U 625

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U 625
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Type : VII C
Field Post Number : 07 314
Shipyard: Blohm & Voss , Hamburg
Construction contract: August 15, 1940
Build number: 125
Keel laying: July 28, 1941
Launch: April 15, 1942
Commissioning: June 4, 1942
Commanders:

OlzS Hans Benker
LzS Kurt Sureth (i. V.)
OlzS Siegfried Straub

Flotilla:
Calls: 8 activities
Sinkings:

3 ships with 18,751 GRT sunk.
2 warships with 939 t sunk by mines

Whereabouts: Sunk by air raid west of Ireland on March 10, 1944

U 625 was a German submarine of the type VII C , a so-called "Atlantic boat ". It was used by the Navy during the submarine war in the North Sea and the North Atlantic for convoy battles and mining operations.

Technical specifications

After the start of the war, the Hamburg shipyard Blohm + Voss was included in the navy's submarine building program. From 1939 onwards, the capacity of the Hamburg shipyard was fully utilized with the construction of submarines. The efficient series production method of the shipyard should enable the annual production of 52 type VII C submarines. Under license from MAN , Blohm & Voss also manufactured diesel engines for installation in boats of this type. These diesel engines guaranteed a speed of 17 knots (= 31.4 km / h) when traveling over water. A VII C-boat had a maximum range of 6,500 nm . Under water, the two electric motors, each with 375 hp, achieved a speed of 7.6 knots (= 14.1 km / h). The armament of the VII C-Boats until 1944 consisted of a 8.8 cm cannon and a 2.0 cm flak on deck as well as four bow torpedo tubes and a stern torpedo tube. Usually a VII C-boat carried 14 torpedoes with it. U 625 was also equipped with mines in late summer 1943. In the course of its operational history, the boat wore different variants of the boat emblem on the tower : A lightning bolt on a clover leaf and the number 13.

Commanders

  • Hans Benker was born on February 21, 1917 in Bochum and joined the Navy in 1936. In the first half of 1941 he made a patrol on U 75 as a second watch officer (II WO) . After completing his commanders course, Hans Benker was in command of the U 152 and U 80 school boats between July 1941 and May 1942 . On June 4, 1942, he took command of the U 625 . On February 1, 1943, he was promoted to lieutenant captain. Hans Benker died on January 2, 1944, when he was washed overboard and drowned during a battle with a Sunderland flying boat. The command was taken over by the 1st officer on watch of the boat, Lieutenant Kurt Sureth.
  • Siegfried Straub was born in Braunsberg on June 22, 1918 and joined the Navy in 1939. He was in command of the Air Force until 1941 and, after completing his submarine training, went on the submarine companion Wega until April 1942 . During his U-boat commander course, Straub was promoted to first lieutenant at sea in early October 1943. On January 26, 1944, he took command of the U 625 .

Mission history

Until September 1942, U 625 was subordinate to the 8th U-Flotilla, a training flotilla that was stationed in Danzig . During this time, Commander Benker undertook training trips in the Baltic Sea to train the crew. In October he transferred the boat to Norway . From here, U 625 set out on its first venture on November 4, 1942.

Northern convoys

Two weeks later, in the 24-hour polar night of November 22, U 625 and U 601 discovered individual ships from the ballast-moving convoy QP 15 , which consisted of 28 ships that were on their way back from the Siberian port of Murmansk to Iceland . Commander Benker sank a freighter. In an attack on the convoy RA 52, which was traveling on this route at the end of January, Benker's attacks had no consequences.

Commander's death

In November 1943, U 625 was ordered to reinforce the 1st U-Flotilla stationed in Brest to northern France and began its transfer journey following a last operation in the North Sea. While passing the Bay of Biscay , the boat was discovered and attacked by a Liberator bomber . The German crew succeeded in damaging the British aircraft with anti-aircraft fire and thus driving it away. When another B-24 appeared shortly afterwards, Commander Benker decided to let the boat submerge, but forgot to dismantle the antenna of the Naxos device that was used to detect enemy radar. The cable of the antenna attached to the tower ran through the hatch of the tower into the interior of the boat, thus preventing the tower hatch from being watertight and thus causing water ingress when diving. Commander Benker ordered the diving process to be interrupted and entered the tower together with another crew member to untangle the cable. Since his command had not been registered, U 625 continued the dive process. Benker and the other crew member went overboard and could not be rescued. On January 6, the boat entered Brest under the command of the first officer on watch.

Sinking

On March 10, 1944, U 625 was discovered and attacked in the North Atlantic, west of Ireland by a Canadian Sunderland flying boat . Commander Straub initially responded to the attack with flak, but then decided to let U 625 dive. However, the detonation of the Sunderland's well-placed depth charges threw the boat back to the surface, whereupon it began to sink. Although most of the crew of U 625 managed to man the life rafts and inflatable boats before the boat sank, no one was rescued.

Notes and individual references

  1. ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat War 1939-1945. Volume 2: U-boat construction in German shipyards. 1997, p. 222.
  2. ↑ Commander Benker was also called “the fast Benker”, so his crew chose the lightning bolt as part of the U 625 boat emblem .
  3. ^ 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. 132.
  4. ↑ 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, ISBN 3-8132-0490-1 , p. 91.
  5. ↑ 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, ISBN 3-8132-0490-1 , p. 27.
  6. ↑ The former Norwegian Wega (Ex Vega ) was used by the 21st U-Flotilla in Pillau and the 27th U-Flotilla in Gotenhaven , both school flotillas.
  7. ↑ Clay Blair: The Submarine War. Volume 2: The Hunted, 1942–1945. 1999, p. 54.
  8. ↑ Clay Blair: The Submarine War. Volume 2: The Hunted, 1942–1945. 1999, p. 570.
  9. ↑ Tests by the Navy later showed that the cable of a Naxos device was cut off by the pressure exerted by the water on the tower hatch.
  10. ↑ The sunderland was used to secure the convoy SC 154.
  11. ^ Paul Kemp: The German and Austrian submarine losses in both world wars. Urbes Verlag, Graefelfing vor München 1998, ISBN 3-924896-43-7 , p. 183.
  12. ↑ Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The U-Boat 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 , p. 203.

literature

  • Clay Blair : The Submarine War. Volume 2: The Hunted, 1942–1945. Heyne, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-453-16059-2 .
  • 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 3: German submarine successes from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler und Sohn, Hamburg et al. 2001, ISBN 3-8132-0513-4 .