns, on course 202°. As darkness embraced the wrinkled sea and a high volume of HF/DF activity engaged HMS Tay s receivers, Sherwood once again deployed his close escort forces for nighttime vigil: HMS Tay ahead, his broken asdic on listening watch only; HMS Sunflower on the port bow; HMS Vidette on the starboard bow; HMS Snowflake on the port quarter; and HMS Loosestrife on the starboard quarter. The port and starboard beams were uncovered. HMS Pink was still occupied with her small flock astern, and the two EG3 destroyers HMS Offa and HMS Oribi were assigned to positions five miles out on each bow. At BdU in Berlin, Admirals Donitz and Godt were drawing up their own plans for the night, expressed in four W/T exhortations to the Fink boats, of which fifteen are known to have been in contact with the convoy in the evening and early nighttime hours.

HASENSCHAR CONVOY BOATS SHOULD REPORT THEIR CONTACTS AND POSITIONS MORE FREQUENTLY.ALL ARE TO MAKE THE MOST OF THE GREAT OPPORTUNITY TONIGHT OFFERS.TO THE MEASURE THAT THEIR ANTI-AIRCRAFT ARMAMENT IS IN ORDER BOATS ARE TO STAY ON THE SURFACE AND FIRE WHEN AIRCRAFT APPEAR. THE AIRCRAFT WILL THEN SOON CEASE TO ATTACK.IF THERE ARE NO MORE MERCHANTMEN THERE TO BE SHOT UP SINK THE ESCORT VESSELS MAKING FULL USE OF MAGNETIC EXPLODERS.

The mist of early night thickened to fog and drizzle. The U-boats could be seen, phantomlike, mustering on the surface. Tay sighted seven boats in close proximity. They may have been the same seven seen by Günter Gretschel in U-707:

“I am positioned within sight of seven boats, in front of the convoy. I wanted to make a joint attack in the darkness. Unfortunately, the weather has thwarted our plans. The visibility has gotten very bad, with fog and drizzle, and this makes any attack impossible in the pitch-black night.”

Gretschel and the weather notwithstanding, between the hours of 2252 on the 5th and 0947 on the 6th the Fink boats made no fewer than twenty-four attempted attacks on the convoy from every direction except ahead. And at battle’s end the night did not belong to the U-Bootwaffe, as Berlin had expected. Instead, thanks to a dense fog bank, to shipborne centimetric radar, and to the pluck and skill of the escort Captains, the night belonged to the Royal Navy, which not only protected ONS.5 and HMS Pink’s Party from further harm, but sank four of the U-boat attackers and damaged and repeatedly drove off other boats or forced them to dive.

The escorts made twenty attacks of their own during the hours named. Every ship of B7 and EG3 was engaged, churning at full speed across the ocean surface in this direction or that, throwing and dropping D/Cs, firing guns, or ramming, then quickly rejoining the screen. Ships of First Escort (Support) Group, when they came on the scene at 0600, similarly threw themselves at the enemy with great energy. In the midst of which actions Commodore Brook ordered another convoy emergency turn, 90° to starboard at 2310, resuming course at 2336, and evasive turns to 186° at 0100 and to 156° at 0200, in conditions when visibility was one mile by 2202 and 100 yards by 0100! Around and inside the convoy columns, combat was fierce, continuous, and confusing. Proving that sea warfare is one of the most confounding of human activities, the night of 5/6 May proceeded in such seeming disarray that at its conclusion, Sherwood threw up his hands and conceded, “It is quite out of the question to give a detailed account in chronological order.”

In the narrative that follows an effort will be made to place a template of order over the tortured seascape by focusing on the principal actions of individual escorts, while leaving aside the parries and thrusts that had no known results. Throughout, it bears keeping in mind that whereas the shipborne Type 271 RDF (radar) oscilloscopes were displaying to Sherwood’s men bright, clear U-boat echoes that conveyed enemy positions and ranges, the U-boat Commanders, lacking comparable equipment, were groping about blind. Said Günter Gretschel on U-707: “Surfaced, pitchblack night, fog, can’t see your hand in front of your face” [Hand nicht vor dem Augen zu sehen].

Advantage: U.K.

[merdiolu]

7 BEYOND ALL PRAISE

The Battle for ONS.5

In the submarine war there had been plenty of setbacks and crises. Such things are unavoidable in any form of warfare. But we had always overcome them because the fighting efficiency of the U-boat arm had remained steady. Now, however, the situation had changed. KARL DÖNITZ

The seven-day battle fought against thirty U-boats is marked only by latitude and longitude and has no name by which it will be remembered; but it was, in its own way, as decisive as Quiberon Bay or the Nile. CAPTAIN STEPHEN W. ROSKILL,D.S.C., R.N.AT 2309*

ON THE 5th, HMS Vidette was in escort position “C,” starboard bow of a fog-blurred convoy anxiously keeping station by whistle, when she acquired a radar contact nearly dead ahead bearing 200°, range 5,100 yards. Hart sounded action stations, altered course slightly, and increased speed to 18, then to 20 knots. At 2317 a second, smaller echo came in from a radar contact bearing 190°, 7,200 yards. Six minutes later, Hart sighted a U-boat ahead steaming away at high speed. Directly after the sighting, the U-boat commenced a dive and by 2325 it was fully submerged 700 yards ahead. Hart ran over the still-visible diving swirl and at 2326 fired the first of a ten-charge pattern; the tenth D/C left the throwers 25 seconds later. Nearly a minute after the last gray geyser, the bridge personnel, D/C crews, and engine room ratings heard a large underwater explosion, after which members of the D/C party as well as the Engineer Officer at the top of the engine room hatch observed a dark column of water rising between 300 and 600 yards astern.

Hart considered the U-boat to be seriously damaged if not destroyed. The NHB/MOD reassessment credits him with the destruction of U-531, a Type IXC/40 boat commanded by Kptlt. Herbert Neckel. Launched only nine months earlier by the Deutsche Werke yard at Hamburg, U-531 was on her first war cruise, having sortied from Kiel on 13 April. Two and a half hours earlier, this boat had reported sighting two destroyers in qu AJ 8368. Neckel, a native of Kiel, had earlier served under Kptlt. Fritz-Julius Lemp on U-30, which had sunk the British passenger liner Athenia on the first day of the war, with the loss of 112 passengers. Now his war was over, too.

Instead of seeking an asdic confirmation, Hart went after the second radar contact, which was then at range 2,000 yards. Reaching 900 yards, he sighted the U-boat, which soon after appeared to alter course 30° to starboard and to dive. At 2333 Hart laid a five-charge pattern over the submerged boat’s estimated position. After opening range to 1,200 yards, he returned to sweep the area by asdic, but made no contact. While returning to his escort station, he swept the position of his first attack, but there, too, he made no contact. It may well be that one of the U-boats known to have been damaged this night suffered that hurt from HMS Vidette’s second attack, probably U-707 (Gretschel), which recorded suffering D/C damage at about that time.

After resuming station at 0125, HMS Vidette went an hour without a contact, until at 0226 radar showed a U-boat bearing 230°, range 1,500 yards. Increasing speed to 20 knots, Hart altered course toward the target, but just past range 700 yards the radar echo disappeared into the ground wave. Starshell fired was of little use in the existing fog, but Hart dropped one D/C set to 50 feet just to assure the intruder that he was not being ignored. Back in station, HMS Vidette obtained, and pursued, two other radar contacts, at 0310 and 0341, but with no better luck than she had on the 0226 chase.

Then, at 0406, when the destroyer was sweeping back to the convoy screen, her luck changed. The asdic operator reported a contact. One minute later, the contact was classified as “submarine,” bearing 097°, range 800 yards. Hart decided to attack with the Hedgehog, and at 700 yards he told the H.H. crew that he would give the order to fire by voice pipe, since, owing to electrical shorts caused by water penetration, the fire buzzer was not reliable. The recorder showed a relative speed of approach to the target of nine knots; it showed, furthermore, that the U-boat was moving slightly to the right, calling for a deflection of 3° right on the projectile pattern. With the last center bearing at 108° and the gun put at iii° to allow for a 3° throw-off to the right, Hart gave the fire order at 0408.

All twenty-four H.H. bombs were successfully fired and there were no prematures on impact with the water. About three seconds after the last splash, lookouts heard two distinct underwater explosions—H.H. projectiles, which were not fused for depth, did not ordinarily explode unless their nose pistols struck a solid object—and, furthermore, observed flashes. Shortly afterward, the Asdic Control Officer reported “very loud” blowing of tanks and “metallic banging noises.” As HMS Vidette maintained course and speed, the First Lieutenant and the D/C party reported that the U-boat appeared to be surfacing on the starboard side. It did not do so, but on that side there was a pronounced disturbance on the surface that Hart thought was caused by air escaping the U-boat.

Asdic contact was lost at 120 yards past the point of attack, and though the point and surrounding area were reswept, contact was not regained. No debris appeared on the surface, but Hart was certain on this one: “In my opinion this U-boat was destroyed.” And he was right. The boat was U-630, commanded by twenty-eight-year-old Oblt.z.S. Werner Winkler, a native of Wilhelmshaven and a product of the “Olympic” Kriegsmarine officers’ class at Flensburg-Mürwik in 1936. A Type VIIC boat, still on her first-ever combat patrol, U-630 had one merchantman to her credit, the British frozen-meat ship Waroonga, sunk with the loss of seventeen seamen during B7’s escort of HX.231 in early April. Now U-630 herself plunged into the locker with twelve unexpended torpedoes and forty-four untold stories of froth-corrupted lungs.

At 2326, while steaming on the convoy’s starboard beam, the corvette HMS Loosestrife obtained a radar contact bearing green (starboard) 8o°, range 4,700 yards. Her captain Lt. Stonehouse altered course to pursue and eight minutes later, sighting the contact moving from right to left on the surface, opened up with Oerlikons and one four-inch round at a range of about 800 yards. The 20mm tracers could barely be seen through the fog caroming off the enemy’s tower and upper hull, as the U-boat careened like a wraith through a catacomb, and then dived. Asdic contact was gained at 300 yards and the corvette attacked it with a ten-charge pattern by recorder trace. The NHB/MOD reassessment believes that the target was U-575 (Kptlt. Günther Heydemann), which was undamaged. With no visible result, HMS Loosestrife resumed station at 2345. Another radar contact soon after proved to be HMS Vidette.

At 0009, in a reshuffle on the convoy screen, Stonehouse was ordered to transfer his vessel to position “H for Harry,” starboard quarter in A.C.I.'s screening diagram N.E.6, which was his very good luck, since in that position, at 0030, he detected the boat that he would kill: U-192, a Type IXC/40 on her first patrol. Commanded by Oblt.z.S. Werner Happe, a native of Alfeld/Leine, south of Hannover, and a graduate of the “Olympic” class of 1936, U-192 had sortied from Kiel, Germany, on 13 April, and on 1 May, in qu AJ 3797, had launched a torpedo that missed one of the ONS.5 merchantmen, identity not known. Now, at 0030 on 6 May, U-192 appeared as a small pulse echo on HMS Loosestrife’s radar set, bearing red (port) 95°, range 5,200 yards. Stonehouse rang up emergency full ahead and went after it.

Six minutes later, the blurry form of Happe’s boat came looming before the lenses of Barr and Stroud Pattern 1900A 7 x 50 binoculars on board Loosestrife, where lookouts called out the range—500 yards— which was a remarkable sighting given the fog. Just as remarkable, Happe’s lookouts apparently sighted the corvette at the same instant, since the U-boat abruptly turned to release the venom in her tail, launching two torpedoes from stern tubes, and then commenced a “violent zigzag” ahead. HMS Loosestrife’s gun crew loaded the four-inch with H.E., but held their fire since Stonehouse’s intention was to ram.

At 0040 U-192 commenced an alarm dive on about the same course very close ahead. As she did so, HMS Loosestrife ran directly up her wake. Failing to make ramming contact, Stonehouse fired a ten-charge pattern set shallow. When the D/Cs released their anvil-like blows, the U-boat was observed to break surface, where, seconds later, she shuddered from an interior explosion. The mortally wounded frame was enveloped in a “greenish-blue” flash, which was the description given by several on board the corvette, including two lookout numbers specially posted aft to confirm results. The officer in charge aft watch also saw debris thrown up from the U-boat. Inside the corvette’s engine room and boiler room the deck plates lifted in reaction to the explosion, leading some of their occupants to fear that Loosestrife’s stern had been blown off. After Stonehouse turned to investigate, his First Lieutenant and Yeoman of Signals saw “an immense patch of oil spreading from port hand to starboard bow” as well as floating debris. In combination, the explosion, oil, and debris constituted as definite a confirmation of destruction as Stonehouse was likely ever to get, excepting the retrieval of a Commander’s white cap. While his after-action report does not mention it, one may suppose that after so long an ordeal at sea, there was prolonged hearty cheering by ship’s company. Certainly we know there was elation among HMS Loosestrife’s passenger list of twenty-nine survivors from Bristol City, whose Master, A. L. Webb, said: “The whole action was extremely exciting, and all my crew thoroughly enjoyed themselves.” U-192 sank with all hands. Stonehouse then set a course of 200° to the convoy, where he resumed station at 0105.

V-class Royal Navy destroyer HMS Vidette , credited with two U-Boat kills during passage of convoy ONS.5

The next success belonged jointly to HMS Oribi and HMS Snowflake. First, HMS Oribi. This EG3 destroyer was in station five miles on the convoy’s port bow when, at 0252 her asdic operator reported, “Echo bearing green thirty—close.” Lt.-Cmdr. Ingram had to make an “instantaneous decision” whether this contact was a U-boat or the corvette HMS Sunflower, which was thought to be nearby. Since he had no radar contacts to starboard, where HMS Sunflower would have shown up as a blip, Ingram swung his ship to that heading, where, with huge relief, he sighted not the corvette but a U-boat sliding out of the fog about one cable (608 feet) on the starboard bow, steering from right to left. It was a perfect plot for a ram, and Ingram’s bridge braced for the impact. Oribi had been proceeding at 22 knots, but her speed now was somewhat attenuated by the drag met on turning to starboard. As the destroyer bore down, the fo’c’s’le hid the U-boat’s conning tower, and the stem plowed into the enemy hull probably abaft the tower. The force of the collision slewed the boat around to port side, where, in Ingram’s words, “she heeled over with her bows and conning tower out of the water.” While a shallow D/C pattern had been ordered, there was no time to get it off; furthermore, the impact of the ramming had broken the light that illuminated the clock and plot.

Worried about damage to his bows, Ingram ordered slow both engines and asked for reports. The forepeak and lower central store were flooded, he learned, but the flooding was contained by a still watertight bulkhead abaft. The asdic dome it was found by trial was slightly damaged, but there was no interior evidence of underwater damage to the hull. At 0310 a still seaworthy HMS Oribi turned to port and searched for wreckage from the U-boat. Visibility had improved to about two cables, but lookouts found no sign of the ramming victim except for “a very strong smell of oil over a very wide area,” indicating a puncture of the U-boat’s portside fuel bunkers. At 0314 the asdic operator reported both asdic and hydrophone contact with a U-boat at green 50°, range 1,100, and Ingram pursued, though at a reduced speed of 12 knots, since the forward bulkheads had not yet been shored. At 0318, by stopwatch, HMS Oribi dropped a single charge, set deep, on the last estimated position. At 0332 the search was abandoned, and Ingram shaped course to resume station, at which he had no further actions during the night.

Said Ingram in his report of the ramming: “Taking into account own ship’s speed and the damage sustained by herself, together with the force and angle of impact I have no doubt whatsoever that this submarine was sunk.” It was a perfectly reasonable conclusion, one that was concurred in by the Admiralty’s U-Boat Assessment Committee, on 21 June 1943. In fact, however, the U-boat struck, Type IXC U—125(Folkers), survived the ramming, though with serious damage rendering her unfit to dive. At 0331, Kptlt. Folkers reported his plight to BdU: HAVE BEEN RAMMED—AM UNABLE TO DIVE. QU AJ 8652. REQUEST ASSISTANCE. COURSE 90 DEGREES; and heard back assurances from nearby boats U-552, U-381, U-413, U-260, U-614, and XJ-402 that they were proceeding to his succor. Three hours later, at 0625, BdU ordered only the first four boats named above to tend to the needs of Folkers and his crew; the latter two were to remain on operations. The four rescue boats hunted for Folkers until the morning of the 7th, when they reported failure and broke off to refuel from the tanker U—461 in the adjoining Marinequadrat AK 89 directly to the east.

Enter HMS Snowflake, which made the BdU rescue order moot. This corvette earlier, at 0231 and 0238, had dropped three heavy charges on U-107 (Gelhaus) as scare tactics. At 0330, while in station R, on the port quarter, Lt. Chesterman received a radar echo bearing 030°, range 4,100 yards, and, after advising HMS Tay, commenced a chase. Fog had closed the visibility to one mile, and starshells were useless, so when he had closed to gun range, Chesterman directed four-inch fire at the target by radar alone. At 0340, the U-boat, which had been working to southward, dived before being sighted. Snowflake immediately obtained asdic contact at a range of 400 yards. Running over the contact at 0341, Chesterman dropped his penultimate D/C, a heavy charge set to 140 feet.

At the moment of dropping, HMS Snowflake acquired a second radar contact bearing 170°, range 2,400 yards, moving rapidly left. Chesterman altered course to intercept and again engaged with the four-inch. While firing, HMS Snowflake received yet a third radar echo bearing 185°, range 1,000 yards. Fearing a torpedo attack by this third, nearby boat, Chesterman broke off his gun action against the second boat and turned to attack the third, which immediately dived. With asdic contact bearing 16o°, range 700 yards, Chesterman began a run in with his last D/C, but for some reason the asdic operator lost the contact before an attack could be made. Meanwhile, at 0349, HMS Tay, to whom Chesterman had been reporting his three pursuits, signaled by R/T: “Sunflower assist Snowflake.”

HMS Snowflake then began an asdic and radar sweep through the last known positions of the three submerged boats. Chesterman commanded the operation from his action post in the center of the compass platform with, to his left, voice pipes to asdic and plot, and to his right, voice pipes to radar and plot. At 0354, radar picked up a fourth boat— on the surface, low in the water, and apparently stopped, since the range was closed rapidly. Visibility was bad. At 0400, when range had decreased to 100 yards (!), Chesterman ordered on the starboard searchlight. Its sword of white light revealed directly ahead a U-boat heavily damaged about the conning tower, under power though, working rapidly to starboard. Chesterman ordered the wheel put hard-a-starboard with intent to ram, and opened fire with every available weapon that could be brought to bear, scoring a number of hits. The U-boat averted being rammed head-on, but Snowflake, maneuvering inside the U-boat’s turning circle, came to dead slow alongside its starboard side, where only a few feet separated the two vessels, and illuminated its tower and deck with the port searchlight and ten-inch Signal Projector.

That close, Chesterman could see that the enemy boat was down by the stern, the tower was crumpled, the periscope standards were warped, the flak guns were crippled, and the after hatch cover had been blown off. That close, too, HMS Snowflake ‘s guns could not be depressed enough to continue fire, so Chesterman ordered a slow withdrawal. As the corvette drew back, the U-boat settled farther by the stern, causing air bubbles to rise from the submerging after hatch. Some German crewmen abandoned the boat at this point; some others lined the foredeck; but a few, more determined and belligerent, or perhaps more desperate, made for the forward deck gun. That endeavor was frustrated by HMS Snowflake s port Oerlikon and 40mm pom-pom guns. An officer was seen on what remained of the tower, waving his arms as a sign of ceasefire or surrender. When this was ignored, the rest of the crew went into the sea.

The U-boat’s sinking led Chesterman for a time to think that in coming alongside, his port bilge keel had rammed the U-boat’s starboard side, but on closer view he found that this was wrong. Suddenly five scuttling charges were heard from the sinking U-boat, the first charge louder than the rest. Sweeping with lights through the survivors, HMS Snowflake saw some in a small dinghy, but most swimming singly through a large oil patch. Since HMS Sunflower was now present, Chesterman thought that the survivors might be taken on board the two corvettes and delivered to St. John’s for interrogation, and he so suggested to HMS Tay. Rescue, no doubt, was what the German crew was expecting when they scuttled. Sherwood’s reply by R/T was as fatal as it was laconic: “Not approved to pick up survivors.” Though Sherwood offered no reason, it is probable that he considered it too dangerous for the corvettes to remain stationary, rescuing survivors in the middle of an ongoing battle.

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In the following minutes one of HMS Snowflake’s searchlights revealed Sunflower dangerously nearby, and both corvettes put wheel hard to avoid collision, which would have been a doubly sad event, since the Australian Chesterman on HMS Snowflake and the Canadian Plomer on HMS Sunflower commanded “chummy” ships, so much so that in B7 they had become known as HMS Snowflower and HMS Sunflake. Leaving then the forty-eight-man crew of U-125, for it was the same boat that had been rammed by HMS Oribi, to bob upon the corpse-ridden sea, HMS Snowflake, with HMS Sunflower, steamed off to other echoes. The panische Angst felt by the U-boat crew, who watched from meager flotage the withdrawal into fog of their only earthly hopes, is, of course, beyond verbal expression.

HMS Snowflake’s R/T log for the attack period fairly crackles with the teamwork displayed by the two corvettes:

TO TAY FROM SNOWFLAKE:“R.D.F. contact eight o’clock.” 0330.“U-boat dived, chasing another.” 0340.“Second U-boat dived, chasing third.” 0345.“Am attacking with charges—last charge.” 0346.

TO GROUP FROM TAY: “Sunflower assist Snowflake.” 0349

TO TAY FROM SNOWFLAKE:“Not attacking with charges. All three dived. Am not in contact. Resuming station.” 0330.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM SUNFLOWER :“Do you wish my assistance?” 0332

TO SUNFLOWER FROM SNOWFLAKE : “Yes. R.D.F. contact bearing two-six-zero degrees, three thousand yards from me.” 0334.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM SUNFLOWER:“I will pass round you and investigate.” 0336.

TO SUNFLOWER FROM SNOWFLAKE:“Have rammed U-boat. Please join me.” 0401.“Areyou in contact with me?” 0403.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM SUNFLOWER:“Am proceeding in your direction.” 0403.

TO TAY FROM SNOWFLAKE:“Shall I pick up survivors?” 0407.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM SUNFLOWER “Am in contact with you, three-one-five degrees, three-five-zero-zero yards.” 0410.

TO SUNFLOWER FROM SNOWFLAKE:“Investigating another echo and leaving survivors.” 0411.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM Tay:“Not approved to pick up survivors.” 0412.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM SUNFLOWER:“Am in your immediate vicinity.” 0413 [the time of the near collision].

TO SUNFLOWER FROM SNOWFLAKE:“Sorry. Am resuming my station. Glad none of yours hurt. Have one charge for one more.” 0417.

TO SNOWFLAKE FROM SUNFLOWER:“Nice work. Don’t mention it. Where shall we go next?” 0418.

After that exchange, HMS Snowflake dropped the last D/C in her stowage and resumed station.

Since HMS Offa’s five attacks earlier that night from 2039 to 2218, this EG3 destroyer had rejoined the convoy on the starboard bow; assisted HMS Vidette, who was giving three U-boats a headache around the midnight hour; proceeded over to the convoy’s port bow to provide cover for an alteration of course to 156° at 0200; gained, regained, then lost a radar contact; and finally, at 0300, regained and held the contact, bearing 258°, range 4,400 yards. The amplitude of the echo received on HMS Offa’s as Type 272 RDF equipment plainly indicated a U-boat, which the destroyer’s plot showed to be proceeding at 12 knots on a course of 190°. Captain McCoy increased speed to 20 knots and set a course of 210° to intercept. At 0312, with range at 500 yards, radar contact disappeared in the ground wave, but hydrophone effect picked up the characteristic high-pitched rattle of fast diesel engines on the same bearing. At 0314, the effect grew fainter, leading McCoy to assume that the U-boat had dived. HMS Offa altered course slightly to starboard, and soon after, lookouts sighted a wake. The boat had not dived after all, and hydrophone effect became loud again. McCoy hauled out to port clear of the wake, took a course parallel to that of the boat, and at 0315 ordered the twenty-inch Signal Projector switched on.

Brightly illuminated on the starboard bow at 100 yards was a light gray-painted Type VIIC U-boat, trimmed down, with after casing awash. Abaft the tower was “a metal framework,” which would have been the Wintergarten. Immediately, HMS Offa opened fire with the starboard Oerlikons, the main armament and pom-poms being unable to depress enough to gain aim, and several hits were observed against the conning tower. At 0316, when the U-boat began a crash dive, McCoy ordered the wheel put hard-a-starboard to ram. The ship’s bows began the turn, but the U-boat’s dive, at about eight knots, was very steep and the conning tower was observed to be disappearing safely under the ship about level with the bridge. McCoy himself could see the hull of the U-boat under the surface as HMS Offa passed over and ahead. In his after-action report he described what happened next:

“Then I gave the order to fire [D/Cs]. This order most unfortunately miscarried. During the hunt I had twice given orders for the throwers:—in the first instance: “Ready Port,” and in the second instance: “Ready Starboard”; but at the moment when I put the helm over it became obvious that the starboard throwers only would be required and I gave the order “Ready Starboard.” These were fired correctly but when I followed this up with an order to “fire everything” the man at the pump lever to the traps was so obsessed with the order to fire the starboard throwers only that he failed to fire the traps and so the barrage from the traps, which would have been laid down in a curve over the U-boat, was not dropped and certain destruction was not obtained.”

Though the failure to fire was “lamentable,” as McCoy stated elsewhere, and whereas Admiral Horton himself lamented later “the failure of a rating to carry out an order at the critical moment,” the CinCWA judged McCoy to have conducted this operation “in a very able manner.” And while neither man would know it at the time, the detonations of the starboard throwers were sufficient to cause slight damage to the U-boat involved, which, it turned out in a recent reassessment, was U—223 (Oblt.z.S. Karljüng Wächter). That boat, which had a bit of ginger taken out of her this time, would be rammed later, on 12 May, but survive again, until finally succumbing to four British warships on 30 March 1944.

At 2240 on the 5th, HMS Sunflower was manning station “M” on the port bow when Lt.-Cmdr. Plomer’s radar received a pulse echo from 4,300 yards. HMS Sunflower altered course and closed the contact at 14 knots. The U-boat dived and asdic pursued it. At 200 yards from the contact the bearing began moving from left to right. Following, the corvette dropped six and fired four D/Cs in what Plomer called “our best D/C attack—almost exercise conditions.” Just before the D/Cs went overside, at 2251, HMS Sunflower picked up a second radar contact at 3,400 yards, and Plomer decided to pursue that one at once, in order, we may conjecture, to keep the U-boats off their stride. As he did so, asdic told him that a torpedo was approaching from red (port) 20°. He watched as it passed down the corvette’s port side. Immediately, radar picked up yet another contact at 2,800 yards, but now Plomer decided to pursue the U-boat that had attacked him, and at 2258 he sighted it close ahead.

HMS Sunflowers deck gun opened fire, but on the third round the cartridge jammed in the breach. Without an operative main armament, Plomer altered course to starboard at 2305 in an attempt to drive underwater his radar contact of fourteen minutes before. Two minutes later, asdic reported incoming torpedoes—a “full salvo”—from the boat he had just been pursuing. Putting helm hard-a-port, then point back, HMS Sunflower managed to be 30° off pointing when the salvo arrived down the port side. Plomer signaled HMS Tay at 2312: “Have broken off chase, fired two H.E.s [high explosive rounds], could not gain.” Two minutes later, however, his gun reported clear, and Plomer decided he was back in the game. For the next three and a half hours he chased five contacts, firing Hedgehogs at one and a five-charge D/C pattern at another, but all without result. The NHB/MOD reassessment believes it possible that these attacks were delivered against the same target, U-954 (Kptlt. Odo Loewe).

At 0443, while back on station “N,” 6o° on the convoy’s port bow, HMS Sunflower received a firm asdic contact at 1,200 yards. The U-boat, it turned out, was in the act of surfacing. Plomer closed at 14 knots in 300 yards visibility and found the German fully surfaced broad on the port beam, on a converging course. He switched on his searchlight, and the U-boat immediately commenced a dive. Plomer then ordered hard to port rudder and double emergency full ahead. In the last seconds before impact hard to starboard was ordered as a course correction, and in Plomer’s description, the corvette rammed the U-boat between its conning tower and stern, riding over the U-boat’s casing like an icebreaker over ice. As she passed, Sunflower dropped two D/Cs set to shallow; a moment before they detonated, the corvette’s crew heard another distinct “heavy explosion.”

Plomer was persuaded that the U-boat had broken in two, since his two asdic domes underside were undamaged. His last sight of the U-boat, he said, was of her stern projected about 8 feet above the surface at an angle of 45°. All guns that could bear were brought into action. With no further contact showing on asdic, and convinced that the U-boat had sunk, Plomer set course to rejoin the convoy. Among the spectators of this encounter were the Master and sixty-five other survivors of M.V. Dolius, who had been picked up by HMS Sunflower the day before. Said Captain Cheetham: “I and my crew thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.” While the corvette’s asdic was still fully operative, she soon discovered defects from the ramming, including leakage in the fore-peak. Furthermore, she signaled Tay by R/T: “My steering is erratic as gyro is out of action and magnetic compass shaken up a bit. Please give me a wide berth. 0505.”

In his after-action report Plomer pronounced the engagement a “kill.” Similarly, Captain J. M. Rowland, R.N., Captain (D) Newfoundland, called it a “certainty”. In London the Admiralty was less convinced. Complaining that Plomer’s report contained no details about exterior damage inflicted on the corvette, or about any wreckage, oil, or survivors seen in the water after the ramming, the U-Boat Assessment Committee expressed doubt that the U-boat had been effectively rammed, much less cut in half. It was much more probable, the Committee argued, “that after a glancing blow the U-boat slid off.” And it gave no credence to the suggestion of an internal explosion. As for the two depth charges, it was unlikely that they were in the lethal range. The assessment, given on 21 June, therefore, was: “Probably slightly damaged.” But the Committee’s finding may have been disingenuous, for one of its members always consulted Rodger Winn in the OIC Tracking Room for an opinion. While Winn never transmitted raw Enigma to the Committee, or even divulged to it explicit information drawn from Enigma, it is known that both before and on the date of the Committee’s deliberations, Winn held in hand a decrypt of a transmission from U-533 (Oblt.z.S. Helmut Hennig) to BdU, intercepted at 1137 on 6 May and decrypted at 1917 on 9 May:

RAMMED ASTERN BY A DESTROYER [SIC] THAT APPEARED OUT OF THE FOG, LOCATING ME BY SEARCHLIGHT. DEPTH CHARGES. AM MOVING OFF TO REPAIR. BOAT WILL BE READY AGAIN IN 18 HOURS. QU AJ 8683

At 1000, U-533 surfaced and made off to the east on course 90° to undertake repairs. These completed by 1800, she continued east, then northeast on 7 May to join sixteen other former Fink boats in forming Group Elbe (after the river). That group and a ten-boat Group Rhein (after the river), organized from former Amsel III and IV boats, were to occupy a 550-mile-long patrol line across the expected courses of two eastbound convoys, HX.237 and SC.129 (see chapter 10). The wounded U-533 successfully took her place in line.

At daybreak on the 6th, four of the five ships making up the First Escort (Support) Group (EGI), the sloop HMS Pelican and frigates HMS Wear, HMS Jed, and HMS Spey—the slower cutter HMS Sennen was on a different course to support Pink—were closing on ONS.5 from the southwest. In line abreast, four miles apart, their bows cleaving the swells and fog, the warships rode down spur and rein, on 030° at 16 knots, like a seaborne Seventh Cavalry. Numerous R/T signals between busy B7 and EG3 escorts helped the support group home in on the convoy by HF/DF, and at 0550, Wear reported the convoy bearing 330°, 8 miles. The group was now inside the Fink concentration. Senior Officer, in HMS Pelican, was Commander Godfrey N. Brewer, R.N., who, after a year at sea in 1939–1940, had been posted to the Trade Division of the Admiralty as Convoy Planning Officer, where he had the advantage of seeing the “big picture” of convoy warfare. “Escaping back to sea,” as he put it, in spring 1942, he returned to Atlantic escort duty with EGI.

At 0552, HMS Pelican obtained a small radar contact bearing 040°, range 5,300 yards. When it was classified as “submarine,” Brewer closed the contact, keeping it about 10° on the starboard bow to avoid the ship’s “blind spot.” From the bearing and rate of change in the range, it soon became apparent that the U-boat was on a heading reciprocal to that of the group. Brewer thought that it either had just been driven off after attempting an attack or was proceeding ahead to take up a daylight submerged bow ahead attack position. When the range was 3,000 yards at 0557, HMS Pelican began hearing faint hydrophone effect on a bearing of 160°, and several minutes later, when the range had been closed to 500 yards, lookouts sighted a bow wake on the starboard bow.

At 0607, range 300, the U-boat itself became visible on the foggy surface, steering 180°, doing about nine knots, as Brewer judged from the relative speed of approach. It was, he said, “a normal 570 ton type [VIIC] painted a dark colour.” When about 100 yards distant, and fine on the port bow, the U-boat crash-dived, turning to port as she sank. Pelican’s A and B guns and the port Oerlikon opened fire. Brewer swung to port under full rudder and placed his bows just inside the conning tower swirl. As he passed, he fired a ten-pattern set to 50 and 150 feet. After the explosions, a “very weak and hard to hold” echo was regained, and about a minute later, the Officer in Charge and most of the D/C crew sighted at the explosion area what they described as “two thin founts of water, resembling shell splashes.” Brewer came around for a second attack, and during the run-in, with the contact moving very slowly right, hydrophone effect detected various strange noises resembling an Echo Sounder set being switched on and off. This time nine charges set to 150 and 300 feet left the throwers and rails, after which there was no further contact.

A minute and a half later, HMS Pelican heard three “small sharp” explosions together with the same switching noises as before; and nine minutes after that, HMS Pelican heard two more explosions, the second of which shook the ship. None of the explosions, Brewer remarked, sounded like the detonation of a torpedo or a depth charge. Though afterwards HMS Pelican carried out an Observant around the attack position, no wreckage, oil, or survivors were sighted. But based on circumstantial evidence, Brewer’s “considered opinion” was that the U-boat was probably sunk. On 28 June the U-Boat Assessment Committee, basing its conclusion largely on tracking evidence and on the fact that there were no further W/T transmissions from this boat (as Donitz and Godt noticed, too, as early as the end of the day, 6 May), agreed with Brewer’s opinion. So does the recent NHB/MOD reassessment. The victim was U—438 (Heinsohn), which had been damaged by Canso PBY Catalina flying boat “A” E of 5 Squadron from Gander on the afternoon of the 4th. In good cavalryman fashion, Brewer stated: “This was a good example of a support group arriving at just the right moment to achieve complete suprise."

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Brewer might have swept about further, seeking other boats to rend and tear, but for the fact that ONS.5 badly needed reinforcement of the close screen, and defending convoys still had the edge over hunting Uboats in escort doctrine. With EGI’s arrival, McCoy on HMS Offa decided that he ought to escort the other remaining EG3 destroyer, HMS Oribi, out of the endangered area as quickly as possible and see her to safety at St. John’s: by daybreak, as a result of her ramming action, HMS Oribi’s forepeak and provision room were both flooded. Accordingly, HMS Offa detached at 0809, ordering HMS Oribi to join and adding a personal message to Ingram: “I should say you have done bloody well during the past 24 hours.” The two destroyers made port at 1215 on 8 May.

The B7 flotilla left behind was sore beset by battle fatigue and fuel depletion from the night’s running fight; furthermore, with HMS Sunflower licking wounds from her ramming of U-533, HMS Snowflake lacking D/Cs, and HMS Tay with no asdic, HMS Vidette and HMS Loosestrife were the only effective ships on the screen of the main body. So HMS Pelican and HMS Jed took up stations ahead and Brewer detailed HMS Spey and HMS Wear to sweep twenty miles astern. Much later, at 2300, slow-gaited Sennen would join HMS Pink with her four merchant vessels in company. On her course toward that rendezvous, which took her to the west of the main body, HMS Sennen acquired two radar contacts, five hours apart, at 0740 and at 1244, which enabled the 1,546-ton ex-U.S.C.G.C. Champlain and her captain, Lt.-Cmdr. F. H. Thornton, R.N.R., to participate in the final moments of the battle. The first contact was obtained bearing 289°, range 4,000, and four minutes later HMS Sennen sighted the U-boat diving at 2,500 yards. When asdic contact was gained three and a half minutes later, Thornton commenced an attack with a ten-pattern set to 150 and 300 feet. Following the attack, which was made at 0753, Sennen regained and lost contact three times, eventually giving up on it and resuming course. Thornton judged that the attack was unsuccessful: “Pattern fired late due to poor recorder trace, and probably too shallow.” The NHB/MOD reassessment agrees and identifies the cutter’s contact as U-650 (v. Witzendorff), which had been the shadower in Group Star.

HMS Sennen ‘s second radar echo at 1244 led to a more persistent effort, as the feisty cutter made no fewer than five separate attacks, two by Hedgehog, and three by D/C, at 1255,1342,1405,1436, and 1522. As in the earlier incident, the U-boat was sighted in the act of diving, this time at 4,000 yards. By asdic recorder Thornton first fired Hedgehog, with no explosions; then attacked with D/Cs set to 150 and 385 feet; then fired Hedgehog, with, again, no explosions; then made two successive D/C attacks, the first of ten set to 150 and 300 feet, the second of five set to 550. With no surface evidence to confirm otherwise, Thornton concluded that the U-boat was “probably not more than badly shaken.” The NHB/MOD reassessment concludes that the U-boat received “minor damage,” and identifies it as U-575 (Heydemann).20 Thornton then proceeded from the area on his original course in order to conserve D/Cs and Hedgehog ammunition, since he had learned that Pink was short of both, and “there were still a large number of submarines in the vicinity.… ”

While trawling astern of the main body, HMS Spey obtained a radar contact on the port bow, range 5,200 yards, closing rapidly. The time was 0940. Commander L. G. BoysSmith, R.N.R., rang up full speed and altered toward the contact, which was soon classified as “submarine.” At 900 yards the U-boat was sighted in the morning’s thick mist, crossing from starboard to port at an estimated 12 knots. To BoysSmith the boat resembled the large “Dessie” Class Italian submarine. He ordered the frigate’s four-inch to open fire and altered to port, hoping to ram. The U-boat dived at 400 yards, but not before the gun crew got two definite hits, one on the conning tower base and one on the hull, and a third possible. The second hit threw up a heavy shower of debris. Pom-pom and Oerlikon fire also raked the tower as it slid beneath the waves.

