U-505 is a German Type IXC submarine built for Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. It was captured by the United States Navy on 4 June 1944 and survives as a museum ship in Chicago.
In her unlucky career, it had the distinction of being the "most heavily damaged U-boat to successfully return to port" in World War II, suffering six botched patrols, and becoming the only submarine in which a commanding officer killed himself in combat conditions.[1] On 4 June 1944, it was captured by United States Navy Task Group 22.3 (TG 22.3), one of six U-boats that were captured at sea by Allied forces during the war. All but one of U-505s crew were rescued by the Navy task group. The submarine was towed to Bermuda in secret, and her crew was interned in an American prisoner-of-war camp, where they were kept in isolation. The Navy classified the capture as top secret and went to great lengths to prevent the Germans from discovering it.
In 1954, U-505 was donated to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois. It is now one of four German World War II U-boats that survive as museum ships, and one of just two Type IXCs still in existence, along with .
German Type IXC submarines were slightly larger than the original Type IXBs. U-505 had a displacement of 1120t when at the surface and 1232t while submerged. The U-boat had a total length of 76.76m (251.84feet), a pressure hull length of 58.75m (192.75feet), a beam of 6.76m (22.18feet), a height of 9.6m (31.5feet), and a draft of 4.7m (15.4feet). The submarine was powered by two MAN M 9 V 40/46 supercharged four-stroke, nine-cylinder diesel engines producing a total of for use while surfaced, two Siemens-Schuckert 2 GU 345/34 double-acting electric motors producing a total of for use while submerged. It had two shafts and two 1.92abbr=onNaNabbr=on propellers. The boat was capable of operating at depths down to 230m (760feet).
The submarine had a maximum surface speed of and a maximum submerged speed of 7.3kn. When submerged, the boat could operate for at 4kn; when surfaced, it could travel 13450nmi at 10kn. U-505 was fitted with six 53.30NaN0 torpedo tubes (four fitted at the bow and two at the stern), 22 torpedoes, one 10.52NaN2 SK C/32 naval gun, 180 rounds, and a 3.7cm (01.5inches) SK C/30, as well as a 2sp=usNaNsp=us C/30 antiaircraft gun. The boat had a complement of 48.
U-505s keel was laid down on 12 June 1940 by Deutsche Werft in Hamburg, Germany, as yard number 295. She was launched on 24 May 1941 and commissioned on 26 August with Kapitänleutnant Axel-Olaf Loewe in command. On 6 September 1942, Loewe was relieved by Kptlt. Peter Zschech. On 24 October 1943, Oberleutnant zur See Paul Meyer took command for about two weeks until he was relieved on 8 November by Oblt.z.S. Harald Lange, who commanded the boat until her capture on 4 June 1944.
She conducted twelve patrols, sinking eight ships totaling . Three of these were American, two British, one Norwegian, one Dutch, and one Colombian.
U-505 was assigned as an operational boat to the 2nd U-boat Flotilla on 1 February 1942, following training exercises with the 4th U-boat Flotilla from 26 August 1941 to 31 January 1942. She began her first patrol from Kiel on 19 January, while still formally undergoing training. For sixteen days, she circumnavigated the British Isles and docked at Lorient in occupied France on 3 February. She engaged no enemy vessels and was not attacked.[2]
U-505 left Lorient on 11 February 1942 on her second patrol. In 86 days, she traveled to the west coast of Africa, where she sank her first vessels. In less than one month, U-505 sank four ships: British Benmohr, Norwegian Sydhav, American West Irmo, and Dutch Alphacca for a total of . On 18 April, U-505 was attacked by an Allied aircraft in the mid-Atlantic, but suffered little damage.[3]
U-505 began her third patrol on 7 June 1942, after leaving her home port of Lorient. She sank the American ships [4] and and the Colombian Urious in the Caribbean Sea.[5] Urious was a sailing ship belonging to a Colombian diplomat, and its sinking was one of a long series of incidents that gave Colombia political grounds to declare war on Germany a year later.[6] U-505 then returned to Lorient on 25 August after 80 days on patrol without being attacked.[7]
