A/N Two of the characters belong to Arthur Ransome. The crew of U-96 are a mixture of real individuals and the work of Lothar-Gunther Buchheim. All other characters are my own invention.
It was just one of those things that happens out in a great ocean. The Atlantic swells were low and rolling, humping black and glistening across the surface. Somewhere to the north, though, a wind was driving its own waves before it. Cutting diagonally across the swells they were slowly robbed of their force until they faded away. Perhaps the water here was warmer, though, allowing both wave systems to rise just a bit higher. Perhaps the angle was just slightly different. Either way, along a strip of ocean a mile long and a hundred yards wide, the short steep seas were piling into the faces of the swells so both waves leapt high then collapsed in a swirl of breaking water. Eruptions of bubbles were driven yards below the surface with each burst, creating an opaque wall that scattered the ASDIC pulses into a hopeless mess of echoes. In the middle of it, motors barely turning, U-96 hung almost motionless.
In the submarine's cramped control room Kapitänleutnant Heinreich Lehmann-Willenbrock squinted through the periscope eyepieces at the British warship. She was moving north at about six knots, obviously searching. The ping of her ASDIC rang through the hull, muffled and distorted by the surrounding turbulence, and her radar would be sweeping the surface above them. His hydrophones had picked up the sounds of U-133's destruction, and he'd immediately dived to periscope depth. Minutes later he'd spotted this patch of disturbed water and decided to hide under it, in the hope that the frigate would come close enough for an attack. Now she had. U-96 had only three torpedoes left and had been heading home after sinking a Norwegian freighter west of Sable Island over a week ago. She'd fallen in behind this convoy more in hope than expectation, but if he could sink one of the escorts it would make it easier for other boats later. All three fish were in the tubes and preheated for maximum speed, and the frigate was now less than 2,000 metres away. Deciding to attack on the surface, he gave a series of quick orders. The helmsman acknowledged, "Jawohl, Kaleu," while the Chief Engineer just smiled and nodded. The Kaleu unclipped a wooden box and took out a pair of heavy binoculars - a UDF. Slowly U-96's bows came round, propelled by her silent electric motors, and she rose. The periscope hissed down into its tube as the conning tower broke the surface. Deck barely awash in the troughs and with the wave crests still frothing across her bridge, she came to rest. A moment later her hatch swung open. Water cascaded over the men scrambling up the ladder.
XXX
"Radar to bridge. Faint contact bearing Red four-two at 2,100 yards."
The Old Man raised his binoculars and searched off the port bow. Nothing showed on the dark sea. He asked, "What's it look like, radar?"
"Hard to say, Sir. It just appeared and it's fading in and out. Very faint, and there's a lot of ghost echoes over that way. Might just be a wave system, Sir, or a chunk of wreckage."
"Bridge to ASDIC. Anything off the port bow?"
"Nothing, Sir. Just a lot of fuzz. Is there a squall or something there? The set's not picking up much."
He looked out over the ocean again. It was dark, but he should be able to see a squall. Nothing. Perhaps the sea was a bit rougher, but that was all. Then an image rose in his mind. The Pike Rock on a windy day with waves washing over its jagged tip. Sometimes visible, sometimes concealed. A danger lurking right at the surface. A danger that had sunk him once. What if there was another danger out there now, momentarily revealed by the wave troughs? Suddenly fully awake despite his exhaustion he flipped open the wheelhouse pipe. "Bridge. Full ahead emergency, hard a port, come to course 345." As HMS Leven began to accelerate he pressed the button on the intercom. "A gun, stand by for starshell dead ahead, range 2,000. Flags! Take a signal."
XXX
FOR CLYDESPR PROBABLE UBOAT CLOSE ABOARD MY LOCSTAT 54 43N 29 39W AM ENGAGING LEVEN SENDS JW
XXX
Kaleu Lehmann-Willenbrock finished clamping the UDF onto the pedestal on the bridge, raised the sights mounted on top of it and flipped open the end caps. Crouching, he looked through the sights and turned the traversing screw. Nothing; the night was too dark to see the frigate unassisted. No problem. He pressed his eyes to the rubber cups of the binoculars and traversed the UDF slightly more. There she was! She was turning towards him and seemed to be picking up speed; no doubt her radar had seen something. Never mind. He flicked up the illumination lever beside the right eyepiece and a thin vertical wire lit up in the sight image. Another slight turn of the screw lined the wire square on the bows of the frigate; as the UDF turned a linkage in the pedestal sent the target bearing to an electromechanical computer in the conning tower below, which in turn fed it to the navigation gyros in the torpedoes.
The Kaleu waited a moment to check the bearing was steady, then leaned forward and flipped open the voice pipe. One last quick check then he shouted, "Rohr eins, los! Rohr zwei, los! Rohr drei, los!" U-96 shuddered slightly as compressed air blew the three torpedoes into the ocean; then their electric motors started, the gyros turned them towards the frigate and they accelerated to 30 knots. At almost the same instant a white flash lit up the approaching warship's foredeck. The starshell cracked overhead a second before the report of the gun reached them.