HMS Spey quickly established asdic contact and BoysSmith ordered a ten-pattern D/C attack, with lights set to 50 and heavies to 140 feet, carried out by eye over the clearly visible diving swirl and wake; the eyeball order was confirmed by recorder trace. When contact was regained on the port quarter after the attack explosions, HMS Spey set up a Hedgehog attack. Asdic showed that the U-boat had turned at about two knots but contact was lost at 500 yards, indicating that the target had gone very deep by the time the H.H. was fired. There were no explosions. With a contact astern at 700 yards, HMS Spey launched a third attack, employing ten D/Cs set to 500 and 550 feet, after which contact was not regained.

At this point, HMS Wear joined in the sweep, and a less than confident contact was obtained, held to 400 yards. Ten charges set to 150 and 385 feet were delivered by Spey, after which all contact was lost. In Boys-Smith’s opinion, his four attacks were “inconclusive.” The U-Boat Assessment Committee decided: “Probably slightly damaged.” The NHB/MOD reassessment is that U-634 (Oblt.z.S. Eberhard Dahlhaus) suffered damage from four-inch gunfire but none from D/Cs. Dahlhaus’s KTB reveals that he was wounded in the neck by a splinter. His F.T. to BdU reads: a full hit by destroyer artillery after surfacing. port air supply trunk bridge torn away. heavy d/c and radar pursuit. BoysSmith’s target was not a large boat, after all, but a standard VIIC, with 114 more days of life.

It was after HMS Spey’s attack that the battle’s fever broke. At 1140, having sensed the dimensions of what Germans later would call die Katastrophe am ONS.3 (Catastrophe of Convoy ONS 3) , Dönitz and Godt ordered the Fink boats to break off operations. Amsel I and II boats were to head for qu BC 33 (5o°33’N, 39°15’W) and the remainder were to move off to the east, some for replenishment of fuel and supplies from U—461 in AK 8769.23 The order was a recognition that Dönitz and Godt had lost what could have been a drawn battle had they discontinued at dusk on the 5th. In a veiled concession that they had instead reached a night too far, the two German Admirals signaled their Commanders:

THIS CONVOY BATTLE HAS ONCE AGAIN PROVED THAT CONDITIONS ON A CONVOY ARE ALWAYS MOST FAVORABLE AT THE BEGINNING. HE WHO EXPLOITS THE MOMENT OF SURPRISE ON THE FIRST NIGHT, AND PRESSES HOME THE ATTACK BY ALL MEANS IN HIS POWER, HE IS THE MAN WHO IS SUCCESSFUL. AFTER THE FIRST BLOW IT BECOMES HARDER AND HARDER. IN ADDITION THERE IS THE UNCERTAINTY OF THE WEATHER, AS ON THIS OCCASION, WHERE THE FOG RUINED THE GREAT OPPORTUNITIES ON THE SECOND NIGHT. WE APPRECIATE YOUR HARD STRUGGLE, ESPECIALLY ON THE SECOND NIGHT.

In their wash-up on “Convoy No. 36” at the close of 6 May, Dönitz and Godt concluded that six boats had been lost in the Fink campaign—U-638, U-192, U-123, U-331, U-630, and U-438. “If none of these boats report later, this loss of 6 boats is very high and grave considering the short duration of the attack. The blame can be laid mainly on the foggy period that began at 2100 [GST] on the 5th May.” If the fog had held off for six hours, they contended, the U-boats would have had “a really good bag that night,” but “the fog ruined everything.” They did not concede that staff meteorologists, from a year and a half of U-boat experience in the western Atlantic, not to mention book knowledge, should have known that where the Gulf Stream met the Labrador Current, causing warm water to mix with cold air, there was almost always opaque vapor, especially in the spring, and that the Grand Banks were renowned for their milk-white air. Nor did they concede that the same fog that blinded the U-boats made air cover from Newfoundland impossible for the enemy. Curiously, the Naval Staff at Eberswalde, not many kilometers from BdU, did anticipate the whiteout: “As the enemy is today entering the heavily fog-bound area, it is to be expected that only a small portion of the boats will be able to maintain contact.” This was on the 5th. Whether there was communication with BdU on the point is not disclosed in the extant records.

The U-boat loss count would be even higher, by one, on 23 May, when BdU acknowledged that U-209, damaged by Canso “A” W 5 Squadron on 5 May, had foundered with all hands (probably on 7 May in the vicinity of 52°N, 38°W) during her desperate attempt to make base. And one could add as well the loss of U-710, sunk by Fortress “D” 206 Squadron on 24 April during the first stage of the battle. The exchange rate of U-boats lost for merchant ships sunk in the two stages was alarmingly high, even given the inflated figures of ships sunk that were transmitted by Commanders to Berlin. The actual number of merchantmen lost to U-boats from ONS.5, beginning with McKeesport and ending with Bonde, was thirteen. The number reported to Berlin was nineteen merchantmen torpedoed and sixteen sunk (90,500 GRT), including Hasenschar’s erroneous count of two definites, including a corvette, plus two probables, which led Donitz and Godt to add to their “hard struggle” message, cited above: hasenschar is champion shot. That honor should have gone to Jessen (U—266), with three definites.

In either event, such high losses of one U-boat (using the low figure of six boats) for every 2.16 (using the actual figure of thirteen merchantmen) or 2.66 (using the claimed figure of sixteen) ships sunk was an attrition rate that could not be borne, and as Donitz stated later, “I regarded this convoy battle as a defeat.” More irreplaceable than the boats, and more critical a loss at this period of the war—one remembers the dangerously declining numbers of trained RAF pilots during the Battle of Britain—was the death toll of U-boat ranks and ratings: a total of 364 human casualties.

Also telling, apart from the number of U-boats sunk, was the number of boats damaged by escort action: Seven boats were so severely impaired they were forced back to base: U-386, U—528, U—332 (in the first stage of the battle, 28 April-1 May), U-648, U-732, U-358, and U-270 (in the second stage, 4–6 May). As noted earlier, boats forced home were the tactical equivalents of kills in a convoy battle. Eleven other boats were roughly handled, suffering heavy to light damage: U-413, U-314, U-648, U-438, U-226, U-223, U-533, U-634, U-266, U—267, and U-575. These boats were removed from the scene for a time, either long or short, while they undertook repairs, and thus were not available during those intervals for operations. (Since Professor Blackett considered four boats damaged to be the equivalent of one boat sunk, by that measure 4.5 boats could be added to the tally of those sunk.) Also notable in the defense of ONS.5 were the twenty-odd occasions when U-boats were driven off or forced to dive; submerged, it bears repeating, they were greatly retarded in their ability to make nighttime attacks. And mention should be made of several boats, such as U-552 (Kptlt. Klaus Popp), that were forced to retire by reason of fuel depletion.

Finally, the records disclose a failing that was endemic to the U-boats in this period and for some time prior: most were not pressing their strength in numbers and most were not taking their shots. Although Fink boats made approximately forty attacks, the vaunted BdU wireless control system seems never to have directed more than fifteen boats at a time into close contact with the convoy, the usual number brought to bear being no higher than nine. In the late forenoon of the 5th, BdU had expostulated: there are forty of you. And the boats in contact correctly reported the convoy’s position and base course all through the battle, as Enigma intercepts disclose. What was the problem? Was it perhaps the low level of command experience, previously noted, that inhibited the effective maneuver and attack of certain boats? Or did low fuel levels in many boats perhaps induce a caution that led those Commanders “to lose the name of action?” Or did the aggressive behavior of the escort screen, which punched as often as it counterpunched, simply succeed tactically in holding the majority of boats at bay? The textual record would support all three possibilities.

In W/T transmissions to Berlin on 5/6/7 May, a significant percentage of the boats reported large numbers of unexpended torpedoes. It is not unusual to read, for example, in the traffic from U-223 and U-378 on 5 May: 12 e torpedoes, 2 a torpedoes, their full complement for a VIIC boat; or in that from U-514 on 6 May: all torpedoes, or in that from U—231 on 6 May: all eels. (This was a longtime besetting weakness of the U-boat force, of which only a little more than 50 percent of boats actually engaged in combat operations sank or damaged an Allied vessel during the war.) That so large a concentration of boats, deployed in such favorable position, should have come up short in torpedo launches must have cast a pall of doubt over BdU planning for future operations.

Fog was not alone to blame for the defeat. Dönitz and Godt stated, “The operation against Convoy No. 36 also had to be broken off because of enemy radar.” It was obvious that in low-visibility conditions the convoy escorts had been able to readily locate the positions of surfaced U-boats, and without the boats learning of their exposure by means of the standard Metox search receivers. The surface escorts, and aircraft, too, it was reasoned, must be equipped with some new kind of detection equipment. Finding an answer to this problem was of “decisive importance” for submarine warfare. “To sum up,” they wrote on 6 May:

“Radar location by air and naval forces not only renders the actual attack by individual boats most difficult, but also provides the enemy with a means of fixing the stations manned by the submarines and of avoiding them, and he obviously makes good use of this method. Radar location is thus robbing the submarine of her most important characteristic—ability to remain undetected. All responsible departments are working at high pressure on the problem of again providing the submarine with gear capable of establishing whether the enemy is using radar; they are also concentrating on camouflage for the submarine against [radar] location, which must be considered the ultimate goal.”

Dönitz’s son-in-law Günter Hessler, who served on Godt’s operations staff, wrote after the war that staff thinking at the time was that the Allies were using either a radar wavelength beyond the capacity of the Metox to detect (which was correct) or a nonradar device such as infrared rays. He expressed the dismay of the staff that in the just-completed operation, “surface escorts alone had sufficed to inflict grave losses on an exceptionally strong concentration of attackers.” Where the Allies spoke of the “U-boat menace,” the Germans now spoke of the “radar menace.” Unless that menace could be quickly and effectively countered, Hessler said, the position of the U-Bootwaffe would become “desperate.”

In his Memoirs, Dönitz, too, stated that in further convoy operations conducted in poor-visibility conditions, which were a common occurrence in the North Atlantic, the U-boats would be helpless. The Allies’ radar advances, furthermore, would enable convoys to take effective evasive action. And radar was not the only technical problem the Germans had to face at this juncture. Hessler informs us that there was consternation expressed after Convoy No. 36 about the fact that British warships were now equipped with powerful new deep-plunging D/Cs as well as with Hedgehogs, about which BdU had learned earlier from decryption, agents, and practical experience. The panoply of weapons arrayed against the U-boats was increasingly sophisticated and effective, particularly since new tactical refinements to “under-water location,” or asdic, had made possible accurate depth charge pursuits on days and at times “when there was fog.”

In their 6 May appreciation Dönitz and Godt also took serious notice of the danger posed to U-boat patrol lines by Allied air escorts, which had “always forced our submarines to lag hopelessly behind” convoys and had prevented them from scoring hits, “especially when naval [surface] and air escorts cooperated efficiently.” They predicted correctly that “the only remaining [air] gaps will be closed within a reasonable length of time by land-based planes, or at any rate by using auxiliary aircraft carriers.” Finally, the Dönitz/Godt wash-up deplored the fact that except for the Pi 2 magnetic influence pistol and a few other minor innovations, “as yet we possess no really effective weapon.” This was a stunning concession. They concluded: “The submarine’s struggle is now harder than ever, but all departments are working full out to assist the boats in their task and to equip them with better weapons.”

They gave no hint, at least here, that they feared insecure W/T communications; although, in fact, Allied cryptographic sources played no role in the defense against Fink, and most naval Enigma from 5/6 May was not decrypted until the 9th. They made no mention, either, of HF/DF, which, despite ample cryptographic and operational evidence, both BdU and Naval Intelligence analysts continued to believe was limited to shore-based installations. Refusal to admit the possibility of shipand aircraft-borne HF/DF had yielded substantial tactical advantage to the Allies, and would continue to do so.

Nor did they mention that their long-established principle of concentrating the largest possible number of boats on an individual convoy—in this case nearly one-half of the whole Atlantic force—rather than make fewer attacks on a greater number of contacts had let six other convoys pass unmolested, and had immobilized the attacking force for a week afterward, during which time boats had to be refueled or replaced.Nor was there any mention in the BdU war diary, or in Hessler’s recollections of the BdU mind in early May, of a decline in crew morale and confidence resulting from recent reversals. As shown in the prologue, this was a recurring subject of speculation in the OIC Tracking Room in London, where, at least since 19 April, Rodger Winn had observed in W/T traffic what he thought was an increasing anxiety among Commanders.

So far, by the close of 6 May, the beleaguered circle held. Surviving U-boats in the mid-Atlantic regrouped to fight another day, and another night. As the deadly duel continued, there was no question of the fighting spirit exhibited on either side.

While they had no way of knowing about BdU’s order of 1140 halting offensive action, no doubt the B7 and EGi escorts were aware during the late forenoon and early afternoon hours of the 6th that an eerie peace had drifted out from the enveloping fog. There had been no known German torpedo attack against a merchant ship or escort since 0527, when U-192 (Happe) launched a brace of stern tube eels at HMS Loosestrife. The U-boats were still about, as HMS Pelican, HMS Sennen, and HMS Spey had proved, detecting three on the surface between 0551 and 1244, but there had been no observations of periscope wakes or torpedo tracks, which one might have expected on the daylit sea, even in its gauzy cover. Most of the boats appeared to be lying doggo below, outside of asdic range. By an ironic twist, which most hands probably noted, during the preceding night it was the U-boats that had become the quarry, and the escorts the hunter. Perhaps no one was more elated to receive that understanding than Commodore Brook, on Rena, who entered a condensed account of “this big Convoy Battle” in his final report, and set down the score as he learned it from HMS Tay.

What was left to do, besides mopping up attacks by HMS Sennen at 1244 and by HMS Jed, which would make the final D/C attack on a probable U-boat contact at 2357 that night, was the collecting of merchant ships that had become scattered in the black and the fog, and the refueling of HMS Vidette from British Lady beginning at 1130.37 That completed, the convoy proceeded without incident toward the Western Ocean Meeting Point (WESTOMP) at 48°11‘N, 45°39’W, east of St. John’s, where Canadian warships out of Newfoundland were scheduled to relieve the ocean escort. At 1500, Sherwood’s Mid-Ocean Escort Group B7 and Brewer’s First Support Group were joined by the Canadian Western Local Escort Force (WLEF), W-4. They were four corvettes, by name: HMCS. Barrie (SO), HMCS Galt, HMCS Buctouche, and HMCS Cowichan. All the assembled forces together with the convoy columns continued toward WESTOMP, the Navy and Merchant Navy crews of B7 and ONS.5 now having every reason to sense the approaching end of a near three-week ordeal, during which they reached and surpassed the human equivalent of PLE. Their stained, worn ships, having survived both the lash of a stern, impartial sea and the bitterest convoy battle of two world wars, rose and dipped with a sober gravity.

Behind ehind their weary screws flowed runnels of gray and white Grand Banks wash. Beneath their keels the Atlantic shoaled on the continental shelf. The long billows of the central ocean gave way to a shorter and choppy surface, while on either beam squadrons of gulls parked on the water to announce the impending shore. What was best, we may believe, the scent of victory was in the air. No one yet could let down his guard, and none could forget merchant mariners left behind in the deep transepts of the cathedral sea, but a lightened mood understandably took hold among all ranks and ratings, whether under the white ensign or the red duster. There was occasion now for the concertina, the George Formby song, dominoes, “uckers” (ludo), or cribbage. And a long unburdening sigh.

Game, set, and match: U.K.

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That night, at 2357, HMS Pelican received a signal from CinCWA directing her, HMS Wear, and HMS Jed to part company from the convoy at daylight on the 7th, if convoy considered no longer threatened, and to proceed at economical speed astern of the convoy to search for torpedoed ships that might still be afloat. They would find no derelicts, but on the forenoon of the 8th, in thick fog, they sighted wreckage and empty lifeboats. After several course changes to support convoys ON.181 and ONS.6, as directed by CinCWA, the three support ship vessels returned through heavy broken pack ice to St. John’s, arriving on the 12th.39 At 1650 on the 7th, on orders from HMS Tay, HMS Vidette and HMS Loosestrife disengaged from the convoy to escort three vessels to St. John’s: British Lady, Empire Gazelle, and Berkel (the last of which had survived the collision with Bornholm on 25 April). They arrived on the forenoon of the 9th. The remaining ships of B7, HMS Tay, HMS Snowflake, and HMS Sunflower, parted company for St. John’s on the same day, arriving on the 8th. HMS Pink with her straggler party made the same port on the 9th. As for the main body of ONS.5, destined for Halifax, Boston, and New York, Commodore Brook’s final report read simply (in local time):

May 12th0520 Detached NY and Boston groups with 3 Corvettes escorting.
1100 Formed single line ahead.
1200 Proceeding up Swept Channel Halifax.
1300 Approaching Pilot Station. Convoy completed.

It was twenty days since the departure from Oversay. A few individual stragglers made port in the days that followed.

On shore, the By, EG3, and First Support Group Captains typed up their proceedings and after-action reports. Several of them offered, in addition, their reflections on such topics as convoy routes, the performance of personnel, the endurance of escort vessels, the usefulness of weaponiy and equipment, and U-boat tactics. A preliminary summary of certain of these comments was prepared on 9 May by Flag Officer Newfoundland Force (Commodore H. E. Reid, R.C.N.) for ciphered transmission to Commander-in-Chief North West Atlantic (CinCNA), Rear Admiral L. W. Murray, R.C.N., in Halifax. The summary began with the observation that the convoy battle had been divided into two periods, 28 April to 1 May and 4 May to 6 May, with a three-day gale in between. After noting that scare tactics based on HF/DF bearings had proved successful, the summary continued:

“U-boats were attacking by night in pairs and threes. Possibly 1 day attack delivered by pair. No new tactics in night attacks. By day, U-boats approached from ahead of centre of convoy and fired from between the columns. U-boats were using 2 different H/F frequencies simultaneously during the night of 4th May. Possibly 2 different packs attacked. A.C.I. [Atlantic Convoy Instructions] diagrams and orders used throughout. Experience shows that at night 6 ships is minimum number on [Type] 271 [radar] close screen unless weather permits 1 side of screen to be left unprotected and that 271 fitted ships of Support Group should be stationed at least 8 miles clear of convoy. Cooperation between Escort and Support Group excellent. Little air cover available due to weather which also prevented fuelling of escorts. Tanker “British Lady” did not carry enough fuel. Rescue trawlers proved their use. It is strongly suggested that convoy was routed too far north into ice and bad weather. Only on 1 night after gale had scattered convoy and in rough sea did U-boats gain upper hand. It is thought likely that day attacks will become more and night attacks less frequent as result of this battle.”

Among the individual ship reports, HMS Tay commented: “All ships worked hard, capably, and with intelligence and considerable humour, and the situation was always well in hand.” And again: “All ships showed dash and initiative. No ship required to be told what to do and signals were distinguished both by their brevity and their wit.” Sunflower stated that his asdic team were “most keen and efficient at all times,” and that his D/C team were a close second. The radar operators, with one exception, had no prior sea experience; they compensated for that somewhat by their zeal. The Chief Bos’n’s mate and the Coxs’n had shown exceptional leadership in keeping ship’s company, many of whom were at sea for the first time, up to the best service traditions.

HMS Snowflake observed that the four-inch H.E. was effective in forcing a U-boat to dive when radar reported a boat dead ahead and the gun was trained with sights set to zero: “This obviated the necessity of a long chase.” (The corvette, it is remembered, was slower than the U-boat on the surface.) During a concentrated attack by U-boats, Snowflake recommended, priority should be given to the speed rather than to the accuracy of the counterattack, so that the escort could retake position on the screen in the shortest possible time.

Destroyers HMS Penn and HMS Panther of EG3, which had been with the convoy for fewer than two days (2–4 May) because of fuel depletion, weighed in with comments about their short-legged craft, HMS Penn suggesting that support group operations should be so arranged that destroyers heavy on oil fuel were not sent long distances from base, “as their first need on meeting a convoy is a large amount of fuel,” and bad weather often made refueling impossible. HMS Panther suggested “that Sloops and Frigates (who are not constantly faced with fuel problem) ought to make up support groups, and that destroyers should always form part of a definite escort group”—a suggestion fully concurred with by CinCNA, Rear Admiral Murray at Halifax.46 For his part, Convoy Commodore Brook praised “the splendid work throughout on part of Escorts, not forgetting (SO) HMS ‘DUNCAN’ who unfortunately had to leave Convoy short of fuel just before Convoy Battle materialized.” Senior Officer Peter Gretton was all too conscious of his misfortune as he talked in St. John’s with the B7 captains and read their reports. That misfortune being that he had missed out on the events of 5/6 May, which were, he said, “probably the most stirring of convoy history.” By a combination of “skill, luck, initiative, and sheer guts,” his B7 group, helped by EG3 and First Support Group, had brought off one of the epic victories in the story of sea warfare. Twenty-one years later he would still be tending to his “wounded vanity,” writing: “I shall never cease to regret that I did not risk the weather and stay with them until the end.… The weather did improve and I would probably have been able to fuel.… I had missed the ‘golden moment’ which comes but once in a lifetime.”

Yet Gretton’s wounded vanity should have been assuaged by the commendations that came to him on every side for having trained so capable a force as B7, which, as HMS Tay’s report noted, needed no further instructions on what to do when the hour of maximum danger arrived. Rear Admiral Murray was unstinting in his praise: “The absence of the Senior Officer of By on the big night, while unfortunate and inevitable, nonetheless speaks volumes for the training he is responsible for in this outstanding Group.” Admiral Horton himself commented that it was “a credit to the training of the group that in his [Gretton’s] absence it was so ably led by his second in command, Lt.-Cmdr. R.E. Sherwood, R.N.R., HMS TAY.”

Gretton had been the first to laud Sherwood’s performance. He had been in Tay with Sherwood during the battle for HX.231, and “I knew that he could compete.” In his own analysis of the 5/6 May engagement, produced shortly after the arrival of the B7 Captains at St. John’s, Gretton wrote that, “Lieutenant-Commander Sherwood of HMS TAY handled a very dangerous situation with ability and coolness. I consider he did exceptionally well, being ably backed up by the group.” It is worth adding that the two-and-a-half-ringed reservist won his victory in the presence of two RN Captains.

Route and engagements of ONS.5 , the decisive turning point convoy battle of Battle of Atlantic

With the after-action reports in hand, Gretton offered further comments on the two stages of the battle: He agreed with his Captains that the convoy had been routed too far to the north, where ice and gales retarded forward progress, prevented fueling, and scattered ships. (This view subsequently was endorsed by Rear Admiral Murray. Recognizing that the far northern route had been selected for evasive purposes, Murray concluded, “It is very much doubted if the game is worth the candle.”) Since near Greenland W/T ship-to-shore communication was impossible on any frequency, and the U-boats, which had superior wireless gear, were having the same trouble, the Admiralty should not assume, said Gretton, that a convoy in those latitudes was not being shadowed because of an absence of signals. EG3 was a model of cooperation and assistance, and the presence of HMS Offa and HMS Oribi on 5/6 May made a significant difference in the battle. Aircraft, particularly the Liberators, which flew to the extreme limit of their endurance in appalling weather, deserved great credit for their coverage, as did the RCAF Canso PBY Catalinas from Newfoundland that attacked two U-boats on the 4th, though fog prevented further air assistance from that quarter.

Crediting her as exhibiting “the most outstanding performance” in his B7 group, Gretton singled out HMS Snowflake for “carrying out at least 12 attacks and finally bagging a U-boat"; though in fact HMS Snowflake, which made seven attacks during the voyage, did not actually sink a boat, and the palm might more fittingly have been awarded to HMS Vidette, which sank two. His only criticism was reserved for HMS Pink, which, he said, made “an incorrect decision” in leaving his straggler station to go after a U-boat (U-358) on the 5th, but, he conceded, “I would have made it myself.” In his operation against ONS.5, the enemy had been “dealt a blow that may have far-reaching results on their future tactics and which must inevitably increase the proportion of day to night attacks.”

In what was perhaps Gretton’s most provocative observation—one that would draw comment from the demanding, some would say irascible, Captain G. W. G. “Shrimp” Simpson, R.N., Commodore (D) Western Approaches in Londonderry—he stated that the just-completed convoy battle proved, as had HX.231 before it, that in favorable seas, an efficient close screen in correct station could alone prevent surfaced night attacks on a convoy. Simpson’s read on Gretton’s confidence in the close screen was more differentiated and searching:

“A point which is brought out is that when a close R.D.F. [radar] ring of well-trained escorts is round the convoy they can defeat the U-boat on practically every occasion, as was proved by the action on the night of 28/29 April, when six attacks were beaten off without loss. It is noted that losses to the convoy did not occur until the close screen had been reduced to five and then to four escorts. It is considered that it is essential for the safety of a convoy that there should be eight escorts stationed on the close screen. On the night of 4th/5th May, five merchant vessels were torpedoed after the close screen had been reduced to five escorts, and it is considered that if Offa and Oribi, who were on the extended screen, had been brought in to support the close screen, as was done the following night, better protection for the convoy would certainly have resulted.… Offa and Oribi, disposed singly on the outer screen, could not contribute much to the safety of the convoy and were themselves in considerable danger of being torpedoed.”

Admiral Horton concurred in this criticism, noting only that a close escort of eight was the minimum required “at night under normal circumstances.” Where Simpson went on to criticize Tay for taking the ahead station on the screen when her asdics were out of action, Horton thought that under the circumstances her position ahead was the correct one. And where Simpson criticized the escorts for not firing Hedgehog in incidents where its use was appropriate, and for sometimes using inaccurate depth settings on D/Cs—“the errors have been pointed out to the vessels concerned”—Horton countered generously: “The skill and determination of all escorts engaged in this operation leaves little to be desired.” In that compliment he specifically included the Third and First Support Groups commanded by Captain McCoy and Commander Brewer, respectively, who “loyally gave complete cooperation with the Junior Officer in command of the close escort.” And to all involved he had earlier, on 6 May, sent a W/T message: “My heartiest congratulations on your magnificent achievements.”

Even by-the-book Simpson acknowledged the final showing as “a major victory,” and the fact that there were only two failures among the 340-odd D/Cs fired or dropped by B7 and its support elements he attributed to “a very high standard of depth charge efficiency in these groups, and [that] is definitely the result of stiff training.” In Horton’s comments on Simpson’s appreciation of the ONS.5 screen operations, the CinCWA judged that not only were those operations “a classic embodying nearly every method and form of tactics current at the time,” they probably marked the end of large U-boat pack attacks: “It may well be,” he wrote to the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, “that the heavy casualties inflicted on the enemy have gravely affected his morale and will prove to have been a turning point in the Battle of the Atlantic.” Like Winn, Horton may have been more optimistic than correct about the battle’s effect on German morale. But he was proved right on the second point: In the remaining twenty-four months of war no other U-boat group would attack with the same apparent pluck and confidence. The wolfpack mystique lay at ruinous discount.

How much Horton was now beginning to edge from a defensive to an offensive posture, as a result of this battle and subsequent events in May and early June, is exemplified by his relatively open response to a recommendation put forward on 9 May by Captain McCoy, SO, EG3, in Offa, who thought that evasive tactics, such as those employed in the long routing of ONS.5 to the north, were wasteful and unnecessary. Echoing Gretton’s confidence in the close screen, McCoy argued that, “Escorts that are fitted with radar and which are handled with determination, will always defeat the U-boat at night or in fog.” Therefore, he recommended directly to the CinCWA, “Our policy should be to invite the enemy to attack so that he can be destroyed.” This was to use merchant ships as bait, which Horton had rejected as “undesirable” in his Tactical Policy signal of 27 April. On 14 June, Horton responded (present writer’s emphases): “It is not agreed that it was desirable at the time this convoy was run to route convoys—particularly slow ones—so as to invite attack. If the changed situation which now prevails in the Atlantic were to be maintained, the routing of fast convoys when covered by support groups across the end of a patrol line so as to invite attack by a small number of U/Boats deserves consideration.… “ Even at that date, in mid-June, Horton was guarded and hesitant in his expressions, but in retrospect it is clear that his long-established policy of Defender was tentatively yielding primacy to one of Hunter.

On 13 May, the Newfoundland Daily News published a front-page article under the headline: 10 nazi subs destroyed in convoy attack. The account, datelined London the day before and transmitted by Reuters, was based on an Admiralty communiqué that did not identify the convoy but did give a summary of anti-submarine attacks by escort ships, which were named, and by RCAF aircraft, though the number of U-boats definitely destroyed in the story did not match up to the number in the headline. The Times of London ran basically the same story on the same day, but was more discriminating in citing the U-boat casualties as four destroyed, four very probably destroyed, and two probably destroyed. Following these two accounts, however, there was little public attention and even less scholarly notice given to the Battle for ONS.5. Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who was in Washington, D.C., at the time of the communiqué, sent a congratulatory message to the escorts via the Admiralty on 9 May—my compliments to you on your fight against the u-boats—but eight years later, in 1951, when writing the fifth volume of his history, The Second World War, the volume that treated of the Atlantic war in this particular period, he did not think the battle noteworthy enough to mention.57 Similarly, the official historian of Royal Navy operations during the war, Captain Stephen W. Roskill, D.S.C., R.N., devoted a mere page and a half to the battle in his three-volume history, The War at Sea, 1939–1945, published in 1956. To be fair, he allotted only twenty-one lines to the big battle of SC.122/HX.229 in the foregoing March.

Horton seems to have been the first to have grasped the decisive character of the ONS.5 triumph, suggesting that it would prove to be a “turning point” in the Atlantic struggle. Rodger Winn, in the OIC Tracking Room, wrote sometime within two and a half years of the battle: “This was probably the most decisive of all convoy engagements. It represented the extreme and, as it happens, the last example of coordinated pack attacks.” The Most Secret documents containing Winn’s appreciation were not released to the Public Record Office until 1975. In the meantime, Captain Roskill’s assessment of the place that this individual battle occupied in the war against Germany underwent a striking transformation. Where the most that he was willing to say in 1956 was that ONS.5’s “adventurous passage” had led to “grave losses” for the U-boats, three years later, in a review of Karl Dönitz’s Memoirs in The Sunday Times, he was emboldened to state: “[Dönitz] considers that the passage of convoy ONS.5 in April-May 1943 marked the turning point in the long struggle, and I fully agree with him.” Comparing Gretton and Sherwood to the likes of Hawke and Nelson, Roskill added this flourish: “The seven-day battle fought against thirty U-boats is marked only by latitude and longitude and has no name by which it will be remembered; but it was, in its own way, as decisive as Quiberon Bay or the Nile.” Perhaps, when viewed on the larger stage of World War II, it would not be unreasonable to say that the set-piece Battle for ONS.5 was the Midway of the Atlantic.

The pendulum of war, which had swung so dangerously to the German side in March and had reverted to center in April, now swung sharply to the Allies’ side. In reflecting on the long, bitter combat experienced by both belligerents during the passage of ONS.5, one’s attention is particularly drawn to the B7 flotilla that was the convoy’s original escort. In late April that force of seven warships, of which the majority were corvettes, set out to protect an argosy of forty-three light-ballasted ships whose best speed was seven and a half knots. Their passage would take them through bow-stopping gales and iceinfested seas. Their base course would be anticipated by German intelligence, resulting in their being attacked and chased at their northernmost position. They would have to pass through what remained of the Air Gap, with scanty overhead protection. And then they would fall into the fatal embrace of the largest U-boat attack force ever assembled against a single convoy—a force comprising as many U-boats as, at the time, the convoy and escorts had ships, and five times the number of RN defenders. By any objective standard their condition was desperate. Little wonder that Captain McCoy, whose EG3 had joined in support, said on 5 May that “the convoy was threatened with annihilation.” And merchantmen did suffer grievous losses. But B7 close escort ships alone exacted a heavy toll from their assailants, and supporting escorts, both surface and air, made additional U-boat kills. Every man who had been on board the B7 vessels, starting with Gretton, who drew up the game plan, and Sherwood, who executed it, down to the lowest ratings in the boiler and engine rooms, deserved the highest credit. Against all odds, the B7 ships and crews survived and prevailed. In the long Atlantic struggle against the U-boats, theirs truly was a sword-from-the-stone triumph. In looking through British naval/military annals for comparisons, one is tempted to recall Rorke’s Drift in 1879, where eighty men of the 24th Regiment of Foot defended the mission station against similarly overwhelming numbers. But Captain McCoy of EG3 will have the last word: “The skill, determination, and good drill displayed by all ships of B.7 Group during the time the Third Escort Group was supporting O.N.S.5 was beyond all praise."

Crews of HMS Sunflower and HMS Snowflake together after passage of ONS.5

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8. TO HUNT

The Bay in May

The effectiveness of the present sorties over the Bay can be raised from a low to a real killing effectiveness only when they become part of a larger organized and co-ordinated force, devoted to surprising, hanging on, and killing. STEPHEN RAUSHENBUSH

If we strike a decisive blow at the trunk in the Bay, the branches will wither. AIR MARSHAL SLESSOR

… take up arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing end them. HAMLET, ACT III, SCENE 1

The U-boat has no more to fear from aircraft than a mole from a crow. ADMIRAL DöNITZ 4 AUGUST 1942

IT IS NOT KNOWN WHETHER forty-seven-year-old American economist Stephen Raushenbush had ever seen a submarine or a bomber before he was suddenly posted to London in December 1942 to help develop a new battle plan for the Bay of Biscay. Military tactics were not something in which he had had any great interest since 1917–1919, when he and most of his graduating class at Amherst College went to France with the American Expeditionary Force, he to serve as a volunteer ambulance driver. Though in that capacity he pursued his famous father’s compassionate ideals, he did not follow the Reverend Walter Raushenbush (1861–1918), a leading exponent of the Social Gospel, into the Baptist ministry. Instead, after the Armistice, he studied economics at the University of Rennes in France, worked in the oil industry in Mexico and Venezuela, researched coal and power issues in New York City, taught at Dartmouth College, and served for eight years as advisor on public utilities to the governor of Pennsylvania, while taking time out in 1934–1936 to be chief investigator for the Special U.S. Senate Committee that inquired into the munitions industry. In his spare time he wrote seven books, ranging in subject matter from The Anthracite Question (1923) to The March of Fascism (1939).

His last pre-World War II position, beginning in 1939, was with the U.S. Department of the Interior as chief of the Branch of Planning and Research in the Division of Power. He was described at that period of his life as a reserved but friendly person; he wore a mustache and smoked a pipe; though a registered Republican, he expressed political views that were liberal and progressive. Shortly after Pearl Harbor, he took a leave of absence from Interior to serve as a civilian economist and statistician in the office of the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) in the Navy Department. From there, in late 1942, he was plucked by Captain Thorvald A. Solberg, U.S.N., Head of the Navy Technical Station, Office of the U.S. Naval Attaché (Alusna), London, to undertake air operations planning for the Bay of Biscay.

In the U.K., Raushenbush quickly familiarized himself with the attack opportunities in the Bay as well as with Coastal Command’s disappointing success rate there. Since June 1942 Coastal Command had flown about 7,000 hours and lost aircraft at a rate of about sixteen for every U-boat sunk in the Bay. Since October only twenty-two air attacks had been mounted on the estimated 290 boats that had passed through the Bay. The effort was out of all proportion to the meager results obtained. Raushenbush then set about studying the hardware. Near Glasgow on the Clyde he examined the Type VIIC U-570, captured in August 1941 and renamed HMS Graph, and learned her operating characteristics, paying special attention to the boat’s capacity for remaining submerged (36–41 hours) and the time required on the surface for fully charging her batteries (6.77–7.77 hours).

At various Coastal Command bases he studied the type of aircraft that were being flown on Bay patrols and took fascinated notice of new centimetric radar equipment that was just then becoming available for airborne use. At both Whitehall and Northwood he availed himself of the vast operations research data that had been accumulated by Professors Blackett and Williams and their scientific teams, whom Raushenbush found “tired and exhausted from too many seven day weeks.” From Williams in particular, who had continued Bay Offensive studies at Coastal during the year following Blackett’s departure for other ASW challenges at the Admiralty, and who was later quoted by Blackett as saying that while his scholarly specialty was quantum theory, he “found the subtle intricacies of the U-boat war of comparable intellectual interest,” the American economist drew generous guidance and support. In the end, not surprisingly, plans put forward to Churchill’s A.U. Committee by Raushenbush and Williams would bear a certain resemblance in conception, if not in details.

When he thought he understood the basic problems that the Bay presented, Raushenbush devoted himself to intense deskwork studies and statistical tables. His roommate at Alusna, Commander Oscar A. de Lima, U.S.N.R., remembered the economist’s “endless days and nights of complicated computations,” though the endless period was just over a month. Raushenbush’s interests were most closely focused on the new availability of “Most Secret” 10-centimeter airborne radar, for which the Germans had no search receiver (G.S.R.). According to a report submitted on 22 December by radar pioneer Watson Watt, the Kriegsmarine would probably not figure out the wavelength, develop an answering G.S.R., and install it in the majority of their boats before “two or three months at the most” after first use of the Allied equipment.