U-505s fourth patrol sent her to the northern coast of South America. She left Lorient on 4 October, 1942 and sank the British vessel Ocean Justice off the coast of Venezuela on 7 November. On near Trinidad, U-505 was surprised on the surface by a Lockheed Hudson maritime patrol aircraft from No. 53 Squadron, Royal Air Force, which made a low-level attack, landing a 250lb bomb directly on the deck from just above water level. The explosion killed one watch officer and wounded another in the conning tower. She also tore the antiaircraft gun off its mounting and severely damaged the boat's pressure hull. The aircraft was hit by fragmentation from the bomb's explosion and crashed into the ocean near U-505, killing RAAF pilot Flight Sergeant Ronald Sillcock and his entire crew. With the pumps inoperative and water flooding the engine room in several places, Kptlt. Zschech ordered the crew to abandon ship, but the technical staff (led by Chief Petty Officer Otto Fricke) insisted on trying to save her. The vessel was made water-tight after almost two weeks of repair work. After sending the wounded watch officer to the supply submarine ("milk cow"), U-505 limped back to Lorient on reduced power.[8]
After six months in Lorient for repairs, U-505 started her fifth patrol. She left Lorient on 1 July 1943 and returned after 13 days, after an attack by three British destroyers that had stalked her for over 30 hours. While U-505 was not badly damaged in this encounter, she had to return to France for repairs.[9] U-505s next four patrols were all aborted after only a few days at sea, due to equipment failure and sabotage by French dockworkers working for the Resistance.[10] [11] [12] [13] Faults found included sabotaged electrical and radar equipment, a hole deliberately drilled in a diesel fuel tank, and faulty welds on parts repaired by French workers. This happened so many times that it became the butt of jokes throughout the base at Lorient. Upon returning from one botched patrol, her crew found a sign painted in the docking area reading: "U-505s Hunting Ground". At a time when many U-boats were being sunk, U-505s commander, Kptlt. Zschech, overheard another commander joke, "There is one commander who will always come back ... Zschech."
After ten months in Lorient, U-505 departed for her tenth Atlantic patrol, seeking to break her run of bad luck and bad morale. British destroyers spotted her east of the Azores on 24 October 1943, not long after crossing the Bay of Biscay, and she was forced to submerge and endure a severe depth-charge attack. Zschech committed suicide in the submarine's control room, shooting himself in the head in front of his crew. First-watch officer Paul Meyer took command and returned the boat to port with minimal damage. Meyer was "absolved from all blame" by the Kriegsmarine for the incident.[14] Zschech is recorded as the only known submariner during the war to commit suicide underwater in response to the stress of a prolonged depth charging.[14]
The boat was placed under the command of Oblt.z.S. Harald Lange. U-505s 11th patrol began on Christmas Day 1943. She again returned early to Lorient on 2 January 1944, after she rescued 33 crew members from the, sunk on 28 December by British cruisers in the Bay of Biscay.[15]
U-505 took part in Wolfpack Hela from 28 December 1943 until 1 January 1944.
The Allies had learned from decrypted German messages that U-boats were operating near Cape Verde, but not their exact locations.[16] The US Navy dispatched Task Group 22.3 to the area, a hunter-killer group commanded by Captain Daniel V. Gallery. TG 22.3 consisted of the escort aircraft carrier and the destroyer escorts,,,, and under Commander Frederick S. Hall. The group sailed from Norfolk, Virginia, on 15 May 1944 and began searching for U-boats in the area in late May, using high-frequency direction-finding fixes ("huff-duff") and air and surface reconnaissance.
At 11:09 on 4 June 1944, TG 22.3 made sonar (ASDIC) contact with U-505 at, about 150nmi off the coast of Río de Oro,[16] only 800yd from Chatelains starboard bow. The escorts immediately moved towards the contact, while Guadalcanal moved away at top speed and launched a Grumman F4F Wildcat fighter to join another Wildcat and a Grumman TBM Avenger torpedo bomber, which were already airborne.
