U 372
|
U 372 ( previous / next - all submarines ) |
|
|---|---|
 Coat of arms of the boat |
|
| Type : | VII C |
| Field Post Number : | 41 556 |
| Shipyard: | Navy shipyard in Kiel |
| Construction contract: | September 23, 1939 |
| Build number: | 003 |
| Keel laying: | November 17, 1939 |
| Launch: | March 8, 1941 |
| Commissioning: | April 19, 1941 |
| Commanders: |
|
| Flotilla: |
|
| Calls: | 6 activities |
| Sinkings: |
3 ships with 11,751 GRT and |
| Whereabouts: | Self- sunk on August 4, 1942 in the eastern Mediterranean, west of Jaffa |
U 372 was a German submarine from the Type VII C , which in World War II by the German Navy in the North Atlantic and in the Mediterranean was used.
Construction and technical data
Until the increase in the number of orders in 1943, the Kiel Navy Shipyard was intended to build 12 submarines a year. This number could not be reached in any year. A Type VII C submarine had a length of 67 m and a displacement of 865 m³ under water. It was propelled by two diesel engines, which enabled a speed of 17 knots over water . When underwater, two electric motors propelled the boat up to a speed of 7 knots. Until 1944, the armament consisted of an 8.8 cm cannon and a 2 cm Flak C / 30 on deck as well as four bow torpedo tubes and a stern torpedo tube. A VII-C boat usually carried 14 torpedoes. In March 1941 a total of nine type VII C boats were put into service by the Navy. At the tower led U 372 the arms of his godfather town of Viersen .
commander
Heinz-Joachim Neumann was born on April 29, 1909 in Guben and joined the Reichsmarine in 1930 . At the beginning of the war he served on the Scharnhorst , completed his submarine training and a U-commander course towards the end of 1940 and - after a patrol as an extra-scheduled watch officer on U 52 - became commander on U 372 in April 1941 .
Commitment and history
After three ventures in the North Atlantic, U 372 passed the heavily secured Strait of Gibraltar in a so-called "Gibraltar breakthrough" on December 9, 1941 . Until the boat was sunk, the boat patrolled the Mediterranean from the naval bases of La Spezia and Salamis .
.jpg)
Sinking
On the evening of August 3, 1942, a British fighter plane discovered the submerging U 372 off Haifa , marked the dive site with flares and radioed two destroyers: the HMS Sikh and the HMS Zulu . The two destroyers of the Tribal class pursued U 372 until the morning of the following day and repeatedly attacked with depth charges until their supply was exhausted and they were followed by two other destroyers. The further pursuit of the German submarine was taken over by the HMS Croome and the HMS Tetcott , two destroyer escorts of the Hunt class . Commandant Neumann had initially tried to escape his pursuers under water. The damage caused by the depth charge, the dead batteries and the lack of air caused him to surface U 372 and to continue his escape over water. Using an oil trail, the HMS Sikh was able to discover the surfaced submarine and start the pursuit again. Commandant Neumann now decided to abandon the boat and ordered the crew to disembark and sink U 372 . All 46 crew members and one passenger - the son of a Lebanese emir - survived the submarine's sinking.
See also
literature
- Clay Blair : The Submarine War. Volume 2: The Hunted, 1942–1945. Heyne, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-453-16059-2 .
Remarks
- ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 2: U-boat construction in German shipyards. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg a. a. 1997, ISBN 3-8132-0512-6 , pp. 233-234.
- ^ Georg Högel: Emblems, coats of arms, Malings German submarines 1939-1945. 5th edition. Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Hamburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-7822-1002-7 , p. 96.
- ↑ Some cities took on “sponsorships” for the boats. Their crews were invited on vacation and gifts were sent to the bases.
- ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 1: The German submarine commanders. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg a. a. 1996, ISBN 3-8132-0490-1 , p. 170.
- ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 2: U-boat construction in German shipyards. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg a. a. 1997, ISBN 3-8132-0512-6 , p. 479.
- ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 4: German submarine losses from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg a. a. 1999, ISBN 3-8132-0514-2 , p. 55.
Map with all coordinates: