Albrecht Achilles (naval officer)

Albrecht Adolf Konrad Achilles (born January 25, 1914 in Karlsruhe , † September 27, 1943 in the Atlantic Ocean near Salvador da Bahia at 12 ° 30 ′ S , 35 ° 0 ′ W ) was a German officer in the Navy and commander of the submarine U 161 . -12.5 -35

Life

Achilles joined the Navy in April 1934. His military training (appointment as midshipman on September 26, 1934 Midshipman he completed on July 1, 1935) on the training ship Schleswig-Holstein and the battleship Gneisenau . He was then transferred to the Mürwik Naval School . His officer career began on April 16, 1937 when he was appointed lieutenant at sea . Achilles was assigned to the submarine fleet in April 1940. After completing his basic training, he was transferred to the U 66 boat under Corvette Captain Richard Zapp on January 3, 1941 . On U 66 , Achilles completed three patrols as I. WO . After the end of the third voyage in the summer of 1941, Achilles was promoted to lieutenant captain (August 14, 1941) and received U 161 as its own command. With this he operated mainly in the Caribbean and the Atlantic Ocean near the coasts of Brazil and Africa . The sinking of the US coast guard ship Acacia and the damage to the British light cruiser Phoebe are among the successes Achilles achieved with the U 161 . In total, Achilles succeeded in sinking 15 ships with 64,842 GRT and damaging six other ships on six patrols with U 161 . On March 12, 1942, his name was mentioned in the Wehrmacht report and on January 16, 1943, he was awarded the Knight's Cross for his services . When U 161 was sunk by a flying boat on September 27, 1943 , Achilles and his entire crew (53 men) were killed. On April 5, 1945 he was posthumously promoted to corvette captain.

Ranks

Midshipman on September 26, 1934
Senior seaman on October 1, 1934
Chief of Staff on January 1, 1935
Ensign at sea on July 1, 1935
Oberfähnrich zur See on January 1st, 1937
Lieutenant at sea on April 16, 1937
Oberleutnant zur See on April 13, 1939
Lieutenant on August 14, 1941
Corvette Captain on April 5, 1945 (posthumous)

Awards

Wehrmacht service award IV class on April 8, 1938
Iron Cross (1939) 2nd class on August 7, 1941
U-boat war badge (1939) on August 7, 1941
Iron Cross (1939) 1st class on April 5, 1942
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on January 16, 1943

literature

Reiner Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The knight's cross bearers of the submarine weapon September 1939 to May 1945 , Mittler Verlag Berlin-Bonn-Herford 2003

Web links

Albrecht Achilles in the database of uboat.net (English)

Footnotes

↑ Veit Scherzer : Knight's Cross bearers 1939-1945. The holders of the Iron Cross of the Army, Air Force, Navy, Waffen-SS, Volkssturm and armed forces allied with Germany according to the documents of the Federal Archives. 2nd Edition. Scherzers Militaer-Verlag, Ranis / Jena 2007, ISBN 978-3-938845-17-2 , p. 187.

personal data
SURNAME	Achilles, Albrecht
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Achilles, Albrecht Adolf Konrad
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German naval officer, commander of U 161 in the German Navy, bearer of the Knight's Cross
DATE OF BIRTH	January 25, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH	Karlsruhe
DATE OF DEATH	September 27, 1943
Place of death	Atlantic Ocean near Salvador da Bahia

[1] Veit Scherzer : Knight's Cross bearers 1939-1945. The holders of the Iron Cross of the Army, Air Force, Navy, Waffen-SS, Volkssturm and armed forces allied with Germany according to the documents of the Federal Archives. 2nd Edition. Scherzers Militaer-Verlag, Ranis / Jena 2007, ISBN 978-3-938845-17-2 , p. 187.