September - Dezember 1943Patrol # for this Kommandant: 2
Patrol area: Indian Ocean
Successful Patrol: Success
Number of freighters sunk: 3 / 4
Number of Tankers sunk: 1 / 1
Number of Capital Ships sunk: 0 / 0
Number of Ships Damaged: 1 / 1
Tonnage sunk: T21400 / T30300
Refit Time: Two months, U-Boot will be ready on the 1st of February for patrol.
Award Requests: None
Crew Status
Kommandant: KptLt. Ulrich Kahn
Erster Wachoffizier: Sven Mahler
Zweiter Wachoffizier: Willy Tischer
Leitender Ingenieur: Felix Trausch (
replacement LI)
Doktor: Jörg Pfeffer (
recovered in time to join this patrol)
Crew Status: Trained
Known and Attributed* Sinking'sDate: | Ships: | Flag: | Tonnage: | Fate: |
13th Oktober 1943 | Mary Livanos
|
| T 4771 | Sunk |
28th November 1943 | Jacksonville |
| T 10448 | Damaged |
8th Dezember 1943
| Chung Cheng |
| T 7176 | Sunk |
13th Dezember 1943
| Thomas Sinnickson |
| T 7176 | Sunk |
25th Dezember 1943
| Haiching |
| T 2183 | Sunk |
Depart Wilhelmshaven – 6 September 1943
6 September:Departed from Wilhelmshaven
6-13 September:During transit we encountered issues with our Gyro going out. Our new LI, Felix Trausch, was able to fix it in short time.
14-20 September:16/9 - 5:25pm Continuing our patrol, transiting to the West African Coast, we were attacked by an Allied air patrol. This PB4Y-1 came in low and fast. They caught our flak crews sleeping and was able to take out the 2cm Flak gun and causing minor flooding. We were able to dive and lost the air patrol shortly after its first go at us. The flak guns were beyond repair so we are now down one Flugabwehrkanone.
21-29 September:28/9 - 9:33am The U-848 encountered a TBF Avenger as we rounded the southern end of Africa. We were some 650 km south of Cape Town when the amerikanisch TBF Avenger swooped in. We crash dove to allude the Allied air attack and once we were certain that the light aircraft had retreated we continued our journey east.
30 September...
The U-848's patrol reports will continue to be updated as they carry on into the next month's...3-18 Oktober:...we continued on our patrol into the Indian Ocean. Shortly after entering the the area we again encountered two amerikanicsh carrier based patrol planes. We spotted then prior to recognizing our untersee boot, so we could dive before the planes could mount an attack. On the 13th Oktober we came across a lone ship. It was the
Mary Livanos, a
Greek Steam merchant (T 4800). From the surface we shot two volleys to sink her.
A few days later we once again had to dive to avoid the Allied air cover. This time they got close enough to make a single attack that damaged our Radio, Hydrophone and took out our other Flak gun. We were able to elude any further attacks and made our way to safer waters.
19 Oktober to 30 November:Our patrol went stale for quiet a few weeks. We either saw smoke off in the far distance or the ships were moving away from our position to give chase. Finally around late November we encountered a pregnant tanker flying an amerika flag. She was 10000 tons plus. We took our time setting up the shot as she was escorted by a destroyer, later identified as the the USS Poole (DE 151.) Our first two fish missed her completely. After maneuvering to avoid the escort, we set up our second run. Again our aft torpedo's missed their mark. Once again we were able to elude detection from the destroyer and made a third attack. This time from the forward torpedo's we launched four G7a Fat's. We heard two detonations at around four minutes. Though the tanker, later we learned it was the
Jacksonville, an
American Turbine tanker (T 10400), was just damaged. She began to list to the port side. This time it took us longer to avoid detection causing us to loose contact with the stricken Tanker. We assume that the
Jacksonville was able to make it back to harbor for repairs. The last week of November brought us no quarry to stalk.
1 Dezember through 1 January 1944:The last month of our patrol was Bitter Sweet. The sweet part culminated in a two week span of good hunting. First on 8th Dezember we came upon the
Chung Chengn a
Chinese Steam merchant (7200), off the coast of Mumbai, all by its lonesome. Being it was mid day we opted for a surface attack with our forward tubes. Shooting a spread of three fish we took the ship down with the first volley. Two torpedo's hit the ship square ripping her wide open. The
Chung Chengn must have been laden with heavy materials as she sank before any life boats could be launched.
Five days later, while surfaced recharging our batteries, we picked up the
Thomas Sinnickson, an
American Steam merchant (T 7200), heading south. As she was unescorted we stayed surfaced and made ready to take the ship with out 105mm Deck Gun. After an hour we maneuvered into a good firing position. It took two volley's to get this ship to sink. The first torpedo struck a forward hold with the second hitting just behind the first hold. This compartment must have held flammable material, as it blew up sending flames hundreds of feet into the air. Crewmen remained on board trying to save the ship. Due to the explosion three rafts flew overboard. Trying to reach the coast, a distance of only 90 miles, Her pumps failed to prevent the complete flooding of the bow compartments and the ship settled gradually by its head. Finally forcing the propeller out of the water. We had to leave around this time as a Flower Class Corvette showed up on the horizon.
Our final engagement happened on Christmas Eve when we happened on the
Haiching, a
British Steam merchant (T 2200), heading south 80 miles off Ponda. At around 0125 on Dezember 25th, we loosed four G7s Fat torpedo's in a wide spread. Two fish hit home causing the
Haiching to sink in 15 minutes.
On the early morning of Dezember 28th, while on the surfaced to finish up recharge our batteries, for the transit through the Bay of Biscay, we were surprised by a low and fast flying Sutherland. Without our flak guns all we could do was make good our escape. But first we took a beating by the aircraft. after its one attack we were limping home. The Englanders damaged our two electric engines, dive planes, deck gun and seriously wounded many crewmen. Surprisingly we were able to dive away and loos the aircrafts attention. Neither did any surface ships show up. We used up our luck for this year on this attack.
Limping back we made it home a bit later than planed. We made St. Nazaire on the 3rd of January 1944.