U 111 (Navy)

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U 111 (Kriegsmarine)
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Type : IX B
Field Post Number : M 22 133
Shipyard: AG Weser , Bremen
Construction contract: August 8, 1939
Build number: 976
Keel laying: February 20, 1940
Launch: September 15, 1940
Commissioning: December 19, 1940
Commanders:

December 19, 1940 - October 4, 1941
Lieutenant Wilhelm Kleinschmidt

Calls: 2 activities
Sinkings:

4 ships (24,176 GRT)

Whereabouts: sunk in the mid-Atlantic on October 4, 1941 (8 dead, 44 prisoners of war)

U 111 was a German submarine of the type IX B , which was usedby the navy during World War II . On its two ventures it sank four ships of 24,176 GRT, with 58 people dead. On October 4, 1941, U 111 approachedthe British trawler Lady Shirley , who in turn attacked surprisingly. Eight men from U 111 were killed in the firefight, including the commander Wilhelm Kleinschmidt and two officers on watch , as well as one man on the trawler. The survivors on U 111 self- sunk their submarine, and 44 submarine drivers werebroughtto Gibraltar as prisoners of war by the British trawler.

history

The construction contract for this boat was awarded to AG Weser in Bremen on August 8, 1939 . The keel was laid on February 20, 1940 and the launch took place on September 15, 1940 . On December 19, 1940, Kapitänleutnant Wilhelm Kleinschmidt put U 111 into service. Wilhelm Kleinschmidt was born in Oldenburg on January 27, 1907, joined the Reichsmarine , later the Kriegsmarine , in 1933 and served on the light cruiser Nuremberg at the beginning of the war . He completed his submarine training in the summer of 1940 and under the command of Wilhelm Schulz made a patrol as a commanding student on U 124 . On December 19 of the same year, Kleinschmidt, who had been promoted to lieutenant captain in April 1939, took command of U 111 . U 111 was a training boat until April 30, 1941, was subordinate to the 2nd U-Flotilla and was stationed in Wilhelmshaven . After that it belonged to the 2nd U-Flotilla in Lorient as a front boat until it was sunk . As a tower emblem, U 111 carried the coat of arms of its godfather city Oldenburg , the birthplace of the commander.

Use statistics

Commander Kleinschmidt leads U 111 during his service time on two operations on which he sank four ships with a total tonnage of 24,176 GRT . A 13,037 GRT ship was damaged.

First venture

The boat left Wilhelmshaven on May 5, 1941 at 12:30 p.m. and entered Lorient on July 7, 1941 at 4:03 p.m. On this 63 day long and 10,522 nm above and 435 nm underwater expedition into the North Atlantic , West Atlantic , southeast Cape Farvel , Davis Strait , Greenland , Belle Isle , Cape Race , Newfoundland and the central North Atlantic, two ships with 9,983 GRT were carried sunk and a ship with 13,037 GRT damaged. U 111 was supplied with 99 m³ of fuel and provisions by the supplier Belchen on May 25, 1941 .

  • May 13, 1941: sinking of the British steamer Somersby ( Lage ) with 5,170 GRT. The steamer was sunk by three torpedoes. He had loaded 8,300 tons of grain and was on the way from Halifax via Loch Ewe to Hull . The ship was a straggler of convoy SC-30 with 28 ships. There were no casualties, 43 survivors.
  • May 20, 1941: Damage to the British tanker San Felix with 13,037 GRT. The tanker was damaged by two torpedoes. The ship belonged to the disbanded convoy OB-322. It entered St. John's on May 26, 1941 and was repaired.
  • May 22, 1941: sinking of the British steamer Barnby ( Lage ) with 4,813 GRT. The steamer was sunk by two torpedoes. He had loaded 7,250 tons of flour and was on the way from Saint John via Halifax (Nova Scotia) to Hull. The ship was a straggler of Convoy HX-126 with 39 ships. There was one dead and 44 survivors.

Second venture

The boat left Lorient on August 14, 1941, and was sunk on October 4, 1941. On this 51-day trip in the mid-Atlantic , west of the Azores , the Cape Verde Islands , off Freetown , Madeira and south-west of Tenerife , two ships with 14,193 GRT were sunk. On September 28, 1941, four torpedoes were delivered to U 68 .

