HMS Seal (N37)
HMS Seal in 1939
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History | |
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United Kingdom | |
Name | HMS Seal |
Builder | Chatham Dockyard |
Laid down | 9 December 1936 |
Launched | 27 September 1938 |
Commissioned | 28 January 1939 |
Captured | by Nazi Germany on 5 May 1940 |
Badge | |
Service record as HMS Seal | |
Commanders: |
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Victories: | None |
Nazi Germany | |
Name | UB |
Acquired | 5 May 1940 |
Commissioned | 30 November 1940 |
Decommissioned | 31 July 1941 |
Fate | Scuttled on 3 May 1945 at 54°22′N 10°11′E / 54.367°N 10.183°E |
Service record as UB | |
Identification codes: | M 15 950 |
Commanders: |
|
Operations: | None |
Victories: | None |
General characteristics | |
Class and type | Grampus-class submarine |
Displacement |
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Length | 293 ft (89.31 m) o/a |
Beam | 25 ft 6 in (7.77 m) |
Draught | 16 ft 10 in (5.13 m) |
Propulsion |
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Speed |
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Range | 6,500 nmi (12,000 km; 7,500 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph) |
Test depth | 200 ft (61 m) |
Complement |
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Armament |
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HMS Seal was one of six
Seal was laid down at the Chatham Dockyard on 9 December 1936, launched on 27 September 1938 and commissioned into the Royal Navy on 28 January 1939. During her entire British career, her commander was Rupert Lonsdale, for whom it was his second command.
Early career
On being commissioned, Seal went for acceptance trials at Dartmouth and in Torbay. On the day of her first successful deep dive, 1 June 1939, news arrived of the loss of HMS Thetis undergoing trials at Liverpool, a personal setback for the crew who had lost many friends. Seal moved to Gosport to complete torpedo trials.[3]
On 4 August, she sailed to China to join
By the beginning of April 1940, the
Loss in Kattegat
Having been at sea for a year, and suffering some damage from a scrape with a merchant ship, Seal was due to return to dry-dock at Chatham. However her sister ship HMS Cachalot had been rammed and needed serious attention in the dry-dock. Some repairs to Seal were carried out at Blyth, Northumberland, and she was required to take over Cachalot's minelaying duties. She was assigned to Operation DF 7, a mine-laying mission in the Kattegat between Denmark and Sweden. This was a particularly daunting task, especially for a submarine the size of Seal. Captain Bethall, the commanding officer of the flotilla, failed to persuade Admiral Horton to reconsider his orders.[6]
On 29 April 1940, Seal left Immingham laden with 50 mines. On entering the Skagerrak, she met HMS Narwhal just leaving the area after having stirred up German defences by scoring six hits with six torpedoes. Seal was running at shallow depth to maintain speed and conserve fuel, when she was spotted by a German Heinkel He 115 on 4 May at about 02:30. She dived to 90 feet (27 m) and was slightly damaged by a bomb. Later that morning, Lonsdale discovered German anti-submarine trawlers searching for them around her target area, and he had to divert to the secondary target area. At about 09:00, Seal started to lay down her mines and completed that mission some 45 minutes later.[7]
Seal turned and headed for home, with the trawlers heading after her. Lonsdale took an evasive course, and used the Asdic to identify when the trawlers were stopping to listen. Then, at 3:00 pm, he spotted a patrol of nine German anti-submarine motor torpedo boats heading from a different direction. There were too many hours of daylight left, and the Kattegat was too shallow to allow a submarine as large as Seal to go deep and run for it. Lonsdale evaded detection by following a zig-zag course and at around 18:00 settled the submarine in stop-trim at the bottom of the sea. Unknown to the crew, they had entered an uncharted minefield. One of the submarine's hydroplanes caught a mine stay-cable and at about 18:30, the attached mine was swept by the current onto the stern of the boat. There was a huge explosion and Seal was severely damaged.[8]
A painful increase in air pressure indicated that a large amount of water had entered the submarine. The crew's evening meal was catapulted round the mess rooms and the boat tilted bow upwards at about 10 degrees. All the watertight doors were quickly sealed and all crew accounted for, after two who had been trapped in the after end of the boat managed to make their way to the control room. To the crew's surprise, the pursuing ships had not noticed the explosion and moved away. After various inspections and repairs, the crew had to wait until 22:30 when it was dark enough for an attempt to be made to raise the submarine.[9]