Chatelain was so close to U-505 that depth charges would not sink fast enough to intercept the U-boat, so it fired Hedgehog antisubmarine mortars before passing the submarine and turning to make a follow-up attack with depth charges.[16] One of the aircraft sighted U-505 and fired into the water to mark the position while Chatelain dropped depth charges. Immediately after the detonation of the charges, a large oil slick spread on the water and the fighter pilot radioed: "You struck oil! Sub is surfacing!"[17] Less than seven minutes after Chatelains first attack began, the badly damaged submarine surfaced less than 600-2NaN-2 away. Chatelain immediately opened fire on it with all available weapons, joined by other ships of the task force and the two Wildcats.[16]
Lange believed U-505 to be seriously damaged and ordered his crew to abandon ship. They obeyed the order promptly, but they did not successfully scuttle the boat; they opened some valves, but left the engines running.[16] The rudder had been damaged by depth charges, so the submarine circled clockwise at roughly 7kn. The commanding officer of Chatelain saw the submarine turning toward his ship and thought that it was about to attack, so he ordered a single torpedo to be fired at her; the torpedo missed, passing ahead of the abandoned U-505.[16]
Captain Gallery was keen to capture a U-boat and had encouraged his captains to plan for such an eventuality.[18] Chatelain and Jenks collected survivors, while an eight-man party from Pillsbury led by Lt. Albert David came alongside the submarine in a boat and entered through the conning tower. They found the body of Signalman First Class Gottfried Fischer on the deck, the only fatality of the combat, and U-505 was deserted. They secured charts and codebooks, closed scuttling valves, and disarmed demolition charges. They stopped the water from coming in and the submarine remained afloat, although it was low in the water and down by the stern, and they also stopped her engines.[16] U-boat researcher Derek Waller has written that a German crewman, Ewald Felix, helped foil the scuttling attempt.[19]
Pillsbury attempted to take the submarine in tow, but repeatedly collided with her and had to move away with three compartments flooded. A second boarding party from Guadalcanal then rigged a towline from the aircraft carrier to the U-boat.[16] Guadalcanals chief engineer Commander Earl Trosino joined the salvage party. He disconnected the submarine's diesel engines from her electric driving motors, while leaving the latter clutched to the propeller shafts. With the U-boat moving under tow by Guadalcanal, the propellers "windmilled" as they passed through the water, turning the shafts and the driving motors. This caused the motors to act as electrical generators charging the batteries. With power from the batteries, U-505s pumps cleared out the water let in by the attempted scuttling, and her air compressors blew out the ballast tanks, bringing her up to full surface trim.[16]
Despite the capture taking place close to Allied-controlled French Morocco, Casablanca was known to be infiltrated by German spies, thus another safe port was needed to house the submarine. After three days of towing, Guadalcanal transferred U-505 to the fleet tug . On 19 June, the submarine entered the Great Sound, site of the United States Navy's Naval Operating Base in Bermuda, after a tow of 1700nmi. The US Navy took 58 prisoners from U-505, three of them wounded. The crew were interned at Camp Ruston, near Ruston, Louisiana, in great secrecy.[20] Secrecy was so important to the mission that the submarine's flag was kept under the personal care of the Commander in Chief of the Atlantic Fleet during the duration of the war.[21] The submarine's crewmen were isolated from other prisoners of war, and the Red Cross was denied access to them. The Kriegsmarine finally declared the crew dead and informed the families to that effect, and the crew was not returned until 1947.[22]
Historian Clay Blair states that United States Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Ernest King was furious with Gallery for endangering Ultra, the intelligence gained from Enigma decrypts, and considered court-martialling him.[23] If the knowledge that a U-boat had been captured had reached Germany, the U-boat Arm would have made changes to tighten Enigma security, leading to an intelligence blackout on the eve of the Normandy landings.[24] Since the Allies had gained access to Enigma with the captures of U-110 in 1941 and U-559 in 1942 the standard practice was to sink U-boats outright rather than trying to board and capture them, for this reason. However, "cooler heads prevailed".[24]
