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CCIP · 03-31-15, 05:49 AM

The First Patrol

Q: What did you do during the war?

I was the commander of the submarine D-2, “Narodnovolets”, with the Northern Fleet.

Q: How did you become a submarine commander?

The usual way. I graduated from the Frunze Institute [naval academy] in Leningrad in 1937, and then took up submarine training. I sailed on the Pravda and Iskra [large training submarines] in the Baltic, then served as starpom [first officer] on the Sch-402 in the Northern Fleet. Then in 1940 I got my first command, that was a harbour guard ship called “Tuman” ["Fog"] in Murmansk - a sturdy little boat, not a submarine of course.

I thought I would stay on the “Tuman” for some time from there, and then they would assign me one of our small submarines, an M-class “Baby” or something of the sort. And then imagine - one day I get called in to the fleet HQ and they say to me - “Korobkov, you are going to Leningrad to get the Narodnovolets and you will take her up the Belomor [Baltic-White Sea Canal] and join the 1st Division of Submarines here in Polyarnyi. You’ll leave Leningrad no later than 17th of May. That is your new command.”

Now, I was surprised of course - the “Narodnovolets” is not a small boat, and it’s a boat with a service record, and a good one. She was the Northern Fleet’s oldest boat. It was rumoured that she already had a commander and a crew assigned, and then they were removed from command at the last moment for some reason - you know how things were back then. Then again, the boat was at the end of a two-year-long capital refit at the time in any case, so it could’ve been just a rumour. We didn’t ask. Me and a few of the other officers from the Northern Fleet just went to the Baltic Works in Leningrad at the end of April, and there she was at the pier.

Q: What did you think of the submarine?

We all thought she was outstanding. Now, you might think that it being a Series I sub, that is the oldest submarines of Soviet production, there would be griping about how it’s old and obsolete, but about our sub there was none. As far as we were concerned, this was a ship that had just finished a complete modernization, had some very progressive equipment installed, brand new guns, brand new rubka [conning tower/deck house], all machinery in good shape. It even smelled freshly-painted.

We knew the series had its flaws of course. Her sister, the D-1 “Dekabrist”, was lost without a trace November. It was probably something mechanical. That affected all of us, because all of the Northern Fleet had comrades and friends on that boat. But we didn’t let it get to us too much. More importantly, it was also a better sub to live in than most - relatively, of course. She held a steady ride with a heavy keel, and had a good amount of living space. The working spaces - diesels, command room, compass room - were very crowded, but not more so than in other boats. The aft room with the electric motors and two torpedo tubes was fully livable.

Q: When did you first sail on her?

In early May 1941, right after the 1st of May celebrations. The boat was already working up before us and some of the crew had already been with her for weeks, including the chief mechanic and the B.Ch-5 commander [chief engineer]. We took her out briefly for some shakedown tests in the Gulf of Finland and everything went well. We signed off on the factory papers, set off up the Belomor waterway, and by the end of the month we were in Murmansk. There, we had to get her to combat readiness, and we determined that we want to meet the readiness milestones as soon as possible. We did a pair of three-day training cruises and drills, and then we began a 2-week stay in port, while the sub was outfitted with its combat load.

The division command helped us along in meeting the milestones and getting us the best technical and personnel support. We were one sub short after the loss of the Dekabrist, so it was just us and our sister ship D-3 Krasnogvardeyets (“Red Guardian”) in the division, and the D-3 was scheduled for an overhaul before the end of June. So there was an order - we have to be a combat unit by the end of June. They wanted the division to be known for good performance, not the lost of D-1.

We also had a very keen politruk [political comissar, communist party representative] on board, I remember him well - Khokhryakov was his last name, very funny-sounding. It sounded like a name for something very short, fuzzy and grumpy. Sure enough, when he arrived on the boat, he was short, hairy, and very grumpy - but a good man. He gave some of the men a hard time but as a commanding officer I never had difficulties with him. A good politruk was a good man to have on board, especially once the war started.

Q. How did your first war patrol begin?

Well, we didn’t really think war was coming, we were very busy in all the details of getting to sea. We had a sailing date of 21st of June for our full battle readiness exercise - basically a mock patrol, full combat load, lots of drills. We had a couple of extra men on board from the division technical staff to keep notes. If everything went well, we planned to be out for 2 weeks at least and to make a stop at Novaya Zemlya.