At 10:30 pm, the ballast tanks were blown empty and the main motors started, but the stern stayed firmly stuck on the sea bed. The bow rose at a sharp angle, and the attempt had to be abandoned. By this time, the air quality had deteriorated badly. Pumping carried on and emergency repairs were made to start the pump to blow air into the rear trimming system. For a second attempt to surface, the 11-ton drop keel was released. This meant that the submarine could not submerge again. More compressed air was used to blow the remaining tanks, but again the attempt was unsuccessful. Carbon-dioxide poisoning was having an accelerating effect on the crew and a third attempt was called for, using the engines and main ballast. This also failed.[10]
At 01:10, Lonsdale, a devout Christian, called his crew to prayer and led them in the Lord's Prayer. The crew then responded to his order for them to move as far forward as they could to try to tip the balance, though many fainted or were sick. While thoughts went to using the Davis escape gear, it was realised that it would take several hours to escape by this method and there was a risk of flooding the entire craft before more than a few could escape. The engineers found they could open a salvage-blow[clarification needed] and a final attempt was made to raise the submarine. The motors caught fire, but the fire went out for lack of oxygen. The batteries were nearly empty and the high pressure air exhausted. The engineer realised there was one air pressure group left with a tiny amount of air, which was some way up the companionway. He reached and opened the valve, and the submarine started to move upwards.[11]
Seal surfaced at 01:30. After the pressure was released, the fresh air caused blinding headaches to the crew, who had suffered oxygen deprivation. Lonsdale clambered to the bridge, and sighting land, decided to try to make for Swedish waters. The confidential papers were consigned to the sea bed, and the Asdics were destroyed and the pieces thrown overboard. Lonsdale sent a message to the Admiralty: "Am making for the Swedish coast". With the cipher books destroyed, Lonsdale did not receive two replies – "Understood and agreed with. Best of luck" and "Safety of personnel would be your first consideration after destruction of the Asdics". If he had, they would have saved him a considerable amount of anguish over his subsequent decisions. The rudder was damaged and the boat impossible to steer, but it was found that it could be made to go in reverse. Fair progress was made, but mud had entered the lubricating system and the one working engine seized up.[12]
At 02:30, Seal was spotted on the surface and attacked by two German
The mine belt laid by Seal sank one German freighter (Vogesen, 4241 BRT) and three Swedish ships between 5 May and 5 June for a total tonnage of nearly 7000 BRT.[15]
In German service
Seal underwent temporary repairs at
On 3 May 1945, UB was scuttled in Heikendorf Bay (54°22′N 10°11′E / 54.367°N 10.183°E), the wreck was later broken up.[17]
Crew
The crew were subjected to routine interrogation in an atmosphere of mutual respect with their German captors. The officers and ratings were separated and held as prisoners of war in a succession of camps until April 1945. The submarine had been adopted by the village of Seal when she was commissioned, and during their imprisonment the crew received considerable support from the villagers.[18]
Two members of the crew managed to escape. Early on, the petty officers and ratings were held at
One of the engineers, Don "Tubby" Lister, made a series of escapes and was eventually sent to Oflag IV-C at Colditz Castle. Realising how hard it would be to escape from there, he and another ERA (Engine Room Artificer), W. E. "Wally" Hammond (from the sunken submarine HMS Shark), insisted on being moved on the grounds that they were not officers. The ruse worked, and they were moved to a more open camp. They escaped from there in late 1942 and made the several hundred mile journey to Switzerland and then home.[20][21][22]
Lieutenant Trevor Beet, the officer left on board by Lonsdale, made three failed escape attempts. He was transferred to Colditz Castle for the rest of the war.[23]
Most of the officers and petty officers had been consolidated into
Lieutenant Commander Lonsdale was the only British captain to surrender his ship to the enemy in the entire war. He, with Lieutenant Trevor Beet, faced court-martial in 1946; they were honourably acquitted.[25]
See also
- HMS Graph – The German U-boat U-570, captured and taken into service by the Royal Navy.