LTJG Albert David received the Medal of Honor for leading the boarding party, the only time that it was awarded to an Atlantic Fleet sailor in World War II. Torpedoman's Mate Third Class Arthur W. Knispel and Radioman Second Class Stanley E. Wdowiak were the first two to follow David into the submarine, and they received the Navy Cross. Seaman First Class Earnest James Beaver received the Silver Star and Commander Trosino received the Legion of Merit. Captain Gallery conceived and executed the operation, and he received the Navy Distinguished Service Medal. The Task Group was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation. Admiral Royal E. Ingersoll, Commander in Chief, US Atlantic Fleet, cited the task group for "outstanding performance during antisubmarine operations in the eastern Atlantic" and stated that it was "a feat unprecedented in individual and group bravery, execution, and accomplishment in the naval history of the United States".[16]
The US Navy kept U-505 at the US Naval Operating Base in Bermuda, and Navy intelligence officers and engineers studied her intensively. To maintain the illusion that she had been sunk rather than captured, it was painted to look like a US submarine and renamed USS Nemo.[25] At the end of the war in Europe, it was used to promote E War Bond sales as part of the "Mighty 7th" War Loan drive. Anyone who purchased a bond could also purchase a ticket to board and inspect her. In June 1945, it visited New York City, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. Captain Gallery was present for the opening of the exhibition in Washington, DC.[26]
The Navy had no further use for U-505 after the war. Experts had thoroughly examined her in Bermuda, and it was moored derelict at the Portsmouth Navy Yard, so the Navy decided to use it as a target for gunnery and torpedo practice until it sank.[16] In 1946, Rear Admiral Gallery, who opposed the Navy's plans for U-505, told his brother Father John Gallery about this plan, and Father John contacted President Lenox Lohr of Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry to see if they would be interested in her. The museum already planned to display a submarine, and the acquisition of U-505 seemed ideal.[16] The US government donated the submarine to the museum in September 1954, and Chicago residents raised $250,000 for transporting and installing the boat. Coast Guard tugboats and cutters towed the boat through the Great Lakes, making a stop in Detroit, Michigan, in July 1954.[27] The museum dedicated her on 25 September 1954 as a permanent exhibit and a war memorial to all the sailors who died in the first and second Atlantic campaigns.
Nearly every removable part had been stripped from the boat's interior by the time it went to the museum; it was in no condition to serve as an exhibit, so museum director Lohr asked for replacements from the German manufacturers who had supplied the boat's original components and parts. Admiral Gallery reports in his autobiography Eight Bells and All's Well that every company supplied the requested parts without charge. Most included letters to the effect that the manufacturers wanted her to be a credit to German technology.[28]
A reunion was held at the museum in 1964, 20 years after the ship's capture, where Gallery returned to Lange some binoculars from the ship that had belonged to him.[29]
The Navy had removed the periscope and placed it in a water tank used for research at its Arctic Submarine Laboratory in Point Loma, California, where it was forgotten. It resurfaced when the lab was demolished in 2003, and the Navy donated it to the museum to be displayed along with the submarine.[30] By 2004, the U-boat's exterior had suffered noticeable damage from the weather, so the museum moved her to a new climate-controlled location (under ground next to the MSI) in April 2004. They restored it and reopened her to the public on 5 June 2005.[31]
In 2019 the Museum refurbished the submarine, restoring her to be closer to her original condition. Also, a special exhibit with many additional artifacts from the submarine was opened in the general-admission section of the museum.[32]
Captain Gallery recounted the capture of U-505 in his 1951 memoir Clear the Decks. Gary Moore recounts a dramatized story of the captured crew in his 2006 historical fiction book Playing with the Enemy. Hans Goebeler recounts the story of the boat's patrols and her crew in his 2005 memoir Steel Boats, Iron Hearts: A U-Boat Crewman's Life Aboard U-505.
| - | Date | Ship Name | Nationality | Tonnage (GRT) | Fate[33] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 March 1942 | Benmohr |  | 5,920 | Sunk | |
| 6 March 1942 | Sydhav |  | 7,587 | Sunk | |
| 3 April 1942 | West Irmo |  | 5,775 | Sunk | |
| 4 April 1942 | Alphacca |  | 5,759 | Sunk | |
| 28 June 1942 | Sea Thrush | | 5,447 | Sunk | |
| 29 June 1942 | | 7,191 | Sunk | ||
| 22 July 1942 | Urious |  | 153 | Sunk | |
| 7 November 1942 | Ocean Justice | | 7,173 | Sunk |