XXX
Pinned in the harsh light of the starshell, the U-Boat's conning tower showed clearly in his binoculars. She was almost awash, but even as he watched she was rising higher out of the water and beginning to move. Ant-like figures scrambled out of her fore hatch and swarmed over the deck gun. U-Boats almost never fought it out on the surface, but the Old Man had no time to wonder at it; there were almost certainly torpedoes in the water, heading right for his ship. He had two choices. Stay on course and present the smallest possible target to the incoming missiles, or make a sharp turn and try to get out of their path entirely. The decision was a quick one - stay on course. If the submarine had just fired there'd be plenty of time to manoeuvre clear, but if the torpedoes had been running for a minute already he'd be likely to catch one amidships. No, best to run right down on the enemy and try to ram. In front of him, A gun started pumping shells towards the U-Boat. A second later the 88mm deck gun began blasting back.
XXX
U-96 gained speed sluggishly at first, but as she moved out of the patch of disturbed water her pitching motion subsided and the screws bit harder into the water. On her bridge the Kaleu watched the approaching frigate. As soon as the starshell exploded he'd taken the decision to run in at high speed with his deck gun firing, then if his fish missed try to crash-dive and break away rapidly from close range. These new frigates carried ASDIC-controlled mortars and if he'd tried to dive from his torpedo firing position the British ship would have trapped him in the rough water and systematically pounded it with mortars and depth charges. This way was risky, but at least it offered a chance. The first shell from the frigate's gun erupted twenty metres off to port; seconds later the next one threw up spray twice as far away but dead ahead. The British gunners were good, but maybe not good enough to hit a small, fast-moving target like U-96. He doubted his own gun would do any better, but at least the crew felt like they were hitting back. It got some of them out on deck, as well, so if a British shell hit his boat they'd be spared death in the sinking hull.
XXX
The range to the U-Boat dropped rapidly as the two vessels charged in at a closing speed of over thirty knots. By the time Leven had fired half a dozen times the submarine was less than 600 yards away, and his Oerlikons were firing at her from the bridge wings. The enemy's 88mm was blazing away at an amazing rate, shells screaming past Leven and exploding in the water round her. Suddenly he became aware that her profile was changing; she was no longer bow on, but had turned slightly to port. Determined not to let her get away he warned the Hedgehog crew to stand by, then flipped open the wheelhouse voice pipe to order a course change.
Before he could speak the bridge flared brilliant white around him. Something smashed into his back with crushing force and he slammed against the rail, then bounced, falling helplessly to the deck. He lay on the torn surface for a moment, feeling hot fluid run down his face, then everything went black.
XXX
The Kaleu watched his gunners ram the waterproof tompion into the muzzle of the 88mm and pull on the breech cover, then run for the hatch. As the last man dropped down and pulled it closed behind him water was already surging up the foredeck. Lehman-Willenbrock took a last look at the frigate, veering off course with dying flames flickering above her bridge, then turned for the conning tower ladder. Ten seconds later U-96 slipped below the waves once more. Silently she headed south, breaking contact before surfacing and resuming her journey home.
XXX
FOR LEVEN CONFIRM OR DENY PRESENCE OF UBOAT AT 54 43N 29 39W CLYDESPR SENDS NW
FOR LEVEN ACKNOWLEDGE MY 0148 SIGNAL CLYDESPR SENDS NW
FOR LEVEN RADIO CHECK CLYDESPR SENDS NW
FOR LEVEN ACKNOWLEDGE PLEASE CLYDESPR SENDS NW
FOR HX204 LOST CONTACT WITH HMS LEVEN AS OF 0143 DO YOU HAVE CONTACT CLYDESPR SENDS
FOR CLYDESPR NEGATIVE RADIO CHECK WITH HMS LEVEN ASSUME LOST WILL SEARCH AT FIRST LIGHT SORRY VIPEROUS SENDS
XXX
The Liberator, weighted down with fuel and depth charges, staggered off the end of the runway at RAF Leuchars and clawed its way into the air. The driver of the crash truck watched in an agony of anticipation as the bomber's white belly seemed to skim the trees. Months before he'd seen an identical plane give up the struggle and sink back to earth. By the time they'd put the fires out nothing had been left of the bomber and her nine-man crew but four blackened engines. This one made it though. The wheels came up and, still fighting for altitude, the Liberator banked gently and headed west on its long flight across Scotland and out into the Atlantic. The driver stubbed out his Woodbine on the door of the truck and reached for the gearstick. His shift would be over in an hour, and his thoughts turned back to his wife and daughters in the little house in St Andrews.
XXX
The Staff Officer Operations put the phone down and turned to the waiting Wren. "Nutts Corner and Aldergrove are still closed by fog, but Leuchars have launched one Liberator. It should be there around first light."
She walked over to the urn and poured another cup of tea. It was only when the hot liquid overflowed the saucer and splashed on her stockings that she realised she'd been staring blankly at the wall. Her hand shook as she carefully placed the cup on the table then turned and walked out of the Submarine Plotting Room, out of the building and into the bleak Glasgow street. She faced the gusting wind with her back straight and her head held high. She'd go back inside in a moment. She had to. Just a moment more… most of the moisture on her face was rain.
Author's Note: U-96 is best known as the submarine in Lothar Gunther-Buchheim's novel Das Boot (in which she was called U-A) and the film based on it. She was a real boat; Gunther-Buchheim sailed on her seventh patrol as a war correspondent, and the characters in his novel were modelled on her crew. On 9 March 1942, on her eighth and last patrol under Kaleu Lehmann-Willenbrock's command, she sank the Norwegian freighter Tyr 55 miles west of Sable Island. Lehmann-Willenbrock surfaced, gave her crew (who had escaped in the lifeboats) the course for Sable Island, apologised for sinking their ship then turned for home. I have diverted his homeward journey slightly to the north to bring him into the path of HMS Leven.