Unterseeboot 48 (1939)

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Career (Nazi Germany)
Name:	U-48
Ordered:	November 21, 1936
Builder:	Germaniawerft, Lübeck
Yard number:	583
Laid down:	March 10, 1937
Launched:	March 8, 1939
Commissioned:	April 22, 1939
Fate:	Scuttled May 3, 1945 off Neustadt.
General characteristics
Type:	VIIB
Service record
Part of	Kriegsmarine 7. Unterseebootsflottille 21. Unterseebootsflottille 26. Unterseebootsflottille
Identification codes	M 27 354
Commanders	Herbert Schultze Hans-Rudolf Rösing Heinrich Bleichrodt Diether Todenhagen Siegfried Atzinger
Operations	12 patrols
Victories	51 ships sunk for a total of 306.875 gross register tons (GRT) 1 warship sunk for a total of 1.060 tons 3 ships damaged for a total of 20.480 GRT

The Unterseeboot 48, or U-48 was the most successful U-boat commissioned into the Kriegsmarine during the Second World War. During her two years of active service, U-48 sank 55 ships for 321,000 tons, and damaged two more at 12,000 tons on twelve war patrols conducted during the opening stages of the Second Battle of the Atlantic. She was a Type VIIB submarine with five torpedo tubes and an 88mm deck gun. She was very fast and agile, thanks to her dual rudders, and could patrol for approximately a month at a time, giving her a range comfortably across the North Atlantic.

U-48 was built at the Germaniawerft in Kiel during 1938 and 1939, being completed a few months before the outbreak of war in September, 1939 and given to Kplt Herbert Schultze. When war was declared, she was already in position in the North Atlantic, and received the news of war via radio, giving her immediate powers to operate against allied shipping.

Contents 1 War Patrols 1.1 Retirement 2 The Sinking of the City of Benares 3 Raiding career 4 Notes 5 References 6 See also

[edit] War Patrols

As the U-48 cruised to the West of the Western Approaches, two days after Britain and Germany went to war, she spotted her first target, the 5,000 ton SS Royal Sceptre, sinking her and two more unescorted ships as she returned to Kiel via the North Sea on 17 September. Her second patrol was even more successful, catching several allied ships unawares in the same area as her previous victories, including the large French tanker SS Emile Miguet on 12 October ([1]). Four more freighters were sunk on this cruise, during which the U-48 was largely untroubled by allied countermeasures.

She sank another three on her final patrol of 1939 and damaged another, including two neutral ships operating in allied controlled areas. After a brief break over the Christmas period, she again put to sea, sinking the British Blue Star Line liner SS Sultan Star in the Western Approaches, it was only carrying freight ([2]). A string of mines she laid off St Abbs Head failed to have effect, but two neutral Dutch ships were added to her tally shortly afterwards, as well as a Finnish ship, all of them operating in the North Atlantic in co-operation with the allied convoy system.

Her fifth patrol, in June 1940 was one of her most successful, making full use of the confusion in Europe following the Fall of France to leave a trail of destruction on her passage around the British Isles sinking three ships on her passage to the Atlantic Ocean, and enjoying an extended patrol thanks to the newly established refuelling facilities available at Trondheim in Norway. In all she claimed eight ships from the convoys in the Eastern Atlantic on this cruise, and bagged five more on her sixth patrol in August, which finished with her stationed at Lorient in France, greatly extending her raiding abilities.

In September, on her seventh patrol she shocked the world by sinking the SS City of Benares, one of eight ships in six days from Convoy SC-3 and Convoy OB-213. Benares was a refugee ship, carrying children from Britain to Canada to keep them safe from The Blitz on Britain's cities. 258 people, including 77 children, were killed. Amongst the other sinkings was the British frigate HMS Dundee. Her eighth patrol was also highly successful, sinking seven ships out of Atlantic convoys, including one from Convoy SC-7. The operating zone for both these patrols was far to the North of her previous areas, being south of Greenland.

Although on her ninth and tenth patrols the U-48 claimed two and five victims respectively, she was clearly beginning to become obsolete in the face of improving technology on both sides despite a winter refit. Her range and torpedo capacity were too small for the widening nature of the sea war, and she would be a risk to her crew and other U-boats if she continued much longer in the main battlefield of the North Atlantic. On her final patrol she sank five more ships, the boat boosted by the award of the Knight's Cross to Erich Zürn, the boat's executive officer, for his success and judgement during the ships's career.

[edit] Retirement

U-48 returned to Kiel on 22 June 1941, where her crew were removed, and she was transferred to a training flotilla operating exclusively in the Baltic Sea. Unlike many of her contemporaries, U-48 never sailed on patrols against Soviet targets following Operation Barbarossa the following month, and in 1943 was deemed unfit even for this reduced service, being laid up at Neustadt in Holstein with only a skeleton crew performing minor maintenance. It was there she remained for the next two years, until the maintenance crew, realising that the war was ending and the boat would be captured, scuttled her in the Bay of Lübeck on 3 May 1945, where she remains.

[edit] The Sinking of the City of Benares

In the late hours of the 17 September 1940, U-48 put a single torpedo into the 11,000 ton liner SS City of Benares, flagship of Convoy OB-213, as she was silouetted against the moonlight in the mid-Atlantic. Unbeknownst to Kapitänleutnant Heinrich Bleichrodt, on board the liner were 90 children being evacuated to Canada under the Children's Overseas Reception Board's initiative in order to escape the effects of the Blitz.