10 centimeter wavelenth Mark III air to surface radar , crucial to Battle of Atlantic

“There was great promise in this situation,” Raushenbush wrote privately in 1948. “The danger in it was that the new weapon might (like tanks in 1916) be used in too small numbers, with too small effect, and that the Germans would consequently be given ample notice of the new weapon before it could be used against them with telling effect, and would be ready for it.” He anguished, he wrote, over the possibility that a centimetric radar installation would first be used in an area such as the Mediterranean or the European mainland, where it might be captured and compromised. As it happened, a few Io-centimeter sets were flown by Coastal aircraft out of Gibraltar in February before their use in the Bay. And Raushenbush’s worst-case scenario—though it is not known that he was aware of it at the time—unfolded on 2 February when an RAF Bomber Command Stirling bomber equipped with centimetric radar went down at night near Rotterdam. The radar set was Type H2S, in which the radar pulses were used in a “look-down” mode for picking out coastlines, lakes, waterways, and (less successfully) cities.

Coastal had forcefully opposed that use of 10-centimeter radar prior to its use in the Bay precisely because capture of the equipment, which seemed likely, would ruin Coastal’s chances of obtaining surprise in the Biscay transit area. But Bomber Command spoke louder, claiming that for the success of the night-bombing campaign over Germany—always the overriding imperative in the Prime Minister’s mind—the bombers desperately needed H2S as a navigational aid. Churchill gave approval for the new radar’s use over enemy territory beginning in January 1943, with, as Coastal feared, predictable results. Though the Stirling’s radar equipment was badly damaged, German technicians were able to reassemble the Rotterdam Gerät, as they called it, at the Telefunken laboratories in Berlin. By chance, the device was badly damaged a second time in an RAF bombing raid. Again, it was reconstructed, this time in a bombproof bunker. After flight-testing the magnetron valve equipment, the technicians realized that the Allies had achieved a major technological breakthrough, and, where the maritime war was concerned, had leapfrogged the Fu.MB (Metox). News of the disclosure was passed at once to BdU, where on 5 May the Dönitz/Godt war diary reported a confirming incident at sea and ruminated on the “Rotterdam Gerät.”

“U-333 [Oblt.z.S. Werner Schwaff] was attacked by enemy aircraft at night without previous radar [detection by Fu.MB] in BF 5897. Slight damage, aircraft was shot down in flames.… [The aircraft was L/L Wellington “B” of No. 172 Squadron, which had just begun Bay patrols with ASV Mark III.] The enemy is working on carrier waves outside the frequency range of the present Fu.MB receivers. The shooting down over Holland of an enemy aircraft apparently carrying an apparatus with a frequency of 9.7 centimeters is the only indication at present of this possibility.”

The secret was out, and it appeared likely that the Germans would now neutralize the centimetric wavelength in the same way that Metox had neutralized the metric. But the Telefunken Company experienced problems in replicating parts of the Allied equipment, and administrative muddles further checked what was to have been a crash program to develop a new G.S.R., with the result, astonishingly, that an effective functional detector called Naxos-U prototype was not ready to the U-boats until December 1943, far later than the two or three months predicted by Watson Watt, and long after the issue in the Atlantic had been decided. (its trials and effective use by U-Boats would extend well into mid 1944)

Raushenbush began his calculations with a review of U-boat performance figures. The optimum (as against maximum) speed surfaced for charging batteries was 12 knots. The optimum speed for running submerged was 1.75 knots. The average battery capacity on entering the 200-mile-deep transit channel was 51 miles submerged, after which a U-boat had to surface for maximum recharge for a period of 6.77 to 7.77 hours, during which it would travel 81 to 93 miles. After another 51 miles submerged, it would have to surface for charging at least once again, briefly, until completing the 200 miles (assuming a direct course) in a total traverse time of 76.37 hours.

Thus, a U-boat in transit would be on the surface and vulnerable to air attack for at least one lengthy period. Any attempt to remain underwater beyond 41 hours would exhaust the air supply, although a boat could surface for 5 to 10 minutes to ventilate. A surfaced U-boat forced to dive by aircraft would later have to charge for approximately seven minutes to compensate for the 100 ampere hours used in one cycle of crash-diving and resurfacing. Since the average density of boats in the transit area at any given time was 15.8 boats, that number together would be exposed from 1,280 to 1,470 miles during their passage. Raushenbush calculated that there would be a density of one surfaced boat per 3,800 square miles.

On the air side, Raushenbush called for an additional 160 long-range aircraft, all equipped with ASV Mark III and many with Leigh Lights, to make up a total force of 260 aircraft. Such a large, coordinated force, trained to capitalize on the Allied advantage of centimetric radar, could be expected to make 7.5 sorties per aircraft per month, to make 1.8 attacks on each of 150 U-boats entering the transit channel each month, to make a minimum of twenty-five kills per month, and to cause damage to a further thirty-four boats. Over the projected 120 operational days of this effort, 100 boats would be destroyed and 136 damaged, thus “paralyzing” the U-boat fleet and throwing it on the defensive. The damaged boats would play their role in the paralysis effect by jamming and overloading the Biscay repair bases.

There were two critical factors in the Raushenbush Plan: (1) the attack program must be put into effect promptly, before the enemy devised a centimetric search receiver; and (2) the attacking force must be sufficiently large from the outset; “no small driblets” of additional aircraft would make the plan work. On the second point he elaborated that a law of increasing returns could be developed to show that up to a certain point, a large but still less than adequate force would produce only minor results; but that once enlarged to and beyond a certain critical mass, the effectiveness of that force was in high progression. He concluded:

“The morale of the remaining U-boat fleet may be broken by such an effort. If in four months (May-August 1943 inclusive) 100 U-boats are killed, and 136 damaged, and every one is attacked 1.8 times in transit, the U-boat fleet based on Biscay would have lost about 36 per cent of its numbers and the crews of an additional 136 would have been shaken up. The unkilled 175 U-boats may thereby be so broken in morale as to impair their effectiveness greatly.”

Raushenbush went on to suggest crew “mutiny” as a possibility, which was going somewhat over the top; the suggestion probably showed the degree to which his views were shaped by British associates, among whom the morale war seems to have been a preoccupation. One suspects, knowing how U-boat crews put out to sea unflinchingly in 1945, when certain to near-certain destruction faced every boat, that infidelity to duty in the U-Bootwaffe was never a consideration.

The Raushenbush Plan was endorsed by Captain Solberg, and, upon his recommendation, by Admiral Harold R. Stark, U.S.N., Commander, United States Naval Forces in Europe, who had it printed up for presentation to the Prime Minister’s A.U. Committee on 24 March. In the meantime, it received strong support from the operations research team at the Admiralty, though those politically savvy people knew that the Plan would not fly unless it passed the inspection of Churchill’s personal science advisor, Professor Lindemann, now Lord Cherwell. Accordingly, Professors Blackett and Williams (the latter now also with the Admiralty) joined Raushenbush to form a special committee under the chairmanship of Sir Stafford Cripps, Minister of Aircraft Production and vice-chair of the A.U. Committee, for the purpose of bringing Cherwell into camp. In that endeavor they were not entirely unsuccessful.

Cherwell was at first dismissive of the Raushenbush Plan as “based upon somewhat speculative foundations,” calling it “unduly optimistic.” Without directly challenging any of the American’s numbers or calculations, he rejected the “largely theoretical” proposals in the Plan as diverging from prior practical experience in the Bay, where the dividends had been very few. Furthermore, he argued, the presumed advantage of 10-centimeter radar would be overcome “very easily” by a new German search receiver; and the probability that the enemy would sprinkle the Bay with radio decoys seemed to have been treated “rather lightly” by Raushenbush. It would be better, Cherwell said, to devote aircraft resources to the more fruitful duty of protecting menaced convoys. In fact, better still would be the allocation of Coastal Command aircraft to the bombing of German cities, which “must have more immediate effect on the course of the war in 1943.” All that said, however, Cherwell did allow that it could be an “interesting experiment” to give the Raushenbush advocates a free run to see how they fared.

Two other events transpired before the plan devised by the U.S. Naval Attache’s one-man Bay research branch was formally presented. First, the Admiralty produced its own similar plan for the Bay. Second, a trial of the two plans was flown by Coastal Command from 6 to 15 February under the code name Operation Gondola. Although authorship of the Admiralty’s plan was credited to Blackett, he suggested in a eulogy of Williams (who died in 1945) that the calculations had been done by Williams during the winter of 1942–1943, when “he worked out in great detail the best methods of conducting such an offensive by a balanced force of day and night aircraft equipped with the latest forms of 10 cm. radar.”

Williams (or Blackett) shared the plan with Raushenbush, who drew up a one-page summary of comparisons and differences between the two sets of numbers. Both plans called for a total force of 260 heavy aircraft. Where Raushenbush estimated that the force required 160 additional aircraft, Williams estimated 190. Where Raushenbush envisioned a four-month offensive, Williams called for a full year’s endurance of effort. Both plans anticipated 150 U-boat transits a month in the Bay during spring 1943 (which proved to be too high). The average number of sorties per aircraft per month were approximately the same, as were the ratios of sightings to attacks, attacks to kills, and attacks to damaged U-boats. Where Raushenbush predicted twenty-five kills per month and thirty-four boats damaged, Williams anticipated twenty-two kills and twenty-two damaged.’

The nine-day Gondola trial did not exactly replicate either plan, since the aircraft of only three of the sixteen squadrons participating in whole or in part were equipped with 10-centimeter radar: these were United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) Liberator Squadrons Nos. 1, 2, and 224. Altogether, 136 individual aircraft, including L/L Wellingtons and L/L Catalinas, took part in standard patrols that “fanned” southward over the Inner Bay (East), where during the operational period forty U-boats traversed the area, and the Outer Bay (West), where thirty-eight boats transited. Eighteen sightings resulted (only two initiated by centimetric radar), leading to seven attacks. One U-boat was believed sunk by Liberator bomber “T” of No. 2 Squadron, but a recent NHB/MOD reassessment finds that the U-boat attacked, U-752 (Kptlt. Karl-Ernst Schröter), escaped serious injury. Still, the numbers, particularly those of sightings, and of the reduced flying hours required to make them, seemed provisionally to validate the Raushenbush/Admiralty Plans, taking into account the fact that most aircraft, as noted, were not equipped with centimetric radar. After the end of the operation there was a marked drop in the ratio of sightings to flying hours, back to the former low level.

In early March, to RAF Coastal Command’s great regret, U.S. Admiral King requested the transfer of two USAAF Liberator squadrons from St Eval in Cornwall to Morocco. Air Marshal Slessor stated that their crews had shown “intense energy and enthusiasm” in the anti-U-boat war, and “were just getting into their stride.” The loss of these centimetric-equipped aircraft as well as No. 405 Halifax Squadron, which had to be returned to Bomber Command, was a blow to both the Raushenbush and Admiralty Plans. Nonetheless, with the aircraft remaining, including this time the newly operational No. 172 Squadron of centimetric-equipped L/L Wellingtons, another combat trial in the Bay called Operation Enclose was laid on by Coastal for dusk 20 to dawn 28 March.

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Curiously, as will be shown below, this was at just the time that Coastal was officially denigrating the Bay Offensive as an uneconomical use of Coastal assets; and indeed, it was on the 22nd that Air Marshal Slessor sent his Note to the A.U. Committee (seen in chapter 3) recommending that the Bay be consigned to the condition of a “residuary legatee.” Yet Peyton Ward tells us that his naval liaison staff at Northwood made the suggestion for a new trial and that Slessor supported it. (This was not the last example of Slessor’s paradoxical behavior.) In P. W.'s conception, the Gondola patrol fan (so-called because it spread out slightly to the east and west below the south England and Welsh bases) should be replaced by a single patrol “ribbon” 140 miles wide running north and south across the Bay between longitudes 7° and 10° W. The width of the ribbon represented the probable maximum distance traveled by a U-boat in 24 hours regardless of the ratio of the time spent surfaced or submerged. The scheme called for aircraft to form a constant stream passing south into the ribbon as far as 44° N and returning on nearly reciprocal courses. P. W. and his staff added a fillip to the nighttime flights that was calculated to sow uncertainty and carelessness among the U-boat crews: in addition to the 10-centimeter pulses, aircraft still fitted with metric equipment should send the old familiar metric pulses.

No. 19 Group stood down for a week beforehand in order to conserve energy for a seven-and-a-half day intensive effort. Then, at dusk on the 20th, 115 individual aircraft—10 cm.-equipped Liberators of USAAF No. 224 Squadron, 10cm. L/L Wellingtons, other Wellingtons, Halifaxes, Fortresses, Sunderlands, Whitleys, and one Catalina—began patrolling the ribbon. A week and twelve hours later, their expenditure of 1,300 flying hours had produced twenty-six sightings and fifteen attacks leading to the sinking of U-663 (Oblt.z.S. Hans-Jürgen Haupt) by Whitley “Q” of No. 10 Squadron Operational Training Unit (O.T.U.), and damage to U-332 (Oblt.z.S. Eberhard Hüttemann) by Wellington XII “T” of No. 172 Squadron. Since forty-one U-boats crossed the ribbon—the estimate having been forty-two—the significant numbers were one-half the Gondola hours per sighting and twice the ratio of sightings to U-boats on passage. Though those results were still not up to the Raushenbush/Admiralty projections, they were sufficiently promising that Coastal planners began scheduling Enclose II for April—at just the moment, it bears repeating, that AOC-in-C Slessor was proposing to concentrate his air resources on close cover of threatened convoys “at,” he said, “the expense of the Bay patrols.

When sitting for its twelfth meeting at 6:00 p.m. on Wednesday 24 March in the Cabinet Room at 10 Downing Street, S.W.I, the A.U. Committee, with Churchill in the chair, found three Papers on their agenda. The first was a Note proposing the Raushenbush Plan, to which Admiral Stark, who since the previous meeting had been made a member of the Committee, was prepared to speak. The second was the Note by Marshal Slessor proposing emphasis of air cover for threatened convoys in preference to Bay patrols. And the third was a Memorandum by the First Lord of the Admiralty, Mr. A. V. Alexander, M.P., and First Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral of the Fleet Sir Dudley Pound, urging that Bomber Command launch new heavy raids on the Biscay bases. Because both the U.S. proposal, which the Committee called the Stark Plan, and the Admiralty’s called for the diversion of bombers to the Bay or its bases, and the sense of the Committee was that for the moment those aircraft could only come from Bomber Command’s operations over Germany, it was decided to defer discussion of the three Papers until the next meeting and to invite the Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Bomber Command, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur T. Harris, to present a Paper, if he wished, and to attend the meeting. Two days before that meeting, the Secretary of the War Cabinet, Sir Edward Bridges, circulated a Note specifying that only thirteen members directly concerned with the agenda Papers should attend. By the meeting date there were three additional Papers on the agenda: the invited response from Air Chief Marshal Harris; Cherwell’s comments on the Raushenbush document; and a new position paper from the Admiralty proposing the Blackett/Williams Plan while supporting the Stark Plan “for its striking and independent support of the Admiralty view.… ”

Not surprisingly, in the meeting of 31 March as in his Memorandum to the Committee (dated 29 March), Air Marshal Harris took aim at that section of the Admiralty’s latest document that called for the transfer of 190 long-range bombers from the bombing campaign over Germany to the Bay Offensive. The loss of so many aircraft, Harris contended, would mean calling off bomber operations against Germany for the next four months and throwing the whole brunt of fighting Germany upon the Soviet Union—points his Naval opposites no doubt thought exaggerations. The Minutes read: “He did not think it was fully realized what great damage was done by the attacks on U-boat construction yards and accessory factories. There was continuous confirmation that the U-boat construction programme was being considerably interfered with by these attacks and if they were stopped he was certain that the output of U-boats per month would increase.”

As for new attacks on the Biscay bases, which the Admiralty’s earlier Memorandum advocated, the U-boats and their essential services were sheltered under impenetrable concrete, Harris reminded the Committee, and the 10,000 tons dropped recently on the bases at Lorient and St.-Nazaire had, as the Admiralty themselves conceded, no appreciable effect on U-boat operations. (Slessor, too, was critical of the bombing, at this stage, of the Biscay bases, “which was actually quite useless and resulted merely in spoiling several nice old French towns."

Chief of the Air Staff Portal spoke up in support of “Bomber” Harris, as he was known in the Force, saying of the U.S. Navy and Admiralty proposals that he deprecated the transfer of any of Harris’s bombers to Bay patrols on the strength of “a theoretical calculation.”

But the Bay Offensive had its own determined champions, including First Lord of the Admiralty A. V. Alexander, who pointed out that “without the Bay Offensive we cannot hope to kill sufficient U-boats to get the upper hand in the Battle of the Atlantic, whilst on the other hand it is believed that we can with an adequately equipped Bay offensive sink sufficient U-boats to destroy their morale.” Alexander announced that the Admiralty had revised downward their estimate of the number of additional long-range bombers required: from 190 to 175 if the U-boats possessed new 10cm detection gear, to 55 if they did not. The First Lord reminded the Committee that the enemy could run but he could not hide: “He cannot withdraw from the Bay.” First Sea Lord Pound expressed his conviction that “the provision of additional aircraft in the Bay of Biscay [was] an absolute necessity and not a luxury in the anti-U-boat campaign.” And U.S. Admiral Stark said that unless the Allies got the better of the U-boat, “we should be in a bad way.” By increasing the Bay patrols, he submitted, “we should be able, for the first time, to carry out an all-out offensive against the U-boats.”

Of course, the Prime Minister had the last word, and it was not favorable to the Bay proponents. With only limited forces, he said, it was not possible to devote the maximum number of aircraft to every theater. The distribution must be commensurate with the results obtained, and so far air cover over menaced convoys, as argued by Slessor, and the bombing campaign against Germany, as argued by Harris, were the most productive theaters for the effort and resources invested. Granting that “even if the Bay of Biscay patrols resulted in sinking only three or four U-boats a month and did not reach the higher figures mentioned in some of the Papers, this must be regarded as a very important object,” Churchill decided that aircraft for that purpose could not be supplied by denuding the essential missions of Coastal and Bomber Commands. Taking a cue from Averell Harriman’s suggestion that the Chiefs of Staff in Washington might find it possible to divert aircraft from other allocations to the Bay, the Prime Minister charged the Air Ministry and the Admiralty with the responsibility for consulting on an estimate of the balance of requirements that might be communicated to the U.S. Government. Oddly, the only Committee member to have his nose put out of joint by these proceedings was Slessor, one of the winners in the debate. Displaying what had all the earmarks of a fit of pique, he railed at the Admiralty for blindsiding him with the Williams Plan and its request for 190 additional first-line heavies, “without discussing it first with the man most directly concerned, namely myself.” Thirteen years later, he was still annoyed, writing in his autobiography: “I only received my copy of the paper the day before it was down for discussion, and went immediately to the First Sea Lord to tell him that I strongly disagreed with this method of tackling the problem, which I described as slide-rule strategy of the worst kind.… ” Slessor took satisfaction from recording that, “The Admiralty paper met with very little luck in the U-boat Committee the next day, where I remember one light-hearted Minister saying, ‘C’est magnifique, mats ce n’est pas la guerre!”

On 4 April he submitted to the A.U. Committee a set of counterarguments to the Williams Plan, explaining in his memoirs that “nothing could be more dangerously misleading than to imagine that you can forecast the result of a battle or decide the weapons necessary to use in it, by doing sums.” He went on to aver that, “The most important factors in any battle are the human factors of leadership, morale, courage and skill, which cannot be reduced to any mathematical formula”; which human factors, the reader will remember, Captain Gilbert Roberts had insisted to Commander Gretton were no longer enough in the Battle of the Atlantic. Taking on Williams’s operations research directly, Slessor wrote: “Summarizing my objections to the principle of strategy by slide rule, I urged that the problem should be tackled from a less scientific but more practical angle.”

It is hard to imagine a more tortured position for Slessor to have taken. It was the very science of O.R.S. that had made his angles practical, a fact that he himself recognized by the close working relationship to O.R.S. that he forged straightaway upon becoming AOC-in-C in the preceding month, and by the very science (and “sums”) he employed at length in his own Paper before the A.U. Committee on the threatened convoy-Bay patrol option.

Furthermore, in denigrating slide-rule strategy in his autobiography, he seems to have forgotten that in the foreword he wrote to Professor Waddington’s 1946 book, O.R. in World War 2, he praised “strategy by slide-rule” by name, and acknowledged that “No one who knows the true facts can have any doubt that a great deal of the credit for what is perhaps still not generally recognised as the resounding victory it was, namely the Battle of the Bay and the defeat of the U-boat in 1943, is due to men like Blackett, Williams, Larnder, Baughan, Easterfield and Waddington himself.” Raushenbush’s name he seems not to have known, although the name appears prominently in the Stark Plan, where he is identified as its author, and that was the Plan whose calculations Slessor acknowledged to the A.U. Committee near the end of May, as will be seen, as having been vindicated by events in the Bay.

Slessor’s letter to the A.U. Committee of 4 April was not taken up by that body. Instead, during the days that followed, Slessor was persuaded to make a complete volte-face. It may have been the Air Ministry or the Admiralty, or both, whose heavy hand wrought this singular reversal—the record does not say—but when the time came for the A.U. Committee to petition the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff for additional longrange bombers for the Bay, it was Slessor who was tapped to draft the document. With the fervor of a convert, brought to his new faith by either conviction or thumbscrew, Slessor gave the case for the Bay Offensive its most striking language yet. Signed by him, First Sea Lord Pound, and Admiral Stark, the telegram to Washington read, in part:

“The one place where we can always be certain of finding U-boats is the Bay. Setting aside the relatively small proportion that pass into the Atlantic North-about [from German ports], the Bay is the trunk of the Atlantic U-boat menace, the roots being in the Biscay ports and the branches spreading far and wide, to the North Atlantic convoys, to the Caribbean, to the Eastern seaboard of North America, and to the sea lanes where the faster merchant ships sail without escorts.… It is a strategic problem which can only be solved by an appropriate deployment of our joint resources, designed to concentrate the necessary force at the decisive point in the battlefield of the Atlantic. We are aware that the United States, like Great Britain, has not enough aircraft to meet in full their many commitments and to afford really adequate protection to the coastal shipping on their long coast lines. But if we strike a decisive blow at the trunk in the Bay, the branches will wither.”

In their telegram the three signers called the Bay “second only to the convoy routes” as a strategic priority in the Battle of the Atlantic. They noted that 150 “first-line” aircraft were already engaged in the Bay Offensive, and that thirty to forty longand medium-range aircraft could be added to the force through recall of a Leigh Light squadron from Gibraltar, new construction, and borrowing. These new figures led to a revision of the number of additional aircraft needed. Hence, to make up the 260-aircraft requirement stipulated in both the Stark and Admiralty Plans, Coastal sought from the U.S. Joint Chiefs six squadrons totaling seventy-two long-range anti-submarine aircraft, drawn, the signers underscored, “from the forces already allocated [at the Atlantic Convoy Conference in Washington the previous month] to the Atlantic theatre.” At that conference the U.S. side predicted that 217 aircraft of suitable type and equipment, including 56 VLR, would be available “in excess of’ immediate Atlantic requirements.

It was important, the signers added, that the squadrons be made available “at the earliest opportunity” so as to take advantage of the period when the U-boats were without a 10-centimeter search receiver. (The A.U. Committee Minutes of their 14 April meeting, which contain a first draft of this communication, indicate that the Committee backed the four-month offensive proposed in the Stark Plan as against the twelve-month offensive proposed by the Admiralty.) The six squadrons would be accommodated at bases in southwest England. A reinforcement on that scale, the signers believed, “might well have results decisive to the issue of the Battle of the Atlantic.”

But Washington’s reception of the British telegram was cool. While sympathetic to the plans for an intensive operation in the Bay, the Joint Chiefs responded on 1 May, they had to report, regrettably, that the aircraft that they had predicted to be “in excess of” immediate requirements did not and would not in fact exist. The number of ASW aircraft cited in the document produced by the Convoy Conference, Admiral King explained, was based on figures “the origin and accuracy of which could not be entirely vouched for and which apparently had raised hopes as to the availability of aircraft which facts did not now warrant.” This reply, appearing so casually dismissive of a formal Allied agreement, caused understandable resentment in England, where a new telegram was drafted asking, if the numbers produced by the U.S. to the Convoy Conference were in error, would the U.S. kindly send the correct figures as quickly as possible?

Another and longer interval ensued before King and the other Joint Chiefs replied, in part because these matters were not exactly in the foreground of King’s interests at the time, since he was then engaged in one of the most contentious interservice rows of the war over the question, Who would control American anti-submarine air squadrons, the Navy or the Army Air Force Anti-Submarine Command? Slessor, who would personally observe these bitter turf battles during a visit to the States in June, said later: “The whole atmosphere in Washington was poisoned by inter-service jealousy and suspicion.”

On a belief that the reader would not want to be wearied by a recital here of that tedious tangle of disputes, which resulted in the US Army’s withdrawal from anti-submarine work in the fall of the year, we shall leave that to the parti-pris literature and say simply that, try as Slessor did, he never succeeded in obtaining the seventy-two aircraft requested for the Bay; and it was not until October (!) that he could count any appreciable number of reinforcements from the American side. In that month Coastal Command had three U.S. Army and one U.S. Naval operational squadrons based at Dunkeswell in Devonshire and two U.S. Naval squadrons that were still working up at St Eval. But by October, it must be recognized, the planned Second Bay Offensive was over, having been waged by the aircraft that Coastal already had in hand, and the crisis of the U-boat war had passed.

Before the telegrams began passing between London and Washington, and Army and Navy air interests began crossing swords across the Potomac River (though invited by the Army’s War Department in 1942 to occupy all of the second floor and part of another in the newly erected Pentagon, an invitation that Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox readily accepted, the Navy Bureau Chiefs, not wanting to live cheek by jowl with the Army or Army Air Forces, objected strongly to moving there, and would not do so until 1948), Coastal had mounted another Bay trial, Operation Enclose II, which ran from dusk on the 5th to dawn on the 13th of April. With fewer aircraft (86) than were used in the first Enclose (115), but with three more L/L Catalinas of No. 210 Squadron, the operation was positioned over the same ribbon of sea as before and with the same deceptive 1.5-meter A.S.V. flooding at night.

During the period, twenty-five U-boats transited the ribbon (as against twenty-eight estimated). The total of 980 flying hours produced eleven sightings, more of them at night than in daylight for the first time, and four attacks, leading to the nighttime sinking of U-376 (Kptlt. Friedrich Marks) by L/L Wellington “C” of 172 Squadron, and damage to U-465 (Kptlt. Heinz Wolf) by Catalina flying boat “M” of 210 Squadron Fewer aircraft and fewer flight hours had produced the same results as those achieved by the original Enclose. And other U-boat crews, having affected narrow escapes, no doubt experienced what Raushenbush called “sheer funk.”

With the demonstration of higher efficiency in the repeat of Enclose, it was decided, even before that operation was concluded, to launch a full-scale, long-term intensive patrol over a larger ribbon between 8½° and 12° W under the code name Operation Derange. A total of 131 individual aircraft, all that were available at the moment, though well below the 260 considered necessary by Raushenbush and Williams, were committed to the new operation, which was to begin at dawn on 13 April and to continue “until further notice.” Included in that number were three new squadrons, a rocm. L/L Wellington squadron, No. 407, an ordinary Wellington squadron, No. 311, and a Whitley squadron, No. 612.

Up to the end of April, eighty-one U-boats crossed the Derange ribbon, either inbound or outbound, and during that period a total of 2,593 day and night flying hours resulted in thirty-six sightings and twenty-two attacks. The percentage of sightings made to hours flown represented no improvement over Enclose II. But one kill was made and two outbound boats were so badly damaged that they were forced to return to Brest and St.-Nazaire, respectively. The 10cm.-equipped Liberator bomber “D” of 224 Sqdn. dropped six D/Cs on the previously damaged U-332 (Hüttemann) 25 seconds after she had dived, sinking her, northwest of Cape Ortegal, Spain, on the morning of the 29th. Damaged were U-366 (Kptlt. Hans Hornkohl), depth-charged by L/L Wellington “R” of 172 Sqdn. on the night of the 26th; and U-437 (Oblt.z.S. Hermann Lamby), depth-charged by L/L Wellington “H” of 172 on the night of the 29th.

The principal effect of the twenty-two Derange attacks in April, however, was to induce exasperation at BdU, where the Operations staff had grown weary of reports from Commanders during Enclose, Enclose II, and now Derange that despite their Fu.MB (Metox) gear, they were being surprised at night like deer in a car’s headlights. On 27 April, Admirals Donitz and Godt made a fateful decision, which they signaled to all Commanders. Standing War Order No. 483 was forthwith revised to require boats (1) to maintain maximum submergence at night through the Biscay transit area, and (2) to fight it out with aircraft on the surface in the daytime if surprised while charging batteries. This decision would lead to heavy U-boat losses during May and the summer months—twenty-six kills and seventeen U-boats damaged in ninety-seven days and nights—causing it to be called by historians “a major tactical error,” resulting from, as Slessor represented it, “the stupidity of the enemy.”

British aviation historian Alfred Price argues that in April only two out of a dozen anti-submarine squadrons in Air Vice Marshal Bromet’s No. 19 Group were fitted with both Leigh Light and 10-centimeter radar, and hence were not numerous enough to cause more than the loss of “a few U-boats to air attack without warning.” But in April the ratio of nighttime L/L-Iocm. hours flown inside the Enclose and Derange ribbons to nighttime hours flown by unequipped aircraft was 777 to 428, and L/L Wellingtons made seven night attacks without Metox warning between 26 and 29 April, resulting in two outbound U-boats seriously damaged, U-566 and U-437 (see above), which had to abort their departures.

No doubt this nighttime coverage got BdU’s attention, and the Dönitz/Godt duumvirate decided that placing their battery-charging boats on the surface at night under the sudden surveillance of searchlights was a more perilous course than was deploying them on the surface in daylight, when at least their lookouts had a reasonable chance of sighting the enemy’s approach in time to bring anti-aircraft armament to bear. They would then have both a warning and a defense, neither of which they had under the lights. Perhaps Dönitz and Godt were not as “stupid” as Slessor thought. They were simply wrong. If the plan was to surface during the daylight hours, then the U-boats should have been instructed to dive upon sighting aircraft. They did not have the firepower to fight back successfully. And one downside to maximum submergence, whether by day or by night, was greatly increased transit time, which translated into reduced opportunities to sink shipping.

In making the decision to spend the battery-charging hours on the surface in daylight, Dönitz and Godt likely were influenced by U-333’s flak success against a Wellington (see above) and U-338’s success in downing Halifax “B” of 502 Sqdn., both in March; and by U-79/s protracted machine-gun defense on 12 April that forced Liberator “M” of No. 86 Squadron to break off an attack—details of which BdU transmitted to all boats as an incentive. (Three L/L Wellingtons were unex-plainedly lost in the Bay during April.) But these three successes, it turned out, were thin reeds on which to base so dangerous a general policy.

Bay of Biscay offensive

And so, on the cusp of May, the Battle of the Bay entered a phase that had not been predicted by either Raushenbush or Williams, a phase in which the secret use of 10-centimeter radar counted less than either boffin had anticipated, since the night had effectively been taken away from the equation.38 Though Bromet’s No. 19 Group maintained night patrols at about the same level from April through August, night sightings decreased sharply at the end of April and the battle from 1 May forward became mainly one of mano-a-mano combat in daylight, and let the metal fall where it may. The essential point that should not be lost here is: displaced by the German decision as the top-drawer weapon in the Bay, the Leigh-Lighters nonetheless had proved for a second time that they were the controlling threat. Even now, in a passive role as menace-in-being, by slowing the passage of U-boats through the Bay, they saved numerous merchant ships from torpedo-wrought deaths.

Bromet’s bombers were ready for this May battle. Based mostly in Devon, Cornwall, and South Wales, they had trained to near-perfect pitch, absorbing the lesson from O.R.S. in 1942 that it was not the weapon but the man that counted. And they had mastered the tactical doctrine long earned by O.R.S. calculations and combat experience. Foremost in anti-U-boat operations was sighting. Two lookouts, the doctrine held, must keep a continuous watch from ahead to 90° on either side of the aircraft, and to prevent errors through fatigue, they should be relieved every half hour.

An efficient A.S.V. watch must also be maintained, except that A.S.V. Mark II (metric) must not be used in daylight unless visibility was under three miles, or the aircraft was flying above heavy cloud, or the gear was required for navigational purposes. No restrictions were placed on A.S.V. Mark III (centimetric). To avoid eye fatigue, radar operators should be relieved every forty-five minutes. The optimum altitude for detecting and surprising a U-boat was judged to be 5,000 feet where there was no cloud or where cloud bases were above 5,000. When cloud density was not more than 5/Ioths and below 5,000, aircraft should patrol 500 to 1,000 feet above cloud tops. When clouds were more than 5/Ioths and below 5,000, aircraft should seek concealment by flying as near the cloud base as possible. When a sighting was made, altitude should be lost as quickly as possible in order to be no more than 300 to 500 feet off the deck when three-quarters of a mile to a mile from the target.

The pilot should make the decision as to whether flying an indirect course toward the target was required, either to provide time to get the bomb bay doors open (where aircraft were so equipped) or to avoid an increase of speed that would throw off the bomb intervalometer setting. (Squadron Leader Terence M. Bulloch, cited in chapter 3 for his successes—altogether in his career he would sight 28 U-boats, attack 19, sink 4, and severely damage 3, becoming the most decorated ASW pilot in Coastal—deviated from the rule of fast descent by stalking a sighted boat from cloud cover, and only when positioned to make an attack up or down the boat’s track at an angle of about 20° would he initiate his dive. Bulloch did not fly patrols in May, but spent the month instead testing a new rocket-propelled weapon, to be used in action for the first time on 23 May, at the Aircraft and Armament Experimental Establishment at Boscombe Down.)

During the final stage of the run-in, aircraft should descend to 50 feet and deliver their attack as nearly as possible along the track of the U-boat, taking their point of aim according to the following data:

(1) The time from the release of a depth charge from 50 feet to detonation at the shallow setting (25 feet) is approximately 5 seconds (2 seconds in the air and 3 in the water).

(2) If the U/Boat is in process of crash-diving, her speed will be approximately 6 knots (10 feet per second). Therefore, if the U/Boat is attacked while some part of the hull is visible, the centre of the stick should be aimed 5 x 10 = 50 feet ahead of the conning tower (or its estimated position) at the time of release.(If the conning tower is itself in sight, however, at the time of release, it is desirable to make this the aiming point, although theoretically the stick will then fall 50 feet behind it.)

(3) If the U/Boat has dived before the depth charges are released, the stick must be aimed a certain distance ahead of the swirl, the apex of which is made by the foremost end of the conning tower.

(4) If the periscope only is sighted, the speed of the U/Boat will probably be only about 2 knots, i.e., 3.4 feet per second, hence the stick should be aimed 5 x 3.4 = 17 feet ahead of the periscope at the time of release.

NOTE: An additional allowance must always be made for the underwater travel of the depth charges (40 feet).

If the U-boat had just submerged, the approximate length of its diving swirl (100 feet) could be used as a yardstick for estimating the distance ahead that D/Cs should enter the water. It was unlikely that a D/C attack would be successful, however, if the U-boat had been submerged for more than 30 seconds, in which case baiting tactics might be employed: In these maneuvers, the aircraft set course from the position of the swirl to a distance of at least 30 miles and remained outside that range for not less than 30 minutes; then it returned to the same position, taking advantage of cloud, sun, or weather conditions for concealment, in the expectation that the U-boat would have surfaced again. When a surfaced U-boat used its flak against the aircraft—most boats were then equipped with one 20mm cannon and several machine guns on the bridge—the decision on how to respond rested with the aircraft Captain, but the Tactical Instruction made it clear what was expected of him: “He must remember that the primary reason for his existence is, for the time being, to kill U/Boats and that a U/Boat on the surface presents a much better chance of a kill than one submerged.”

The point was made that a U-boat’s bridge made a very unstable gun platform in any kind of sea and particularly if the sea was beam-on, and that even a large aircraft properly handled and using its forward guns presented a fleeting, dangerous, and difficult target. Aircraft Captains should therefore press home their attacks against enemy fire, preferably from dead ahead, “making full use of the front guns to kill the U/Boat’s gun crews or at least to keep their heads down.” (The U-boats, for their part, were instructed when under attack to keep the aircraft on a stern bearing in order to present a small target—though, ironically, this helped the aircraft to drop a D/C straddle up track—and to use all available flak and machine gun fire simultaneously. When the aircraft began its final run in, the U-boat should initiate evasive maneuvers at maximum speed using full helm. In cases where a strong cross-wind was blowing, the U-boat’s avoiding action should be to windward in order to take advantage of the aircraft’s drift sideways.)

[merdiolu]

Aircraft carrying six or fewer D/Cs on hunting patrols or sweeps, such as Derange, should drop the whole load in one stick; aircraft carrying more than six should drop sticks of six. Aircraft on convoy or other escort duty should drop sticks of four, leaving D/Cs for a possible second attack; this rule could be altered at the Captain’s discretion, for example when nearing his PLE or while returning to base. After carrying out an attack on a diving boat by day, the aircraft must drop a marker on or beside the swirl. By night the position must be marked by flame floats, usually two dropped at the same time as the D/Cs.

For purposes of assessment and so that every possible lesson could be learned from each attack, a complete and detailed record, for example, of the exact time lapse between submersion of a U-boat and the release of D/Cs, should be kept by members of the crew. “The story should be complete to the smallest detail and even facts which may appear irrelevant should be included.” Within twenty-four hours a connected account should be written down and read by the crew.

Not all of these rules were observed to the letter, as will be seen in the after-action reports that follow. Some pilots, following Terence Bulloch’s example, fudged the rules and had unorthodox successes. But in the main, Coastal Command’s tactical doctrine proved out not only in the Bay but also in the convoy routes. The mole, it turned out, had a lot to fear from the crow. At 2055 GMT on 30 April (all times that follow are GMT), L/L Wellington “N” of 172 Sqdn. lifted off from Chivenor in Devon, bound southwest to the Derange ribbon, where the cloud was 4/Ioths to 7/Ioths with bases at 2,000 feet, the sea moderate to rough, the air bumpy, and visibility 2–4 miles. At 0007 on 1 May, Pilot Flight Sergeant Peter W. Phillips was patrolling in the ribbon at 1,200 feet on course 168° when he obtained an S/E contact (Special Equipment, a code word for A.S.V. Mark III 10cm radar) bearing Green (starboard) 45°, range 6’½ miles. Phillips dived on the surfaced U-boat, which was proceeding inbound on a course of 132° at seven knots, and, after reach-ing 550 feet three-quarters of a mile from the target, he “struck” (switched on) the Leigh Light. The run-in was made on the U-boat’s port bow at 8o° to track, while the Navigator, Sergeant H. A. Bate, fired about forty rounds from the front gun before it jammed, and at 0100 Phillips released six Mark XI Torpex D/Cs set to shallow depth and spaced 50 feet apart from a height of 75 feet. All were seen by the rear gunner to explode with blue flashes, two to port and four to starboard; Nos. 2 and 3 were thought to have been very close to the U-boat’s hull.

