GERMAN "HERBERT" U -BOAT CAPTAIN 1/6 DRAGON

How did men become U-boat commanders?

There were some different groups of commanders, which had gone their very different ways into command.

1. The pre-war Commanders

 
This group of commanders took command of the first 36 U-boats in 1935 and 1936 with only a short preparation for this function. Some of them died or became captive in the first months of war: Kptlt. Weingaertner (U-16), Kptlt. Lott (U-35), Korvkpt. Grosse (U-55) and Kptlt. Dau (U-42).

  Many of them later in the war became famous commanders and earned the Knights Cross, those included men like Korvkpt. Werner Hartmann, Kptlt. Schütze, Kptlt. Liebe and Kptlt. von Stockhausen.

But also some of these first commanders we found later in the war in some staff positions like the later FdU Mittelmeer (Mediterranean) Kapitän zur See Werner Hartmann, the FdU West Kapitän zur See Rösing, the later BdU staff officers Korvkpt. Meckel and Korvkpt. Oehrn, but also some later flotilla commanders like Fregkpt. Pauckstadt (8th flotilla), Fregkpt. Schütze (2nd flotilla) and Fregkpt. Cohausz (11th flotilla).

2. The pre-war watch-officers

 
This group of young officers for the most part joined the U-boat force during 1936-1938 and received the long and also thorough pre-war training. Some of them also rode the first few months of war as IWO.

This group of men generated most of the very successful commanders in the war, men like Prien, Kretschmer, Schnee, Suhren, Lüth, Topp and Schepke. The BdU took later in the war these officers, which still in combat, back from the front in staff or training duties where they could pass on their hard-earned experience.

3. Officers from other naval branches and from the "Luftwaffe"

 
In the war a lot of naval officers, who served on battleships and other surface ships, attempted to join the U-boat force. Many of them became also very successful commanders and included among their ranks men like Brandi, Merten, Gysae, Hartenstein, Lange, Lehmann and Lüdden.

Also some members of the naval air force (Luftwaffe) changed to the U-boat force and some of them later became famous U-boat commanders and Knights Cross holders like Hardegen, Thomsen and Hechler.

4. The usual way during the war

 
Here should be shown the most usual way in the years of war. Notice, the following shows the normal way, there were a lot of deviations depending from some different facts, like the up-to-now-career of the officers and the phase of war.

Course	Contents	Time	Where
Ua-Lehrgang	U-boat basic course	8 - 12 weeks	1. ULD Neustadt/ later Pillau
UTO-Lehrgang	U-boat torpedo course	4 - 8 weeks	Torpedoschule Flensburg-Mürwik
UWO-Lehrgang	U-boat radio course	4 weeks	Marine-Nachrichtenschule Flensburg-Mürwik
UWO-Lehrgang	U-boat artillery course later anti aircraft course	4 weeks	Schiffsartillerieschule Kiel-Wik/ later Sassnitz
II WO or I WO	U-boat watch officer	3 - 18 months	frontboat
Kommandanten- Schiesslehrgang	Commander course	4 - 8 weeks	24. U-Flottille Danzig/ later Memel
Kommandantenschüler "Konfirmand"	Commander trainee	usually one patrol	frontboat

The age of U-boat commanders

During the first years of the war there was a strict rule, that a commander had to be at least 25 years old. That's why "Teddy" Suhren, then already a Knights Cross holder, had to wait in a training unit for a few months until he became 25-year old.

Later in the war this limit was lifted and Leutnant zur See Ludwig-Ferdinand von Friedeburg became the youngest combat U-boat commander. He took over the command of U-155 on 15 August 1944. He was then 20 years and 3 months old. There were 3 others Leutnants who took over a boat while only 20 years old; Hans-Eckart Augustin (U-62), Gerhard Ady (U-704) and Hans-Joachim Dierks (U-14). They all commanded training U-boats only.

The oldest Commander was Fregattenkapitän Wilhelm Kiesewetter. He took over the command of the training boat UC 1 on 20 November, 1940. He was at that time 62 years old! In WWI Wilhelm Kiesewetter was Commander of SM UC-56.

The oldest Commander on patrol was Korvettenkapitän Georg von Willamowitz- Moellendorf, the well known commander of U-459, one of the Milk-Cows. He died in 1943 at the age of 49 years.

The usual limit for combat-commanders was 40 years.

What rank was normal for the commander?

The usual rank for a U-boat commander was Oberleutnant zur See or Kapitänleutnant.

Following is the last (highest) ranks of all commanders in the war. 

The lowest rank, Leutnant zur See, is listed first.

6	Leutnant zur See
625	Oberleutnant zur See
523	Kapitänleutnant
175	Korvettenkapitän
47	Fregattenkapitän
21	Kapitän zur See
2	former U-boat commanders reached in the war an Admirals rank Konteradmiral Godt (U-25, U-23) & Generaladmiral von Friedeburg (U-27).

