U 471
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U 471 ( previous / next - all submarines ) |
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|---|---|
| Type : | VII C |
| Field Post Number : | 46 834 |
| Shipyard: | German works , Kiel |
| Construction contract: | January 20, 1941 |
| Build number: | 302 |
| Keel laying: | October 15, 1941 |
| Launch: | March 6, 1943 |
| Commissioning: | May 5, 1943 |
| Commanders: |
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| Calls: | three ventures |
| Sinkings: |
no depressions |
| Whereabouts: | sunk in the dock during a bombing raid on August 8, 1944 |
U 471 was a German submarine from the Type VII C , a so-called "Atlantic Boat". It was used by the Kriegsmarine in the submarine warfare of World War II in the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean .
Technical specifications
By circumventing international treaties, the Kieler Deutsche Werke had been building submarines for the Reichsmarine since 1935 . After initial discussions in 1932, a contract was signed for the construction of small submarines, which were manufactured three years later in secret in camouflaged assembly halls. Officially, the capacity of the shipyard was fully utilized with the construction of capital ships. Immediately after the start of the war, the shipyard was included in the submarine building program by the Kriegsmarine and was intended for the annual output of twelve Type VII C boats. Because of their usefulness, boats of this type were also called "Atlantic boat". A VII C-boat was 67.1 m long and 6.2 m wide. The maximum speed for diesel-powered overwater travel was 17 kn , which corresponds to 31.5 km / h. Two electric motors with 375 hp each enabled a ride of 7.6 knots under water, which corresponds to 14 km / h. On the tower , U 471 carried an elephant as a boat coat of arms, with an umbrella over his head, which was trampling a ship with his feet.
commander
Friedrich Kloevekorn was born on February 19, 1918 in Saarbrücken and joined the Navy in 1937. In the summer of 1942, he first drove as an officer on watch on the submarine escort ship Erwin Waßner . As a student commanding officer, he completed a patrol on board U 84 and completed his U-boat commanding course in March 1943. On May 5 of the same year, Kloevekorn took over command of U 471 .
Commitment and history
Until October 31, U 471 was subordinate to the 5th U-Flotilla, a training flotilla stationed in Kiel . During this time, Commander Kloevekorn undertook training trips with the boat in the Baltic Sea to train the crew. On November 1, 1943, the boat was assigned to the 1st U-Flotilla. On November 27th, Commander Kloevekorn left for his first patrol with U 471 . The intended area of operation was the central North Atlantic, in particular the sea area west of Ireland .
Submarine group Rügen
In the spring of 1944, the submarine command put together a submarine group under the keyword “Rügen”, which was to seek combat with allied convoy groups in accordance with the pack tactics defined by Karl Dönitz in the North Atlantic. U 471 was one of the 18 boats that were pulled together in the corresponding sea area for this purpose . Initially, the Rügen submarine group was assigned units of the Luftwaffe to help locate enemy ships. However, the German air forces were withdrawn to support the Borkum submarine group operating in the eastern mid-Atlantic when reports from the B-Service announced a convoy that was gathering off Gibraltar . When air support was due to resume in mid-January, bad weather made coordinated operations impossible. Nevertheless, the Rügen submarine group managed to track down and attack some Allied ships. On January 13th, Commander Kloevekorn shot an acoustic torpedo at a freighter, which he estimated at 9,000 GRT. After the expected torpedo running time had expired, the crew heard a detonation in the submerged submarine and then sinking noises. However, this sinking could not be confirmed.
Sinking
At the beginning of April 1944, U 471 had passed the heavily guarded Strait of Gibraltar and has been operating from Toulon in the Mediterranean ever since. In the summer, the boat was docked in the military port of Toulon because it was the first and only one of the German Mediterranean submarines to be used for the installation of a snorkel . The boat had already been badly damaged in a bomb attack by the United States Army Air Forces . In another attack that destroyed the dock on August 6, U 471 finally sank .
Further use
The boat was lifted on May 20, 1945 and put into service by the French Navy in 1946. It drove for many years under the name Millé until it was renamed Q 339 on July 9, 1963 and decommissioned.
literature
- 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 .
- Paul Kemp: The German and Austrian submarine losses in both world wars. Urbes Verlag, Graefelfing before Munich 1998, ISBN 3-924896-43-7 .
Individual evidence
- ^ 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. 111.
- ↑ The elephant was referred to as "Bobby", that was the commandant's nickname.
- ↑ Clay Blair : The Submarine War. Volume 2: The Hunted, 1942–1945. Heyne, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-453-16059-2 , pp. 573-574.
- ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 3: German submarine successes from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler und Sohn, Hamburg et al. 2001, ISBN 3-8132-0513-4 , p. 209.
- ↑ The two bombing raids by the American forces destroyed four other German submarines that were docked in Toulon: U 586 , U 642 , U 952 and U 969 .