During the aircraft’s pass over the target a shudder was felt underneath, though no gun fire was observed. (An hour after the attack it was found that the hydraulic system had been damaged; not known until landing was that the port tire had been punctured.) Phillips made a 180° turn to port and, four minutes later, flew back over the attack position, which was marked by flame floats. Except for a patch of foam and bubbles, nothing could be seen, not even a diving swirl. After twelve more minutes in the vicinity, Phillips resumed patrol. At 0452 he and his five-man crew landed at the nearest base, Predannack in Cornwall. As they did so, the port landing gear collapsed, and the aircraft swung off the runway and slammed into a Nissen hut. Beyond scratches, the crew were not injured. The base Medical Officer pronounced them “very lucky.”

The U-boat they had attacked, U-415 (Oblt.z.S. Kurt Neide), returning from her first war cruise, was also very lucky. Damaged by Phillips’s D/Cs, she would be attacked twice more before the day was out. At 1136 she was visually sighted on the surface in visibility 15 miles, at 4435’N, 10°37’W, by Sunderland “M” of Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) No. 461 Sqdn., flying on Derange. Bearing Green 30° at a range of 5–6 miles, the U-boat was estimated at 6 knots on a course of 100°. Seeing the aircraft approach, U—415 dived. Pilot Flight Lieutenant E. C. “Bertie” Smith, DFC, put the flying boat into a dive and attacked the swirl 18 seconds after submergence from the U-boat’s port beam, dropping four Mark XI D/Cs set shallow and spaced 200 feet apart from a height of 50–75 feet. The D/Cs straddled the U-boat’s line of advance 70–100 feet ahead of the apex of the swirl. No debris appeared, however. Smith took his aircraft off on baiting procedures and returned in cloud 29 minutes later, but again saw no evidence of damage where his sea marker had disappeared in rough seas.

U-415 had received a severe shaking but was still intact.43 At 1727 she was sighted for a third time, in position 44°13’N, 10°23’W, by Derange aircraft Whitley “E” of 612 Sqdn. The sea had moderated to a slight swell and visibility was still 15 miles. The U-boat was bearing 180°, distant 5 miles, at a fast speed, 15 knots, on course 090°. Pilot Flight Sergeant Norman Earnshaw descended from 3,000 feet, intending to attack from the U-boat’s port quarter at 20° to track. As he began his run in at about 150 knots, U-415 opened fire with 20mm cannon and light machine guns. Earnshaw’s release from 90 feet of six Mark XI D/Cs, set to shallow, spaced 200 feet apart, exploded 200 feet to starboard of the target, as the U-boat took hard evasive action in a tight turn.Kicking rudder, Earnshaw set up for a second attack. Meanwhile, U-415 dived. In the second attack, made from the U-boat’s port beam at 90° to track, two D/Cs were released from 70 feet and exploded 28 seconds after submergence 300 feet ahead of the swirl. This time oil was seen. Earnshaw patrolled the scene for 40 minutes, then set course for base at Davidstow Moor in Cornwall. Further shaken, U-415 limped on to her base at Brest. At BdU, Donitz and Godt were relieved to learn of her safe arrival. Their war diary recorded: “U-415 was bombed three times … Despite much damage she was still able to dive.” The good luck that carried U-415 through May Day would stay with her until 14 July 1944, when she struck an RAF mine and sank in the Brest approaches.

Two other attacks in the Bay were made on 1 May: At 0825, Halifax bomber “C” of Coastal Command 502 Sqdn. dropped six D/Cs on a surfaced boat, and at 1015, Hampden bomber “L” of 1404 Sqdn. released six on a surfaced boat. Initial contact was made by eye in each case. Return fire was not observed from either boat before it dived. There were no visible results from the attacks. Three daylight attacks on surfaced boats were made the next day, 2 May: by Sunderland “R” of 10 Sqdn. at 0810; by Hudson “W” of 269 Sqdn. at 1437; and by Whitley “G” of 612 Sqdn. at 1531. In the first and third attacks initial contact was by eye; in the second it was obtained by S/E. None of the boats was reported to have fought back.

The first kill in May was made at dusk that day by Flight Lieutenant “Bertie” Smith and his ten-man Australian crew in the same Sunderland flying boat “M” they had flown the day before (which deserves mention only because it should be noted that air crews frequently switched aircraft from day to day within a squadron). Smith was trolling in the Derange ribbon at 2,500 feet in the base of 6/Ioths cloud. Visibility was 10–12 miles. The darkening sea below was rough in 26-knot winds from 010°. At 1917, eyeballs sighted a U-boat on the surface bearing Red (port) 45°, range 10 miles. Smith estimated it to be traveling at 10–12 knots on an outbound course of 270°. He pushed forward his four engine throttles and climbed into cloud, where he turned to make his approach. At four miles from the target he dove from the cloud. On sighting the flying boat, the U-boat responded with flak and machinegun fire, and when Smith was down to 300 feet and ½ mile distant, the U-boat abruptly altered course to port. Smith was able to complete his run-in from the U-boat’s port beam at 90° to track, while RAF gunner Sergeant R. MacDonald swept the deck with fire from the bow turret. Just before release from an altitude of 50–70 feet, the U-boat gunners were seen scrambling for the conning tower hatch.

Four Mark XII D/Cs straddled the boat just aft of the tower, after which the boat described a tight circle, apparently out of control, then came to a gradual stop with a bad list to port. A large volume of brown vapor blew out from its stern and a white vapor plume rose about three feet from its port quarter. Then a heavy flow of oil was observed pouring from its port side. Meanwhile, Smith was making a climbing turn to 500 feet to set up a second attack, which he delivered at 75 feet with four D/Cs released from the target’s starboard bow at 15° to track, again straddling the tower. The now gravely wounded boat settled by its stern. The oil patch spread to 300 yards in diameter. Some fifteen crewmen were seen jumping into the water, where they waved frantically at the aircraft. Then, at 1940, the U-boat’s stern sank beneath the waves; its bow followed, reappearing twice briefly at an angle of 30°. The victim was U—465 (Kptlt. Heinz Wolf, 28 years old, from Emmerich/Rhein), on her third war patrol. Smith and crew remained in the area for 30 minutes, then, having reached PLE, returned with their victory photographs to base at Pembroke Dock in South Wales.

Two daylight attacks were made on 3 May against boats sighted on the surface in the Derange ribbon: by Sunderland flying boat “S” of 461 Sqdn., at 1044, and by Whitley “R” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U. In the first instance, the initial contact was made by eye and four D/Cs were released 22 seconds after the U-boat had submerged. In the second, the contact was also made by eye, and five D/Cs (one having hung up) were released while the boat was still on the surface. There were no visible results in either case. On the next day, 4 May, Halifax bomber “S” of 58 Sqdn. was on morning patrol, having lifted off at 0555 for the Derange area, where the seas were very rough under 7/Ioths-8/Ioths cloud, visibility 8–10 miles. At 1740, the crew made the visual sighting of a creamy wake, bearing Green 90°, which led to a surfaced U-boat, outbound from base at 6–8 knots on a course of 270°, distant 4–5 miles.

Pilot Flying Officer John M. Hartley turned to starboard, lost height rapidly, and approached out of the sun. At 1,400 yards the U-boat opened fire with what Hartley thought was an impressive amount of armament: “heavy guns” from the afterdeck, followed at 1,200 yards by “cannon at the front of the bridge,” and later by cannon on the forward deck and two pairs of machine guns on a stepped gun platform in front of the conning tower. He could see about fifteen of the boat’s crew, most of them manning the cannons and guns, but two men in black uniform and another in a white sweater, all wearing peaked caps, standing on the deck at the port side of the tower. Hartley ordered answering fire against the pugnacious boat, which scattered some of the men manning cannon and machine guns, the rest maintaining heavy and light flak.

By evasive action Hartley managed to prevent his four-engine Halifax from being hit by that fusillade, and at a quarter of a mile from target, he leveled out to release six Mark XI D/Cs from the U-boat’s port quarter at an angle of 60°-70° to track. The navigator firing the front gun saw one man on deck hit and fall overboard. Altitude at the time of release was a relatively high 200–400 feet. The rear gunner reported that the D/Cs straddled aft of the conning tower, two on the port quarter and four on the starboard beam. In addition, the gunner had fired 500 rounds at the tower and hull as the aircraft passed. But the U-boat submerged thirty seconds after the Halifax, turning back, caught sight of it again, and no damage was visible, only the usual D/C scum. Baiting procedure was followed, Hartley returning at 0910, but the marker could not be found. With PLE reached at 1000, the Halifax returned to base, landing at 1258. Subsequent assessment by NHB/MOD has identified the boat as U-190, which suffered “slight damage,” nothing to prevent her continuing on Feindfahrt.

Three more attacks in the Bay were made later in the day: by Halifax “A” of 502 Sqdn. at 1920, by PBY Catalina flying boat“J” of 202 Sqdn. at 2110, and by L/L Wellington “P” of 407 Sqdn. at 2309. In the first, initial contact was made by eye and six D/Cs were released on a surfaced U-boat. In the second, contact was also made by eye and five D/Cs (one hanging up) were dropped 37 seconds after submergence. In the third, contact was obtained by S/E and six D/Cs were dropped 10 seconds after submergence. No results were evident, but minor damage was done to U-405 (Korv. Kapt. Rolf-Heinrich Hopmann) by the Halifax, and the target of the Catalina was later assessed to be U-6oo (Kptlt. Bernard Zurmühlen).

Three daylight attacks were made on 7 May in the Derange area, the first two on diving boats by Wing Commander Wilfrid E. Oulton of 58 Sqdn. At 0656, just after dawn (Oulton forbade his crew to eat breakfast prior to a morning flight because it put “spots,” not U-boats, before the eyes), Oulton sighted a U-boat’s wake from the cockpit of Halifax “S,” dived on the target, and dropped six D/Cs over its swirl 10–15 seconds after the U-boat’s submergence. And at 1015, Oulton dived on another U-boat’s wake and released three D/Cs on the submerging boat while its conning tower was still visible. The first attack yielded no visible results. The second, now known to have been against the outbound U-214, badly wounded her Commander, Kptlt. Rup-precht Stock, and forced the boat back to her base at Brest. Oulton’s aircraft received machine-gun hits during the run in.

The third attack was made by Sunderland “W” of RAAF. 10 Sqdn. Flying on Derange, aircraft captain Flight Lieutenant Geoffrey G. Rossiter and his eleven-man crew had been airborne from Mount Batten in Cornwall since 0635 when, at 1023, they sighted a wake, then the conning tower, of an outbound U-boat on the starboard beam, distant 10 miles. As the flying boat turned to attack, the U-boat, now known to have been U—603 (Oblt.z.S. Rudolf Baltz), dived and disappeared, making attack inadvisable. Patrol was resumed at 2,000 feet just below 6/10ths cloud base, and at 1220 a fully surfaced U-boat was sighted through binoculars 17 miles away on the starboard bow, in position 47°O6’N, IO°58’W. The sea state was moderate, the wind was 235° at twenty-six miles per hour, visibility was twenty miles. Rossiter estimated the U-boat to be making 12 knots on an outbound course of 280°. He made a climbing turn into cloud and broke out of it on course 225° with the still-surfaced U-boat four miles distant on the starboard bow.

As he pushed the elevator column forward into a dive, the U-boat altered course to starboard. Rossiter turned with it and ran in across track 6o° on its starboard quarter, the nose gunner opening fire with 100 rounds at 800 yards range, scoring hits on the conning tower, where two men were seen. From a height of fifty feet Rossiter released four D/Cs that straddled the boat just forward of the tower, and the resulting explosion plumes completely obscured the boat. Before the explosions, as the aircraft passed, the tail gunner fired 600 rounds at the tower. Rossiter pushed hard left rudder and turned the ailerons for a quick return to the site. Setting up, he attacked a second time, from the U-boat’s port quarter at 45° to track, again releasing four D/Cs from fifty feet. The first D/C fell within twenty feet of the port side aft of the tower; the three remaining overshot.

The U-boat, plainly wounded, made several complete tight circles to starboard at 4–5 knots, trailing oil and gradually losing way. At 1300 it submerged slowly on course 090°, still putting out oil, and disappeared bows up four minutes later. By 1330 a crescent-shaped oil patch 250 yards in diameter and 500 yards in circumference covered the site. The Sunderland remained in the area for another hour and a half, then shaped course for home with its photographs, becoming waterborne at Mount Batten at 1655. Rossiter received the DFC for this action. The NHB/MOD assessment has identified the stricken U-boat as U-663 (Kptlt. Heinrich Schmid). Seriously damaged, she sank the next day with all hands, probably as the result of these injuries.

An eight-day drought in Bay attacks ensued, owing in great part to heavy pro-German weather that greatly restricted visibility. Then, on the 15th, with visibility improved to as much as 25 miles, there were six attacks in one day, all in sunlight, all resulting from visual sightings in the Derange ribbon. The first, by Liberator “O” of 224 Sqdn., was made at 0936 on a U-boat that had submerged 15 seconds before six D/Cs were released. The boat, now known to be U—168 (Kptlt. Helmuth Pich), which was returning from its first war cruise during which she participated in the Battle for ONS.5, was not damaged. The second attack, by Whitley bomber “M” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U., was delivered at 1127 against a boat that took five D/Cs (one hung up) on the surface. It has since been identified as U-648 and assessed as undamaged.

The third attack, again by Whitley bomber “M,” at 1233, was directed at another surfaced boat, outbound from base, since identified as U-591 (Kptlt. Hansjürgen Zetzsche). Though the Whitley had only the one previously hung-up D/C to drop, which did no damage, the aircraft’s nose machine gun wounded the Commander and one crewman, forcing the boat’s return to base. The fourth attack, by Whitley “B” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U., was made at 1314 on another outbound surfaced boat. The six D/Cs released caused slight damage to U-305 (Kptlt. Rudolf Bahr). The fifth attack, by Whitley “S” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U., was delivered at 1403 against the outbound, surfaced U-211 (Oblt.z.S. Karl Hause), which was not damaged.

The sixth and final attack of the day took place at 1810 when the sun was low and there was a bright glare on the water. Pilot Wing Commander Wilfrid E. Oulton of Coastal Command 58 Sqdn. had lifted off in Halifax bomber “M” from St Eval at 1208 and now was on a routine rectangular creeping line ahead patrol at position 45°28’N, 10°2o’W, where he swept the sea below with Polaroid glasses. There was 1/10th cloud at 6,000 feet, the sea was moderate to rough, winds were 080° at twenty-four mph, visibility was 10–15 miles in haze. Ahead a V-shaped wake slowly emerged into view bearing Green 30° distant 10 miles. Realizing that he was up sun where he could stalk, Oulton let down gradually to 2,500 feet, and at four miles range sighted a U-boat on the surface, speed 10 knots on an inbound course of 070°. He circled to starboard and descended through 1,500 to begin the run in. At 1,000 yards the navigator opened fire with the nose gun and saw hits on both the conning tower and hull. At a height of 100–120 feet the Halifax released six D/Cs from the U-boat’s port quarter at 10° to track. After crossing, the rear gunner got off additional rounds at the tower and hull and watched for results of the explosions. He reported that two or more D/Cs at the end of the stick fell against the port side of the boat.

When the explosion plumes subsided and the boat could be seen again, the fore part of the hull appeared to lift; then, two to three seconds later, there was a “sudden jerk,” and the boat stood up on its stern in a completely vertical position with the bows above water. After Oulton completed a turn for a second attack, he could see a large light blue oil patch and “greenish white water” boiling around the upright 20 feet of bows. The victim’s condition was such, Oulton decided, that he could save his remaining D/Cs for another boat. Two minutes following the attack the U-boat’s last apparition of “gray with brown patches” slid beneath the waves. At 1827, Oulton set course on the homeward leg and was down at St Eval by 2125. The U-boat sunk was the returning U-266 (Kptlt. Rolf von Jessen), which had been Group Fink’s lead U-Boat scorer in the Battle for ONS.5.

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With good weather holding, No. 19 Group had another full day on the 16th when five attacks were made in the Derange patrol area, all as the result of visual sightings. The first, by Whitley “E” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U., was made at 1143 on a diving boat, since identified as U-648 (Oblt.z.S. Peter-Arthur Stahl), which was not damaged. The second attack, by Wellington “H” of 311 Sqdn. (Czech), was delivered at 1410 on a fully surfaced boat, since identified as U-662 (Kptlt. Heinrich Müller), which was not damaged. The third attack, by Liberator “M” of 224 Sqdn. at 1450, was against the same U-648 (Stahl) that Whitley “E” had attacked with six D/Cs three hours before. Now, attacked on the surface with six more D/Cs, the lucky boat escaped again with no damage. The fourth attack, by Liberator “E” of 224 Sqdn., was made at 1650 on a diving boat, which was the same U-662 (Müller) attacked by Wellington “H” two and a half hours before. This time the boat suffered minor damage. Another lucky boat. But, like U-648, she would be sunk within the year.

The killing attack of the day would come at dusk, 2007, when conditions were 1/10th cloud, bases 20,000 feet, sea moderate, wind 110° at 25 mph, and visibility 10 miles in haze. Halifax “R” of 58 Sqdn. made a visual sighting of a narrow brushstroke of a wake across the evening’s dark gray surface. The wake was on bearing Red 100°, distant 6–7 miles. Pilot Flight Officer A. J. W. “Tony” Birch immediately altered course to port. The U-boat, when seen, was on an outbound course of 270°, speed 10 knots. Realizing that he could not lose sufficient height in the distance given, Birch made an altitude-losing turn, keeping up sun of the U-boat, finally making his run in from due west of the target, out of the sun. Eventually seeing him, the U-boat dived. Birch’s six D/Cs dropped while the conning tower was still visible. Because of glare on the water, the rear gunner could not get an exact fix on the stick placement, although, according to the aircraft’s after-action report (Form 540), it was thought that one D/C fell 100 feet ahead of the swirl and the remainder in the swirl or wake.

When Birch circled back over the scene, he observed a patch of blue oil. Shortly afterwards, the mid-upper turret gunner sighted what appeared to be a body. Birch dropped a marker and flame floats, then at 2018 set course away on baiting tactics in company with Halifax “B,” which had been flying about five miles to the west and had witnessed the attack. When both aircraft returned from baiting, they found a large irregular-shaped patch of blue oil a quarter-to a half-mile in extent. Also seen nearby was a circling Sunderland (“T” of 10 Sqdn.), which reported by R/T that it had seen and photographed wreckage. Shortly afterwards, the Sunderland sighted two bodies and wood planking, although these did not show up in the photographs. Halifaxes “R” and “B,” having reached PLE, returned to base, where they sat down at 2345 and 2350. The U-boat was the Type XIV U—463 (Korv. Kapt. Leo Wolfbauer), one of Dönitz’s prized tanker boats, under way from Bordeaux on her fifth supply cruise. She was the first Milch Cow to be sunk. There were no survivors.

On the 17th, Halifax “D” of 58 Sqdn. released six D/Cs on U-628 (Kptlt. Heinz Hasenschar), the shadower boat of the Battle for ONS.5, which was returning to base. The U-boat was not damaged. One attack was made at 1721 on the 20th, by Wellington “G” of 172 Sqdn., following an S/E contact. The identity of the target, depth-charged 40 seconds after submergence, is not known. On the 21st there were three attacks, all as the result of visual sightings. At 1459, Whitley “Q” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U. attacked Us-634 (Oblt.z.S. Eberhard Dahlhaus) 21 seconds after submergence. This boat, which had been damaged in the Battle for ONS.5, was not damaged a second time. At 1756, Whitley “H” of the same squadron attacked a boat, thought possibly to have been U-230 (Kptlt. Paul Siegmann), 30 seconds after submergence. And at 2031 Liberator “D” of 224 Sqdn. attacked a boat, thought possibly to have been U-525 (Kptlt. Hans-Joachim Drewitz), 15–20 seconds after submergence.

Three more attacks came on the 22nd. At 1123, Halifax “O” attacked a boat, unidentified, 30 seconds after submergence; at 1154, Whitley “D” attacked a surfaced boat, unidentified; and at 1227, Whitley “G” attacked an unidentified boat 12 seconds after the conning tower had disappeared. The first of two attacks on the 24th was made by Whitley “J” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U. at 1122 against a fully surfaced boat, unidentified, that offered no return fire. But such was not the good fortune of Sunderland “L” of 228 Sqdn., based at Pembroke Dock, which four and a half hours later encountered U-441, the first of two VIIC boats converted to anti-aircraft role (Flak-U-boot), the other being U-216.

In this modification a quadruple 20mm cannon was mounted on a raised platform before the bridge, two single 20mm cannon on the after end of the bridge, a 3.7cm gun on a raised platform abaft the bridge, and another “quad twenty” on an extension to that platform. The curtain of fire produced by that amount of armament was formidable. The task given U-441 (Kptlt. Götz von Hartmann), which sortied from Brest on the 22nd, was to operate entirely on the surface in the Bay, attacking Allied aircraft and giving cover to damaged boats unable to dive. When Sunderland “L” made her run in against the boat at 1400 she passed, bleeding, through a hail of fire. Pilot Flying Officer H. J. Debden managed to straddle the boat with his D/Cs before, fatally wounded, his “Queen” plunged into the sea. The entire eleven-man crew was lost. But U—441 was also badly wounded, and had to return to Brest, not to sortie again until 8 July. On the 12th of that month she was dived on by three cannon-equipped Beaufighters of 248 Sqdn., which killed ten U-boat men and wounded fifteen others, including the Commander, forcing the boat back to Brest again. Her sister boat U-256 did not put to sea until October, and, after one less than successful patrol, was reconverted to an attack role. The flak-boat idea was not working.

Attacks were made on a submerged boat on the 29th by Beaufighter “O” of 236 Sqdn., employing a new “R.P.” rocket-propelled warhead (see chapter 10); on a surfaced boat on the 30th by Liberator “G” of 224 Sqdn; and on a submerged boat, again on the 30th, by Halifax “E” of 502 Sqdn. All three attacks resulted from visual sightings. None was assessed as causing damage.

The last day of May was one on which, it could be said, No. 19 Group snatched the hood from the falcon. Seven different Derange aircraft made eleven attacks (including second attacks by individual aircraft) resulting in two U-boats destroyed and a third forced back to base. Liberator “Q” of 224 Sqdn. obtained an S/E contact in daylight and dropped six D/Cs on a surfaced boat, causing no visible damage. Fortress “A” of 206 Sqdn. scored the first success of the day, visually sighting a wake and then a surfaced U-boat at 1151. The aircraft attacked from one point abaft the boat’s starboard beam with six D/Cs, obtaining a straddle of two explosions on the starboard side and four on the port. During the run in two German crewmen were seen manning a gun on the bandstand (Wintergarten), but no fire was observed. Although the Fortress crew saw nothing more than a spot of oil in the explosion mark, British interrogators later learned from captured crewmen from the attacked boat, which was U—523 (Kptlt. Werner Pietzsch), sunk on 25 August 1943, that in A/206’s depth-charging she suffered damage to two tanks and had to return to base.

The coup de théâtre on the 31st was a joint attack by four aircraft on a U-boat first visually sighted on the surface in position 46°35’N, 10°40 W. Cloud was 5/10ths, bases at 3,000, tops at 5,000. The sea was moderate. Wind was 260° at twenty-five knots. Visibility was fifteen miles. Running parallel to the Biscay coast and creeping westward, Wing Commander Oulton of 58 Sqdn., seen before on the 7th and the 15th, was dipping his Halifax “R” in and out of the cloud base when at 1550 his flight engineer sighted “white horses” bearing 20° Red, distant six miles. Oulton altered course, climbed into the cloud, and increased revolutions per minute (RPMs) and manifold pressure. At four miles from the estimated position of the wake-making U-boat, Oulton dived out of the cloud at a steep angle so as to give the mid-upper turret gunner an opportunity to spray the U-boat’s tower and put the German gunners “off their job a little.”

After leveling off at 80–100 feet, Oulton made his run in from starboard quarter at an angle of 30° to track, dropping six Mark XI Torpex D/Cs set to shallow depth and spaced 86 feet apart, while the U-boat was still fully surfaced. Photographs later showed a straddle midway between the conning tower and bow. After getting off gun bursts, the rear gunner reported that as the explosion plumes fell away, the U-boat was observed to be “wallowing” in the D/C pool. Oulton circled tightly to port and returned to the scene from dead astern on a westerly course, firing rounds as he came and releasing three more D/Cs. When the spray subsided, the U-boat was seen to be stationary in the center of the D/C scum.

Out of D/Cs, Oulton circled around and made a gun run about 300 yards to port of the injured boat, firing from both the mid-upper and rear turrets. The U-boat was now lying beam on to sea at a northerly heading, surrounded by a large oil patch and considerable wreckage. Twice more Oulton returned to rake the boat with gunfire, now seeing individual crewmen emerge from the tower hatch and run along the deck. Soon there was answering 20mm fire from the boat, but it was inaccurate, and was quickly suppressed. On another weaving, up-and-down pass Oulton saw bodies lying on the bridge. He climbed to 3,000 feet and reported the action to St Eval, suggesting that a reinforcement be sent.

This was done, and at 1710 Halifax “J” of 58 Sqdn. homed in to the position on Oulton’s W/T. Since the pilot could not find the U-boat, Oulton led him down to it, then banked off about 200 yards on J/58’s starboard to give him covering fire. The U-boat was now circling to port. The J/58 pilot made an attack but dropped his six D/Cs 100 feet off-target. On a second attack run he missed again by the same margin. Oulton later said sympathetically that the pilot, young in age and experience, was “over-anxious.” The J/58 stayed around and poured about 200 rounds into the conning tower, on which five crew members were seen; then, at 1275, sighting a Sunderland at 180°, the pilot flew off to attract the flying boat by Aldis lamp signals to the scene. This was Sunderland “E” of 10 Sqdn. At nearly the same time a second Sunderland, “X” of 228 Sqdn., was sighted, and it too was invited to attempt a coup de grâce.

The E/10 swept in from 40° on the U-boat’s starboard bow and dropped four D/Cs that straddled the target. Previously able to maneuver, though trailing oil, the U-boat, now badly shaken again, lost way and stopped. The E/10 wheeled around for a second attack, which she delivered at 1747 from the starboard beam. Four more D/Cs descended on the stubborn boat. Three overshot, but one exploded about 30 feet distant from the “yellowish brown” hull, forward of the conning tower.

Sunderland X/228, nearby, watched E/10’s two attacks and then, at 1750, made one of her own, from the starboard quarter to the port bow, with four straddling D/Cs. She returned two minutes later with four more D/Cs, which entered the water forward of the conning tower. When the second stick exploded, the U-boat shuddered, and bodies were thrown into the air along with the spray. Shortly afterwards, thirty to forty bodies, some still alive, were seen in the water, suggesting that the crew were on deck in the process of abandoning ship when the last attack was made. Oulton, who was still around, flew over the scene and dropped two rubber dinghies and two Mae Wests. “At that point, I felt very sorry for those poor devils in the water,” he said later. “They had only been doing their duty as they saw it and were as brave as any other combatant.”

When the boat disappeared from view, both E/10 and X/228 left the scene, satisfied that the thoroughly hammered enemy craft had been destroyed. The U-Boat Assessment Committee agreed with them and gave major credit for the kill to Oulton in R/58, who carried out the first two attacks, causing severe damage, and homed in another aircraft. But it also praised the teamwork exhibited by the other participating pilots. In a rare personal expression, the Committee commented: “A triumph of co-operation and a good party in at the death.” Oulton was awarded the DSO and DFC for this and previous actions. Pilot of E/10 Flight Lieutenant Maxwell S. Mainprize and pilot of X/228 Flight Officer William M. French each received the DFC. The U-boat sunk was later identified as the Type VIIC U-563 (Kptlt. Gustav Borchardt), which had sortied from Brest on her eighth war cruise two days before.

While that remarkable series of attacks was taking place, Sunderland “R” of 201 Sqdn. was patrolling Derange in position 45°38’N, 13°04’W when, at 1711, a surfaced U-boat was sighted visually, bearing 240°T, distant 8 miles, on an outbound course of 250° at 5–6 knots. Pilot Flight Lieutenant Douglas M. Gall immediately headed straight downhill from 5,000 feet at 150 knots. It was his crew’s first-ever U-boat sighting after many fruitless and boring 15-hour patrols, and he was not going to let this chance go by if he could help it. The only thought that deterred him was that this submarine might be “one of ours.” When he saw light pulses from the boat he feared that they might be Aldis lamp flashes of the recognition Letter of the Day, but a Scottish gunner put his mind at ease: “He’s no’ flashin,’ skipper, he’s firin’.”

Gall made his run in up the U-boat’s track at 50 feet off the deck. In the last seconds of the approach, when it appeared that his four-D/C drop might miss the U-boat to starboard, the U-boat suddenly made a turn to starboard directly into the stick(!). When the explosion plumes subsided, the U-boat was observed to proceed on course for approximately half a minute, then to sink by the stern at a steep angle into the dark malls below.

After making a circuit to port, Gall and his crew saw the surface shimmer from two heavy underwater explosions. One or two minutes later, they watched the sea “effervesce” over an area 200 to 300 feet in diameter and become pale blue and brown in color. A large oil patch appeared and eventually extended a half-mile in diameter. At 1753, Gall’s aircraft resumed patrol with the crew cheering loudly at their triumph. But, as Gall said later, his own feelings were the same as those of Oulton after U-563—“the poor devils!” For the action he received the DFC. The boat was later identified as U-440 (Oblt.z.S. Werner Schwaff), which had sortied from St.-Nazaire on the 26th, bound for what she hoped would be her fifth war cruise.

No. 19 Group, and units of No. 15 Group attached to it, did not accomplish May’s six sinkings and seven damaged U-boats in the Bay transit area without losses of their own, nineteen aircraft in daytime and two at night. Twenty-eight percent (6) of the losses were to enemy aircraft, mainly JU88C6 heavy fighters based on the Biscay coast at Kerlin Bastard near Lorient and Bordeaux Mérignac. Also active, and possibly responsible for daylight losses to “unknown causes,” were four-engine Focke Wulf 200s at Bordeaux and shorter-ranged FW190S at Brest. Another 28 percent of aircraft (6) were lost on takeoff or landing crashes. Twenty-four percent (5) were shot down by U-boat flak. And twenty-one percent (4), including two L/L Wellingtons at night, were lost to unknown causes. (Aircraft occasionally lost engines; the twin-engine Wellington VIII could not maintain altitude on one engine. Some aircraft, as earlier noted, flew into destructive weather systems; some, through navigational error, went down from fuel exhaustion; still others, when close to the sea, hooked a wing on a wave and cartwheeled in.)

The human casualties in the Bay during May were ninety-four crewmen killed, seven missing, and six taken prisoner (from the shot-down Whitley “N” of 10 Sqdn. O.T.U. on 30 May). An additional fifty-two men, two with injuries, were rescued by their countrymen. The number of airmen both killed and missing (101) compares with the number of U-boat crew members killed on six boats, which was 264, figured on the typical Type VIIC crew list of forty-four. The number of U-boat crewmen lost or wounded on damaged boats is not known. The total hours of RAF and RAAF flight time from liftoff to landing required to destroy six boats and damage seven was 6,181 in daytime and 1,314 at night: that is, 1249 flight hours per U-boat sunk, or 576 hours per boat sunk or damaged.

On the strength of the numbers given above it is difficult to assess whether BdU’s policy of maximum submergence at night saved more U-boats than would have been saved had most submerged hours been observed by day, as was the practice prior to May. Certainly in favor of the May policy were the five known aircraft shot down in daylight, actions that not only saved the U-boats involved but also inflicted material and human losses on the enemy, which would not have been likely if attempted at night. Without real numbers for comparison the question remains speculative, but the historical judgment continues to be that the Dönitz/Godt policy was mistaken.

Although No. 19 Group was never able to put in the air the full requirement of 260 aircraft specified in both the Stark and Admiralty plans, proportionately, for the number of assets that could be made available, and taking into account the spanner thrown into the plans by BdU’s surprise nighttime submergence policy, it was thought by both the Air Ministry and AOC-in-C Coastal Command Air Marshal Slessor that Operation Derange had matched the predictions put forth in Raushenbush’s paper. The 103 sightings and 68 attacks in the Bay in May conformed to the numbers crunched in Raushenbush’s “slide rule strategy.”

Twice Slessor went on record to that effect, first on 12 May in the 18th Meeting of the A.U. Committee, when he stated: “An analysis over the past four weeks of operations in the Bay of Biscay showed that the number of sightings and attacks accorded with the previous estimates that had been submitted to the Committee.” And on 23 May, in a “Comparison of Actual and Estimated Results,” Slessor reported to the A.U. Committee that his general conclusion, based on a sufficiently long period of operations to permit such a conclusion, was, in the case of Derange, “that the difference between theory and fact is very small—in fact the two can never be expected to approximate more closely in war.” (Nor could there ever be a more candid concession to strategy by slide rule.) “The analysis of those operations, therefore, can be taken as bearing out the calculations used in A.U. (43) 84 and 86.”

The latter document cited (86) was the Rauschenbush paper (Stark Plan). The former (84), cannily, was Slessor’s own “Value of the Bay of Biscay Patrols” Paper, in which he had consigned the Bay offensive to the status of “a residuary legatee.” If anyone knew, he did, that while there had been 103 sightings and 68 attacks in the Bay during May, there had been 110 sightings and 67 attacks elsewhere in the Atlantic during the same period; and that, while six U-boats had been sunk and seven others damaged in the Bay, during May there had been nine sunk and four damaged by Coastal aircraft giving cover to threatened convoys. Slessor had loyally come on board the Raushenbush strategy. But he had been vindicated, too.

Commander of RAF Coastal Command , Air Marshall Sir John Slessor

Of such judgments it is not thought that Stephen Raushenbush had any direct knowledge. After Enclose I, learning that his permanent position at the Department of the Interior was in jeopardy, he resigned from the Navy and returned to Washington to reclaim it—and to enter an obscurity from which only now he has been delivered. Virtually unknown for the brief but impressive role he played in the making of Black May, he died in 1991 at the age of ninety-five in Sarasota, Florida. Evan James Williams, it was earlier noted, died in 1945. Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Baron Blackett, of Chelsea, died in 1974.

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9 INSIDE THE U-BOAT MIND

The Latimer House Discs

HERMANN KOHLER (U-175): There are only four things you are allowed to tell as a POW, otherwise you will be guilty of betraying your country. Our Commander read it out to us: your name, rank, number, and home address—you mustn’t tell them anything else.29 APRIL 1943

HELMUT KLOTZSCH (U-175): It gets worse and worse, all the U-boat men are grousing.

ADOLF MARCH (U-175): Now it practically amounts to this: as soon as one U-boat is put into commission, another is lost at the same moment.26 MAY 1943

KLOTZSCH: Things look very bad for us. The boats are being sunk one after the other.13 MAY 1943

WLLHELM RAHN (U-307): To tell the truth, I haven’t much hope. They’ll crush us in time.3 MAY 1943

DURING THE WAR, approximately 5,000 German prisoners were captured from 181 U-boats. Most of them, ranks and ratings alike, were passed through the Combined Services Detailed Interrogation Centre, U.K., which, in 1943, was situated at Latimer House, Chesham, Buckinghamshire, northwest of London. There, each man was purposely billeted with a POW from a different boat, or a surface ship, or a Luftwaffe bomber or fighter squadron. The expectation was that a U-boat POW who did not previously know his roommate(s) would want to explain in detail his experiences at sea, how his boat was sunk, his boat’s operating systems and weapons, the layout of his home base, and his general thoughts about the war. Such raw, contemporaneous accounts, British Intelligence apparently believed, equaled or exceeded in value the often guarded information that the POWs gave to Interrogation Officers in formal debriefings. For that reason, each living space was secretly bugged with hidden microphones that picked up most of what the POWs said to one another, and a team of “listeners”—native German speakers able to identify voices—clandestinely recorded their conversations on shellac-covered metal discs.

The data were then transcribed in both the original German and English translation onto typewritten forms headed with the words: “This report is Most Secret. If further circulation is necessary, it must be paraphrased so that neither the source of the information nor the means by which it has been obtained is apparent.” There is no indication in the record that the listeners had any ethical scruples about what a later period in history would call “invasion of privacy.” A similar bugging operation was conducted immediately after the war, from July to December 1945, when ten German nuclear scientists were detained in Farm Hall, Godmanchester, near Cambridge. Latimer House, however, was apparently the first large-scale deliberate operation of clandestine recording of ordinary conversation.

The Latimer House transcripts are housed in the Public Record Office, Kew, under Crown Copyright. The extracts given below focus mainly on U-boat men captured in April and May and on conversations of men captured earlier but recorded during May. Several conversations from March, June, and August are included because of the interesting character of the information contained. The writer has endeavored to make a representative and balanced selection of conversations that fall generally into four categories: (1) operational experiences at sea; (2) technical equipment, including torpedoes; (3) the home front and Biscay bases; and (4) questions of morale and the course of the war.

The reader will find that many of the conversations are flat and passionless; some even banal. It is typical sailors’ talk, with predictable criticism of superiors and occasional bellyaching—or, as the British translation expresses it, “grousing.” One hears exaggerations, misconceptions, and falsehoods, as well as authentic experiences and feelings. There is little that can be called wit or intended humor; and, considering the circumstances, that should not be surprising. How much vital information the Intelligence people drew from the extracts given here is not known. Probably some of the data contributed to the overall interrogation summaries that were printed up periodically.

