SM UC 44

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SM UC 44
( all submarines )
Type : UC II
Shipyard: AG Vulcan , Hamburg
Build number: 77
Keel laying: unknown
Launch: October 10, 1916
Commissioning: November 4, 1916
Commanders:

Kurt Tebbenjohanns (* November 20, 1885, † unknown)

Calls: unknown
Sinkings:

27 sunk merchant ships, 1 warship, 1 prize

Whereabouts: Loss on August 5, 1917 by mine in the port of Waterford / Ireland

SM UC 44 was a German submarine type UC II , which according to British representation on August 5, 1917. Waterford on Ireland's south coast in one of the news service of the Royal Navy arranged ambush , was lured to the signal books to capture. Except for the commandant , Lieutenant Captain Kurt Tebbenjohanns, the entire 29-man crew was killed; the wreck was recovered and scrapped.

Deployment and demise

Apparently, UC 44 was used from May 1917 to mine the Irish south coast.

Early on the morning of August 5th, UC 44 began a mining operation in the port of Waterford. Been here from 44 UC themselves and from UC 42 laid mines, but had been already vacated by the British. Commandant Kurt Tebbenjohanns (* November 20, 1885 - †?) Was with two other crew members in the tower of the boat when a powerful explosion occurred that immediately caused the boat to sink.

By unanswered knocking signals, Tebbenjohanns established on the bottom of the harbor basin that there were apparently no survivors in the hull. The boat was at a depth of 30 meters. Tebbenjohanns opened the hatch and the three survivors were thrown to the surface of the water after the water pressure had equalized. The two other survivors were driven away by the strong current and remained missing, Tebbenjohanns was rescued after an hour and a half by two Irish fishermen.

He was questioned by British authorities that same day, later apparently by the Chief of Naval Intelligence , William Reginald Hall , personally. Allegedly, the commander only found out after the end of the war that he and his crew had been the victims of a ruse . Hall was known that the Imperial Navy had changed some of the signal keys. In order to get to the new codes, it was planned to intercept a submarine or aircraft and retrieve the signal books. Since the German mining activities in the port of Waterford were known, mines that UC 42 had laid in the port on June 14, 1917, were not cleared, as had been expected by the German side. They were deliberately left on site in order to damage the next mine-layer so badly or at least to sink it in shallow waters that the wreck could be recovered.

The wreck of UC 44 was lifted on September 26, 1917 and towed into a nearby bay. The corpses of the fallen were buried, the boat thoroughly examined, especially its radio systems:

… On board they found a valuable set of secret documents and detailed charts laying out the precise courses that U-boats should steer to pass safeley through the “impregnable” Dover Strait. Not only did the charts show the courses, they also indicated the depths at which the submarines should travel, together with dates, times and tides ...

Nolan & Nolan, Secret Victory , p. 235

UC 42 sank on September 10, 1917 due to a self-contained mine explosion off the southern Irish coast near Cork. The wreck still contains mines that will be recovered in 2015.

literature

  • William James: The Eyes of the Navy. A Biographical Study of Admiral Sir Reginald Hall , London (Methuen & Co.) 1955, p. 116.
  • Liam Nolan & John E. Nolan: Secret Victory. Ireland and the War at Sea 1914-1918 , Cork (Mercier Press) 2009, pp. 234f. ISBN 978-1-85635-621-3 .
  • David Ramsay: "Blinker Hall", Spymaster: The Man Who Brought America into World War I , Stroud (Spellmount) 2008, p. 231. ISBN 978-0-7524-5398-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Sean O'Riordan: German U-boat on Cork coast to be disabled . In: Irish Examiner of 7 January 2015.