So how many Commanders served in the war?

There were more than 1,410 commanders, 574 of them died in the war. 530 commanders died in combat, the rest by accidents, illness, suicide or sentenced to death.

  

Captain (Kapitanleutnant)- U-boat commander, 1941
01 - officers' jacket, Kapitanleutnant insignia
02 - Kninght's Cross of the Iron Cross
 03 - U-boat crew badge
 04 - Unofficial badges of the 1st and 9th U-boat flotilas
 05 - cigarettes
06 - Kriegsmarine officers' cap
07 - leather gloves
08 - leather "U-Boot-Päckchen" - U-boat battle dress
09 - boots
10 - "Junghans" watch
11 - naval binoculars

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A Brief History of U-boats in the Second World War

One of the most successful elements of the German Kriegsmarine was the U-boat arm. Organized by the master tactician Grossadmiral (Grand Admiral) Karl Doenitz, the U-boat fleet would be the one part of the German military that would truly frighten Prime Minister Winston Churchill (as mentioned in his concise history of WW2).

With Hitler's call for rearmament, Doenitz believed he could decimate the sea lines of communication and trade that were so vital to the British Empire if he had 300 boats.  But when war broke out in September of 1939, Germany was nowhere near Doenitz's goal of 300 submarines.  Instead, there were approximately 45 operational boats out of a total of 57.  Of these, only 22 were capable of service in the rough seas of the Atlantic.  Until 1943, when Hitler finally called for a cessation of all large surface fleet construction, only 5% of German steel production was dedicated to the U-boat mission that Doenitz had to carry out.  Early reliabilty problems with torpedoes and lack of good air support also hampered initial U-boat efforts.

Still, the early years of the war were to yield excellent results and were known as the "Happy Time." Guenther Prien's attack on the Scapa Flow naval base and his sinking of the British battleship Royal Oak there was a major propoganda victory for Germany during this period.  And with the instituting of "Wolfpack" tactics, British shipping was being sunk at an alarming rate.

Into 1941, Great Britain finally gained a grip on the situation with a combination of convoying, radar, ASDIC detection, and better escort tactics.  Additionally, capture of code books and an Enigma encoding machine allowed the British to read German radio messages, and U-boats were no longer able to operate in secrecy.  The conduct of the sea war shifted in Britain's favor.

With US entry into the war in December of 1941, U-boat captains like Erich Topp and Reinhard Hardegen headed for the American east coast and the second Happy Time began.  In the first six months of 1942, nearly 400 American ships were sunk at a cost of over 5,000 lives--the greatest disaster at sea ever suffered by the US Navy.  The addition of a fourth rotor to German Enigma machines also put the Allies in the dark once again as to U-boat movements.  By the end of 1942/early 1943, Great Britain was desperately short of fuel and supplies, and it looked very much like Germany would win the Battle of the Atlantic, and quite possibly the war along with it.

In 1943, the final turning point came, however, in what the Germans called "Black May."  In this month alone, more U-boats were sunk than was Allied merchant shipping. What helped bring about this shift in the balance of power was the breaking of the new German code, improved radar aboard aircraft, high frequency direction finders (HF-DF) on escorts, and overwhelming Allied ship production. Doenitz attempted a major push back into the Atlantic in the fall of 1943 with several new advances of his own (such as acoustic torpedoes and the snorkel "breathing" apparatus), but the offensive was short-lived.  U-boats would continue to patrol up to the very last day of the war, but 1944 and 1945 went badly for the Ubootwaffe overall.

In the end, roughly 800 of 1,100 U-boats constructed had been sunk.  30,000 of 40,000 U-boat men who had put to sea never returned home.  In the history of warfare, no combat force has ever sustained such losses yet still maintained so well its spirit and high sense of duty. The U-boats themselves sank more than 3,000 Allied vessels for over 14 million tons of shipping.  The Battle of the Atlantic was the single longest and costliest battle of the Second World War.

 

 
CREWS

Kommandant	(Commander)
Leitender Ingenieur (LI)	(Chief engineer)
Wachoffizier	(Watch officer, exec officer)
Obersteuermann	(Chief Quartermaster)
Obermaschinist	(warrant machinist)
Bootsmann	(chief boatswain mate)
Seemännisches Personal	(nautical personnel)
Technisches Personal	(technical personnel)
Zentrale-Personal	(control room personnel)
Funk-Personal	(radio personnel)
Torpedo-Personal	(torpedo personnel)
Artilleriemechaniker-Personal	(gunnery mechanical personnel)
Koch, 'Smutje'	(cook)
Additional crewmembers
Bordarzt, Sanitätsmaat	(doctor)
Flak Personal	(anti aircraft personnel)
PK-Leute	(war correspondent)
Meteorologe	(meteorologist)
B-Dienst	(intelligence personnel)

U-Boat Insignia & Emblem

U-boat insignias and emblems were popularly sported by U-boat crews during the war. Emblems and insignias were an expression of individualism or they could also sometimes be representative of some sort of feature of meaning connected to their boat. Propaganda and superstitious influence also came into play, with some sporting the clover for good luck, or cupid for a good shot.