- HMS X2 – the Italian, Archimede-class submarine, Galileo Galilei; captured and taken into service by the Royal Navy.
- HMS H6 – a World War I Royal Navy submarine interned by the Netherlands in 1916, and captured from them by the Germans in 1940.
References
- ^ Helgason, Guðmundur. "Bruno Mahn". Uboat.net. Retrieved 30 April 2016.
- ISBN 0-394-58839-8
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.23-24
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.25-31
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.34-45
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.46-48
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.49-62
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.63-70
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.70-91
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.91-104
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.105-115
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.116-127
- ^ Bekker. 1964 p. 91.[permanent dead link]
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.128-153
- ^ a b Helgason, Guðmundur. "HMS Seal (37 M)". German U-boats of WWII. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.181-184
- ^ Gröner 1991, pp. 103–104.
- ^ "Account of HMS Seal and consequences of capture". Cavillconnections.co.uk. Archived from the original on 5 June 2011. Retrieved 27 December 2007.
- ISBN 978-0966646931.
- ^ Reid, Patrick Robert (1953). The Latter Days at Colditz. London: Hodder and Stoughton
- ^ "Photo of Hammond and Lister in Switzerland". Royal Naval Museum. Sea Your History. Retrieved 2 January 2023.
Photograph showing W.E. Hammond and D. Lister in Switzerland after escaping from their prisoner of war camp at Lamsdorf. Armed with forged identity papers, money and civilian clothing, Hammond and Lister volunteered to wash up the Sunday soup cauldrons in the wash house and slipped out of the camp through a nearby garden. They travelled by train to join the Colditz escape route at Dresden, showing German cigarettes as they passed through the police checks. Going via Nuremburg [sic] they continued to Ulm, accepting a drink from a German soldier along the way. Finally they ended up in Switzerland where they later held a great Christmas party with other escapers.
- ISBN 978-0-340-79494-4.
In September 1942, Chief Petty Officers Wally Lister and Tubby Hammond arrived in Colditz with the Royal Navy contingent. They had been promoted to the rank of officer so that they might stay with their friends, but technically they were in the wrong camp, and after a month they applied to be transferred to the troop camp at Lamsdorf, where they joined work gangs in the local fields and factories: escaping was easy, and after a series of adventures, they crossed the Swiss frontier on 19 December.
- ^ "Navy Photos". Colditzcastle.net. Archived from the original on 4 March 2012. Retrieved 15 November 2011.
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.184-287
- ^ Warren and Benson (1961) pp.218-228
Bibliography
- Busch, Rainer; Röll, Hans-Joachim (1999). German U-boat Commanders of World War II : A biographical dictionary. Translated by Brooks, Geoffrey. London, UK; Annapolis, MD: Greenhill Books; Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-186-6.
- Busch, Rainer; Röll, Hans-Joachim (1999). Der U-Boot-Krieg:Deutsche U-Boot-Verluste von September 1939 bis Mai 1945 [The U-boat War:German U-boat losses from September 1939 to May 1945] (in German). Vol. IV. Hamburg, Berlin, Bonn: Mittler. ISBN 3-8132-0514-2.
- Gardiner, Robert, ed. (1980). All the World's Fighting Ships 1922–1946. London: Conway Maritime. ISBN 0-85177-146-7.
- Gröner, Erich; Jung, Dieter; Maass, Martin (1991). German Warships 1815–1945. Vol. 2: U-boats and Mine Warfare Vessels. London: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-593-4.
- Warren, C. E. T; Benson, James (1964). Will Not We Fear: The Story of His Majesty's Submarine "Seal" and of Lieutenant-Commander Rupert Lonsdale. London: Harrap.
- ISBN 978-1-86176-281-8.
External links
- Helgason, Guðmundur. "HMS Seal (37 M)". German U-boats of WWII. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
- Helgason, Guðmundur. "U-B (former HMS Seal)". German U-boats of WWII. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
- "Lieutenant-Commander Canon Rupert Lonsdale". RN Subs.
- "A Captured British Submarine is Converted to a U-boat" from Die Deutsche Wochenschau Nr. 538 (Newsreel) (in German). 25 December 1940. Event occurs at 20:10.