What, then, are the transcripts’ special value to the present narrative? The answer must be that fifty-five years after the events of spring-summer 1943, they provide us the only existing completely fresh, artless, and uninhibited disclosure of the U-boat mind: what these men were thinking and feeling at the time. Whereas officers and crewmen interviewed in the 1990s concede that details once green in memory have now gone gray in mind, and that the immediacy of once-intense experiences has dissipated through the wake of years, in these long-ago recorded voices we hear U-boat men as they were, in the months of their testing.

All but one of them cited here are now dead, according to the files of the Verband Deutscher U-Bootfahren e.V. (U-Boat Veterans Association) in Hamburg. On the “listeners” forms they are identified only by number. Walter Köhler, for example, a Matrosenobergefreiter (Seaman, first class) captured from U-752 on 23 May, was identified as N 1635; and Helmut Klotzsch, an Obersteuermann (Navigator) captured from U-175 on 17 April, was identified as N(Am)15, the “Am” indicating that he was captured as the result of an American action, namely depth charges and gunfire from the U.S. Coast Guard cutter U.S.C.G.C. Spencer. At some point in the later history of these transcripts someone (one of the listeners? one of the former POWs?) wrote the prisoners’ family names alongside their numbers. The names correspond to names on the U-boat crew lists preserved in the U-Boot-Archiv at Cuxhaven-Altenbruch, where founder and director Horst Bredow was able to supply as well many first, or given, names.

Because not every word or phrase spoken by the POWs was captured on the discs, there are numerous ellipses in the transcripts. Additional ellipses were entered on the following extracts by the writer in order to pass over uninteresting detail or confusing phraseology. Occasionally a word or phrase was added in brackets to identify persons or U-boats or to help the flow of speech: here, as in similar transcripts of unguarded conversation, one learns that people do not always speak in complete sentences. Numerals were written out to conform with speech, Captain was changed to Commander, and British spellings (e.g., harbour, defence) were changed to American forms. Briticisms such as “That’s not cricket” were left untouched.

All the speakers in these extracts are identified in the endnotes, where the reader will find each POWs family name, and given name if it is available in the records; the U-boat on which he served; his rank or rating together with the U.S. Navy equivalent; and his date of capture.4 The first section of the extracts, which focuses on experiences at sea, begins, for example, with conversations between Heinrich Schauffel, a Leutnant zur See (Ensign) from U-752, captured on 23 May, Werner Opolka, an Oberleutnant zur See (Lieutenant [jg]) from U-528, captured on 11 May; and Karl-Heinz Foertsch, a Leutnant (Ing.) (Ensign, engineering duties) from U-659, captured on 4 May. The date of each recording is given below the extract.

SCHAUFFEL: A bomb fell on the after deck of [Kptlt. Heinz] Wolfs boat [U-465].… Everything was ripped open, but the bomb didn’t explode. We once got a depth charge on deck and were unable to submerge with it, yet they couldn’t remove it. It had gone through the woodwork and was so jammed that we couldn’t get it out. It happened in the Bay of Biscay and we fought off aircraft for two days.

FOERTSCH: Kapitünleutnant [Heinrich] Schmid [U-663] got a direct hit on the metal of his outboard tank, but the thing glanced off.

SCHAUFFEL: Did you hear that the outboard tank of a boat had come off?

OPOLKA: Not the whole outboard tank, but the outer covering was torn off; there are double ribs in it and you couldn’t break them down. [Oblt.z.S. Karl] Hauser [U-211] once came back with all his compensating tanks smashed. Also, in the Bay of Biscay, he got eight depth charges, four on the surface and four when submerged. The external pressure connection for the quick-diving tank was broken, then the compensating tanks and the oil compensating tanks.…

SCHAUFFEL (?): Yes, our boats can take tremendous punishment.

OPOLKA (?): You can do anything you like with them. Recorded 10 June 1943

FOERTSCH: Not far from the American coast … unloaded the two hundred kilogram mines. At first the Commander wanted to see what it looked like there; we rushed off at three-fifths speed, which was reduced to one electric motor at “dead slow.” That’s how we went along. It wasn’t pleasant, sitting right in the harbor entrance.

SCHAUFFEL: Which harbor was that?

FOERTSCH: Over at Jacksonville.

SCHAUFFEL: That’s in the south, isn’t it?

FOERTSCH: Florida.

SCHAUFFEL: The main thing is that some [merchant ships] ran on to them.

FOERTSCH: Yes. Three of them.

SCHAUFFEL: Does that count?

FOERTSCH: Certainly, they count a tremendous number of points.…Recorded 7 June 1943

…

POLKA: It said on the wireless: “[Korv. Kapt. Hans-Rudolf] Rosing has gone.” I bet he laughed!

SCHAUFFEL: He’s a smart fellow.

OPOLKA: First-class fellow; he looks very fit, but he’s got gray hair.

SCHAUFFEL: He hasn’t made many long-distance patrols.

OPOLKA: Three, I think.

SCHAUFFEL: He got the Knight’s Cross—what for?

FOERTSCH: He sank one hundred thousand tons.

SCHAUFFEL: Kretschmer was the BdU’s favorite, wasn’t he?

OPOLKA: The BdU has his favorites, that’s quite right. Topp, Kretschmer, Engelbert Endrass, Suhren.

SCHAUFFEL: Endrass was always rather quiet.

OPOLKA: Very quiet, yes; it’s a pity that he has gone. It isn’t known at all how that happened. We lost five boats there.

SCHAUFFEL: On one convoy?

OPOLKA: Yes, Gibraltar convoy. Endrass, [Eberhard] Hoffmann—

FOERTSCH: Nico [Nicolai] Clausen was nearly lost, too.

OPOLKA: If he hadn’t previously rammed the steamer—he still got home.

SCHAUFFEL: His hair has gone gray, too.

OPOLKA: From the last patrol.

SCHAUFFEL: Yes, because of abandoning ship, and water, et cetera.

OPOLKA (?): They did target practice on the U-boat, with flak and ten-point-five [gunfire]. The whole conning tower was shot to bits. Half of the hatch came down on his head. His whole head was full of splinters; his lower jaw was broken, and he was badly cut about below the eye; he couldn’t … his mouth, he couldn’t see. He was picked up by a cutter.

SCHAUFFEL (?): Where did that happen?

OPOLKA (?): In the Atlantic.…Recorded 11 June 1943

SCHAUFFEL: [Werner] Hartmann [U-198] is at sea again, isn’t he?

OPOLKA: Yes. He’s had some successes, too, and [unclear name] should be Kapitän zur See now.

SCHAUFFEL: Hartmann too.

FOERTSCH: Is he Kapitän zur See now?

OPOLKA: Yes.SCHAUFFEL: [Unclear name] has gone, hasn’t he?

OPOLKA: Yes. [Otto von] Bülow was very successful!

FOERTSCH: Aircraft carrier.…

SCHAUFFEL: He’s a smart fellow.

FOERTSCH: He was the captain of my training boat—a grand fellow. I know him very well: he couldn’t [get on] with [Paul] Büchel, who treated him very badly, very shabbily. I couldn’t bear Büchel.

SCHAUFFEL: [Otto] Schuhart was the best of the lot. Recorded 9 June 1943

…

APEL: I remember once, the first convoy on my first patrol. The Commander approached—the whole day long we were forced down by aircraft and destroyers; they kept on forcing us to submerge. We were just in contact and wanted to get ahead of it when a destroyer was reported and we submerged. The next time we were ready again—“Aircraft!”—and down we went. The convoy got away every time until one night we had crept up and got well ahead of it. We had gotten right through and had already gone to action stations, ready to attack; the bow caps were open, and we were about to fire. The Commander had picked out a nice eighteen thousand-ton ship that he wanted to sink, when suddenly—“Pschew, pschew, pschew!” Starshells! Bang! Hell broke loose. The Commander shouted: “Destroyer! Destroyer! Destroyer!” All three were coming for us. “All torpedoes in the tube.” All of a sudden we heard the sounds of propellers and “tsch, tsch, tsch, bang” The fun began. It was only a few seconds before we had fired where the ship was lying, and they had located us by radar, which was quite new at that time. They didn’t actually see us, the weather was very bad—it was up here between Iceland and England. They fired starshells and the moment the starshells exploded they naturally fired their guns of all calibers from two to fifteen centimeters. They kept on booming away, there were crashes all round; we submerged immediately; there were a few depth charges, but not many. They only dropped eight of them very close to us and a few more farther away and then they couldn’t find us again. Suddenly we surfaced, but the convoy had gone. Then we went after it again. That day we got another … full from the aircraft. The next day: “Destroyer!” “Crash dive to periscope depth!” “Action stations!” The Commander said: “I’m going to sink the destroyer. Is everything ready?” Two destroyers; suddenly he zigzagged! The whole … made off. That was another fiasco for us. Recorded 19 May 1943

…

Navigator from the surface ship REGENSBURG: They search the Bay of Biscay, I suppose, don’t they?

APEL: They must have a regular sort of patrol there. One formation relieving another, because they know all the U-boats have to go through there. For the most part we proceed submerged there. You only surface for fresh air and in order to charge the batteries and even then you are disturbed a few times. On our last patrol we were in difficulties on the return trip. We were already near land, we could see the French coast, but we were rather far south in the Bay of Biscay and we had to proceed northwards along the French coast. We still had four hours before getting to the German patrol boat, and then we were located by an aircraft. Now the water was only about sixty-five meters deep, added to which the whole area was covered with wrecks, perhaps even old ground mines, which were lying below. In any case, we couldn’t dive. It [the aircraft] located us continually, but we were lucky right until we met the escort, and after that it didn’t come back. Recorded 21 May 1943

…

APEL: We had followed a convoy across from America. We followed it over nearly to England. Then we had warning of an aircraft; it had been seen rather late. We immediately opened the air vents, that is to say, we dived; the bow and the conning tower were submerged. Do you know how we dive? The English, Italians, and Japanese all come on under power, stop both engines, and let themselves go down. We, the Germans, were the first to hit on the following idea.… We are moving along, the alarm is given, and down we go at full speed; you have to hold on to prevent yourself from falling flat. Both hydroplanes right down. Down at three-quarters speed. Occasionally—the Engineer Officer sees to it, that it never occurs too markedly—but this time we had a tremendous list. We were down by the bows, and lying at an extreme angle. And this list is intensified by the fact that the last air vent of the last diving tank is opened up later, and through that the boat goes down still more by the bows. Now the bow and conning tower were submerged; the stern still showed. Then five bombs fell directly over the boat and shook us terribly. Everything flew about. As a result of the fact that we weren’t so … deep and the bombs were so near; all mechanical and electrical installations failed. The light was out, we were in darkness. Both the engines and the electric motor[s] were put out of action. The main switchboards were blown out, the automatic fuses were burnt out. Our hydroplane motor was out of order. The hydroplanes were still right down. If the engines [electric motors] had gone on working we should inevitably have carried on down with the hydrophones in fixed position until there was a crash. But perhaps we might have been able to crank up the hydroplane at the right moment by hand, but that always takes time and the high speed … we should have certainly gone right down out of control. The hydroplane position gauge—we had a mechanical and an electric gauge—was put out of action, too. So we would have had no idea, if the button had been pressed, in what position the rudder would have been. The main rudder was out of action. In short, all sorts of safety installations and everything were not working. The light soon came on again, just switched over. Then the light was on, we let in the main switch, the engines turned again, the motors were repaired; it all went quickly; in any case the boat was again ready to submerge. Just a matter of luck. Recorded 19 May 1943

Apel: Our boat was sixty-eight meters long. Every conceivable corner was stuffed with provisions. Every few days you’re done out of your sleep. Either the torpedoes have to be brought up, or a convoy is reported, or there are destroyers or something about, or the W/T operator reports propeller noises.My U-boat was the first German U-boat that managed to get through up there between Iceland and Ireland without interference and without being spotted. After that every other boat up there got done in. But we owe it to the extremely bad weather alone that we weren’t spotted by any aircraft. A number of U-boats have been destroyed there.… [Pause] German espionage is very much up to the mark. We knew about practically every convoy, we knew when it put out from New York or wherever it was, and exactly of what it consisted.Recorded 20 May 1943

…

APEL: On the last patrol but one we had two destroyers at our heels. They forced us to remain submerged for twelve hours and dropped their depth charges—we counted thirty-six of them, which fell quite close to us—the others were farther off, we didn’t count them. He [one of the destroyers] dropped depth charges, which made a terrific noise. The destroyer was sailing at three-quarters speed, and at that moment they couldn’t hear anything themselves. Every U-boat always makes good use of that moment if depth-charges are being dropped. We were at three-quarters speed, helm hard over, and above all we made it a habit, when we were depth-charged, immediately to rush to the bilge suction pumps, because they couldn’t hear us and we kept trying to get a little water out of the trim regulator. We never had any luck, air kept … in between.… Suddenly, after about ten hours, one of the crew and I succeeded. The pump sucked in and we were able to expel a thousand liters of water in all, out of two tanks. The boat became so light again that without any difficulty and without changing the speed, it could remain at a uniform depth. There was no need to alter the speed now. We proceeded silently, very gently, and he could no longer hear us; he lost us and proceeded in a completely different direction. We made our escape.… We once had an alarm owing to aircraft, a Sunderland flying boat. The fellow succeeded in forcing us to remain submerged for seven hours. He dropped a bomb every ten minutes to the second, and always near us. We couldn’t surface. Either it was the same aircraft, though I don’t imagine so, or it may have been relieved at intervals. A Sunderland. In the middle of the North Atlantic. We were about half-way between North America and Ireland. Exactly every ten minutes he dropped a bomb. It was quite extraordinary. The devil even tracked us from the air. That is an entirely new English discovery and I don’t know if we know [about] it, at any rate it was quite unknown to us.…

NAVIGATOR FROM THE SURFACE SHIP REGENSBURG: Did the steamer get away?

APEL: The steamers? Oh, they had all gone! [Pause] I know of one boat where the Commander was absolutely determined to score a proper hit. He approached so close to the ship before he fired that his boat sustained such serious damage from the explosion of his own torpedoes, that he only got home with great difficulty. Recorded 19 May 1943

…

KLOTZSCH: … The fellows are supposed to defend themselves against aircraft.

ARENDT: Yes.

KLOTZSCH: Proceeding on the surface on a zigzag course is more successful than submerging.

ARENDT: Yes, actual flak cruisers are being built now—U-flak cruisers for the Bay of Biscay.

KLOTZSCH: Well, it’s not much good if they are only being built now. They ought to have been ready at the beginning of the war. Recorded 14 May 1943

ARENDT: We had the cross.

KLOTZSCH: We had the fixed G.S.R.

ARENDT: With the [magic] eye on it?

KLOTZSCH: Yes.

ARENDT: a Funkmaat of our flotilla invented that, at sea. He got the Iron Cross, Class One, for it, and five hundred Reichsmarks.

KLOTZSCH: Good Lord, how stingy!

ARENDT: Well, it doesn’t work properly. They’ve got something else now.

KLOTZSCH: We couldn’t locate anything with the [magic] eye, but only listen, in the same way as the old G.S.R. used to work.

ARENDT: When we were on our journey home from our last patrol, on the last night but one, we were suddenly right in the beam of a searchlight. A Steuermann happened to be on watch. He came rushing down.

KLOTZSCH: Did you submerge?

ARENDT: Yes and got away. They had a … searchlight. They came from straight ahead. He [the pilot] must have miscalculated, perhaps he hadn’t got his bombs quite ready and only the lamps in the petty officers’ quarters came down; nothing else was broken. He dropped four bombs. It was just the same when we sailed out there. We submerged and got away and he, too, dropped his bombs quite wide. He didn’t hit anything at all. We always got through safely, without any damage, except for the last two times, the last patrol, when we were coming into port, and this time, when we were setting out. Before that we never had any aircraft.Recorded 13 May 1943

KLOTZSCH: On the trip before, we were at a depth of only eighteen meters. The aircraft was very near. Our present First Officer of the Watch was on duty and he saw it too late, gave the alarm, and the aircraft banked and came towards us and dropped its load and they exploded at eighteen to twenty meters off. We were forced up to the surface by the blast and then the boat went down out of control. We were forced up twenty meters so that the whole boat was on the surface, and then went down again, right down deep, and then we regained control, and then we blew the tanks so that the boat rose, and then we flooded them again, but we couldn’t flood them quickly enough, and we remained on the surface for seven minutes with the conning-tower hatch closed down. The Commander went straight back to the periscope and said: “Flood the tanks, he’s making another approach, flood the tanks!” It [the diving system] was all out of action. “He’s making another approach, flood the tanks!” And he behaved like a madman up in the conning tower, shouting: “Flood them, flood them, he’s making another approach, Chief Engineer!” You can’t imagine what it was like. I was standing in the control room and thought: “Now one more bomb on us and it will be all up!” He had gotten plenty of time to aim, we were a fine target, floating about on the surface with our conning-tower hatch closed, but he hadn’t any bombs left, so he just fired at us with his guns and scored a few hits on the upper deck, in the woodwork and covering of the conning tower. If he had had any bombs we should have been done for, all right. That’s the worst of all—when you just wait without being able to defend yourself. Recorded 3 May 1943

[merdiolu]

KLOTZSCH: Soon we shall have reached the point where we shall have built a thousand U-boats and if about fifty U-boats go for a convoy— even if it is escorted by twenty destroyers—they will be able to do nothing against them [the U-boats]. They’ll exhaust their supply of depth charges, without knowing where to drop them. You saw that in this convoy, when we shot up three hundred thousand tons [sic].

CHIEF RADIOMAN FROM THE SURFACE SHIP SILVAPLANA: You weren’t there yourself, were you?

KLOTZSCH: No. But people who actually participated in this witch’s caldron said that not one of the English who had lived through this bombardment would ever sail again. It was such a hell of fire, flames, noise and explosions, dead bodies and screams, that none of all the ships’ crews will ever go to sea again. That is definitely one up to us, a clear moral victory, if the enemy’s morale should deteriorate to such an extent that he should have no further desire to go to sea. But if they really get short, they will force the crews to sail, exactly as we do.

RADIOMAN: They [the English] are forced to do that already.…

KLOTZSCH: One U-boat was depth-charged off Finisterre and let in a tremendous amount of water. She sank immediately down to a depth of one hundred fifty meters and settled on the bottom. The crew were standing up to their knees in water and they waited until all was quiet above and then they pumped out the water with bilge pumps and came to the surface again, and in the night they did some welding on the upper deck and got back safely.On a former patrol we suffered more serious damage than on this one. We remained at a depth of two hundred meters from two o’clock in the afternoon until eleven o’clock at night with battery gas escaping in the boat, which we trimmed only by moving the crew. [Pause]Near Barbados, off Kingston harbor, we saw English officers strolling on the beach with native women. Recorded 6 May 1943

KLOTZSCH: We get twenty-five hundredweight of fresh potatoes. Of these I throw ten hundredweight away. Then everything tastes of oil. Fresh vegetables last perhaps eight days. We can’t take any more with us, otherwise [they] would go bad. Then fresh bread lasts fourteen days at the most; the stuff lies all over the place in the boat.… It is everywhere, in the bilges. The bread lies under the diesel, the sugar and the flour behind the electric motor, everything in tins, flour, rice, eggs, semolina, and everything imaginable. We get about thirty-five hundred tins of milk and about four thousand eggs. We get two eggs every morning and when they begin to go bad, two every evening as well, so that they get eaten up instead of our having to throw all the bad ones overboard. Then the bad eggs smell and they are lying all over the place! Ten cases, each containing three hundred sixty, is three thousand six hundred eggs. Therefore, towards the end, the bad ones are already beginning to smell and then, naturally, one can’t find and take out the eggs which are lying right down in the middle, so they too begin to smell. There is always a smell somewhere. Both the “heads” always stink, and everything else, too. There is such a stink, such a fug, such muck and filth, and then on top of all that you start eating this tinned stuff! Then there’s all the pill-swallowing business, which nearly lays you out, against scurvy or pyorrhea [inflammation of the gum and tooth sockets causing loosening of the teeth], then against.… So that the keenness of his eyesight should not be affected the bridge lookout is given pills to take.

CHIEF RADIOMAN, SILVAPLANA: Did you join up voluntarily?

KLOTZSCH: If you can call it that, voluntarily, like everyone else. I didn’t want to volunteer, I didn’t want to have myself to blame if anything happened to me. So I waited to be called up.

CHIEF RADIOMAN: All the battleships have been put out of service, anyway.

KLOTZSCH: These Petty Officers, third class [Bootsmaate] are so completely dumb, [and] those who [are] now … noncommissioned officers [[Unteroffiziere]—never in all my life have I seen such stupidity. Recorded 3 May

KLOTZSCH: The First Officer of the Watch who left the boat on the last trip, is now in command of a boat himself.

CHIEF RADIOMAN, SILVAPLANA: Who is that?

KLOTZSCH: Oberleutnant [unclear name]. He was rather effeminate. In broad daylight once, south of the Azores, he had the port sector [to watch], that is, the sector in which the sun rises—we were on a southerly course—and there he stood on the bridge, singing popular songs and so on. Suddenly the Unteroffizier [in the sector] next to his reported: “Herr Oberleutnant, there is a ship in your sector.” There was a twin-funnelled neutral passenger ship lying there, her engines stopped, and she’d already given the recognition signal. Since they had the sun behind them, they’d seen us for a long time and we’d continued to head straight for them, so they said to themselves: “Here’s a U-boat, she will probably stop us and demand a recognition signal,” so they’d stopped already. All the neutral ships know that, they’ve all been stopped any number of times. He [the First Officer of the Watch] had allowed them to come within eight hundred meters and hadn’t seen them. Just suppose it had been a destroyer or an enemy armed ship—that would have been the end of us, all right! What a peach our First Officer of the Watch was!

CHIEF RADIOMAN: Imagine a fellow like that having command of a boat now!

KLOTZSCH: I’m sorry for his poor crew. All the things we put up with are still in store for them. Everyone in the boat pitied the crew he’d got.

CHIEF RADIOMAN: I shouldn’t like to sail under anyone like that.

KLOTZSCH: No more would I but what can you do? … Our Second Officer of the Watch, who has now become First Officer of the Watch, once failed to see a flying boat, a huge crate, three hundred sixty miles from land, in broad daylight. We were on a northerly course and it was on a westerly one, which meant that it was at right angles to us, a long way away on the starboard side. The idiot of a Second Officer looked out and saw how the flying boat turned towards us as soon as they saw us, and instead of taking evasive action at high [speed] on the surface, and making off on a zigzag course to allow them to fly over us and drop their bombs, and then submerge—because that gives you much more time—he gave the alarm, with the result that everything inside the boat was put out of action and we went down out of control.… It was a bad mistake on the part of the bridge watch, the First and Second Officers of the Watch—people like that make your hair stand on end! … We were on a homeward course.… Suddenly [an aircraft] approached on the starboard side.… The [helmsman] had … the helm to fifteen port and had gone to sleep. I gave him a kick in the pants, all right. It often happens that the helmsman falls asleep, because he sits in the conning tower and for four hours on end has nothing else to do but steer, and if you’ve got the middle watch, when there’s nothing happening in the conning tower and [only a] few smokers join you—smoking is allowed in the conning tower—

CHIEF RADIOMAN: Even when the hatch is closed?

KLOTZSCH: NO. In areas where there is danger from aircraft no one is allowed up on the bridge except the four men and the Commander, who sometimes goes up. [In other areas] there are two or three men smoking in the conning tower. When one goes below, the next man may come up; when we’re in the middle of the Atlantic or a long way away, some are allowed up on the bridge. Recorded 7 May 1943

VOELKER: I was going through the Bay of Biscay … [and the order was given] to surface: “Look out!” and we submerged again. After about an hour we surfaced again, “Look out!” and down we went again. It went on like that all night long for two nights. We had only just been on the surface for a minute or two and the top of the conning tower was scarcely out of the water when he [the Commander] shouted: “Look out!” and we submerged again and went to action stations. There must have been one aircraft after the other up there. There is always a commotion when we make a crash dive. There was one man in the boat who had his peaked cap on and it got stuck in the conning-tower hatch and when we submerged he couldn’t close the hatch. All the water was coming in from above, and the water was pressing down on it and it took two men to pull the cap out! Recorded 4 May 1943

…

RADIOMAN FROM THE SURFACE TANKER GERMANIA: What else were you attacked by?

KALISCH: Destroyers, corvettes and those fast bombers too.

RADIOMAN: Fast is a slight exaggeration.

KALISCH: At sea they always seem to be fast. Believe me. We detect the aircraft and they’re over us in no time. You’ve hardly started … before they reach you.

RADIOMAN: Where would you be now, if you hadn’t been captured?

KALISCH: In the North Atlantic. We should be homeward bound now. Recorded 13 May 1943

…

VOELKER: [Re: sinking of U-175]: They had caught sight of our periscope and had also DFed us. We were at a depth of twenty meters and then dived and stayed down. The blast from the depth charges was terrific; we lost control of the boat, everything was smashed. The water was coming in and everything was creaking, groaning, and crackling. We were at a depth of two hundred thirty-forty meters. It was pure chance that we were able to get ourselves up again, pure luck.When we dived the bow caps were open and we couldn’t shut them again. They had been bent by the depth charges, so we went down to two hundred meters.

NAVIGATOR FROM THE REGENSBURG: Wouldn’t it have been better to have fired them [the torpedoes] out quickly?

VOELKER: That can’t be done. You can’t get them out.

NAVIGATOR: The water pressure was twenty atmospheres.

VOELKER: We fire at fifteen atmospheres. [Pause] The poor fellows who are now at sea! In the old days it used to be pleasure trips, even in the little two hundred fifty-ton boats, but now—! Recorded 9 May 1943

ROSS: In the Bay of Biscay we proceeded submerged during the night. It used to be the other way around. When you’ve been on duty for four hours in the U-boat and then suddenly come into the fresh air, your strength seems to ebb away. You go quite limp and don’t feel like doing anything; you just lie down. When you submerge normally—it’s simply called “submerging”—it’s exactly like a crash dive and is done just as fast, the only difference being that the bell is not rung. They keep on bringing in something new, until the word submerge will simply be forbidden. However, when the command “submerge” [Tauchen] or “crash dive” [Alarm] is given, or “Action Stations,” or some such thing, you know at once, you hear that even in your sleep.In the Bay of Biscay every day at two o’clock … punctually at two o’clock, another day it might be five minutes past or five minutes to, but the fellow [enemy aircraft] was always there about two o’clock. We were proceeding along the coast of Spain and the Commander would say: “We’d better look out, he must be coming soon.” The Commander went on to the bridge and then he gave the alarm. They had … already seen … [the aircraft]. Schultze [Kptlt. Heinz-Otto Schultze, U-432] had wonderful eyesight.

MARCH: It was the same in our boat. You might have seen nothing at all, but the Commander would have already sighted something long before.ROSS: His eyes are keen after years at sea.Recorded 29 March 1943

PLNZER: On the long Africa patrol … I was looking round and suddenly I saw a destroyer. You could see her with the naked eye.… When we submerged we were forty-five degrees down by the bows. In the electric motor compartment there were sacks of dried potatoes and they suddenly burst. They lay strewn about the Petty Officers’ quarters and all over the whole galley, the whole diesel compartment and the bow compartment were full of dried potatoes. In the wardroom as well.… All the kitchen utensils got piled up forward in the bow compartment.

RLCHTER: … On the very first patrol. A devil of a sea. The old hands who were with us said they had never before experienced such seas. It was just about Christmastime. We were proceeding between Iceland and the Faroe Islands on Christmas Eve.

PLNZER: When, this last Christmas?

RLCHTER: Christmas Eve. I was as sick as a dog. Recorded 2 June 1943

…

ELEBE [U-752]: Our morale was about as good as if we were being led to the slaughterhouse. You must remember it was the first patrol and when we saw something we submerged immediately. The Officers of the Watch had a regular slanging match [drag-out quarrel]—it’s a wonder they didn’t come to blows.

KEITLE [also from U-752]: Yes, that’s quite true.

ELEBE: Our officers never dared open their mouths because they knew nothing about it [the boat] and all our Unteroffiziere … were old experienced men.

KEITLE: That was the sad part about it: “I’m an officer, you can tell me nothing.” Yet what could you say to the lad, he’s nineteen—.

GRATZ: They wouldn’t have got away like that with us.

KEITLE: That was some boat! It was bound to sink! We all said that on the first day.

ELEBE: We said that right from the beginning. “They put the boat into commission—we’ll put it out of commission again.” That was obvious from the beginning, first as a joke, and afterwards—my God, how we dreaded this patrol, we older ones. “They should skip this patrol and go straight on to the next.” That’s more or less how we were talking. And that turned out to be correct, as they introduced a sort of military atmosphere in our mess, with physical training every morning and other such nonsense. We definitely didn’t make faulty trials, as normally the engines ran quite well. To think that that damned aircraft had to drop its nice little bomb right where the outer tanks on the pressure hull are! … Put out of action immediately as the safety valves in the diesel were smashed, and the fuel began to run out. Up by the outside locker a stream of water came from the Chief Engineer’s cabin. Had it only been water which got in, the Chief Engineer could have held the boat, but it was fuel. It was already over the deck plates in the control room—that’s practically half the boat—and it began to run into the batteries. Already some of the cells in the battery had broken. And what an atmosphere in the boat! It was icy cold. It felt like minus sixty degrees centigrade, and then we were down by the stern … three quarters speed, dead slow. The main air valve was blown off.Recorded 31 May 1943

SCHAUFFEL: I’ll tell you about us now.

NOWROTH: Who was the Commander?

SCHAUFFEL: [Karl-Ernst] Schroeter [U-752], who has the Knight’s Cross. Aircraft forced one boat to submerge.

NOWROTH: Was that in daylight?

SCHAUFFEL: It was at night. We never saw anything, the whole time. We’d already been at sea for five weeks. Afterwards [a message] arrived from a U-boat, I don’t know which one. Forced to submerge … bearing so-and-so. “The enemy is making off in such-and-such a direction.” ‘We’ll see,” said the Commander, “I don’t believe it, but we can set off now and be there early tomorrow morning.” … At eight o’clock in the morning aircraft forced us to submerge and we remained submerged until eleven.

NOWROTH: At what latitude was that, roughly?

SCHAUFFEL: It must have been around fifty degrees.

NOWROTH: And the longitude?

SCHAUFFEL: Roughly forty degrees. We surfaced at eleven. I was on watch.… When suddenly an aircraft approached on the port side. We didn’t stand a chance.… He started dropping his bombs.… I went to the machine gun and started firing, but it was too late. It [the plane] was flying at forty meters—just imagine it. I don’t know where their eyes were. So we had to submerge. We did so … and surfaced again.… We should have shot the aircraft down.… Two rounds of ammunition misfired. It was impossible to give any sustained fire and then suddenly there was [a] fighter [aircraft] there and he swept our bridge clear … everybody killed. I was sitting right in the center. The aircraft fired to the right and to the left of me, but I wasn’t hit. Recorded 31 May 1943

TLLLMANNS: We torpedoed an eight-thousand-ton steamer carrying dynamite. It was a surface shot and the ship was blown right out of the water. We were fairly close to it… [our] control panel, electric light bulbs, everything was smashed. Recorded 1 June 1943

…

[UNCLEAR NAME]: I could distinguish every tree in Russia … bushes … and in America the coastal road went like this—we could see the houses of the millionaires brilliantly lighted, the lights of the cars shining. You can see the lights at the bends of the road, they shine out over the sea. You can clearly [see] the traffic there.…

STOCK: Well, when our U-boat went through the Strait of Gibraltar, I can tell you, it’s damn narrow, you could spit across it.

[UNCLEAR NAME]: When you go through with your U-boats, can’t they hear you?

STOCK: We go through at night, [and] we’re lit up by a searchlight. We slipped through at very slow speed on our electric motor. At that time they hadn’t so much D/F gear, et cetera. Recorded 29 May 1943

…

LINK: How did they sink you? [Re: sinking of U-752 on 23 May by Swordfish “G” of 819 Sqdn. Royal Navy and Marlet “B” of 892 Sqdn. RN, both from the escort carrier H.M.S. Archer]

PLNZER: We broke surface and got a bomb from an aircraft.

LINK: How many of you did they rescue?

PLNZER: On the destroyer where we were, there were twelve of us. About thirty-five men got out of the boat. We were up near Greenland. Well, we came up with difficulty and they [destroyer crew] hung out ropes, rescue ladders, five in a row—but nobody could get over the railing—it was colder than in Russia. But the men on the destroyer were very decent. We were all given smokes and everything ! Six of our men were aft in the engine room, and couldn’t get out. The others all got out. There were very heavy seas running. We were only afraid that the aircraft would fire on us. Link: Why?

PLNZER: Because they fired right up to the last minute. We could assume that they wanted to fire because we had fired as well. We went on firing to the last round.

LINK: Was it at night?

PLNZER: No, about midday. We had submerged on account of aircraft and destroyers, then we broke surface and the Commander kept seeing an aircraft through the periscope, and they told us then that small aircraft had already spotted us under the water, at periscope depth. Then it must have kept right above us.… [We] surfaced … and suddenly: “Aircraft one hundred meters distant,” and instead of opening fire we submerged and were only at a depth of three or four meters when the bomb fell. Immediately a mass of water broke in.LINK: … Where were you based?

PLNZER: In St.-Nazaire.

LINK: There’s a lot of damage there.

PLNZER: The town has been smashed up, but not the shelters.

LINK: No, not the shelters. It is the same in Lorient.

PLNZER: The last time they raided there they shot down fourteen aircraft during the night. They dropped bombs and in one night the town became a heap of ruins, but they did nothing to the shelters. Recorded 28 May 1943

APEL: Corvettes are far the best thing against U-boats, far better than destroyers. We can’t get at them because they are built with a shallow draft. Recorded 21 May 1943

…

SCHMELING: The good times of U-boat sailing are past.

TLLLMANNS: I’ve been in U-boats since April 1938.

SCHMELING: My cousin was drowned between the twenty-sixth and twenty-eighth of June last year, up there in the “Rose Garden” between Scotland and Iceland. We picked up W/T messages from him and then he was gone; nothing more came through. It was six weeks before his parents got the news: “The boat has been overdue for some time and must be presumed lost.” And it wasn’t until four weeks after that that they heard he’d died a sailor’s death on active service. “He gave his life for Greater Germany.” Recorded 28 May 1943

[merdiolu]

The second section of extracts focuses on weaponry and detection gear, both German and Allied. There were many more conversations on these and other technical matters than the few extracts reproduced here would suggest, but on the belief that most readers would not want to get caught up too much in the whirring world of machinery and electrons, only a few sample conversations on technical matters are extracted here.

KLOTZSCH: … Those fellows [the English] have excellent instruments. Have you seen the semicircular thing up aloft, which moves round in a circle? It’s a sort of semicircle, about as big as this, which moves round at this speed the whole time; that’s the thing which our G.S.R. [German Search Receiver] receives.

MARCH: Yes, that’s the radar, that’s the same thing; they have the radar, with which they emit a beam.…

KLOTZSCH: And then they had a sort of network round the mast, and the thing at the masthead, a sort of network right up aloft. That’s for use on the surface. That corresponds to our G.S.R.

MARCH: Yes, they receive with it.

KLOTZSCH: That is their receiver; their transmitter is below. They also have excellent hydrophones, and this asdic as well.

MARCH: That asdic must be a marvelous thing.

KLOTZSCH: It is! And recently, of course, there’re … beams penetrating below the surface from above—as in the case of aircraft.… Aircraft can now establish the presence of U-boats when submerged. That’s the so-called.…

MARCH: … Ultraviolet rays.

KLOTZSCH: Yes, it has something—no, not ultraviolet; ultraviolet are rays which can only be rendered invisible, that is, that have such a short wavelength that they are invisible—inaudible. No, that’s something else—well, they are frequencies to which the medium of water offers no resistance.

MARCH: But that must be something very special.

KLOTZSCH: They are shorter than—I believe you speak of wavelength zero—from nought to ten centimeters, I believe; thus, they’re extremely short waves which strike the water with such an impact that the water offers no resistance.

MARCH: They must have absolutely terrific energy.

KLOTZSCH: They have.Recorded 26 May 1943

…

BRÖHL: It is a normal receiver, but somewhat specialized for certain wavelengths.

FIGHTER PILOT, F.W. 190: Which wavelengths are they?

BRÖHL: Destroyer wavelengths; they usually work on the one hundred eighty meter band and aircraft on the one hundred forty band. I can’t remember the number of kilocycles at the moment.PILOT: Then that’s a receiver and you have someone sitting at it all the time?

BROHL: It’s a normal receiver and a man sits at it with headphones.

PILOT: And at what distance can he [detect] an aircraft’s radar?

BRÖHL: The range is fairly large.

PILOT: Ten miles or so?

BRÖHL: Even at twenty miles.

PILOT: And a destroyer?

BRÖHL: A destroyer as far, too. It depends also on the atmospheric conditions at any given time.

PILOT: You don’t have a special aerial or anything, do you?

BRÖHL: Yes, you have a special aerial, which is put up on the bridge; it’s a simple cross with horizontal and vertical bars. The destroyer radar wavelengths are vertical and the aircraft radar wavelengths are horizontal; or rather the other way around, the destroyer radar wavelengths are horizontal and the aircraft radar wavelengths are vertical.…

PILOT: And is that simply a cross aerial?

BRÖHL: Yes, it’s a cross aerial.…

PILOT: It can’t pick up destroyer and aircraft at the same time, can it, because you are listening in to two different wavelengths?

BRÖHL: You can switch over quickly.

PILOT: Oh, you tune in to a different one?

BRÖHL: Yes.

PILOT: I suppose it is spot-tuned, isn’t it?

BRÖHL: Yes.

PILOT: Must there always be a man sitting at it?

BRÖHL: Yes, there’s always one there in the areas which are in danger of air attack, especially in the Bay of Biscay and to about twenty to twenty-five degrees West.