The sinking ship took on an immediate list, thus preventing the launching of many of the liferafts and trapping numerous crew and passengers below decks. As a result, many of the 400 people on board were unable to escape. As hundreds of survivors struggled in the water, the U-boat's powerful searchlight swept once over the chaotic scene, before the boat left the area for good. The survivors in the boats were not rescued for nearly 24 hours, as the nearest allied units were 300 miles away, and in that time dozens of children and adults died from exposure, or drowned, leaving only 148 survivors. One boat was not picked up for a further eight days. In total 258 people^[1], including 77 of the evacuees, died in the disaster, which effectively ended the overseas evacuation program.

The controversy of the City of Benares disaster has been debated ever since. It has been suggested that had the British openly declared that the ship was carrying evacuees, then the Germans would have taken pains not to sink it, recognising the potential for a propaganda crisis, which indeed occurred. However, the ship was not only travelling unlit at night in an allied convoy, but it was also the flagship of Rear-Admiral Edmund Mackinnon^[2], the convoy commander. Other historians have argued that the Germans would have attacked any large liners at the time, no matter the cargo or the passenger list. Finally, it is unlikely that Bleichrodt was able to see that there were children amongst the wreckage from his single sweep, and was also keenly aware of his vulnerable position close to his two latest victims, which compromised his ability to provide aid even he had wished to do so.

[edit] Raiding career

Date	Ship	Nationality	Tonnage	Fate		Date	Ship	Nationality	Tonnage	Fate
5 September 1939	SS Royal Sceptre	British	4,853	Sunk		15 September 1940	SS Alexandros	Greek	4,343	Sunk
8 September 1939	SS Winkleigh	British	5,055	Sunk		15 September 1940	HMS Dundee	British	1,060	Sunk
11 September 1939	SS Firby	British	4,869	Sunk		15 September 1940	SS Empire Volunteer	British	5,319	Sunk
12 October 1939	MV Emile Miguet	French	14,115	Sunk		15 September 1940	SS Kenordoc	British	1,780	Sunk
12 October 1939	SS Heronspool	British	5,202	Sunk		18 September 1940	SS City of Benares	British	11,081	Sunk
13 October 1939	SS Louisiane	French	6,903	Sunk		18 September 1940	SS Marina	British	5,088	Sunk
14 October 1939	SS Sneaton	British	3,677	Sunk		18 September 1940	SS Magdalena	British	3,118	Sunk
17 October 1939	SS Clan Chisholm	British	7,256	Sunk		21 September 1940	SS Blairangus	British	4,409	Sunk
26 November 1939	SS Gustaf E. Reuter	Swedish	6,336	Sunk		21 September 1940	SS Broompark	British	5,136	Damaged
8 December 1939	SS Brandon	British	6,668	Sunk		11 October 1940	MV Brandanger	Norwegian	4,624	Sunk
9 December 1939	MV San Alberto	British	7,397	Damaged		11 October 1940	SS Port Gisborne	British	8,390	Sunk
15 December 1939	SS Germaine	Greek	5,217	Sunk		12 October 1940	MV Davanger	Norwegian	7,102	Sunk
10 February 1940	SS Burgerdijk	Dutch	6,853	Sunk		17 October 1940	MV Languedoc	British	9,512	Sunk
14 February 1940	SS Sultan Star	British	12,306	Sunk		17 October 1940	SS Scoresby	British	3,843	Sunk
15 February 1940	MV Den Haag	Dutch	8,971	Sunk		18 October 1940	SS Sandend	British	3,612	Sunk
17 February 1940	SS Wilja	Finnish	3,392	Sunk		20 October 1940	MV Shirak	British	6,023	Sunk
6 June 1940	SS Stancor	British	798	Sunk		1 February 1941	SS Nicolaos Angelos	Greek	4,351	Sunk
7 June 1940	SS Frances Massey	British	4,212	Sunk		24 February 1941	SS Nailsea Lass	British	4,289	Sunk
7 June 1940	SS Eros	British	5,888	Sunk		29 March 1941	SS Germanic	British	5,352	Sunk
11 June 1940	SS Violando N Goulandris	Greek	2,375	Sunk		29 March 1941	SS Limbourg	Belgian	2,483	Sunk
19 June 1940	MV Tudor	Norwegian	6,607	Sunk		29 March 1941	SS Eastlea	British	4,267	Sunk
19 June 1940	SS Baron Loudoun	British	3,164	Sunk		29 March 1941	SS Hylton	British	5,197	Sunk
19 June 1940	SS British Monarch	British	5,661	Sunk		2 April 1941	SS Beaverdale	British	9,957	Sunk
20 June 1940	MV Moerdrecht	Dutch	7,493	Sunk		3 June 1941	SS Inversuir	British	9,456	Sunk
16 August 1940	SS Hedrun	Swedish	2,325	Sunk		5 June 1941	MV Wellfield	British	6,054	Sunk
19 August 1940	SS Ville de Gand	Belgian	7,590	Sunk		6 June 1941	SS Tregathen	British	5,201	Sunk
24 August 1940	SS La Brea	British	6,666	Sunk		8 June 1940	MV Pendrecht	Dutch	10,746	Sunk
25 August 1940	MV Athelcrest	British	6,825	Sunk		12 June 1941	SS Empire Dew	British	7,005	Sunk
25 August 1940	SS Empire Merlin	British	5,763	Sunk

[edit] Notes

1. ^ uboat.net - Allied Ships hit by U-boats - City of Benares (Steam passenger ship)
2. ^ Mackinnon did not evacuate the sinking ship, and drowned on board.

[edit] References

• Sharpe, Peter, U-Boat Fact File, Midland Publishing, Great Britain: 1998. ISBN 1-85780-072-9.
• Bridgland, Tony, Waves of Hate, Leo Cooper, Great Britain: 2002. ISBN 0-85052-822-4.
• uboat.net webpage for U-48
• ubootwaffe.net webpage for U-48

[edit] See also

• List of U-boats

For other U-boats with similar designations, see Unterseeboot 48