U 422

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U 422
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Type : VII C
Field Post Number : 50 330
Shipyard: Danzig Werft AG in Danzig
Construction contract: April 10, 1941
Build number: 124
Keel laying: February 11, 1942
Launch: October 10, 1942
Commissioning: February 10, 1943
Commanders:

Lieutenant to the Sea Wolfgang Poeschel

Flotilla:
Calls: 1 patrol
Sinkings:

no

Whereabouts: sunk in the mid-Atlantic on October 4, 1943

U 422 was a German type VII C submarine . This class of submarines was also called "Atlantic boat". It was used by the Kriegsmarine during the submarine war .

Technical specifications

Following the attack on Poland, Danziger Werft AG was included in the Kriegsmarine's submarine building program and was intended for the annual production of a dozen VII-C boats. Until the city was taken by the Red Army, this shipyard produced a total of 42 submarines. U 422 was part of the sixth construction contract for this shipyard for a total of four type VII C boats. Such a boat had a length of 67 m and a displacement of 865 m³ under water. It was powered by two diesel engines that ensured a speed of 17 knots . Two electric motors produced a speed of 7 knots under water. Until 1944, the armament consisted of an 8.8 cm cannon and a 2.0 cm flak on deck as well as four bow torpedo tubes and a stern torpedo tube.

commander

  • February 10, 1943 to October 4, 1943 - Wolfgang Poeschel

Wolfgang Poeschel was born on March 25, 1920 in Berlin . He joined the Navy in 1938 and served as a watch officer on the U 28 (under Commander Friedrich Guggenberger ) and U 604 . In the winter of 1942, Leutnant zur See Poeschel completed the U-boat commanders course with the 24th U-Flotilla in Memel . On January 30, 1943, Wolfgang Poeschel took over command of U 737 , a recently completed boat that was at that time in Kiel . On February 10 of the same year he finally took command of U 422 , which he held until the boat sank. Wolfgang Poeschel was promoted to first lieutenant on April 1, 1943 .

Commitment and history

U 422 initially drove as a training boat for the 8th U-Flotilla in the Baltic Sea. On August 1, 1943, it was assigned to the 1st U-Flotilla as a front boat.

"Leuthen" group

In mid-August, U 422 moved to Bergen , where it arrived after a three-day journey. On September 8, the boat set out on its first patrol from Bergen, the intended area of ​​operation was the mid-Atlantic north of the Azores . In the middle of the month the boat was assigned to the newly established submarine group "Leuthen". These 21 boats were ordered to form a search chain to track down the next convoy heading east. The hunting group used the XIV boat U 460 , which took up position north of the Azores, to supply the “Leuthen” boats .

Rendezvous in the Atlantic

On September 23, Commander Poeschel reported the attack by an airplane which he had identified as Halifax . The boat was damaged by the depth charge and machine gun fire and three crew members were injured, two of them seriously. To enable the necessary medical care, U 422 met the U-tanker U 460 four days later . With U 264 and U 455 , two more boats were added, which had been damaged while trying to pass the Strait of Gibraltar .

Submarines versus planes

The four submarines were sighted on October 4th by an Avenger , reported to the aircraft carrier USS Card and then attacked. A little later three more aircraft from the USS Card arrived, two Wildcats and another Avenger. U 422 and the other two VII-C boats dived, but U 460 remained on the surface and returned the machine gun fire of the four attackers with anti-aircraft fire. An acoustic torpedo (so-called “Fido”) thrown by the Avenger, which arrived first, was long regarded as the cause of the loss of U 460 . In fact, a diving accident was probably the reason that the penultimate U-tanker of the Kriegsmarine in the Atlantic no longer reported after October 4, 1943.

Sinking

At the time of the attack by the second Avenger, U 422 was lying right next to U 460 and was taking over fuel. While U 460 remained on the surface, probably unclear, U 422 dived . Following the detonation of a “Fido” dropped by the Avenger (presumably aimed at U 460 ), oil and parts of the wreckage found at the dive site of U 422 ( location ).

Notes and individual references

  1. ↑ The construction contract of April 10, 1941 also included U 421 (commissioning January 1943), U 423 (commissioning March 1943) and U 424 (commissioning April 1943).
  2. ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 4: German submarine losses from September 1939 to May 1945. 1999, p. 150.
  3. ↑ The faster Wildcats started late because regulation work on the catapult deck of the USS Card had delayed the start.

literature

  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 1: The German submarine commanders. ES Mittler und Sohn, Hamburg et al. 1996, ISBN 3-8132-0490-1 .
  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 2: U-boat construction in German shipyards. ES Mittler und Sohn, Hamburg et al. 1997, ISBN 3-8132-0512-6 .
  • Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 4: German submarine losses from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler und Sohn, Hamburg et al. 1999, ISBN 3-8132-0514-2 .
  • Clay Blair : The Submarine War. Volume 2: The Hunted, 1942–1945. Heyne, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-453-16059-2 .
  • Jürgen Rohwer , Gerhard Hümmelchen : Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. Manfred Pawlak Verlagsges., Herrsching 1981, ISBN 3-88199-0097 .
  • Dan van der Vat: Battlefield Atlantic. The German-British naval war. 1939–1945 (= Heyne books. 1, Heyne general series. No. 8112). Heyne, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-453-04230-1 .