PLLOT: As far as twenty to twenty-five degrees West. Does the [Allied air] patrol extend as far as that?

BRÖHL: Yes, as far as that. We were in square B[runo] E[mil], I believe that’s three hundred fifty sea miles west of Cape Finisterre. That’s the northwest corner of Spain. We were rather farther south, and on the same day, another boat, which was to the north of us, about in the latitude of the Bay of Biscay, … that is, twenty to twenty-five degrees westward, was bombed by aircraft, suffered serious damage, and had to put back into port. We have to use the search receiver as far out as that. One can say, about two hundred miles west of Portugal, along the whole coast as far as the latitude of Gibraltar, the whole area is in danger of attack from the air.

PILOT: Do you hear it at the same moment as the aircraft begins searching?

BRÖHL: Yes. At first you heard a continuous sound all the time, starting rather faint and becoming louder, but, later on, the boats evolved a better method. When the aircraft is searching you hear the short continuous sound. Then you switch off. If the sound has become louder, you can tell that the fellows are making their approach, they have found you. If it doesn’t recur, you can assume with a reasonable amount of certainty, that it was just an accident. They [G.S.R. operators] always have to search again, as a check, to convince themselves.

PILOT: What would happen if he [Interrogation Officer] found out, for example, that you had something like that [Metox]?

BRÖHL: They know about it. They have noticed that themselves from their lack of success. First, we lost a considerable number of boats … in the Bay of Biscay, boats which were putting out to sea and returning to port. Suddenly their [English] successes stopped. Then they knew that we had some countermeasure.

PILOT: Suppose they changed their wavelengths the whole time, suppose each aircraft searched on a different wavelength?

BROHL: It wouldn’t matter if they did. We can cover the whole scale with our apparatus in any case.

PILOT: Suppose they worked outside the scale?

BRÖHL: In any case, the [G.S.R.] operator always goes over all the wavelengths as a check. Recorded 21 March 1943

…

In the following section of extracts the POWs speak of the home front as they saw it last, of the war in general, of high-ranking government officials, and of their U-boat bases. Much more could be selected from conversations about the bases with their U-boat bunkers, or shelters, since that was a popular topic, but the descriptions tend to be repetitive and the few reproduced here can stand for the rest.

VOELKER: The last time I was in Germany and my wife and I came out of the cinema, we heard the strangest languages—French, Dutch, Danish, Polish, et cetera, everything but German. The Germans are shedding their blood at the front and these damned foreigners are sitting in our cinemas. Believe me, I’m fed up with National Socialism. If we win the war, we’ll rebuild Germany and we won’t pay a penny. [We’ll see to it that] they [the enemy] are ruined first. They must be bled white.

NAVIGATOR FROM THE REGENSBURG: if things go wrong, Adolf[Hitler] will go to Switzerland.

VOELKER: No, he’ll do himself in. [Reichsmarschall] Hermann [Goring] will go to his daughter, who is married and living in Sweden. [Heinrich] Himmler will put on a fig leaf and go to Africa. If things go wrong, the Fiihrer will agree to a negotiated peace.

NAVIGATOR: No, England and America will never agree to a negotiated peace.

VOELKER: If peace is made now, we’ll have to go through another war; but I still hope that the Japanese will finish off America.Recorded 9 May 1943

…

NOWROTH: You’ve no idea how many prisoners of war make a getaway in Germany—every day!

SCHAUFFEL: Really!

NOWROTH: When I was on leave at Bonn recently, everything was suddenly barricaded off. I was in civilian clothes with my wife [and] … wanted to cross the Rhine by tram, that is, the fast Rhine-bank electric line. I had my naval identity card with me. The tram suddenly stopped on the bridge, all the traffic was held up. The police came in and asked for our identity cards. Everybody who hadn’t identity cards had to get out and was taken away. I had my naval identity card with me, with a photograph in it and then he took a good look at me. It was a photograph of me when I was a midshipman. It was still a good likeness.… I was stopped twice more on the way. There was a terrific roundup of forty-six English officers who had suddenly gotten away, just imagine it, and they only caught thirty-nine of them. A waiter who was there was in the auxiliary police and in his free time he worked as a waiter and he knew all about it, how many they recaptured and [how] seven of them had completely disappeared. They didn’t catch them again. Dirty business … There was frightful scandal about it. How on earth is it possible for forty-six officers to escape?

SCHAUFFEL: Germans do it now.

NOWROTH: … The whole of Germany is a military machine today. There are Italians, Croats, … Belgians. All the races are represented. It’s a fact: if we were to lose the war, the enemy would already be in the majority in the country.

SCHAUFFEL: Yes. We’re in a sorry state. My wife can shoot with rifle and pistol. I suggested pistol shooting. I said to her: “You know what you have to do if I shouldn’t come back, which we hope won’t happen, that you at least are.… Shoot anyone you see.”

NOWROTH: … It was always the aim of the Jews to make the Christians their slaves and the only way they could succeed was by means of a war between Christian and Christian.

SCHAUFFEL: We may well thank God that we’ve got the Führer and Hermann [Goring].

NOWROTH: Yes, yes.

SCHAUFFEL: I have nothing against the English and the English have nothing against us. It’s just the Jews who are responsible for the war. (Just from this concversation saöple we can deduct how much German Armed Forces has been brainwashed with anti Semitic National Socialist propaganda)

NOWROTH: That’s right. Recorded 31 May 1943

KLOTZSCH: I went with my wife to Weimar, which is the quietest, most idyllic and peaceful town in the Reich, but you keep meeting grousers there. I had several arguments with them, and my wife used to say to me: “Let them talk.” I replied: “I can’t do that. They are miserable creatures who have never been anywhere near the enemy and here they are, grumbling and grousing. Are we to come from U-boats and listen to that sort of thing?”I came back from leave. In rather less than a fortnight we sailed. I spent three hundred and four Reichsmarks on drink. Oh my God, how Germany has changed! They aren’t National Socialists any longer, they are agitators, nothing but agitators. They just shoot their opponents. I’ve told my wife that if ever we have a boy, the last thing we must do is to put him in the Hitler Youth. We are responsible for the child. Recorded 3 May 1943

OPOLKA: When guerrillas are captured behind the lines [in Russia] they are naturally shot, but this guerrilla warfare has slackened off there. When it was very bad and people were continually being shot and the miscreants were never caught, they killed one hundred thousand for every German who was shot. That worked.

SCHAUFFEL: Well, I don’t know whether that would always work.

OPOLKA: Oh yes.

SCHAUFFEL: What? To kill one hundred thousand people for one German who’s shot?

OPOLKA: Well it did work.

SCHAUFFEL: Well, in France at any rate it didn’t. Nor in Poland.

OPOLKA: In Poland? It worked in Poland, too. There were no more afterwards. It’s quite true what the English say about our having killed masses of them there.

SCHAUFFEL: Well, that had to be.

OPOLKA: I’d like to see the infantry officer here who wouldn’t kill a crowd like that if he’d driven into a town in an armored vehicle and a few Poles had come creeping out with their hands up and then thrown in a hand grenade when he opened the roof. That’s not cricket! [Das gehört sich ja nun nicht!]

FOERTSCH: Things have happened which should never have been allowed to happen.

OPOLKA: However that may be, it’s a question of “bend or break.” Either the thing goes well—in that case it will have been all right because a problem will have been removed from the Reich with a sudden, momentarily painful brutality, which in the long run will have been a good thing. And if things go wrong, it’s all up with us anyway. It’s a pity. If we had avoided a war with England, the whole world would have belonged to us.

FOERTSCH: That’s the opinion of the English, too.

SCHAUFFEL: Yes, I should only like to know what went wrong that time, with [Prime Minister Neville] Chamberlain.

OPOLKA: Chamberlain was thoroughly friendly towards the Germans. Perhaps, even if he wasn’t that, he at least saw that reason [existed] to cooperate with Germany.

FOERTSCH: The trouble was that something went wrong that time at Munich—that’s my opinion for what it’s worth.

OPOLKA: Nothing at all went wrong there. Everything was conceded to us except the [Polish] Corridor. Recorded 10 June 1943

…

KLOTZSCH: Adolf [Hitler] is unmarried. He hates humanity and he is driving the whole German nation to ruin. He has no normal human feelings. He has a bestial hatred of mankind. We are bleeding to death in Russia—Tunisia has fallen. Here we’re well treated; in Germany the English POWs are in chains. I loathe that arch-liar [Propaganda Minister Josef] Göbbels, with his evil tongue, and his twenty-two million tons that have been sunk. Then there’s [Labor Front head Robert] Ley with his four or five villas on the Rhine, that villainous blackguard, with his three marriages and his countless illegitimate children; however the war ends, he’ll be murdered one day. Here they tell you the truth. Every Englishman can listen to the German radio. Here you can eat in restaurants without coupons. When I was on leave recently, my father warned me about one-sided propaganda. I must admit now that he was right. Recorded 13 May 1943

CHIEF RADIOMAN FROM SLLVAPLANA: I was responsible for all the German ciphers in France, the general Enigma and the officer’s Enigma machines, all the recognition signals, for the period June to May. I took it as a compliment myself, but I often thought it was quite wrong to give things like that into the keeping of an Other Rank. I could have had the things photographed and no one could have raised a finger against me, no one would have noticed it. And then all the civilians—there are so many of them who sail as wireless officers on merchant ships, and they are all given these ciphers and so on to look after; it’s not right at all. And, then, as I said, in France, where espionage activity is even greater.

KLOTZSCH: I also had all our own minefields which we’d laid in the Northern Hemisphere on my grid map, and I used to think: “An Englishman would give me a great deal of money for that map.” Recorded 9 May 1943

FOERTSCH: We went ashore with revolvers, then we shot up the brothel and came back with far more money than we had started out with. They cleared out the brothel later. There were female agents there; there usually are in those bars. A girl working there would earn five Reichsmarks in ten minutes, but there aren’t any seamen there; they don’t pay anything. Recorded 8 June 1943

KALISCH: The U-boat shelter at Brest certainly is a large one.

SPITZ: Does it only take boats from one flotilla?

KALISCH: Yes.

SPITZ: How many pens are there?

KALISCH: There are five pens and ten docks.

SPITZ: Can three U-boats get into each pen?

KALISCH: Yes.Spitz: That would be … for one flotilla.

KALISCH: Yes. At present the Ninth and the First are together, but they are enlarging the thing now. They are beginning to build again.

SPITZ: Are they in a row now?

KALISCH: Yes, side by side. They are building on another five pens to it now. Just imagine how many boats can get into it.

SPITZ: Five pens, that means fifteen U-boats.

KALISCH: There are more than fifteen U-boats.

SPITZ: Ten docks.

KALISCH: That makes twenty-five and another fifteen.

SPITZ: That makes forty U-boats.

KALISCH: At present they’ve got a four meter-thick roof. Now they’re adding another four meters to it.Recorded 13 May 1943

GEIMEIER [Re: Lorient]: The U-boats lie inside in the pens, like cars in a motor garage. When there’s an air-raid alarm, the French people and everyone about have to go into the shelters. We then closed the doors there; not a soul could get in or out.

PHILLIPPS: Under what sort of conditions do the fellows live in the one thousand-man shelter?

GEIMEIER: They have their rooms there.

PHILLIPPS: As big as this one?

GEIMEIER: Yes, bigger.

PHILLIPPS: How many men to a room like that?

GEIMEIER: It varies, four or five. You spend the first week after you put into port and the last week before you put out, down in the shelter. Everything is in one compartment in the shelter, the noncommissioned officers and ratings are all together. These doors, the movable doors, are all… guards outside, wire entanglements, and barbed wire. We lived inside them.… The inside of the shelter is lined with wood and there are bunks there. You’re together with four or eight men, it all depends. The noncommissioned officers, ratings, and officers all live separately. The last week before the boat puts out to sea and is in the hands of the shipyard, when it is lying in the pen in a dry shelter, we lived in the big shelter all together. It’s right on the harbor, we have about ten minutes walk to reach the boat. They’re still building shelters; … hundreds of Frenchmen are employed there. There are twelve mixing machines where the shelter is being built, all in use. There are two shifts of French workmen—they are building another shelter where we were—who do the shoveling. One shift looks on, smoking cigarettes, while the others work, and then the other relieve them. And then this new layout; the concrete is five meters thick, and then there was scaffolding on top; they are adding another meter of concrete on top.

PHILLIPPS: On top of the shelters?

GEIMEIER: Yes. The men now no longer live in the shelters. They live farther outside, about thirty kilometers away, right in the woods. An artificial lake has been installed, and a big mess built, there are hutments there with steam heating and everything in them. They are driven there in buses every day. By the time we were due back from this patrol, the camp would have been ready. There are several flotillas there. I believe the Tenth and the Second are at Lorient, and then there are the ones from St.-Nazaire, too.

PHILLIPPS: Are the U-boat men also supposed to live outside now, no longer inside the shelters?

GEIMEIER: They all live outside.

PHILLIPPS: … One flotilla [already] lives up in the woods, doesn’t it?

GEIMEIER: Yes, that’s the Second Flotilla. When we were there, their camp was already finished.They were about forty kilometers away from us. We belonged to Tenth and as Tenth wasn’t ready, we were still in the shelter; if we’d gotten back we shouldn’t have returned to it.

PHILLIPPS: … Are the boats [of the Second and Tenth Flotillas] together?

GEIMEIER: The boats themselves are berthed together, but the men are billeted separately, in separate camps; … The longest time that any of our boats was at sea was sixteen weeks. Otherwise, the average patrol was five or five and a half weeks if we were not supplied at sea, and eight weeks if we were, or, at most, nine. To which brothel did you go? The one at La Rochelle?

PHILLIPPS: Yes.

GEIMEIER: Do you know the one at La Pallice, too … at the top end towards the … the petrol store is there.

PHILLIPPS: Yes, I know that [one], too.

GEIMEIER: … The layout at Lorient is a sight worth seeing, because the thing has been designed like a wasp’s nest. It’s like a labyrinth; you can’t find your way about in it. All the workshops are inside the shelter, [for example,] the torpedo workshops.… Lorient has been smashed up, but that doesn’t matter at all. Only the population has suffered, the French population, and no one else. You must imagine the Kiel shipyard … [or] the Deutsche Werke, with a large concrete shelter on top, only even more clearly arranged. On one side you have … engines, then here are the … cleansing workshops where all the pistons are washed down and all that; then here are the … workshops, and here are the torpedo workshops; here is the compressor room, where the air compressors are taken off; here is another pen; it is all arranged in pens, and all beside the boat.

PHILLIPPS: Did you actually have a Junkers compressor?

GEIMEIER: Yes.

KUFFNER: You pass through there, the U-boats are in single pens and between the U-boats there are the workshops. It goes right up to the roof. Then there are other things which are separate—Junkers is separate—and that is separate, and all the experimental places are separate.

GEIMEIER: You can’t form any picture of it if you haven’t seen it yourself.

KUFFNER: Well, the Junkers compressor is damnable!

PHILLIPPS: Is there only one staircase leading to the one thousandman shelter, is there only one way you can go?

GEIMEIER: There are two proper entrances. But one of them is always closed during the day, it is only opened at coffee and mealtimes … otherwise, there’s just one way up.

KUFFNER: Inside there you could buy everything in the canteen—cloth, wine, everything you needed. What amount of stuff we took with us on leave! You can buy stockings, cloth, everything.

GEIMEIER: I always bought my wife expensive stockings.

KUFFNER: I used to send my wife a parcel before I put to sea. I bought her five meters of cloth. It was marvelous blue coat material and cost twenty-four Riechsmarks a meter. Recorded 11 May 1943

…

ROSENKRANZ: The English will never find out where the hutments of the Tenth Flotilla are [outside Lorient]. They are inside the woods, right in the middle of them, and they are camouflaged into the bargain! Everything has been camouflaged, even the pond. It is all covered with scrim. You can’t see anything at all. They haven’t got any landmark there. The huts are covered over with scrim. You can’t see them at all. All round them there are meadows. It’s all surrounded by woods. They certainly won’t find it. They won’t see the lake, it isn’t really a lake, only a pond. They have no idea where the camp is.

GRATZ: Did the hutments belong to the Second Flotilla or the Tenth? Or are both flotillas stationed together?

ROSENKRANZ: No, the camps are perhaps a quarter of an hour apart. Recorded 15 May 1943

…

W. RAHN: The Commander hit the First Officer of the Watch over the head with a bottle. They were very drunk, and the First Officer of the Watch retaliated by taking a broom and beating up the Commander.

Radioman from the GERMANIA: How are things with the Italians?

W. RAHN: They hate us like poison. When seamen get drunk they open the portholes and throw bottles at the Italians walking by on the street. Recorded 3 May 1943

…

OPOLKA: We simply must win the war. If things go wrong, presumably the Russians will overrun our country; and even if the Russians don’t come right in but confine themselves within certain limits, for the simple reason that they, too, have lost a lot, then all these head-hunters will come in, the Poles and the Czechs. I come from the frontier district, from that actual part; I hate the Poles, they’re a vile race. I’m anxious about my parents. Recorded 10 June 1943

The Admiralty’s Naval Intelligence Division issued a report on 2 April in which it evaluated morale among U-boat POWs as of mid-March. It had an “on the one hand … yet on the other” quality. It reported “no marked deterioration in fighting spirit” among those POWs recently captured. Given the leadership of confident, able, and imaginative Commanders, “even young and raw recruits are resolute in face of the enemy.” In captivity, however, the crews recently captured, including officers, had shown a previously unseen tendency to divulge information that they must have known was contrary to their country’s interests. The Intelligence people theorized that that talkativeness resulted mainly from Germany’s recent reverses on the Eastern Front—the German Sixth Army had fallen at Stalingrad on 2 February 1943—and from Panzer Army Afrika’s impending collapse in Tunisia, which would occur on 7 May 1943. Other reasons advanced were distaste of Roman Catholic POWs for Nazi treatment of their church, general war weariness, and a mounting feeling that Germany would lose the war. Withal, Intelligence noted, recent POWs continued to believe that they were loyal Germans, and it cautioned that nothing heard from the POWs suggested a decline in the fighting efficiency of U-boat crews still at sea, or that their combative ability would fall “in the near future.”

Given the 2 April assessment of talkativeness, it is striking that the secretly recorded POW conversations after March and throughout May and June reveal a studied intention on the part of many recently captured men to stonewall or mislead their Interrogation Officers. Furthermore, among the mass of recorded conversations during that same period, there are relatively few expressions of despondency or of what the British obsessed on, “collapse of morale.” There were, of course, a few such fears of inevitable defeat, strongly put, as seen in the epigraphs heading this chapter (which are repeated below together with their serial numbers). As indicated earlier in this narrative, there is little ground for assuming that the U-boat crews ever lost their fighting spirit up to and including the last months of the war. One may argue that morale is a different attribute from courage, and that it, at least, diminishes in the face of inevitable defeat. Perhaps. If ever a distinction could be drawn between morale and courage, perhaps this was the moment. But he morale collapse so long and devoutly sought by the British, and cited so frequently in their documents as a goal, if it ever was achieved in fact, seems not to have had any appreciable effect on the resolute willingness of the German crewman to come back swinging, like one man fighting three. One thinks of Napoleon’s army on its way to Waterloo, of whom it was said, they marched without fear and without hope.

MARCH: I don’t want to sail in any more U-boats, I’ve had enough of them.

Radioman from the SLLVAPLANA: I can well believe that!

MARCH: The anti-U-boat devices are getting too good. They had instruments with which they DFed us exactly. Three destroyers came along, and got us right in the middle. We should never have gotten away again however deep we’d gone. It was hopeless. I believe they sank three U-boats that day. radioman: Three U-boats in one day—that’s the limit! Recorded 25 April 1943

OPOLKA: I was with the BdU a whole year at Lorient as Adjutant to the Commander in Chief. [Pause] … My father is a Kapitänleutnant on a Sperrbrecher [auxiliary minesweeper]. But he’d rather sell vacuum cleaners. My brother is a soldier, my brother-in-law is a soldier.… I didn’t want the war. I’m not a pacifist and I was sorry that I had to remain on the Staff for so long. I kept applying for a transfer. But to say that I enjoy the war—the decisive factor for me is that my parents have to go through the whole damn business a second time. They lost everything and with great labor have struggled to their feet again. Recorded 9 June 1943

OPOLKA: So you are convinced that we shall win the war?

SCHAUFFEL: Yes, we’ve both said: “We shall not lose.”

OPOLKA: I’ll tell you something, no one wins in war.

SCHAUFFEL: When I’m on board, I’m the type of person who likes to start an argument, because the others always said: “We shall win the war.” It’s nonsense; one must allow logic to play a part. My one fear is that my father’s vessel [Pott] will go down under him.Recorded 9 June 1943
…

LINK: Don’t you believe that we will use gas if worst comes to worst?

MARCH: I don’t think so. But I think we shall lose the war. Time is no longer our ally. These attacks on Germany now—our losses in the field!

LINK: Two million were killed in the last war; only two hundred thousand have been killed so far in this war!

MARCH: But the English and Americans will hold out longer, and the use of gas would only hasten our downfall. Recorded 23 May 1943

[merdiolu]

10.IN PERIL ON THE SEA

Tenebrae

The ships destroy us above
And ensnare us beneath.
We arise, we lie down, and we moveIn the belly of Death.
RUDYARD KIPLING

Whoever is of the opinion that offensive action against convoys is no longer possible is a weakling and not a true U-boat commander. The battle in the Atlantic is becoming harder, but it is the decisive factor in this war. Be conscious of your great responsibility and be quite certain that you will have to answer for your deeds. KARL DONITZ 21 MAY

There can be no talk of a let-up in the U-boat war. The Atlantic is my first line of defense in the West. And even if I have to fight a defensive battle there, that is preferable to waiting to defend myself on the coast of Europe. The enemy forces tied down by our U-boats are tremendous, even though the losses inflicted by us are no longer great. I cannot afford to release these forces by discontinuing the U-boat war. ADOLF HITLER 31 MAY

FOLLOWING THE EPIC BATTLE for ONS.5, nearly 600> Allied merchant ships in fourteen convoys crossed the Atlantic during the remaining three weeks of May. Of that number only six ships were sunk by U-boats. Where the U-Bootwaffe crews were concerned, the startlingly low number did not result from their lack of trying; at Dönitz’s urging, they fought desperately to get back into the game. But it was too late. Both the initiative and the numbers had passed to the Allies. There were now too many experienced close escort and Support Group vessels in the convoy lanes. And overhead there were too many shore-based bombers, not to mention at this date carrier-borne British Fairey Swordfish bombers and Martlet (Grumman F4F4 Wildcat) fighters and American Grumman TBF—1 Avenger bombers: it was during these weeks that such aircraft from American-built escort carriers achieved the first singlehanded destruction of a U-boat. These weeks also saw the first successful employments of the American airborne homing torpedo code-named Mark XXIV Mine and of the British “R.P.” (solid-head rocket projectile) It was all too much for the U-boats, once the aggressors, now left panting heavily in the wake of events. And many went down to sodden deaths. In this chapter our narrative will examine briefly those particular convoys that defined transatlantic traffic during the last three weeks of May, the major aircraft actions outside the Bay of Biscay, and, finally, U-boat losses elsewhere in the Atlantic and Outer Seas.

The surviving U-boats that had operated against ONS.5 moved off to the east and south. Approximately fifteen boats were still capable of operations; ten would shortly be operational after reprovisioning from two milch cows; and nine were on their way back to base. Western Approaches had no information about these movements, since decryptions of German radio traffic were still trying to catch up to events following the cryptographic intelligence blackout from 26 April to the afternoon of 5 May. Suspecting, however, that packs were still operating in the general area of the ONS.5 battle, the next westbound convoy in the eight-day cycle, ONS.6, departing 30 April, was routed to the west of those possible concentrations. Surface protection was provided the convoy by Escort Group B6, consisting of one destroyer, HMS Viscount (S.O.), five corvettes, and two trawlers; and air cover flew out of Iceland beginning on 3 May. Despite its evasive route, the convoy did not escape enemy detection. Two U-boats, U—418 and U—952, from a new Gruppe Isar [after the river] forming between Greenland and Iceland, sighted the convoy on the morning of 6 May, when the convoy was at 60°15‘N, 24°20‘W. Their reporting signals to Berlin were DFed by HMS Viscount and shore stations, leading CinCWA to increase the air cover by noon. By 2100, aircraft had made ten U-boat sightings, two 55 and 73 nautical miles ahead of the convoy columns, seven between 18 and 32 miles abaft the starboard beam, and one 58 miles astern. Several attacks resulted.

Meanwhile, on the surface, one of the corvettes had made a visual sighting on the starboard quarter at 1946. The abundance of air threat, excellent intercommunication between surface and air units, and an evasive alteration of course at 2300 had the desired effect of shaking off the shadowing boats. A second alteration at noon on the 7th avoided boats known to be to the north. The 8th was quiet until dusk, when HF/DF intercepts suggested that the U-boats were closing the convoy again, and HMS Viscount sighted a conning tower breaking the surface at a range of 7,000 yards. She pursued, the U-boat dived, and she dropped a ten-charge pattern over the swirl without result. The U-boats backed off, apparently made wary, if not unnerved, by the forces arrayed against them, and the night that followed was uneventful.

At 0700 on the 9th, the convoy’s protective screen was enlarged by the arrival of the “cavalry,” a Support Group (Fourth Escort Group) made up of destroyer HMS Faulknor (SO), two other destroyers, and one of Britain’s new escort carriers, HMS Archer. But by that time the danger was past and, after 48 hours, the Support Group disengaged to join Convoy ON.182. The ships of ONS’.6 then proceeded to their destinations without further incident. The convoy’s safe passage through the now-closing Air Gap where Gruppe Fink had gathered its predecessor convoy in a deadly embrace was a clear signal of the new dispensation that prevailed.

In Berlin, BdU was aware from sailing cycles that a pair of east-bound convoys were due to depart on or about the same date in early May, one a slow-moving SC convoy from Halifax, the other a faster HX convoy from New York. In anticipation of their crossing longitude 42°W at some time on 8 May, Dönitz/Godt formed two patrol lines stretching 550 miles across their probable courses: Group Rhein [the river], formerly Amsel III and IV, consisting of ten boats spaced at twenty-mile intervals from 47°33’N, 40°55’W to 43°57’N, 4o°o5’W; and Group Elbe [after the river], consisting of seventeen boats, mostly ex-ONS.5 operation, stationed at the same spacing from 52°45’N, 43°55’W to 47°51’N, 41°05’W.2 Early in the game, the German B-Dienst radio monitoring and cryptanalysis service that so troubled Francis Harry Hinsley in Hut 8 at Bletchley Park learned from decryptions of Allied Naval Cipher No. 3 that on 3 May, eastbound convoy HX.237 was positioned at about 40°50’N, 67° (31–49’?) W, steaming on a course of 056°, speed 9.5 knots; and that on 5 May, eastbound convoy SC.129 was at position 44°50’N, 47°01‘W, course and speed unknown. It was likely that the faster convoy HX.237, even if its departure was the later of the two, would be the first to cross the line that Dönitz/Godt had drawn in the sea.

In the evening of 6 May, B-Dienst informed BdU that as of 2130, HX.237 was in BC 7684 (43°56’N, 48°27’W). That information was quickly relayed to the Rhein and Elbe patrol lines. Further data learned by B-Dienst on the 7th revealed that HX.237 had turned toward the south on a course of 128°, and that SC.129 was on a base course toward the east. This intelligence that the two convoys were taking a more southerly route than expected, which would cause HX.237 to elude the patrol lines altogether and SC.129 merely to brush the southern tip of Rhein, had three immediate effects:

(1) BdU ordered the Rhein boats to move at best speed on a course of 120° so as to position that group’s southernmost boat at 39°45’N, 35°02’W; and at the same time, the Elbe boats were directed to take the same course of 120° at ten knots in order to intercept SC.129; though BdU conceded that, “No clue to the [present] position of this convoy is in hand.”6

(2) The six boats of Group Drossel (Thrush), which had been operating on the coastwise West Africa-Gibraltar-U.K. lanes, were ordered west to reinforce Rhein and Elbe.

And (3) Donitz/Godt demanded to know “how the enemy was able to intercept our patrol strip” and to divert the two convoys around it.

BdU considered every possible explanation, from detection of the patrol lines by aircraft, to DFing of U-boat radio traffic during the Battle for ONS.5, to the possibility “considered unlikely, that the enemy has cracked our ciphers” It is ironic that this is one of the few occasions in 1943 when, in fact, decryption of Enigma played no role in the diversion of convoys around wolfpacks. It appears that prior to the movements of the two convoys on the 6th and 7th the Allies had no knowledge of the formation or positions of Rhein and Elbe. The first British decrypt of German traffic pertaining to the formation of Rhein in the existing records is a message intercepted at 1015 on the 7th but not decrypted until 1304 on the 9th; and the first mention of Elbe was intercepted at 1320 on the 12th and not decrypted until 1016 on the 14th. Very probably, the two convoys were given southerly routes to evade U-boat concentrations thought to be east of Newfoundland and building up between Greenland and Iceland as well as to provide better flying weather for the aircraft aboard escort carrier HMS Biter, which, in the course of events, would offer cover to both HX.237 and SC.129.

Two ocean escort groups were assigned to HX.237: C2, consisting of the destroyer HMS Broadway (Lt.-Cmdr. E. H. Chavasse, R.N., SO), a frigate, four corvettes (three of them Canadian), a trawler, and a tug; and Escort Group 5, acting as a Support Group, consisting of escort carrier HMS Biter (Capt. E. M. C. Abel-Smith, R.N., SO) and three destroyers. Owing to heavy fog, C.2 relieved the local escort a day later than planned, at 1400 on 7 May. HMS Biter and her escorts were even further delayed, not joining until the 9th, in thick weather unsuitable for flying, but on the 7th and 8th, in better weather, her aircraft had flown out to the convoy to make close patrols ahead and astern and thus “hearten the Masters and their crews.” The merchant argosy itself was made up of thirty-eight ships in company and nine stragglers. Two stragglers put back to St. John’s, four rejoined the convoy, and three, Fort Concord, Brand, and Sandanger, continued independently; these three would be sunk on the 12th, the only casualties among the vessels actually or nominally part of HX.237: once again it was proved how vital it was for merchant vessels to keep their stations in a convoy.

At 1300 on the 9th, thanks to BdU’s new dispositions, U-359 (Oblt.z.S. Heinz Förster) of the Rhein group sighted the main body in 41°09’N, 26°54’W and, on BdU’s order, became its shadower. The U-boat’s transmissions were DFed by HMS Broadway, who sent the corvette HMS Primrose down the bearing, where she got a sighting and, after the boat dived, dropped a ten-pattern, with no evidence sequent. Meanwhile, Chavasse ordered the convoy to alter course 40° to starboard. More HF/DF bearings were acquired later in the day, suggesting that at least two U-boats were in contact with the convoy, but no sightings resulted, and because of the continued milky air, the nine Swordfish and one Martlet of 811 Naval Air Squadron aboard HMS Biter, steaming on station astern, could not assist in the hunt. (There had been three Martlets originally, but on the 7th two Martlets had failed to return from patrols, though vigorous efforts were made to home them back. Lost, they both made forced landings alongside ships, a straggler and a trawler, and their pilots were picked up. The two ships were 90 miles northeast of the convoy! Three days later, a Swordfish was lost and its crew rescued in exactly the same way.)

The next morning, the 10th, in slightly more diaphanous air, U-403 (Kptlt. Hans Clausen), following C2’s tug on the surface, sighted the convoy, and at 1647 was sighted herself to starboard by the escort screen. Two corvettes made revolutions after the intruder, and HMS Biter was able to launch Swordfish “M,” which reached the still-surfaced boat six miles distant before the corvettes. Raked by machine-gun fire when 1,500 yards from the conning tower, the fabric-skinned biplane banked hard out of range; then, as the U-boat dived, it returned to the attack at maximum speed of 120 knots, approaching from the U-boat’s port quarter at an angle of 45° to track, and from a height of 60 feet dropped four Mark XI D/Cs set to 24 feet and spaced 60 feet apart. They missed astern. The surprised U-boat, having survived the attack, signaled BdU that she had been engaged by a wheeled aircraft. This was certainly news to BdU, which had just signaled the Rhein boats that they need not fear aircraft, since the convoy was out of the range of shore air bases, so BUT LITTLE AIR CAN JOIN THE CONVOY. But HMS Biter’s flight deck, built on an American merchant hull, had been able to offer the ultimate surprise, a hard-surface landing gear aircraft flying from a midocean runway.

The escort carrier (CVE) was a warship type coincidentally first produced by both the RN and USN in June 1941. In both instances a flight deck was mounted on a merchant ship hull. The RN type, HMS Audacity, embarked six Martlet fighters on the converted merchant ship Hannover captured from the Germans. Assigned to the U.K.-Gibraltar convoys, she had an outstanding six-month career, destroying five Luftwaffe aircraft, sighting nine U-boats, and on 17 December 1941 sharing in the sinking of U-131 (Korv. Kapt. Arend Baumann) with the 36th Escort Group (Cmdr. Frederic John Walker, R.N., SO), though the attacking Martlet and pilot were lost to the U-boat’s gunfire. While escorting Convoy HG.76 on the night of 21–22 December 1941, HMS Audacity was struck by three torpedoes from U—751 (Kptlt. Gerhard Bigalk) and sunk.

Her American counterpart, carrier USS Long Island, capable of embarking twenty-one aircraft, would not see action in either the Atlantic or the Pacific theaters but spend her career in ferrying, training, and experimental duties. But beginning in 1942, the USN heavily committed funds to the CVE program, and American shipyards began turning out large numbers of improved carrier conversions from merchant hulls, eventually producing 128 by war’s end. British yards produced five. Many of the early U.S. CVEs went to the RN, which made additional modifications, mainly to the avgas fuel systems to prevent vapor explosions, and two of these, HMS Biter and HMS Archer, were in active service on the Atlantic convoy routes during Black May. Swordfish “L” from HMS Biter had earlier, on 25 April, shared in the destruction of U-203 (Kptlt. Hermann Kottmann) along with the destroyer HMS Pathfinder, while both ships were with EG5 supporting EG B2, the close screen of Convoy ONS.4. The aircraft’s principal contribution to the kill was two well-placed calcium sea markers, since her two D/Cs dropped 20 seconds after submergence apparently did not damage the U-boat. On 10 May, HMS Archer, with Fourth Escort Group, was supporting EG B6 with Convoy ONS.6.

Royal Navy escort carrier HMS Biter

British naval historian David Hobbs has commented on the relative merits of shore-based and naval-embarked aviation at that period. Most of the flying hours of the former, he points out, were expended in transit to and from their patrol areas rather than in patrol itself. Add to that the fact that significant numbers of shore-based bombers and crews had to be kept in constant rotation on successive legs to and from the convoy, and the economy of carrier aircraft, which were based constantly with the convoy, becomes apparent. Furthermore, RAF Coastal Command aircraft did not always successfully rendezvous with their designated convoys; in 1942, for example, 34 percent of all Coastal sorties were Not Mets. Finally, unlike bombers from afar, the carrier aircraft lent themselves to rapid and flexible tactical use by the escort commander, the attack on U-403 being an apt example. The only problem at this date, apart from pilots’ tendency to get lost navigating, was the inadequacy of the Swordfish aircraft in speed and structural strength.

Following the action against this boat, BdU decided that the main body of Rhein must be 90 miles behind the fast convoy, with little chance to catch up. Accordingly, it ordered that group, excepting U-403, to withdraw from the operation against HX.237 and to move instead against the slower SC.129, which was “considered to offer better chances of success.” The fast convoy would be left to the shadower U-403 and to the six boats of Drossel closing from the east. The daylight hours of 11 May were quiet, though HF/DF activity increased, and Chavasse sent two destroyers ahead to probe for threats, and two of HMS Biter’s aircraft searched the convoy’s perimeter. Later in the day, U-436 (Kptlt. Günther Seibicke) of Group Drossel found HX.237 BD 9554 (44°15’W, 27°25’W). Another of Drossel’s boats, U-89 (Kptlt. Dietrich Lohmann), reported the presence of carrier-type aircraft circling overhead—either a confirmation or a first disclosure to BdU that the aircraft that attacked U-403 was carrier-borne.

At 2013, another of HMS Biters aircraft, Swordfish “L,” caught U-436 on the surface and attacked her with four D/Cs from 150 feet. During the run in, the “Stringhag,” as the frail biplane was called by pilots, took heavy anti-aircraft fire, but the pilot and gunner watched the tracers pass harmlessly between the port upper and lower wings, and the pilot returned fire with his front gun. Following the D/C drop, the pilot climbed to make a return run, but after he got the slow-gaited craft around, the U-boat had disappeared. The pilot dropped a smoke float and resumed patrolling.14 At 2100 U-89 reported the convoy on a new course, 000°, or due north.15 Contact was not resumed until daybreak on the 12th, when the surfaced Drossel boat U-230 (Kptlt. Paul Sieg-mann) sighted the ship columns in heavy swell astride BD 2826, confirming that the convoy, estimated at 9.5 knots speed, had made an evasive turn to north.

Soon afterwards, U-230 found herself under attack by the first Swordfish to make it off HMS Biter’s bucking deck that high seas morning, which was the twenty-third birthday of U-230’s First Watch Officer (I.W.O.) Herbert A. Werner, a native of the Black Forest region of southern Germany, who was commanding the bridge watch:

“Aircraft astern!” It was too late to dive. The single-engine plane came in low in a straight line exactly over our wake. I fingered the trigger of my gun. Again the gun was jammed. I kicked its magazine, clearing the jam. Then I emptied the gun at the menace. The mate’s automatic [machine gun] bellowed. Our boat veered to starboard, spoiling the plane’s bomb run. The pilot revved up his engine, circled, then roared toward us from dead ahead. As the plane dived very low, its engine sputtered, then stopped. Wing first, the plane crashed into the surging ocean, smashing its other wing on our superstructure as we raced by. The pilot, thrown out of his cockpit, lifted his arm and waved for help, but then I saw him disintegrate in the explosion of the four bombs [D/Cs] which were meant to destroy us. Four violent shocks kicked into our starboard side astern but we left the horrible scene unharmed.

