Max Valentiner

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Max Valentiner
Max Valentiner (center) with his mother and younger brother Otto around 1902

Christian August Max Ahlmann Valentiner (born December 15, 1883 in Tondern , † July 19, 1949 in Sønderborg ) was a highly decorated German naval officer and submarine commander in the First World War .

Life

Earlier life

Valentiner was the eldest son of the deacon Otto Friedrich Valentiner and his wife Mathilde Julie Olde. He had two younger sisters and a younger brother Otto (1896-1918), who in 1918 fell as an officer on watch on UC 79 . He spent his school days in Ketting and Augustenborg and graduated from high school in Sønderborg . On April 1, 1902, Valentiner joined the Imperial Navy as a midshipman on the sailing training ship Moltke . During his basic training on August 15, 1902, he saved a ship's boy from drowning off Swinoujscie . Valentiner successfully completed his training at the Hansa in 1903 .

On September 29, 1905 he was promoted to lieutenant in the sea and in 1907 came to the ship of the line Braunschweig . A year later he was promoted to lieutenant at sea . From 1908 to 1910 he was a company commander in the 1st Sailor Artillery Department in Kiel . In 1911 Valentiner came as a rescue officer on the special ship Vulkan and was responsible for the submarine acceptance command in Kiel. From March 22, 1914 he was promoted to lieutenant captain, and nine days later he became a teacher at the U-Boat School in Kiel. He held this position until the outbreak of the First World War .

First World War

His first job was to sink Russian warships in the Baltic Sea with U 3 , but the company failed. He was then ordered to Kiel to explain the problems of the operation to the Supreme Commander of the Baltic Sea, Grand Admiral Prince Heinrich of Prussia . He then became the commander of the new U 38 submarine . By the end of March 1915, some problems with the diesel engine and repairs to the submarine had been fixed, and a few practice trips took place off the British east coast between repairs. From October 20 to November 11, 1915, the U 38 sailed in the Mediterranean . 14 ships with 47,460 GRT were sunk. On November 8, 1915, U 38 sank the Italian passenger ship Ancona ; over 200 people were killed. On December 30, 1915, the Persia was sunk near Crete without warning , killing 343 people. On September 15, 1917, Valentiner left U 38 in Cattaro and took over command of the new U-cruiser U 157 in Kiel on September 22 , 1918, which he held until July 20, 1918. Valentiner undertook the longest journey of a submarine in World War I with U 157, which lasted a total of 139 days from November 27, 1917 to April 15, 1918 and during which the seven ships with a total tonnage of only around 10,000 t were sunk. In 1918 he was ordered back to the naval school in Kiel as a trainer. Valentiner sank a total of 142 ships with a tonnage of over 300,000 GRT during the war, making him one of the most successful submarine commanders in the history of naval warfare.

post war period

After the end of World War I, Valentiner was indicted as a war criminal by the victorious powers France , Great Britain and Italy . He fled to Berlin, where he was deleted from the list of naval officers and given a new identity . As Karl Schmidt he traveled to East Prussia , where he lived in Kadinen for some time . After the Treaty of Versailles was signed and entered into force, he returned to Kiel. Valentiner was exonerated and subsequently promoted to corvette captain.

Valentiner founded a company in Kiel that dealt with machines and spare parts. He later became a shipowner and worked for Drägerwerke AG in Lübeck and Ardeltwerke AG in Eberswalde .

reactivation

On September 1, 1934, Valentiner was reactivated in his old rank in the Reichsmarine and was initially employed in the General Naval Office of the Reichswehr Ministry. From June 1, 1935, it was used in the Statistical Department (BStat) in the Navy High Command .

In January 1940 Valentiner took over the office for the submarine acceptance commission (UAK) in Kiel - Danzig , which he held until March 1945. He was promoted to sea captain on January 1, 1941 . On March 31, 1945 he was discharged from the Navy.

death

Max Valentiner died on July 19, 1949 in Sønderborg Hospital of a lung disease that he contracted while inhaling the toxic fumes from the engines of the first submarines ( U 10 and U 3 ).

Awards

Reports

  • 1918: With Kapitänleutnant Max Valentiner on board a submarine cruiser
  • 2003: n-tv report : Hunt for the Empire's gold ship - with Lieutenant Captain Max Valentiner on board a submarine cruiser (1918)

literature

  • Joachim Schröder: The emperor's submarines. The story of the German submarine war against Great Britain in World War I. 2nd Edition. Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Bonn 2003, ISBN 3-7637-6235-3 , ( Subsidia academica series A: Modern and recent history 3), (At the same time: Dortmund, Univ., Diss., 1999).
  • Max Valentiner: 300,000 tons sunk! - My submarine rides. Ullstein, Berlin / Vienna 1917.
  • Max Valentiner: U 38 - Viking trips of a German submarine. Ullstein, Berlin 1934.
  • Max Valentiner: The Horror of the Seas - My Submarine Adventure. Amalthea-Verlag, Leipzig 1931.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ With Kapitänleutnant Max Valentiner on board a submarine cruiser (1918) at The German Early Cinema DatabaseTemplate: GECD title / maintenance / ID is missing in Wikidata
personal data
SURNAME Valentiner, Max
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Valentiner, Christian August Max Ahlmann (full name); Schmidt, Karl (false identity)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German naval officer and submarine commander in World War I.
DATE OF BIRTH December 15, 1883
PLACE OF BIRTH Tønder
DATE OF DEATH July 19, 1949
Place of death Sønderborg