On the night of 13/14 October 1939, the Type VIIB U-boat U-47, on its second war patrol, penetrated the main Royal Navy base at Scapa Flow and sank the British battleship HMS Royal Oak. This legendary attack is remembered as one of the most audacious raids in the history of submarine warfare. Over the months that followed, U-47 went on to complete a total of ten war patrols. During these, Kapitänleutnant Günther Prien and his crew sank a total of 31 Allied ships and damaged eight more, making it one of the most successful U-boats of the Second World War. This book charts the full story of U-47, its commander and crew.
On the night of 13/14 October 1939, the Type VIIB U-boat U-47, on its second War Patrol, penetrated the main Royal Navy base at Scapa Flow and sank the British battleship HMS Royal Oak. This legendary attack is remembered as one of the most audacious raids in the history of submarine warfare. Laid down on 25 February 1937, and entering service in December 1938 under the command of Oberleutnant zur See, later Kapitanleutnant Gunther Prien, after sinking HMS Royal Oak both Prien and his famous U-boat were known thereafter as 'The Bull of Scapa Flow'. During a lavish celebration in Berlin to mark the sinking of HMS Royal Oak, the crew members of U-47 were received by Adolf Hitler. For his part, Prien received the Knight's Cross, becoming the first U-boat officer and only the second member of the Kriegsmarine to receive this decoration. Still under Prien's command, U-47 returned to sea on 16 November 1939. Over the months that followed, U-47 went on to complete a total of ten war patrols. During these, Prien and his crew sank a total of thirty-one Allied ships and damaged eight more, making it one of the most successful U-boats of the Second World War. As a central figure in the Battle of the Atlantic, Prien was consistently at the heart of events until he was lost on board U-47 in March 1941. U-47 had departed Lorient on her tenth and last patrol on 20 February 1941. She went missing on 7 March 1941. In this remarkably detailed account, the author charts the full story of U-47, its commander and crew. As well as examining all the main events in each of U-47's ten War Patrols, particularly the attack on HMS Royal Oak, for which a number of important new conclusions are explored, as is U-47's final fate. AUTHOR: Dougie Martindale is the author of fifteen articles which primarily focus on the modifications made to German U-boats and the paint colours. Ten articles have been translated into Spanish and six were published in the SubCommittee Report magazine. He is co-owner of Accurate Model Parts, a company producing aftermarket products for submarine models. He has also completed books on Scottish aircraft wrecks and cycle touring. Dougie lives in the west of Scotland with his wife and daughter.
In August 1939, U-48, commanded by 'Vaddi' Schultze, took up a waiting position around England. Schultze showed himself to be a notable humanitarian: he addressed signals to Churchill giving positions of ship sinkings so that crews could be saved. By 1 August 1941 this most successful boat of World War II, had sunk 56 merchant ships one corvette.
Otto Kretschmer was only in combat from September 1939 until March 1941 but was Germany's highest-scoring U-boat commander sinking 47 ships totaling 274,333 tons. This definitive work details his personal story and the political backdrop from his earliest days. Aged 17 he spent 8 months studying literature at Exeter University where he learned to speak English fluently. The following year, on 1 April 1930, he enlisted as an officer candidate in the Weimar Republic's small navy. After completing his officer training and time on the training ship Niobe he served aboard the light cruiser Emden. In December 1934 he was transferred to the light cruiser Köln, then in January 1936 made the move to the fledgling U-boat service. His first operational posting was to the 2nd U-Flotilla’s Type VII U35 where he almost being drowned during training in the Baltic Sea! During the Spanish Civil War, he was involved in several patrols as part of the international nonintervention force. He was finally given command of U23, a post which he held until April 1940. He had already sunk 8 ships including the destroyer HMS Daring east of Pentland Firth on 18 February 1940. He demonstrated a cool approach to combat: his mantra ‘one torpedo for one ship’ proved that the best way for his boat to succeed against a convoy was to remain surfaced as much as possible, penetrating the convoy and using the boat’s high speed and small silhouette to avoid retaliation. His nickname ‘Silent Otto’ referred to his ability to remain undetected and his reluctance to provide the regular radio reports required by Dönitz: he had guessed that the Allies had broken German codes. Alongside his military skill was a character that remained rooted in the traditions of the Prussian military. While other U-boat commanders and crew returned from patrol with beards and a relaxed demeanor, U99 always returned with all men clean-shaven and paraded on deck. In the Bowmanville POW camp he organized a 2-way radio link to the German Naval High Command and planned a mass breakout with a U-boat rendezvous arranged. He was also instrumental in the ‘Battle of Bowmanville’ that lasted for 3 days in October 1942. His antics behind the wire became the inspiration for the 1970 film ‘The McKenzie Break’. Postwar he answered the call for volunteers upon the establishment of the Bundesmarine. He retired from the rank of Flotillenadmiral in 1970. He suffered a fall celebrating his 50th wedding anniversary aboard a boat and died two days later at the age of 86.