This loss had a sobering effect on HMS Biter, who decided that antiquated Swordfish should no longer engage in gunfire duels with U-boats, despite their crews’ keenness to do so. Henceforth, the Sword-fish were to attack only with D/Cs when the U-boat was seen to be diving or had just dived. In other cases the pilot was to keep the U-boat in observation and, if possible, call in surface ship assistance. HMS Biter’s next attack would include an excellent example of called-in assistance from HMS Broadway and the frigate HMS Lagan. At 1230, in good weather, visibility 20 miles, Swordfish “B” sighted a wake, then a U-boat distant four miles, proceeding at 12 knots on a course of 060°. At about the same time, the U-boat—it was U-89—sighted the aircraft, altered course, and dived. By the time the Swordfish got down to 50 feet and dropped four D/Cs, U-89 had been under for 30 seconds. The pilot returned to the position, saw no evidence on the surface, dropped a smoke marker, and reported the action by R/T. HMS Broadway received the report and closed the position at 24 knots, while the Swordfish returned to HMS Biter short of fuel.

At 1301 HMS Broadway reached the marker and, her asdic dome lowered, obtained a contact bearing 045°, range 1,500 yards. Chavasse decided on a Hedgehog attack, which he delivered just as U-89 accelerated across his bow. There were no explosions. HMS Lagan, in the meantime, had arrived to assist and she now made two unsuccessful Hedgehog attacks of her own. Ten minutes later, HMS Broadway regained strong echoes on which to fire a second 24-projectile salvo, with a deflection of 15° right. This time, at 1359, there was a single sharp explosive CRACK! that was felt throughout the ship. Twenty seconds later, a second, muffled explosion was heard, and a marker was thrown overside.

HMS Lagan made two Hedgehog attacks on the position without result, but forty-five minutes after HMS Broadways hit on the U-boat’s hull, the wreckage appeared on the surface. It consisted of a piece of wood with an electric light switch, two positions for plugs, and the identification “Schlüssel-M” (Enigma machine); several pieces of laminated wood varnished on one side and painted white on the other; a woolen jersey with a Nazi emblem; and various other articles of clothing that were not picked up. The single Hedgehog projectile had drilled a fair-size hole. No bodies were seen. They were all entombed below in the Type VIIC iron coffin. And the burying for that day was not over. Within the same hour as HMS Broadway’s puncturing hit, another Drossel boat was gored; subsequendy it would flail about wounded, call desperately for help, then die gamely from the last penetrating effects of a weapon never before used at sea. Ironically, U-89 was on her way to help that boat when death chose her first.

U-89 entering submarine pen

[merdiolu]

On 10 December 1941, three days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. National Defense Research Committee (NDRC), acting on a proposal made to it sometime before by the U.S. Navy, convened a Top Secret meeting of scientists and engineers at Harvard University to consider the feasibility of a low-weight airborne anti-submarine acoustic homing torpedo. The feasibility agreed upon, the participants met again two weeks later to draw up general requirements and assign responsibilities for design and testing. The requirements in sum were that such a homing torpedo should be able to detect, track, and impact a source of underwater noise, such as the twenty-four-kilocycle sound produced by cavitation—the sudden formation and “popping” of the bubbles created by a high-speed marine propeller; be of a size to fit in existing bomb bays or on a 1,000-pound bomb rack; be droppable from 200 to 300 feet from an aircraft in level flight at airspeeds between 120 and 150 knots; be propelled electrically by a lead acid storage battery at 12 knots for five to fifteen minutes; and be able to carry a 100-pound high-explosive charge.

Bell Laboratories, a division of the Western Electric Company, and the Harvard Underwater Sound Laboratory (HUSL) agreed to pursue independent but cooperative and information-sharing development of the general design. The General Electric Company would design the propulsion and servo motors (and it may also have developed parts or all of the hydrostatic depth-control system). A lightweight 48-volt, shock-resistant, lead-acid storage battery was developed by the Electric Storage Battery Company. HUSL measured the “self noise” made by the torpedo’s own propeller and solved the problem of allowing for it; though this was not the problem it might have been, owing to the participation of the David Taylor Model Basin at the Washington Navy Yard. There, Dr. Karl Schoenherr, after discussing prop noise for twenty minutes with Bell Labs visitors, whipped out a large piece of paper and drew a propeller design freehand. “Here is your prop,” he said, presenting the sketch of a propeller with a 14¾-inch diameter and a 12-inch pitch. When the Bell Labs people protested that these were hardly the precision specifications they required, Schoenherr had a draftsman make a more exact, scaled, dimensional drawing and, after lunch, presented that instead. Not only did the design well serve the prototype acoustic torpedo then under construction, it was not improved upon until five years after the war was over.

The sometimes improvisational character of the torpedo’s development was further demonstrated when, for the midsection casings of the torpedo body, Western Electric and Bell Labs engineers turned to a bathtub manufacturer “whose most precise measuring instrument appeared to be a wooden yardstick”; but the company made and shipped interchangeable sections that were remarkably free of defects. In the end, the only significant difference between the Bell Labs and Harvard configurations of the torpedo were the type and placement of the sound-receiving hydrophones. In the Bell Labs model, Rochelle salt crystal hydrophones were arranged symmetrically around the circumference of the torpedo midsection. In the Harvard model, magnetostriction hydrophones were mounted on the nose section. While there was no meaningful difference in the performance of the two systems, it was decided by the NDRC to go with the Bell model, since the nose section containing the 92-pound warhead of HBX—1 Torpex high explosive and Mark 142 impact fuse in the forward 14½ inches of the weapon could then be handled independently and, in operations, be attached just before the torpedo was mounted on an aircraft. The four acoustic sensors, left, right, up, and down, homed to the noisemaking target by body shadow. The hydrophone on the right side, for example, did not hear the noise to the left, or port side, which was shadowed by the torpedo’s body, hence the torpedo’s guidance system turned the torpedo to port. The up and down sensors acted in the same way along the depth axis.

Prototypes of the torpedo were tested by both boat launches and aircraft drops to measure and verify performance characteristics. The principal testing was done at Solomon’s Island on the deepwater Patuxent River in Maryland and at Key West, Florida. At the latter site a USN submarine with a protective cage built around its propellers served as a target for air-launched homing torpedoes loaded with plaster instead of explosive. After the first three of six torpedoes banged into the propeller cage repeatedly until they broke themselves apart, the Captain in command of the exercise called a halt to the testing, reminded everyone present of his secrecy oath, and advised USN personnel involved to stay out of submarines!

With testing completed, the design was frozen in October 1942, and production under sole contract was awarded to the Western Electric Company. The first production model was delivered to the USN in March 1943, a remarkable fifteen months since conception. It measured 19 inches in diameter, 84 inches in length, and weighed 683 pounds. Its maximum speed underwater was 12 knots, more than adequate to overhaul a U-boat at its best submerged speed. In fact, its operating characteristics were very close to those first proposed in December 1941. Since the midsection hydrophones had maximum sensitivity in a direction at right angles to the sound source, it was not expected that the Bell model chosen, having reached its preset depth, would head directly, nose-first, at the target, even if dropped along the submerged U-boat’s track. As a USN operations research study reported in August 1946:

The torpedo is fitted with a wooden spoiler ring and tail stabilizer to aid its flight in air; these break off when it enters the water. After water entry the torpedo usually circles, with a turning radius of 50 to 150 feet, at a depth below 40 feet, until it comes within the sphere of influence of a sound source sufficiently intense to activate the controls. Thereafter the torpedo proceeds on an approximate pursuit course until it strikes the target (or loses it). At full battery capacity it will run from 12 to 15 minutes, traveling approximately 6,000 yards, after which it will sink, since it has no negative buoyancy.

From this description, it is little wonder that airmen nicknamed the weapon “Wandering Annie.” But its official designation, to mask the Top Secret nature and purpose of the device, was Mark XXIV Mine. (Another reason for use of the term mine, it has been suggested, was to keep the weapon out of the ponderous USN torpedo establishment with all its baggage.24) It also was called FIDO, and when that was thought too closely to suggest “sniffing,” the code name was changed to PROCTOR. From the beginning, Mark XXIV was cloaked under the strictest official secrecy, since if word of its function leaked to the Germans, all a U-boat had to do in order to avoid its fatal sting was to proceed at slow submerged speed after diving, when cavitation would fall below the sound sensors’ threshold. When a manufacturer’s lot of Mk.24S was ready for shipment from Kearny, New Jersey, it was kept hidden and loaded on military aircraft in off-ramp, secure areas. Usually a guard of one officer and five technicians accompanied the lot until it reached its destination, either USN or RN.

Mark 24 Magnetic mine , the cover name for US made acoustic torpedo Mark 24

The first RN-destined weapon, however, traveled to the United Kingdom under the guard of only one officer, Acting Group Captain Jeaff Greswell, R.A.F., who had been in the United States on liaison ASW missions to USAAF bases and was asked to escort the Mk.24 on the British liner Empress of Scotland. It was Greswell who had worked with Humphrey de Verde Leigh in developing the Leigh Light, who had formed the first operational L.L. squadron, No. 172, and who, on the night of 4 June 1942, had made the first L.L. damaging attack, on the Italian submarine Luigi Torelli, while attacking the Italian Morosini as well. At a New York dock, Greswell told the writer, he received the weapon from a USN truck heavily guarded by armed sailors, who carried it up the gangway in three separate unmarked boxes, one containing the nose section, one the midsection, and one the tail. Greswell signed off on the USN documents and, after the ship’s Captain had the boxes placed in his ship’s safe, Greswell asked for and received a receipt. Upon the ship’s arrival at Liverpool much the same high-security procedures ensued, and the three boxes were secretly whisked away on a highly guarded RAF lorry. Imagine his surprise, he asked the writer, when, on leave, Greswell received a postal notice from His Majesty’s Customs inquiring why he had failed to declare the importation into the United Kingdom of an airborne homing torpedo for use against U-boats!

More efficient security attended the first consignment of Mk.24s in number to Northern Ireland on 27 April and to Iceland on 1 May. Originally the weapon was to have been used first against independently operating Japanese submarines in the Pacific, but the British delegation to the Washington Convoy Conference in March had persuaded Admiral King to permit simultaneous use against the U-boats, for which the date 8 May was set, later advanced to 6 May. The greatest secrecy was imposed on USN, Coastal Command, and RN aviation personnel engaged in operational use of the weapon. It was not, for example, to be released except when a U-boat was diving with the conning-tower hatch closed, or when one had already dived (though never beyond two minutes time), so that the nature of the weapon could not be observed. It was not to be used in the presence of any surface ships, both because their propeller sounds might deflect the Mk.24 from its intended target, and because even the crew members of Allied ships without need-to-know clearance were not to observe or learn about the weapon. Nor was the Mk.24 to be used in the Mediterranean or in inshore waters of the Atlantic where it might run ashore. Even the aircrews employing the weapon were not to be told anything about its operation other than the drill required for maintaining, arming, and releasing it, though most crews could figure out Wandering Annie’s scheme. These restrictions were so faithfully observed that the Germans did not learn about the Mk.24 until after the war.

In the newly formed second VLR (Very Long Range B-24) Liberator Squadron, No. 86 at Aldergrove, Northern Ireland, aircrews found that a VLR could carry two Mk.24s plus four D/Cs, and this became the standard load. The first operational sorties with the homing torpedoes took place on 7 May, but there were no attacks. At this stage, it should be mentioned, tactical doctrine was minimal, and only after some operational experience was it learned that an individual Mk.24 aircraft was advised, upon sighting a U-boat, to dive upon it with D/Cs or strafing fire to force a dive so that the Mk.24 could be employed. Later, in USN attacks by CVE aircraft working in tandem, the F4F4 Wildcat induced the dive and the TBM-1 Avenger dropped the Mk.24. It was on 12 May that the first-ever attacks employing the weapon were made, all in support of Convoy HX.237, which was being hounded by the U-boats of Gruppe Drossel in 46°40’N, 26°20’W. Three Coastal VLRs from 86 Sqdn. at Aldergrove each sighted a Drossel boat and released a Mk.24 after it dived. Two FIDOs wandered off from the scent. But the third hit bang on.

Liberator bomber “B” had lifted off at 0344 with Flight Lieutenant John Wright at the controls. Seven and a half hours later, at 1113, while flying cover for HX.237 in showery weather, Wright and his seven-man crew sighted a surfaced U-boat at 46°4o’N, 26°2o’W and initiated an attack. The target was U-456, a Type VIIC boat on her third patrol, having sortied from Brest on 24 April. Her Commander, born at Kiel in 1915, was Kptlt. Max-Martin Teichert, a Knight’s Cross holder who had torpedoed, among numerous other ships, the trophy RN cruiser HMS Edinburgh (which was full of gold being shipped from Russia) on 30 April 1942, while the warship was escorting convoy QP.11 on the Murmansk run; the cruiser had to be finished off by a British torpedo. And, more immediately, on 11 May 1943, Teichert had shared with Clausen (U-403) in the sinking of the HX.237 straggler Fort Concord. Now, on 12 May, the Edinburgh was about to be avenged.

Lookouts on U-456 sighted the approach of Wright’s B-24 Liberator bomber, and Teichert gave a fateful order to dive. With the conning tower going under, and no ships nearby, Wright’s bombardier released a Mk.24 from his bay, and after the torpedo entered the water, B/86 circled while all eyes on board searched the water’s rough surface. Two minutes later, within a half-mile of the diving swirl, a “brownish patch” appeared, about 90 feet in diameter. Shortly afterwards, U-456 resurfaced and proceeded at high speed on a zigzag pattern, firing away at B/86 with her Flak armament. The Liberator returned fire and made a D/C run in, but overshot with a stick of three. With no more D/Cs, Wright called up the surface escort on R/T and two destroyers, HMS Pathfinder and HMS Opportune, raced toward the scene. The Liberator stayed overhead until 1435, when PLE forced it home to base.

Captain of U-456 Teichert sent a first distress signal to BdU and nearby boats at 1130, following it up with another at 1151:

AM NOT CLEAR FOR DIVING. QU BD 6646. AIRCRAFT IS KEEPING CONTACT. URGENTLY REQUEST HELP.

The source of his problem was made clear in a signal at 1325:

AM STEERING COURSE 300 AT HIGH SPEED. BAD LEAK IN AFTERCOMPARTMENT, NEED HELP URGENTLY.

The puncture had been made at some point other than at the propeller shafts, since the boat was moving smartly on the surface. From Berlin BdU ordered U—89 (Lohmann) to proceed at maximum speed to Teichert’s assistance, and later detailed U-603 (Oblt.z.S. Rudolf Baltz) and U-190 (Kptlt. Max Wintermeyer) to the same task. Teichert may have been heartened to hear the order given to U-89, and he sent out beacon signals for Lohmann to home in on, but it is clear from his message traffic that as time passed, he became more and more anxious about U-89’s whereabouts. At 1526 and 1606:

WHERE IS OUR U-BOAT? [FRAGE WO STENT EIGENES BOOT U.D.] …LEAK WILL HOLD FOR AWHILE YET.

TO LOHMANN. WHAT IS YOUR POSITION? DO YOU HEAR MY HOMING SIGNAL? MY POSITION IS BD 6569, COURSE 220, SPEED 11.

Of course, Lohmann’s and his commands U-89 position was on the seabed, where he no longer heard anything. And soon Teichert would have to fend for his fate alone. At 1640 the destroyer HMS Opportune, bearing down at flank speed, had the conning tower of U—456 in sight from 10 miles distance, and no doubt the U-boat had the larger vessel in sight as well. In that extremity Teichert must have thought that there was but one supreme expedient and that was to test the material integrity of his wounded boat against the depths, for at 1645. HMS Opportune observed the U-boat dive. Did Teichert think the gamble preferable to surrender? We shall never know. The dive became an irreversible plunge into a bourne from which no hand returned, ranks and ratings closed up at Diving Stations forever.

Though HMS Opportune, joined by HMS Pathfinder, searched the scene, which was probably BD 6594, or 46°39’N, 26°54’W, no further sign of the U-boat was observed. The Mk.24, unaided by any other agency, had performed its appointed duty, and just seventeen months after its conception. Sole credit for U-456’s destruction is given to Liberator B/86.33 Dönitz/Godt in Berlin, having, like Teichert, no idea what had really happened to U—456, speculated in the BdU war diary for 13 May that she was “probably sunk by a bomb hit on her stern.”

In addition to the sinking of two of the U-boats attacking HX.237, surface and air escorts succeeded on 12 May in damaging several other boats, which had to move off for repairs. At BdU it must have been clear that Drossel had taken a beating; accordingly, at 0821 on 13 May, those boats that were operational, unless they were in positions ahead of HX.237, were ordered to abandon that convoy and retire to the southwestward in order to shore up Groups Elbe I and Elbe II, which had been formed from Elbe and Rhein three days before to intercept SC.129. Before they got away, however, the Drossel boats took one more licking. At 0635, Sunderland “G” of 423 RCAF Sqdn., detailed to a dawn patrol over HX.237, sighted a U-boat at 48°35’N, 22°50’W, ten miles distant from the convoy closing its starboard beam. The Sunderland made a D/C attack on the surfaced boat, without result, then circled over it, exchanging gunfire. Corvette HMS Drumheller observed the aircraft circling low to the water and sped to the scene, bringing her four-inch gun to bear at 0655. The boat dived, and HMS Drumheller, acquiring an asdic echo, fired depth charges. She was soon joined by the frigate HMS Lagan, which made a Hedgehog attack at 0729 that led to two explosions.

Within one minute of the Hedgehog D/C mortars firing, a large air bubble mushroomed on the surface, followed by smaller bubbles that lasted about ten minutes and then by quantities of diesel oil that eventually formed a patch 600 feet in diameter. Pieces of wood and a rubber eyepiece were recovered by HMS Lagan. Definitely sunk was U—733 (Korv. Kapt. Alfred Mannhardt von Mannstein), which had sortied from La Pallice on 5 May. It was her sixth patrol. There were no survivors. Following this action there were a few scattered attacks on sightings by Biter aircraft, but by late morning, with the enemy having disappeared from every quadrant, Biter and EG5 disengaged to the southwest to support SC.129, about a day’s steaming away.

That convoy’s close escort EG B2 had had a busy time since the afternoon of the 9th May, when first contact with the enemy was made in 41°N, 33°W, running down HF/DF and radar bearings and dropping D/Cs on various asdic contacts. At 1800 that day, two merchant ships, Antigone and Grado, were sunk by U-402 (Korv. Kapt. Siegfried Freiherr von Forstner). Commander Donald Macintyre, captain on the destroyer HMS Hesperus, became particularly occupied on the night of the 11th/12th, when he made four D/C, two Hedgehog, and one ramming attacks between 0129 and 0232 against U-223 (Oblt.z.S. Karljung Wächter). The ramming resulted after the harried U-boat was sighted surfacing and HMS Hesperus opened fire with her 4.7-inch gun and Oerlikon guns, scoring at least three hits. The boat, which was seen first as trimmed down, or decks awash, then became fully surfaced, and some of the crew came up onto the conning-tower bridge, which was now illuminated by the destroyer’s 10-inch signal projector, where some were seen hit by Oerlikon fire and two went overboard (one, a Fireman second class named Zieger, was recovered by U-359 [Oblt.z.S. Heinz Förster] and later handed back to XJ—223).

U-boat then turned under full helm 360° and came beam on across the destroyer’s bows. Mindful that he was still ten days’ steaming from home and that he did not want to disable himself with two other U-boats known present, Macintyre decided to administer only a “halfhearted ram.” With engines stopped and proceeding at about 10 knots, HMS Hesperus struck U-223 just abaft her conning tower. Gunfire delivered at the same moment produced a “blinding red” explosion. As HMS Hesperus withdrew, lookouts reported torpedo tracks from another U-boat approaching from astern. The warheads missed. Thinking the rammed U-boat to be in a sinking condition, Macintyre rejoined the screen of SC.129. U-223, in fact, did not sink but, extensively damaged, was forced to return to base, which she reached, after limping through the dangerous Bay of Biscay, on the 24th.

By daybreak on the 12th, a considerable number of boats were trying to work their way around to the front, with U-186 (Kptlt. Siegfried Hesemann) acting as shadower. Dönitz/Godt urged them onward: DO NOT SLIDE BACK. FORWARD WITH THE HIGHEST SPEED. At 1133 HMS Hesperus obtained an HF/DF contact bearing 020°, ahead of the convoy about 15 miles, and shaped course to investigate. At 1205, with speed reduced to 20 knots to allow for an asdic sweep, Macintyre received a strong echo classified “submarine.” Two minutes later, he made a Hedgehog attack, but there were no explosions. Then, 30 seconds later, the U-boat showed its periscope at 50 yards Green 10°, crossing from starboard to port. Macintyre pursued and fired a ten-pattern, followed by a second Hedgehog salvo at 1219, again without result. Asdic contact was then lost, leading Macintyre to assume that the boat had gone deep. By hydrophone effect, however, he regained the target, at 1215, and made a deep drop of ten Minol and Amatol D/Cs set to 350 and 500 feet. Eighteen minutes later, just before a planned deeper drop, HMS Hesperus heard a series of explosions. A fourth and last attack with ten D/Cs set to 550 and 700 feet was carried out at 1233½. Then, at 1245, a single “sharp” explosion—probably internal—and “peculiar noises” were heard quite near the destroyer; soon afterwards, wreckage and oil came to the surface. The victim of HMS Hesperus was the shadower U-186, on her second combat patrol.

During the rest of the afternoon there was heavy HF/DF activity. Between 1530 and 1930 the close escort made six sightings and two attacks. At dusk, the convoy acutely altered course 40° to port on to 343° in order to “throw the U-boats out of position.” A large-scale night attack by the Elbe I and II boats—there were twenty-two remaining after one sunk and two forced back to base with damage—was feared by Macintyre, but to his surprise it did not materialize; one lone attack was turned back by HMS Hesperus and the corvette HMS Clematis. By the morning of the 13th, HF/DF traffic had greatly diminished, and the appearance overhead later in the day of VLR B-24 Liberators no doubt added encouragement to EG B2’s aggressive ahead-of-convoy patrolling. When BdU received a signal from the Elbe boat U-642 that it had sighted a carrier (Biter) proceeding on a southwest course at high speed, obviously to lend succor to SC.129, BdU concluded, the decision was made in Berlin to call off operations against the convoy on the 14th. HMS Biter joined SC.129 at 1400 on that day, when, because of its threat alone, the U-boats had already been ordered away. Two days later, absent any further contact with the enemy, HMS Biter and EG5 disengaged, and four days later still, the convoy arrived safely in home waters.

While “powerful air escort” was named the principal reason for ordering withdrawal, BdU was equally concerned that during the 12th when twelve boats were in contact with the convoy and no air escort was yet available, the U-boats still failed to achieve results. It could only surmise that with some unknown shipborne detection devices (actually HF/DF and centimetric radar, primarily the former), “the enemy must have picked up all the boats around the convoy with astonishing accuracy.” It observed that “such a rapid detection of the boats has not previously occurred on such a scale.” The campaign against HX.237 and SC.129 had sputtered and failed despite excellent intelligence about the convoys’ positions, courses, and alterations, and despite the fact that altogether, about thirty-six U-boats operated against the two convoys.

The plain fact was that the U-boats’ 1939-period technology (excepting certain torpedo advances) was now no match for the 1943-period sophisticated detection equipment, target plotting tactics, and state-of-the-art weaponry of the surface escorts, not to mention the operational research-developed tactics of the air escorts and their new Mark XXIV Mine. Herbert Werner, I.W.O on U-230, complained to the writer that the “May disaster” was owed to the “unconscionable policies of the U-boat Command” that required crews to go to sea that late in the war with “obsolete and inadequate equipment, weapons, and tactics.” The BdU staff, he asserted, “had not prepared for this disaster. It discounted what the Commanders were reporting from the field. It didn’t want to face reality—the inevitable that was to come.”

While that view may be regarded as extreme by other U-boat veterans of Black May, it is beyond serious dispute that by that month, if not earlier, the U-boat, considered as a high seas detection instrument and weapons platform, was outclassed by the quality of the Allied forces, sea and air (excluding the Swordfish), arrayed against it. The numbers still favored the U-boats, but the disparity in quality was starkly apparent. Add to that the ever-widening gap between the experience and proficiency levels of the human components on either side, and the reasons for what Werner called “the May disaster” were all the more manifest. The material inequalities were reflected in BdU’s bar graphs. Since the pivotal Battle for ONS.5, the exchange rate of U-boats lost for merchant ships sunk suffered an ineluctable, if uneven, decline: In the battle for HX.237 the U-boats had exchanged three U-boats lost for four stragglers sunk; and in the battle for SC.129 they exchanged one boat sunk and two severely damaged for two convoy vessels sunk. In Convoy ONS.7 to follow, the loss ratio would be one-to-one, and, strikingly, that one merchant ship lost to enemy action would be the last lost in the Northern transatlantic convoy lanes for the remainder of May and the whole of June.

[merdiolu]

On 11 and 12 May BdU collected twenty-five U-boats from those just entering the North Atlantic from French, German, and Norwegian bases, as well as from those that were refueling in midocean from the supply boats U-459, U—U-119, U-461, and U-514, and formed them into five small groups, placed southeast of Greenland, named picturesquely after rivers : Lech, Isar, Inn, Illier, and Nab. Westbound Convoy ONS.7, having departed the U.K. on 7 May under the guard of EG B5, encountered Iller on the 13th when U-640 (Oblt.z.S. Karl-Heinz Nagel) reported sighting its columns in AL 1265. Later on the same day, Groups Inn and Isar were ordered to combine forces in a new patrol line, Group Donau [Danube River] I, and Lech and Nab were similarly joined to form Donau II, both new groups charged with the task of interdicting U-640’s convoy. The Iller group, of which U—640 was a part, was ordered to operate independently against ONS.7.

But shadower U-640 herself would not be a factor for long, since, early on the next day, she was caught on the surface at position 6O°32’N, 3I°O5‘W by PBY Catalina flying boat “K” of USN 84 Sqdn. based in Iceland. In 7/10th cloud with bases at 1,700 feet and visibility ten miles, K/84 sighted U-640 sixteen miles from the convoy and, at 0739, initiated an attack from the still-surfaced U-boat’s port beam. At 75 feet off the deck the pilot released three USN 350-pound depth bombs (D/Bs) set to shallow 25-foot depth. Nos. 2 and 3 D/Bs straddled the boat, and following their explosions, the “blue-black” hull slowed from 8 to 2 knots, left a path of air bubbles 20 yards wide, became stationary, wallowed, listed at a sharp angle, and sank.

There were no further incidents during ONS.7’s passage until shortly after midnight on the 17th, when Iller boat U-657 (Kptlt. Heinrich Göllnitz), on her first combat patrol (out of Norway), put two torpedoes, two minutes apart, into the 5,196-GRT British steamer Aymeric, which had the unhappy distinction of being the last northern transatlantic ship under the red duster to go down in May or in the whole of the month that followed. The ship’s foremast collapsed; the hatches from No. 1 hold, the rafts from the fore rigging, and even the derricks were blown over the side; while slag ballast was strewn everywhere. Moments after the second torpedo, the ship’s boilers exploded, fracturing both port and starboard sides of the vessel. A number of the Lascar crew panicked while lowering the boats and lives were lost as a result. The ship went under five minutes after the first explosion. Men found themselves swimming in bitterly cold water, where many became stiff and sank. The survivors were rescued by a rescue ship and a trawler. Of the seventy-eight-man crew, fifty-three died. It was one of the worst human tolls of the month. But the drowned and frozen would not go unavenged.

HMS Swale, lead escort of EG (Escort Group) B5, ordered “Artichoke” and swept out herself 6,000 yards astern of the victim’s position. There, at 0138, she obtained an asdic contact classified as “submarine,” bearing 285°, range 900 yards. Three minutes later, HMS Swale was on top of the contact with ten D/Cs. When no evidence surfaced, she fired Hedgehog mortars at 0203. There were no explosions, but the bridge observed patches of light oil in which, peculiarly, small yellow flames appeared. The River-class frigate then fired a second Hedgehog salvo at 0224 and, 33 seconds later, heard a single loud explosion followed after 107 seconds more by two “muffled” explosions. At 0231, just to be sure, HMS Swale dropped a ten-pattern set to 150 and 350 feet over the position, and was rewarded by two loud explosions five and a half minutes later and a second appearance of oil patches. Aymeric’s slayer U-657 would not surface again , she sank with all hands. The position where forty-four young Germans paid the stern price was 58°54’N, 42°33’W.45 Convoy ONS.7 continued its passage without further hindrance, joined briefly from daylight on the 18th to 1100 on the 19th by the four-destroyer Third Escort (Support) Group. Close escort B5 was relieved by the Western Local Escort Group at WESTOMP on the 21st and the convoy entered Halifax four days later.

As long before as February, reckoning on the eight-day cycle for departures of ONS and SC convoys, Commander Peter Gretton, CO, Escort Group B7, had set a date at the end of May when he pledged he would be in London to meet a Wren whom he had courted at Gilbert Roberts’s Tactical Unit (WATU), and there exchange vows of matrimony with her in St. Mary’s, Cadogan Square. At 1330 on the 14th of the month, his prenuptial voyage began, as a now-familiar company of warships—HMS Duncan, HMS Vidette, HMS Tay, HMS Loosestrife, HMS Snowflake (her mate, the injured HMS Sunflower, to follow), and HMS Pink—slipped their moorings at St. John’s, Newfoundland, and bore eastward through the inevitable fog. Joining the escort at sea were the rescue trawler Northern Spray, also of ONS.5 fame, and an extra corvette, HMCS Kitchener. At 0600 on the 15th, still in fog, B7 met the convoy entrusted to its care, SC.130, consisting of thirty-nine merchant vessels, not including a rescue ship, HMS Zamalek.

Heavily laden with grain, sugar, pulp, lumber, fuel oil, gas, and general cargo, the merchant fleet, with many old coal burners, was not expected to exceed seven and a half knots, but Gretton was confident that, pace adverse seas and unkindly U-boats, the convoy would reach the U.K. by its due date, the 25th. The first night of passage was spent in thick fog, and when a large iceberg was encountered, HMS Vidette positioned herself, fully illuminated and whistle blowing, between it and the advancing columns. That danger past, the rest of the night was spent making steady revolutions on course 081°. With daybreak on the 16th the veil of fog lifted and the columns moved smartly ahead at eight knots. HMS Sunflower joined at 1100. Good clear sailing weather continued on the 17th, and five RCAF Fortresses patrolled the surrounding water, though Gretton complained: “The air escort from Newfoundland are not yet trained to convoy work. Their communications are bad and they do not fully understand homing procedure.” He particularly regretted that the only day SC.130 was without air cover was the next day, the 18th, when the convoy was sighted by the enemy.

At 2219, in 54°39’N, 36°47’W, rescue ship Zamalek, which was equipped with FH3 HF/DF, reported a ground-wave signal to the north. Beginning at 0116 on the 19th the air filled with HF/DF contacts—HMS Duncan was fitted with FH4 and Tay with FH3—and cross-cuts revealed the presence of four U-boats, one close on each bow of the convoy and one on each quarter. Taking the role of hunter, HMS Duncan went after the boat judged to be four miles on the port bow. A radar contact was obtained at 5,000 yards, but the boat dived before being seen on the bright, full-moonlit sea. HMS Duncan fired a five-charge pattern in the estimated diving position and started operation “Observant.” Though without visible result, this first attack, which kept a U-boat down and out of the game, was representative of the aggressive behavior the B7 escorts displayed thereafter over the next forty-eight hours against an enemy force numbering altogether thirty-three U-boats, though apparently no more than twenty would be in contact with the convoy.

The force was organized by BdU as the result of an intercepted signal in Allied Convoy Cipher No. 3 dated 15 May, which B-Dienst forwarded on the 17th. The signal gave SC.130’s position, course, and speed, as well as the identity of its close escort, B7.48 Here was an opportunity for BdU to gain vengeance for die Katastrophe am ONS.5. (Catastrophe of ONS.5) Accordingly, two patrol lines were established to be in position at 2000 on the 18th athwart the convoy’s course: Donau I, consisting of thirteen boats (two, U-640 and U-657, had been sunk, unknown to BdU) from AK 4258 (56°03’N, 37°55’W) to AK 8141 (53°31, 35°25’W); and Donau II, consisting of twelve boats from AK 4944 (53°09’N, 35°15’W) to AK 8734 (5o°33’N, 33°35’W). In addition, eight boats coming out from Biscay bases or from at-sea refueling were to take up a patrol line from ED 2181 (5o°21’N, 33°25’W) to DD 2769 (48°39’N, 32°35’W) under the name Oder (the river). Although BdU’s orders creating these dispositions were not decrypted by the Allies until the 19th through the 22nd, according to the Bletchley Park Hut 8 record, thus providing no cryptographic intelligence on the basis of which to divert the convoy from danger, the prescient Rodger Winn in OIC’s Tracking Room somehow knew of these dispositions anyway, since on the 17th he wrote in his Special Intelligence Summary:

“The next development will be the establishment of new patrols on an arc between 020° and 140° from Virgin Rocks at a radius of 600 miles from Gander, Newfoundland. Twenty or more U/boats are now moving to take these up and the apparent gap through which SC 130 has been routed is rapidly closing: it will be touch and go whether this convoy scrapes through.”

But Gretton’s first warning did not come until 2219 on the 18th, when the rescue ship Zamalek reported HF/DF contact. Later, on reaching port—he knew nothing of B-Dienst’s or of Bletchley Park’s cryptographic penetrations—he wondered aloud how it happened that so large a concentration of U-boats had been assembled without warning to him from the Admiralty’s shore-based HF/DF. The answer no doubt was that the patrol lines were formed under orders of radio silence. Now, at 0300, just before dawn on the 19th, when he knew that he was being shadowed if not surrounded, Gretton turned the convoy 90° to starboard in order to avoid a dawn submerged attack. The stratagem worked, and when the first VLR Liberator (T/120) arrived from Reykjavik and made two attacks on U—731 (Oblt.z.S. Werner Techand), which was undamaged, the enemy boat was approximately where SC.130 would have been had not the foxing course alteration been made. The course 081° was resumed at 0400.

Liberator T/120 went on to sight five additional boats in the vicinity, a record six for one sortie.52 With so many boats about, Gretton had to be cheered to know not only that aircraft from Iceland and Northern Ireland would watch over him but that a Support Group was on its way to firm up the surface screen: it was the same First Escort Group that had ridden out to assist B7 in the final hours of the ONS.5 struggle. EGI’s frigates HMS Wear (S.O.), HMS Spey, and HMS Jed, together with the former USCG cutter Sennen (HMS Pelican had to return with engine defects) cleared St. John’s at 1930 on the 16th, and in the late morning of the 19th, while closing the convoy 15 miles off from the starboard quarters, Wear sighted a U-boat on the surface bearing 034° 12 miles. At 1135 the boat, identified later as U-952 (Oblt.z.S. Oskar Curio), was seen to dive. At 1209 the crow’s nest lookout in Jed sighted a second U-boat, which HMS Jed and HMS Sennen would later hunt.

At 1228 the first boat launched a salvo of four eels that passed between HMS Wear and HMS Jed. HMS Wear then altered course up the torpedo tracks and obtained asdic contact at a range of 1,800 yards. At 1245 she made a Hedgehog attack, but only twelve projectiles fired because a safety ready switch handle retaining spring broke. There were no explosions. What was worse, HMS Wear’s helm jammed hard aport and took an hour to fix. In the meantime, HMS Spey closed, obtained contact, and made three D/C attacks, at 1319, 1335, and 1415. The repaired HMS Wear joined Spey in a fourth, barrage-type attack—sixteen D/Cs fired deep from each ship at six-second intervals—at 1533. No evidence appeared on the surface, but U-952 was extensively damaged at 170 meters depth by the last bombardment, and forced back to base.

The second U-boat, meanwhile, was visible to HMS Jed’s bridge by 1227 at an estimated range of 8 miles. Observing HMS Jed in pursuit, the boat dived at 1245 when 5 miles intervened. HMS Jed made asdic contact at 1312; moments later, the U-boat unaccountably blew tanks, broached the surface, and dived again. HMSA Jed fired a five-charge pattern at 1316, and a D/C from the starboard thrower fell directly into the swirl, after which an oil patch appeared on the surface. Contact was not regained until a weak echo was received at 1324 and HMS Jed reduced speed to 10 knots in order to carry out a Hedgehog attack, which she delivered at 1334. There were no explosions, and subsequent loss of echo led HMS Jed to question the contact.

While the frigate started an “Observant” around the position of the first attack, the cutter HMS Sennen came on the scene, obtained a contact of her own, and fired a ten-pattern at 1405. The explosion plumes were followed at 1427 by oil and bubbles, then, at 1440, by splintered woodwork and a small red object resembling meat or remains. At 1443 the asdic operator reported strange noises like escaping compressed air, and Jed made a Hedgehog attack on the noise source, with no explosions, at 1447. Oil continued to rise and by 1515, when the two escorts were ordered to rejoin the convoy if no longer in contact, the oil patch was estimated to be over a quarter of a mile wide. In the latest assessment of this engagement, U-760 (Oblt.z.S. Otto Erich Blum) is thought to have been the target of the first two attacks; she sustained damage to upper-deck containers. The second two attacks were made against U-954 (Kptlt. Odo Loewe), which was destroyed by HMS Sennen’s ten-pattern depth charge attack at 1405. There were no survivors from U-954, which was on her first combat patrol, having sortied from Kiel, Germany, on 8 April. Among the dead was twenty-one-year-old Leutnant zur See Peter Dönitz, the Grand Admiral’s younger son.