One of the more well known emblems is the golden horseshoe by Otto Kretschmer. The horseshoe was welded with the opening facing downwards for good luck, and ironically, the destroyer that sank his boat, also bored a horseshoe for good luck, but it was facing upwards.

Before the war, U-boat numerals were painted in large white letters about 1.5 meters tall on the conning tower. At the outbreak of war, however, these numeral markings were discontinued and all boats were painted an overall neutral gray in order to keep the enemy guessing about the deployment of the U-boat force. It didn't take long however, before U-boat crews began adopting insignias and emblems as a means of self expression and individualism.

In addition to U-Boat emblems, each graduating class from U-Boat academy also chose an emblem. The crew of 1936 chose the Olympic Rings, in reference to the 1936 Olympic Games in Munich. An upright dagger through a wedding ring was chosen for the crew of 1937, and was characterized as "First win, then marry!". Even U-boat flotillas had emblems. The 7th U-flotilla adopted the snorting bull after Gunther Prien's boat while the 9th flotilla had the laughing sawfish as its emblem.

However, not all boats had emblems, while some boats had more than one emblem. For example, a boat could display its flotilla emblem, the graduating class emblem and the boat's individual emblem. When a new commander took over a boat, he would just add his own emblem rather than replace the existing emblem and risk losing the old luck. U-boat insignias were also worn on uniforms, sewn onto caps and even imprinted on items such as mugs and badges.

With the advent of the true submarine, such as the Types XXI and XXIII, which spent most of their time underwater, these boats rarely surfaced and thus together with it, the colorful naval tradition of the U-Boat insignias began to fade out.

Type IX U-Boat

Technical Specification

	Type IXA	Type IXB	Type IXC
Role	Long Range Attack U-boat	Long Range Attack U-boat	Long Range Attack U-boat
Displacement Surfaced Submerged	1,032 tons 1,153 tons	1,051 tons 1,178 tons	1,120 tons 1,232 tons
Dimensions Length Beam Draught	251.0ft (76.5m) 21.3ft (6.5m) 15.4ft (4.7m)	251.0ft (76.5m) 22.3ft (6.8m) 15.4ft (4.7m)	252.0ft (76.8m) 22.3ft (6.8m) 15.4ft (4.7m)
Top speed Surfaced Submerged	18.2 knots 7.7 knots	18.2 knots 7.3 knots	18.3 knots 7.3 knots
Maximum range Surfaced at 12kt Submerged at 4kt	8,100nm 65nm	8,700nm 64nm	11,000nm 63nm
Crush depth	656ft (200m)	656ft (200m)	656ft (200m)
Weapons Bow tubes Stern tubes Torpedo capacity Mines Guns	Four 21 inch Two 21in 22 None 1 x 105mm cannon 1 x 37mm Flak 1 x 20mm Flak	Four 21 inch Two 21in 22 None 1 x 105mm cannon 1 x 37mm Flak 1 x 20mm Flak	Four 21 inch Two 21in 22 None 1 x 105mm cannon 1 x 37mm Flak 1 x 20mm Flak
Crew	48	48	48
Total built	8	14	54

	Type IXC/40	Type IXD1	Type IXD2
Role	Long Range Attack U-boat	Long Range Attack U-boat	Long Range Attack U-boat
Displacement Surfaced Submerged	1,144 tons 1,257 tons	1,610 tons 1,799 tons	1,616 tons 1,804 tons
Dimensions Length Beam Draught	252.0ft (76.8m) 22.6ft (6.9m) 15.4ft (4.7m)	287.4ft (87.6m) 24.6ft (7.5m) 17.7ft (5.4m)	287.4ft (87.6m) 24.6ft (7.5m) 17.7ft (5.4m)
Top speed Surfaced Submerged	18.3 knots 7.3 knots	20.8 knots 6.9 knots	19.2 knots 6.9 knots
Maximum range Surfaced at 12kt Submerged at 4kt	11,400nm 63nm	9,900nm 57nm	23,700nm 57nm
Crush depth	656ft (200m)	656ft (200m)	656ft (200m)
Weapons Bow tubes Stern tubes Torpedo capacity Mines Guns	Four 21 inch Two 21in 22 None 1 x 105mm cannon 1 x 37mm Flak 1 x 20mm Flak	Four 21 inch Two 21in 24 None 1 x 105mm cannon 1 x 37mm Flak 1 x 20mm Flak	Four 21 inch Two 21in 24 None 1 x 105mm cannon 1 x 37mm Flak 1 x 20mm Flak
Observation kite	None	Focke-Achgelis FA-330	Focke-Achgelis FA-330
Crew	48	55	57
Total built	87	2	28

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