SM UB 68

SM UB 68 ( previous / next - all submarines )
Technical specifications
Submarine type	Two-hull ocean-going type
Submarine class	UB III
displacement	513 tons (above water) 647 tons (under water)
length	55.8 m
width	4.40 m (over all)
Max. Diving depth	50 m
drive	2 diesel motors each 550 HP 2 electric motors each 394 HP
Armament	4 bow torpedo tubes 1 stern torpedo tube 10 torpedoes 1 × 8.8 cm cannon exchanged for 10.5 cm cannon in 1918
crew	34 officers and men
speed	13.2  kn (24.4  km / h ) (over water) 7.6 kn (14.1 km / h) (under water)
Calls	4 patrols
successes	5 merchant ships with 10,758  GRT sunk, 4 merchant ships with 23,788 GRT damaged
Whereabouts	October 4, 1918 east of Malta on ( 35 ° 56 ′  N , 16 ° 20 ′  E ) after being hit by artillery, self sunk, one dead, 33 survivors

SM UB 68 was a seaworthy German two-hulled submarine that was used by the Imperial Navy in the Mediterranean during the First World War .

Technical specifications

The need for ocean-going submarines that could be used in the unrestricted submarine war against the British supply routes was the basis for the conception of this type of submarine. A UB-III boat had a powerful engine and developed considerable speed over water, but was relatively slow when submerged due to a battery that was reduced in size in favor of surface propulsion. The order to build UB 68 was placed on May 20, 1916 at the Germania shipyard in Kiel . It belonged to his sister boats of the series of UB 66 and UB 71 war order J . The boat was launched on July 4, 1917 and was put into service by the Imperial Navy on October 5, 1917.

history

UB 68 was initially stationed in the North Sea, but was then subordinated to the U-Flotilla Pola and finally - after the reorganization of the German Mediterranean Armed Forces - the I. U-Flotilla Mediterranean in Pola .

Commanders

The commissioning of the boat took place under Lieutenant Heino von Heimburg , a highly decorated and experienced commander who sank three submarines and the Italian armored cruiser Amalfi with UB 14 and UB 15 and UC 22 . He commanded UB 68 on three companies. In the summer of 1918, the boat underwent considerable renovation work in the port of Pola. Among other things, additional buoyancy tanks were installed and the cannon exchanged for a 10.5 cm cannon. In September 1918 Oberleutnant Karl Dönitz was given command of UB 68 . He had previously commanded the considerably smaller UC 25 mine submarine on three operations in the Mediterranean and received the U-boat war badge for his enemy voyages .

Ventures

First Lieutenant Dönitz ran out with UB 68 on September 25 on a patrol in the eastern Mediterranean. The meeting with SM UB 48 was ordered in order to carry out a joint coordinated undertaking. However, as the repair work on this boat had been delayed, UB 48 did not appear at the meeting point.

Sinking

In an attack on a convoy, Dönitz decided after the successful sinking of a ship by torpedo, to attack a British convoy east of Malta . However, the Chief Engineer (LI) had difficulties trimming UB 68 safely and the boat surprisingly sank to a depth of 100 meters. The now immediately initiated blowing out of the diving cells caused UB 68 to shoot to the surface and to snap out of the water at an angle of 45 ° in the middle of the convoy. While the artillery shells of the British steamer Queensland were damaging the tower and destroying the bow, Commander Dönitz first considered diving again, but then decided to let the crew disembark because, according to the LI, there was no longer enough compressed air to surface Board would be. At Dönitz's order, he stayed in the boat to sink the boat by opening the flood valves by hand and did not reappear. The LI was the only loss among the crew of U 68 , which went into British captivity on October 4, 1918 . In a later publication, Dönitz attributed the sinking of his submarine to a design flaw in the boat.

Sunk or damaged enemy ships

date	commander	Ship name	nationality	Tonnage ( GRT )	fate
April 10, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Warwickshire	United Kingdom	8012	Damaged
April 11, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Kingstonian	United Kingdom	6564	Damaged
April 13, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Provence III	France	3941	Damaged
April 26, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Angelina di Paola	Kingdom of Italy	228	Sunk
0June 1, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Angelina	Kingdom of Italy	1260	Sunk
0June 3, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Glaucus	United Kingdom	5295	Sunk
June 12, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Monginevro	Kingdom of Italy	5271	Damaged
June 24, 1918	Heino von Heimburg	Saint Antoine	France	43	Sunk
0October 4, 1918	Karl Doenitz	Oopack	United Kingdom	3883	Sunk

literature

• Bodo Herzog: German U-Boats 1906–1966. Karl Müller Verlag, Erlangen 1996, ISBN 3-86070-036-7 .
• Eberhard Rössler : History of the German submarine building Vol. 1. Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Bonn 1996, ISBN 3-86047-153-8 .
• Paul Kemp: The German and Austrian submarine losses in both world wars. Urbes, Gräfeleing 1997, ISBN 3-924896-43-7 .

Notes and individual references

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Guðmundur Helgason: Ships hit by UB 68. In: UBoat.net. Retrieved March 1, 2015 . 
2. ↑ Eberhard Rössler: History of the German submarine building Vol. 1. 1996, p. 88.
3. ↑ von Heimburg had received the Pour le Mérite in August .
4. ↑ Peter Padfield: Dönitz - The Devil's Admiral. Ullstein, Berlin 1983, p. 98.
5. ↑ Bodo Herzog: German U-Boats 1906–1966. Karl Müller Verlag, Bonn 1996, p. 58.
6. ↑ On the shipyard side, a maximum permissible diving depth of 50 meters was specified.
7. ^ Paul Kemp: The German and Austrian submarine losses in both world wars. Urbes, Gräfeleing 1997, p. 58.
8. ^ Karl Dönitz: 40 questions to Karl Dönitz. Bernard & Graefe, Munich 1980.