A second U-boat would be sunk in the vicinity of SC.130 that day, though it was not a member of the Donau and Oder groups, and when it was found by Hudson “M” of 269 Sqdn. it was proceeding due west some four degrees latitude north of the convoy’s known position. This was U-273 (Oblt.z.S. Hermann Rossmann), another boat on her first patrol. At 1627 the Hudson pilot dived on the neophyte boat and delivered a four-D/C straddle of the conning tower, No. 3 being observed to enter the water on the starboard side within ten yards of the surfaced hull. Almost immediately afterwards, oil spread from the U-boat’s stern, eventually covering an area 100 feet wide and 600 yards long. U-273 remained on the surface for seven minutes, turning continually to starboard, and fighting back with flak. The Hudson returned fire, scoring hits around the tower and causing panic among the lookouts and gunners.

Finally, at 1634, the U-boat attempted a dive, from which she would not resurface, though floating wreckage did. Another forty-four men descended to their deaths while Hudson pilot Flying Officer J. N. F. Bell returned to base (and to a postwar career as a British Airways Captain). It was another of the Atlantic war’s fateful exchanges, now almost always unfavorable to the German side. More mysterious was the disappearance of U—381 (Kptlt. Graf von Pückler und Limpurg), which had sortied from St.-Nazaire on 31 March and made her last transmission to BdU at 1502 on 9 May from qu AK 7962. Subsequently, she was ordered, with three other boats, to form Group Inn, and later to join Donau I. Whether she did either is not known. On the 21st, BdU, not having received any further signals from the boat, asked her to report her position. When no response was received, U-381 was posted as missing with effect from that date. Her loss has not been matched to any of the attacks made by the surface ships of EGI or B7 or by any of the air escorts.

Prior to and following HMS Jed and HMS Sennen’s kill of U—954, indeed throughout the 19th and continuing until dawn on the 20th, SC.130’s surface escorts made no fewer than twenty-seven individual attacks on U-boats sighted from the cockpit of an aircraft or from an escort’s crow’s nest or bridge, or detected by HF/DF or radar, and/or tracked underwater by asdic. Each sighting or contact was pursued energetically in keeping with Western Approaches’ finding that most U-boats sunk by surface vessels during the year prior to May were destroyed prior to their attacks, not afterward (see chapter 3). As it happened, however, none of B7’S attacks and none further of EGI’s resulted in a kill.

HMS Duncan and HMS Snowflake were certain, because of the accurate placement of the D/Cs and one Hedgehog explosion seven seconds after the pattern struck the water, that they had destroyed a U-boat in a series of six attacks that they carried out jointly between 0755 and 0918 on the 19th, HMS Duncan getting in what he thought was the fatal blow. But a recent reassessment finds that HMS Snowflake’s contact, U-304 (Oblt.z.S. Heinz Koch), was undamaged except for a tank put out of action, and that HMS Duncans contact, a different boat altogether, probably U-636 (Kptlt. Hans Hildebrandt), was undamaged. HMS Wear and HMS Spey severely damaged U-952 at 1245 through 1533 on the 19th, as shown above; HMS Spey slightly damaged U-413 (Poel) at 0346 through 0542 on the 20th; and HMS Jed lightly damaged U-91 (Oblt.z.S. Heinz Hungershausen) at 0420 through 0439, also on the 20th.

Despite that apparent lack of success in destroying U-boats, the surface escorts achieved a success that, on shore, was more highly valued than U-boat trophies hung on a wardroom wall: they saved every merchant ship in the convoy from harm. They did that, under Commander Gretton’s skillful command, by aggressively running to ground every enemy craft sighted or detected, and by directing the VLR Liberators in the cloud cover overhead to every W/T transmission source. The number of HF/DF contacts was striking even by the usual standard of talkative German radiomen: during the 19th and 20th Duncan counted fifty-one, Tay thirty-one, and Sennen twenty-three.

As each cross-cut came into his plotting room, Gretton vectored the VLRs to the transmitting boat from their overhead air search patterns, which were called by such code names as “Frog,” “Adder,” and “Viper.” On more occasions than a few, U-boat Commanders were stunned to find that at or before the close of an Ausgang F.T. (outgoing W/T transmission), a Liberator was bearing down on their positions. In his war diary entries for 19 and 20 May, Dönitz/Godt complained about the “continual surprise attacks by land-based aircraft out of low-hanging clouds.” Of course, BdU attributed them to radar, but the attacks were instead additional evidence of the importance in the Atlantic war of what the Allies affectionately called Huff-Duff.

The final U-boat kill of the SC.130 crossing came from the air at the hands of No. 120 Sqdn. out of Reykjavik, whose aircraft made twenty-seven sightings on the 19th and 20th. Two VLR B-24 Liberators struck at U—707 (Kptlt. Günter Gretschel), which like U-413 (Poel) had operated against ONS.5: at 1340 on the 19th, P/120 dropped four D/Cs on the surfaced Gretschel boat without inflicting injury, but at 0810 the next day, N/120, sighting the same boat and attacking ten seconds after Gretschel submerged, caused severe damage, forcing that boat to retire from the field. At 0745 on the 20th, U-418 (Oblt.z.S. Gerhard Lange) was injured by four D/Cs dropped by Liberator “X” of 59 Sqdn. based in Ballykelly, Northern Ireland. The kill was made on the 20th by P/120, whose pilot, Squadron Leader J. R. E. Proctor, lifted off from Reykjavik at 0954 and met SC.130 at 1430 in 55°N, 30°W, where, at Gretton’s direction, he began a series of searches, sighting one U-boat at 1448 that he was not able to attack and another at 1710, Red 15° six miles, that he dived on, dropping four D/Cs and obtaining a straddle on the partially submerged boat. It was U-238 (von Mässenhausen), another ONS.5 boat, which had sunk the American freighter McKeesport twenty-two days before in that convoy.

The Liberator’s rear gunner saw the boat’s conning tower lifted out of the water for three seconds by the explosions. When the spray of the plumes subsided, the boat was no longer visible, but an oil patch appeared that during the next thirty minutes spread to about 200 feet in diameter, with an “almost white patch” at its head looking like air bubbles. Ironically, at just one hour and eight minutes after this attack, U-258 was sent a signal by BdU ordering her to return to base and to make frequent transmissions over the next three days for purposes of deception. Von Mässenhausen and his crew would not be able to obey that order because U-258 had sunk with all hands as a result of depth charge attack made by Proctor’s Liberator bomber. Meanwhile, P/120 carried on her patrol, and at 1924 sighted a surfacing U-boat three miles distant. Diving, Squadron Leader Proctor decided to strafe the conning tower with machine-gun fire in an apparent attempt to force the boat back under water so that he could drop a Mk.24 Mine. Six crewmen sighted on the bridge returned his fire and the boat remained on the surface.

Proctor swung the heavy craft around and made another pass, expending 180 cannon rounds against the tower and foredeck. Though his report does not state that the U-boat finally did dive, Proctor released a FIDO at 1931. Three minutes later, he reported, the U-boat could be seen on the surface down by the stern, circling, “in difficulties.” At 2143, he began the return flight to base, where he arrived at 0115 on the 21st. Proctor’s after-action report in the Squadron’s Operations Record Book makes no mention of the Mk.24 but states instead that he released a “600 lb D/C.” This was the code for Mk.24, and a cleverly chosen one, since there was a Mark I 600 lb. depth bomb just coming into service. When a weapon was cited in print as a depth “bomb (D/B)” it was in fact a large depth charge; when the citation read “600 lb. D/C” it was the Mk.24. One may have further confidence here that Proctor’s weapon was indeed the Mk.24 because No. 120 Sqdn. had not yet been equipped with the 600-lb. D/B.63 In any event, the Mk.24 was dropped on this occasion without effect: the intended target, U-418, made off with no further injury (until 1 June when, homeward bound, she was destroyed by Beaufighter “B” of 236 Sqdn. in the Bay of Biscay).

Among the merchant ship columns of SC.130, stationkeeping was excellent throughout the battle, even during the twenty emergency turns that Gretton ordered in its course. As he commented in his Report of Proceedings, “The convoy was executing blue turns with the precision of a battlefleet.” The last such evasive alteration was made at dawn on the 21st, but it was an unnecessary precaution by that time, since, on the evening before, BdU signaled the U-boats to break off the operation and move away westward. The remainder of the passage was uneventful, except that the weather deteriorated and the convoy’s speed on the 22nd dropped to 4 knots in an easterly gale. At 1100 that day, on orders from CinCWA, Gretton detached EGI. The major escort work was done. Though heavily beset during its passage, SC.130 arrived unscathed in home waters on the 25th. Some merchant ships entered Loch Ewe escorted by HMS Loosestrife, the remainder, with HMS Vidette, anchored at the Mull of Kintyre. HMS Duncan and the other B7 escorts put into Moville near Londonderry, and, to relieve the reader’s suspense, Gretton got himself to the church on time. A “safe and timely arrival” indeed!

In the Admiralty’s Naval Staff wash-up on this convoy it was decided that the successful passage was owed to four factors: (1) the heavy air support during the time that U-boats were in contact; (2) the timely arrival of the First Support Group on the 19th; (3) the accurate appreciation of the situation throughout by the Senior Officer escorts; and (4) the successful evasive steering of the convoy both away from known U-boat positions and immediately before dawn each day while in contact in order to hook or slice submerged boats into the rough.67 What might well have been added was: (5) the efficient use by HMS Duncan, HMS Tay, HMS Sennen, and HMS Zamalek of HF/DF, which enabled Gretton at considerable distances to vector his air and sea assets economically to fixed targets. Said Gretton in his Comments of Senior Officer, Close Escort: “Directing an escort without reliable HF/DF information is like entering a ring blindfolded.”

In the retrospect of a half-century and more, SC.130’s was one of the more significant convoy passages of May, since it demonstrated dramatically both how effective Allied escort operations had become and how far the U-boat fortunes, so promising at the beginning of the month, had declined. It is striking also how few of the Donau and Oder boats dared to run the Allied gantlet. Were their Commanders practicing a caution approaching timidity, or were they simply denied every chance to advance? We shall probably never know, since the few survivors among them today would not be able to speak for all or even most. What is clear is that an already grim exchange rate worsened further, falling from one-to-one in Convoy ONS.7 to a negative balance of three U-boats (counting U-273 but not U-381) lost for zero merchant ships sunk in SC.130. The bar graphs at BdU could be hung with black crepe for the dire tale they told. The mighty U-Bootwaffe, once the scourge of the oceans, only twenty-five days after its strongest-ever month’s start, wallowed at worsening discount. Fortuna secunda, denique adversa , uti.

[merdiolu]

On 21, 22, and 23 May the Allies pulled off what might be called a trifecta. On those three days, successively, a Royal Navy submarine sank a U-boat; an American escort carrier (CVE), U.S.S. Bogue, got its first kill; and a U-boat was sunk by the first rocket used successfully by British in naval warfare. Although it may not seem obvious that one side’s submarine might sink another side’s submarine, since they were two scorpions that rarely got into the same bottle, it was hardly unknown for that to happen: since the war’s start eight U-boats had been sunk by British submarines, the most recent being U-644 (Oblt.z.S. Kurt Jensen), sunk by HMS (submarine) Tuna on 7 April in the North Sea northwest of Narvik. In fact, on the 18th of the same month, the German boat U-123 (Oblt.z.S. Horst von Schroeter) sank a British submarine, HMS P.615, south of Freetown. On 21 May, HMS Sickle was patrolling in the Mediterranean Sea off the southern coast of France when, at 1456, she sighted a Type VIIC boat leaving the port of Toulon on a test run. Sickle closed the range to 2,600 yards and, at 1510.29, launched two Mark VIII torpedoes 2½ seconds apart set to depths of 8 and 10 feet. One torpedo struck the U-boat about 30 feet abaft the conning tower, sending up a towering detonation column of water and smoke. The boat settled by the stern and the crew were seen jumping into the sea. The bows of the boat stood up at an angle of 50° and then slid under at 1512.20. HMS Sickle made no attempt to pick up survivors, since it would have “unnecessarily hazarded” the submarine. The victim was U-303 (Kptlt. Karl-Franz Heine). Twenty of the forty-four-man crew were lost.

On 20 May the U.S. Navy created the Tenth Fleet, a paper organization with no warships of its own, which would allow Admiral King, by that date heavily committed to ASW (Anti Submarine Warfare) , to bring together all anti-submarine ships, aircraft, weapons, radar and HF/DF, Intelligence, operations research, communications, convoy routing, and tactical attack doctrine and training under one overall command—his own. While a Tenth Fleet chief of staff, Rear Admiral Francis S. “Frog” Low, handled day-by-day administrative duties, and Admiral Royal E. Ingersoll, Commander in Chief Atlantic Fleet (CINCLANT), directed operations at sea, King supervised Tenth Fleet and Low in much the same way that his German counterpart, Dönitz, superintended BdU and Godt. On the date of Tenth Fleet’s epiphany—long-awaited, it should be said, by critics, particularly in the Army and USAAF, who thought that the Naval service’s approach to the U-boat threat had been too random, reactive, and unstructured—the Tenth Fleet’s prize Atlantic weapons platform was in mid-Atlantic steaming toward a pack of twelve wolves. This was USS Bogue, the first American-built escort carrier to fight U-boats under the United States flag.

USS Bogue , CVE

Converted from a C-3 merchant hull at Tacoma, Washington, named after Bogue Sound in North Carolina, launched on 15 January 1942, and commissioned by Captain Giles E. Short on 26 September of that year, USS Bogue was classified an ACV for Auxiliary Aircraft Carrier (until July 1943, when the classification would be changed to CVE for Escort Carrier). In service she would be designated CVE-9. Popularly, she would be known as a “Jeep” carrier. USS Bogue’s flight deck was 442 feet 3 inches long. A narrow “island” (five feet wide, twenty-five long, fifteen high) stood on the starboard side. The vessel’s steam turbines and single screw produced a maximum speed in open water of 17.75 knots. Her normal crew complement was 890, but it quickly grew to a crowded 97 officers and 921 men. In November 1942, at San Diego, USS Bogue embarked her aircraft: nine Grumman TBF—1 Avenger torpedo-bombers and twelve Grumman F4F4 Wildcat fighters. Together they formed the Escort Scouting Squadron Nine (VGS-9), redesignated Composite Squadron Nine (CV—9) on 1 March 1943. Commanding Officer was Lieut.-Comdr. William M. Drane, U.S.N.

In many ways, though not all, the Avenger represented a huge advance over HMS Archers and HMS Biter’s Fairey Swordfish. Where the latter, a fabric-covered biplane, had a weight of 9,250 lbs., a maximum speed of 139 mph, and a range of 546 miles, the aluminum monoplane Avenger had a weight of 15,905 lbs., a top speed of 270 mph, and a range of 1,215 miles. On two counts, however, they were similar: the Swordfish had a crew of two or three and the Avenger a crew of three (pilot, radioman, and gunner); and both had a bomb load capacity of 1,600 lbs.

The Avenger’s speed enabled it to deliver an attack before the targeted U-boat could submerge, while exposing the aircraft to flak for the shortest possible time. Again, the Avenger’s endurance permitted it to remain on patrol or over a target for an effective period of time. The preferred type of attack, worked out in theory and practice, was a long power glide at maximum speed out of cloud or cloud bases, followed in the final stage by a pushed-over 20° dive with wheels lowered to reduce speed for the D/C drop. While the D/C depth was set to 25 feet in keeping with the doctrine learned at the Fleet Air Arm Anti-Submarine School, Ballykelly, Northern Ireland, which all of USS Bogue’s TBF-I pilots would attend (despite being Americans , their superiors recognised long ago that British ASW training and methods were way better) , Squadron Nine chose to reduce the 100-foot spacing recommended there to 75 feet because of the speed of their aircraft.

The purpose of the Wildcat fighters was primarily to provide defense against air attacks, not likely in midocean but possible when operating near the U.K., and secondarily to strafe surfaced U-boats in coordinated attacks with the TBF-Is. In the latter case Lt.-Cmdr. Drane was insistent that the Wildcats restrain themselves by not engaging in highspeed maneuvers that condensed vapor in humid air and gave away the attack, and by not dashing about madly without orders from the accompanying Avenger and thus compromising an attack by driving a U-boat down prematurely. Ideally, a Wildcat should be available on call to strafe the U-boat from three to five seconds before the D/Cs were dropped. The operational endurance of each aircraft type was, for the TBF-16 hours at 125 knots, for the F4F4 3.5 to 4 hours at 125 knots. Both types could be launched by the flight deck catapult without the carrier having to turn into the wind, a wind component of only 16½ knots along the track being required by a fully loaded TBF—1, and a component of only 6 knots being required by an F4F4. Without the catapult, wind velocity over the deck necessary to fly off aircraft was 31 and 24 knots, respectively.

USS Bogue was named the centerpiece of a pioneer aggressive USN sea force called the “Hunter-Killer Group.” Her mission, not unlike that of HMS Archer and HMS Biter, was to hunt down U-boats in the vicinity of convoys and destroy them. It was thought at first by Ingersoll that USS Bogue’s best use was on the Central Atlantic routes to and from Gibraltar, where generally good weather conditions favored aircraft launches and recoveries, but as it happened, USS Bogue found herself from the outset in the thick weather and heaving seas of the North Atlantic lanes. On 6 March 1943, out of Argentia, Newfoundland, accompanied by two “flush-deck” destroyer escorts, USS Belknap and USS George E. Badger, she joined the U.K.-bound Convoy HX.228. Four days later, Avenger pilot Ensign Alexander C. “Goose” McAuslan, USNR, sighted a U-boat and dove to attack it. Both D/Cs he was carrying hung up in their racks. (In pitching seas the squadron was fitting only two D/Cs in the TBF-IS to assist takeoff.) The U-boat initiated a dive while McAuslan swung around for a second run. Again his D/Cs failed to release. USS Bogue was ordered to return to Argentia; on the way, TBF-1 pilot Lt. H. S. “Stinky” Roberts, U.S.N.R., mistook a gam of porpoises for a U-boat and had yet another bomb rack failure, to the very good fortune of the sea mammals. Something would have to be done about the bomb hangups, and it was.

On 20 March, USS Bogue began a second partial crossing as air escort to SC.123, but rough seas and wet gray curtains caused her aircraft to stand useless in their lashings for most of the voyage. On the 26th she began a return to Argentia, arriving there four days later. On 25 April she joined Convoy, HX.235, which was routed to the southward through better weather. This time, with the addition of three more flush-deck destroyers, USS Greene, USS Lea, and USS Osmond Ingram, the carrier had a five-escort screen. The entire support force was designated Task Group 92.3. Their passage was uneventful until the afternoon of the 28th, when Lt. Roger “Stomp” Santee, USNR, in an Avenger, caught a fully surfaced U-boat about 50 miles distant from the convoy and attacked it with two D/Cs that released well enough but ricocheted off the surface, owing to too much speed on the dive, and went under to explode too far from the target.

Two days later, TG 92.3 was detached to make for Belfast, where, during the following two weeks, Bogue’s officers passed through the Anti-Submarine School at Ballykelly, a British HF/DF set was installed in the carrier’s island (see chapter 2), and VC-9’s TBF-I quota was increased from nine to twelve, while the F4F4 fighter complement was reduced from twelve to six. Interestingly, in his comments on the new aircraft composition, Captain Short suggested that four slower type-aircraft, such as the Swordfish, be substituted for three TBF-is: “The Swordfish, for instance, can be operated in weather which precludes the landing and take-off (except by catapult) of the TBF. They could be used for night operations and rough water work when the employment of the heavy and faster TBF would be unduly hazardous in this class of vessel. Further, a slow aircraft at night would prove more effective in spotting submarines than a fast one.” The suggestion was not followed.

Grumman Avenger torpedo bomber

USS Bogue departed Belfast Lough at 1837 on 15 May. Three and a half hours later she rendezvoused with her surface escorts, minus USS Lea, to form the Sixth Escort Group, and proceeded to Iceland. From there, on the 18th, the Group, taking with it the freighter S.S. Toltec, intersected the route of the westbound convoy ON.184, which it was to accompany in support of the close screen. Destroyer USS Lea overtook the remainder of the Group on the 18th, and at dawn the next day, USS Bogue and her four-stackers took assigned convoy stations, USS Bogue in the Commodore’s column astern of the escort tanker. Heavy weather made flying impossible until the 21st when, coincidentally, ON.184 stumbled on a pack of U-boats that had been assembled not to meet it, but another, eastbound, convoy, HX.239 (escorted by HMS Archer), crossing 30 miles to the south, which had been betrayed by Naval Cipher No. 3. Again, as in the case of Convoy SC.130 in the middle of the month, B-Dienst had decrypted HX.239’s position, course, and speed, and BdU had formed a patrol line of twenty-one boats named Mosel (after the river) across it.

Subsequent decryptions by B-Dienst enabled BdU to know the convoy’s estimated positions for the 20th, 21st, and 22nd. Since these positions were farther to the south than BdU had anticipated, twelve Mosel boats were instructed to proceed southeastward to make contact. Boats of the Donau group withdrawing from SC.130 were also vectored to intercept at AK 97 (51°25’N, 30°15’W). None of these orders was decrypted by the Allies before 22 May, and some signals relating to the dispositions of southern Mosel were not read until 3 June. On the 20th, B-Dienst intercepted a signal giving the position of convoy ON.184 as 51°01’N, 33°5O’W.80 Ironically, it was the carrier escort of ON. 184 that the southern Mosel boats would encounter first as the two convoys passed in opposite directions some 520 miles southeast of Cape Farewell.

The morning of the 21st broke CAVU—Ceiling and Visibility Unlimited—and Squadron VC-9 flew continuous search patrols. At twilight on that perfect day, squadron skipper Bill Drane, flying an Avenger with four D/Cs at 3,000 feet 60 miles ahead of the convoy, sighted and pursued a streak of silver with a black splinter at its head. He increased speed to 200 knots, circled, and made his approach from dead ahead, lowering his landing gear on the final run in to reduce speed and avoid the D/C ricochets that had ruined Lt. Santee’s chances the month before. This time four Mark 44 flat-nosed D/Cs, released by intervalometer from 50 feet, dug in properly and blanketed the U-boat with explosive geysers. Nothing was seen of the boat thereafter, and no evidence of damage appeared except for some unidentified dark specks in the center of the Torpex slick. Having reached PLE (30 gallons left on return), Drane called for destroyers to investigate and returned to Bogue. After the war it would be learned that he had severely damaged U-231 (Kptlt. Wolfgang Wenzel), forcing her back to base.

There was no action overnight, but on the 22nd, which dawned clear with occasional rain squalls, VC-9 made no fewer than five Avenger attacks on three separate U-boats of Mosel’s southern wing, beginning at 0635 when Lt. (jg) Roger C. “Bud” Kuhn, USNR, dropped four D/Cs up the wake of U—468 (Oblt.z.S. Klemens Schamong), which, unable to dive for slightly over an hour, circled slowly, emitting a bluish oil streak. Kuhn’s call for backup went unanswered both because he had erred in plotting his position and because he was in a “null” area where ship’s radar could not get a fix. Finally, the U-boat sank stern first, and though seriously damaged, managed to make a successful Rückmarsch. Second out of the box, at 1103, was Ensign Stewart E. Doty, U.S.N.R., who found a fully surfaced boat proceeding at high speed almost broad on the convoy’s bow 18 miles distant. Just before he mounted an attack the U-boat was DFed by USS Bogue. Coming out of an overcast sky at 1,500 feet, Doty survived incoming flak and released four D/Cs on the U-boat, obtaining one explosion, apparently under the hull between the conning tower and bow, the other three D/Cs falling well to port ahead. As the spray subsided, the U-boat was observed to shake violently to starboard, then to submerge slowly. A bluish oil bubble, about 50 feet in diameter, came to the surface. Shortly afterwards, the boat lifted its bow out of the water at an angle of 45°; then it settled back under at the same angle. Like “Bud” Kuhn’s boat, U-305 (Kptlt. Rudolf Bahr) was forced out of the hunt and back to base.

At 1325 Lt. (jg) Robert L. Stearns, flying 26 miles off the convoy’s starboard quarter, sighted 5 miles distant a “large dark object” leaving a long wake on a course of 035°, directly opposite to that of the convoy. It was the same U-305, on her way home to Brest with a severe headache. Stearns dove out of a 1,200-foot cloud base and attacked through heavy flak, dropping a four D/C salvo from 125 feet. The charges exploded close aboard U-305, inflicting additional damage (she would spend nearly three months in Brest) and sending her under again to lick her wounds.

Lt. (jg) William F. “Champ” Chamberlain, USNR, who catapulted off USS Bogue’s deck at 1757, had a daredevil reputation and a record of being hard on aircraft. No one who watched him leave the deck was surprised to see him bank the big Avenger as though he were flying a Wildcat—which is what he used to fly until he complained that the Wildcat pilots were not getting enough flying time. Born in Hoquiam, Washington, he attended the University of Washington, where he studied aeronautical engineering and joined Navy ROTC, eventually entering USN flight school. He was short and stocky, a man of unquestioned courage, without, as an acquaintance said, “a shy bone in his body.” Among his adventures: he crash-landed a plane on his parents’ farm, ground-looped fighters, and ditched an Avenger at sea when he misjudged the height of waves he was skimming. Aircraft Radioman second class (ARM2c) James O. Stine, who rode with him in May, told the writer: “Our old Chief ‘Dusty’ Rhodes, who made the crew assignments, couldn’t get anybody to ride with Chamberlain. But I said I would. I was older than he was, and sort of a fatalist. I was on board when he went into the drink. But we survived.”‘

Chamberlain was launched to chase down a U-boat bearing that USS Bogue had established at 1723 with her new British HF/DF set. Taking a course of 067°, at an altitude of 1,500 feet in the base of broken cumulus, he bore down the invisible Huff-Duff track at 170 knots, and seven minutes after launch made a visual sighting of the transmitting U-boat 25 miles distant from Bogue, proceeding at high speed on a course of 180°. He climbed into cloud cover and circled so as to dive, he hoped undetected, from the U-boat’s stern. When properly positioned, he pushed over at 20°, and at 100 feet altitude and still in the dive, he let go four Mark 17–2 flat-nosed TNT D/Cs set to 25 feet that appeared to straddle the U-boat. Two of the D/Cs were captured while still falling in a remarkable photograph taken by Radioman Stine (see frontispiece); at the same time, Gunner Donald L. Clark, AMM2C, swept the bridge and its startled watch with gunfire. Noting with satisfaction that the U-boat crew had been “completely surprised,” Chamberlain watched as the U-boat slowly dived in the sea of explosive foam. Then, expecting that the Germans, if hurt badly enough, would resurface, he called USS Bogue for another TBF—1 with D/Cs to relieve him.

On her ninth war cruise, out of La Pallice on 19 April, U-569 was a singularly unsuccessful boat, with only three ships to show for twenty-one months on operations. Her second Commander (since 30 January 1943) was Oberleutnant der Reserve Hans Johannsen, a thirty-two-year-old native of Hamburg who had been a prewar merchant marine officer with the Holland America Line. Largely because the boat had achieved few sinkings, Johannsen had found his new crew dispirited and listless. On taking command, therefore, he had had the motto Los geht’s (“Let’s go”) together with a compass rose painted on each side of the conning tower in an attempt to bolster morale. But there were other crew problems that were not so easily addressed, such as a general disaffection from the U-boat arm and a widespread belief that Germany would lose the war.

On 18 May, U-569 had refueled and revictualed from the supply boat U-459. On the 22nd she was part of southern Mosel, operating ostensibly against HX.239, and in 50°,0’N, 35°oo’W when surprised by Chamberlain. According to her survivors, the Avenger’s charges cracked open high-pressure water lines and water began leaking into the after compartments. The boat dived to 120 meters, but when water reached the maneuvering room and the boat became very heavy by the stern, it was no longer possible to maintain trim, and the crew were ordered to the forward torpedo room in a desperate effort to correct the imbalance. When the boat failed to respond, Johannsen gave the order to surface.

Just as U-569 broke above the waves at 1840, Lt. H. S. “Stinky” Roberts, USNR, appeared overhead in Avenger “7.” Sighting the U-boat’s bow beneath his port wing from 3,000 feet, Roberts knew that he had little time before the bridge hatch opened and his presence was discovered. So he pushed over immediately into a 50° dive-bombing attack, releasing four D/Cs in train at 600 feet and pulling out at 100. As Roberts reported afterwards:

"At the time [the D/Cs] hit the water [the U-boat] had fully surfaced and two distinct explosions were seen half way from conning tower to stern—one on either side of sub—the spray from which merged over U/B. The U/B was seen to rise out of the water—then sink—rise a second time, this time on its side. It sank again and finally rose a third time—this time on an even keel. The gunner opened up at once with 50 cal[iber] turret gun as the crew poured out of conning tower and jumped into water. During this time those on board were frantically waving a white flag. Every effort was made to keep the crew inside with gunfire to prevent scuttling but they kept jumping overboard. Finally all ammunition was expended.… "

Johannsen had tried to surrender by waving a white napkin, but when Roberts’s gunner continued fire, a white sheet was brought up and waved instead. Meanwhile, USS Bogue had called upon the Canadian destroyer HMCS St. Laurent to assist, and Chamberlain, who had flown toward the carrier when Roberts relieved him, returned to the scene after hearing by R/T that the boat had resurfaced, allowing Gunner Clark to get in a few more licks before the white sheet went up. Though it appears that most of the U-boat crew who sprang into the water were wearing life jackets, many were carried away in the heavy sea and lost. One of Johannsen’s officers secured a line about his waist and leaped into the water to save two crew members. When at last Canadian destroyer HMCS St. Laurent hove into sight, the L.I. descended the tower ladder and opened the sea cock, which scuttled U-569; he did not reemerge. Altogether, the destroyer picked up twenty-five survivors, not including the L.I. and the II.W.O. One crewman, critically wounded, was hospitalized in St. John’s. The remainder were turned over to USN authorities in Boston for interrogation.

For the first time in naval warfare, a submarine had surrendered to carrier aircraft. For the first time, too, a U-boat had been destroyed by a CVE’s aircraft operating alone. During nineteen months of operations in the Atlantic, Composite Squadron Nine went on to become the highest-scoring ASW squadron in the Navy, with nine U-boats sunk and eight damaged. USS Bogue, her squadrons, and her surface escorts would together destroy eleven more underseas craft—nine U-boats and two Japanese submarines—during the remainder of the war. “Champ” Chamberlain was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and Silver Star for his action against U-569. In March 1944, at Norfolk, Virginia, VC-9 boarded CVE-67, USS Solomons. During a cruise in the South Atlantic out of Recife in Brazil, “Champ” showed that his reputation as a plane-buster was still deserved. On making a landing aboard US Solomons—he was never one, his fellow pilots said, to pay much attention to the Landing Signal Officer—he collided with the edge of the flight deck ramp and split the aircraft in half. “Champ” ended up on deck, but his two crewmen in the tail section careened off the five-inch gun on the fantail into the sea, where, fortunately, they were rescued by the group guardship.

On 15 June 1944, “Champ’s” lucky string ran out. Diving on U-860 (Freg. Kapt. Paul Büchel), which had already been attacked by six VC—9 aircraft, he approached so low—fewer than 50 feet off the deck and into the teeth of heavy flak—that either the flak, or the explosions of his D/Cs, or an internal explosion aboard the damaged U-boat caused his Avenger to be engulfed in flames. Though he managed to make a 180° turn and splash into the water ahead of the U-boat, neither he nor his crew (James Stines had been replaced by his best friend among the ratings) was found by destroyers dispatched to the scene.

That night, a remarkable vigil took place aboard USS Solomons, when one of the carrier’s lookouts reported to the bridge that he had heard a sound in the sea that sounded like a human voice. Though it was a dangerous thing to do in U-boat waters, Solomons Captain Marion Crist ordered the carrier’s speed reduced to two-three knots so that engine, wake, and bow wave noise might be diminished; and all hands—over a thousand—were positioned around the edge of the flight deck to listen for a call from the black, moonless sea. But, though they strained, no one heard a thing other than the pliant waves slapping against the hull, and after a decent, caring interval, the men were returned to normal duties, their only consolation being the knowledge that U-860 had been sunk with half her complement.

Deciding on Sunday the 23rd both that the Mosel boats were too far behind ON.184 to continue operations against it and that “it is not possible at present, with available weapons, to attack a convoy escorted by strong air cover,” BdU ordered Groups Mosel and Donau to break off from that convoy and from HX.239 as well. The ON.184 columns proceeded on the remainder of their voyage to New York unmolested, arriving on the 31st. U-boats were still in contact with convoy HX.239 to the south on the 23rd, however, which would prove the undoing of one of their number, U-752 (Kptlt. Karl-Ernst Schroeter). That boat, on her eighth war cruise, made the mistake of surfacing in daylight to make a contact report and encountered a Swordfish from Royal Navy escort carrier HMS Archer carrying a weapon that was used successfully that day for the first time in combat. It was an airborne rocket fitted with a 25-pound solid steel armor-piercing (A.P.) head called simply “R.P.” (Rocket AProjectile)

Rockets had been fired from Royal Flying Corps aircraft during World War I, though with little success. In the years immediately before the second conflict, their use was considered again in Great Britain as ground-to-air and air-to-air anti-aircraft weapons. As development and trials proceeded in both Army and RAF testing establishments, the rockets came to be called, by the Army, “U.P.s,” for Unrotated Projectiles, and by the RAF “R.P.s,” for Rocket Projectiles. The RAF developed two types of heads, one a 60-lb. High Explosive (H.E.)/Semi Armor Piercing shell of 6 inches diameter for attacks on U-boats and merchant ships, and the other a 25-lb. Armor Piercing (A.P.) solid shot of 3.44 inches diameter for attacks on land targets such as tanks, gun positions, and concrete emplacements. In one of those odd paradoxes that characterized some Allied operational research and testing, it was found that the H.E. head worked better against land targets than did the A.P. head; and that, conversely, the latter worked better against submarine and ship hulls. Thus their roles were reversed.

The A.P. head was screwed into a steel tube four feet in length containing cordite that was ignited electrically. The tube and head traveled together, moved forward by the recoil action of gas escaping at high speed from the combustion of cordite in the rocket engine. When launched from an aircraft such as the Swordfish, flying at 120 knots, the rocket reached a maximum velocity of 1,600 feet per second after 1½ seconds. There was no recoil, or “kick,” felt by the Swordfish, which could carry a load of eight R.P.s hanging from projector rails, four under each lower main plane. As engineered, the projectiles could be fired in four pairs or as a single salvo of eight. Trials conducted at the Aircraft and Armament Experimental Establishment at Boscombe Down indicated that upon striking a U-boat’s hull, the A.P. head fired from 400 yards or less would cause a 3-inch puncture. A perforation that large, it was thought, would prevent a surfaced boat from diving and a diving boat from resurfacing. The introduction of burning cordite into the U-boat’s interior was expected to delay a crew’s attempt to repair the hole and expel water by pumps. If repair could be effected, the U-boat at the very least would have to return to base.

Remarkably, the R.P. proved to have excellent underwater ballistics. Normally, the pilot’s aim should be taken at the base of the U-boat’s conning tower. Should the shot fall short and enter the water, and should the firing have been made from an optimum distance of 400 yards, at an angle of 20°, the rocket would travel submerged, reaching a depth of 13–15 feet, for a distance of 100 feet, and retain lethal penetrative power for 70 of those feet. If the angle of shot was less than 10°, however, the rocket on striking the water could be expected to ricochet.

Tactical advice given the first pilots to carry this weapon in May stressed the importance of making the final run in at 400 feet altitude, with slant attack angle on the U-boat of 20°, firing at 400 yards range. Attack should be made as nearly as possible dead on the beam to prevent glancing blows. Attacks should not be attempted when a diving U-boat had reached periscope depth or had completely disappeared. Once rockets had been fired, the pilot should break away at once to left or right, since if the rocket hit the U-boat it would throw up debris, and if it did not hit, but traveled underwater, one-third of R.P.s emerged from the sea at a steep angle, climbing to 200–300 feet.

Before a rocket projectile was fired in anger against a land target or against a merchant ship, Swordfish “B” of 819 Sqdn. embarked on escort carrier HMS Archer struck the first blow, while flying on Sunday, 23 May, in support of Convoy HX.239, about 750 miles west of Ireland. When HMS Archer left port she carried the first three carrier aircraft to be fitted with RP. Two of them suffered damage landing in rough weather, however, with the result that “B,” piloted by Sub-Lt. Harry Horrocks, R.N.V.R., had sole honors when U-752 made the mistake of traveling surfaced on the port quarter of the convoy in full view of Horrocks and his two-man crew, who were at 1,500 feet 10 miles distant. The time of the sighting was 1015.

Horrocks climbed into cloud cover, where he stayed until he estimated that he was positioned on the U-boat’s beam. He then dived and sighted the enemy slightly on his port bow, range one mile. Deciding to fire in four pairs, Horrocks initiated the attack from 800 yards, twice the recommended range. The first pair fell 150 yards short. The second pair was ignited at the optimum 400 yards, but it, too, was short, by 30 yards. The surprised U-boat began a crash dive, and the third pair, from 300 yards, entered the water 10 feet short while the U-boat’s stern was still visible. One of these two rockets penetrated the pressure hull. The fourth pair, from 200 feet, cleanly hit the hull about 20 feet forward of the rudders.

The now-punctured U-boat immediately resurfaced and, after several futile attempts to dive again, circled on the surface while discharging heavy trails of diesel oil. When her crewmen manned the 20 mm flak, Horrocks called for assistance from a nearby fighter. Coming on the scene in less than a minute, Martlet (Wildcat fighter models renamed by British) “B” loosed off a long burst of 600 rounds at the conning tower that killed the Commander, Schroeter, and a midshipman, while sparing the II.W.O., who was standing alongside them. Below, the L.I. ordered the crew out and scuttled the boat. Both the L.I. and I.W.O. went down with her. Eleven survivors were picked up by a destroyer from HX.239’s screen, and several more were later pulled from the water by another U-boat, U-91.

Aboard HMS Archer there was understandable elation in becoming the second escort carrier to bag a U-boat singlehandedly, and the first to get a kill with R.P. It was, states the official British Naval Aviation history, “shooting in the best traditions of the Wild West"