  • September 10, 1941: sinking of the Dutch motor ship Marken ( Lage ) with 5,719 GRT. The ship was sunk by a torpedo. It had planes loaded and was on its way from Cardiff to Table Bay . There were no casualties, 37 survivors.
  • September 20, 1941: Sinking of the British motor ship Cingalese Prince ( Lage ) with 8,474 GRT. The ship was sunk by a torpedo. It had loaded 2,000 t of manganese ore, 1,000 t of pig iron and 8,156 t of general cargo and was on its way from Bombay via Cape Town and Trinidad to Liverpool . There were 57 dead and 18 survivors.

Whereabouts

Painting by C. Pears: 44 surviving submariners surrender to the 13 survivors of Lady Shirley

On October 4, 1941, the submarine attempted submerged in the mid-Atlantic, southwest of the island of Tenerife , to attack the British armed trawler Lady Shirley . The commander, KptLt. Wilhelm Kleinschmidt, mistook the small trawler for a large freighter and therefore significantly overestimated its distance. Surprising for Kleinschmidt took the trawler that the submarine with sonar had pinpointed to about 1500 meters, it at periscope depth with depth charges on. This caused Kleinschmidt to order an overwater artillery attack and to appear not far from the Lady Shirley . Subsequently, however, continuous fire from the trawler from a short distance prevented the manning of the large 10.5-inch deck cannon of the submarine and the heavily smoking diesel engines prevented from diving again.

In a 19-minute overwater firefight from a very short distance, eight crew members of U 111 were killed, among them the commander Kleinschmidt and the two watch officers Helmut Fuchs and Friedrich Wilhelm Rösing. One of these eight died from his wound (torn off leg) shortly after his capture. Captain Hans Joachim Heinecke, who was to gain combat experience as a submarine commander student on board the U 111 , took command as the highest ranking officer and had the submarine self-scuttled . It sank at position 27 ° 15 ′  N , 20 ° 27 ′  W in naval grid reference DH 7952. 44 sailors from the submarine, including two seriously and two slightly wounded, survived and were brought to Gibraltar as prisoners of war by the British trawler . Of the 14 man crew of the trawler, one man was killed and four wounded. The prisoners were visibly shocked to have been defeated by 14 men from a small trawler that their fallen commander had mistaken for a large freighter. The insufficient experience of the submarine crew, including the officers, was clearly evident.

See also

literature

  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 1: The German submarine commanders. Preface by Prof. Dr. Jürgen Rohwer, Member of the Presidium of the International Commission on Military History. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 1996, p. 124. ISBN 3-8132-0490-1 .
  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 2: Submarine construction in German shipyards. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 1997, pp. 37, 211. ISBN 3-8132-0512-6 .
  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 3: The German submarine successes from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 2008, p. 100. ISBN 978-3-8132-0513-8 .
  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 4: The German submarine losses from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 2008, p. 31. ISBN 978-3-8132-0514-5 .
  • Erich Gröner , Dieter Jung, Martin Maas: The German warships 1815-1945. Volume 3: Submarines, auxiliary cruisers, mine ships, net layers. Bernhard & Graefe Verlag, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-7637-4802-4 .
  • Erich Gröner: Die Handelsflotten der Welt 1942 and supplement 1944. JF Lehmanns Verlag, Munich 1976, ISBN 3-469-00552-4 (reprint of the 1942–1943 edition).
  • Erich Gröner: Search list for ship names (= The merchant fleets of the world. Supplementary volume). JF Lehmanns Verlag Munich 1976, ISBN 3-469-00553-2 (reprint of the 1943 edition).
  • Georg Högel: Emblems, coats of arms, Maling's German submarines 1939–1945. 4th edition. Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Hamburg 2001, ISBN 3-7822-0826-9 .
  • Paul Kemp: The German and Austrian submarine losses in both world wars. Urbes Verlag, Graefelfing before Munich 1998, ISBN 3-924896-43-7 .
  • Clay Blair : The Submarine War - The Hunters 1939–1942 . Heyne Verlag, 1998. pp. 346-350, 360, 368, 371, 453-458. ISBN 3-4531-2345-X .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 1: The German submarine commanders. ES Mittler und Sohn, Hamburg et al. 1996, page 124
  2. ^ Georg Högel: Emblems, coats of arms, Malings German submarines 1939-1945. 5th edition. Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Hamburg 2009, page 57
  3. ^ Blair, Clay: Submarine War . US title Hitler's U-Boat War. Ed .: Verlagsgruppe Weltbild GmbH, Augsburg. Licensed edition for Bechtermünz Verlag in Weltbild Verlag GmbH, Augsburg 2004, ISBN 3-8289-0512-9 (Volume 1, Book 1, SIX, Chapter "Feindfahrten vor Westafrika", page 558).