The story of the German submarine U-505 and its dramatic capture by the US Navy during WWII—told by one of its crewmen. Hans Goebeler is known as the man who “pulled the plug” on U-505 in 1944 to keep his beloved U-boat out of Allied hands. Steel Boat, Iron Hearts is his no-holds-barred account of service aboard a combat U-boat. It is the only full-length memoir of its kind, and Goebeler was aboard for every one of U-505’s war patrols. Using his own experiences, log books, and correspondence with other U-boat crewmen, Goebeler offers rich and very personal details about what life was like in the German Navy under Hitler. Because his first and last posting was to U-505, Goebeler’s perspective of the crew, commanders, and war patrols paints a vivid and complete portrait unlike any other to come out of the Kriegsmarine. He witnessed it all: from deadly sabotage efforts that almost sunk the boat to the tragic suicide of the only U-boat commander who took his life during WWII; from the terror and exhilaration of hunting the enemy to the seedy brothels of France. The vivid, honest, and smooth-flowing prose calls it like it was and pulls no punches. U-505 was captured by Captain Dan Gallery’s Guadalcanal Task Group 22.3 on June 4, 1944. Trapped by this “Hunter-Killer” group, U-505 was depth-charged to the surface, strafed by machine gun fire, and boarded. It was the first enemy ship captured at sea since the War of 1812. Today, hundreds of thousands of visitors tour U-505 each year at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry. Includes photos and a special Introduction by Keith Gill, Curator of U-505, Museum of Science and Industry
DIVFrom 1939 to the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945, Allied ships and planes fought U-boats and other German warships to protect merchant shipping on the unforgiving North Atlantic./div
An “indispensable” guide to the Royal Navy’s submarines through 1945, with numerous photos and original plans (The Naval Review). The Royal Navy didn’t invent the submarine—but in 1914, Britain had the largest submarine fleet in the world, and at the end of World War I it had some of the largest and most unusual of all submarines—whose origins and designs are all detailed in this book. During the First World War they virtually closed the Baltic to German iron ore traffic, and blocked supplies to the Turkish army at Gallipoli. They were a major element in the North Sea battles, and fought the U-boat menace. During World War II, US submarines were known for strangling Japan, but lesser known is the parallel battle by British submarines in the Mediterranean to strangle the German army in North Africa. Like their US counterparts, interwar British submarines were designed largely with the demands of a possible Pacific War, though that was not the war they fought. The author also shows how the demands of such a war, fought over vast distances, collided with interwar British Government attempts to limit costs. It says much about the ingenuity of British submarine designers that they met their requirements despite enormous pressure. The author shows how evolving strategic and tactical requirements and evolving technology produced successive types of design. British submariners contributed much to the development of anti-submarine tactics and technology, beginning with largely unknown efforts before World War I. Between the wars, they exploited the new technology of sonar (Asdic), and as a result pioneered submarine silencing, with important advantages to the US Navy as it observed the British. They also pioneered the vital postwar use of submarines as anti-submarine weapons, sinking a U-boat while both were submerged. Heavily illustrated with photos and original plans and incorporating much original analysis, this book is ideal for naval historians and enthusiasts. “Sure to become the standard reference for British submarine development for years to come” —Warship
This is a truly unique account of Nazi Germany at war and of one man's struggle against totalitarianism. A mid-level official in a provincial town, Friedrich Kellner kept a secret diary from 1939 to 1945, risking his life to record Germany's path to dictatorship and genocide and to protest his countrymen's complicity in the regime's brutalities. Just one month into the war he is aware that Jews are marked for extermination and later records how soldiers on leave spoke openly about the mass murder of Jews and the murder of POWs; he also documents the Gestapo's merciless rule at home from euthanasia campaigns against the handicapped and mentally ill to the execution of anyone found listening to foreign broadcasts. This essential testimony of everyday life under the Third Reich is accompanied by a foreword by Alan Steinweis and the remarkable story of how the diary was brought to light by Robert Scott Kellner, Friedrich's grandson.