Now, the night of 21st-22nd of June for us back then only meant one thing - brightest night of the year. We were in the arctic, of course, and well north of the Polar Circle, which meant that during our cruise we’d see constant sunlight. That made certain things easier for training, and the weather forecast was excellent too.

Nobody thought of war the day we sailed. We left just before noon. I tried to pick out my old ship Tuman on the way out of port, but didn’t find it. There were some new ships that recently arrived, warming up in the Kola Bay - so we got to watch them as well. D-3 just returned from exercises at Motka Bay and their crew was waving at us from the dock as we left. When we got to sea, we had a great dinner cooked up from fresh supplies - submarines always had good provisions - and the gramophone was playing, records all picked out by the politruk of course. We got to our patrol station by 10pm, did a trim dive, then a motor calibration and some maneuver checks, and then I went to bed and left my starpom [first officer] Malyshev in command.

To be continued...

03-31-15, 05:49 AM	#2
CCIP Navy Seal Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Waterloo, Canada Posts: 8,700 Downloads: 29 Uploads: 2	The First Patrol Q: What did you do during the war? I was the commander of the submarine D-2, “Narodnovolets”, with the Northern Fleet. Q: How did you become a submarine commander? The usual way. I graduated from the Frunze Institute [naval academy] in Leningrad in 1937, and then took up submarine training. I sailed on the Pravda and Iskra [large training submarines] in the Baltic, then served as starpom [first officer] on the Sch-402 in the Northern Fleet. Then in 1940 I got my first command, that was a harbour guard ship called “Tuman” ["Fog"] in Murmansk - a sturdy little boat, not a submarine of course. I thought I would stay on the “Tuman” for some time from there, and then they would assign me one of our small submarines, an M-class “Baby” or something of the sort. And then imagine - one day I get called in to the fleet HQ and they say to me - “Korobkov, you are going to Leningrad to get the Narodnovolets and you will take her up the Belomor [Baltic-White Sea Canal] and join the 1st Division of Submarines here in Polyarnyi. You’ll leave Leningrad no later than 17th of May. That is your new command.” Now, I was surprised of course - the “Narodnovolets” is not a small boat, and it’s a boat with a service record, and a good one. She was the Northern Fleet’s oldest boat. It was rumoured that she already had a commander and a crew assigned, and then they were removed from command at the last moment for some reason - you know how things were back then. Then again, the boat was at the end of a two-year-long capital refit at the time in any case, so it could’ve been just a rumour. We didn’t ask. Me and a few of the other officers from the Northern Fleet just went to the Baltic Works in Leningrad at the end of April, and there she was at the pier. D-2 “Narodnovolets”* , Dekabrist* (D-I) class Medium multirole submarine of the Soviet fleet Double hull construction; twin diesels (direct drive propulsion), twin electric motors, twin screws, single rudder, fore and aft dive planes. Displacement: 933t surfaced, 1354t submerged Armament: 8 torpedo tubes (6 fore, 2 aft); 14 torpedoes carried (8 in tubes + 6 reloads for forward tubes; aft tubes can only be reloaded in port) Single 100mm B-24-PL deck cannon on forward deck, single 45mm 21-K AA gun on conning tower (in 1941 configuration - originally built with larger conning tower mounting different guns) Speeds: 14kt surfaced, 9kt submerged Diving depth: 75m rated, 90m maximum (during one incident, D-2 is known to have uncontrollably dived to 125m without substantial damage) Crew: 53. Designed for 40-day patrol duration without resupply. Equipped with advanced survival and escape gear. (all submarines in this class, the first Soviet-designed underwater vessels, were named after historical revolutionary movements. The name ship of the class Dekabrist was named after the Decembrist uprising of the early 19th century; Narodnovolets was named after “Narodnaya Volya” (“Will of the People”), an anarchist radical group of the later 19th century) History: Built during 1927-1929, at the Baltic Works in Leningrad Commissioned the the Soviet Navy’s Baltic Fleet in 1931 as “Narodnovolets” Transferred to the Northern Fleet via the White Sea Canal in 1933 Received designation number D-2 in 1934 Throughout its pre-war career, participated in numerous expeditions and equipment experiments to assist with exploration of the arctic, and improving living conditions for submarine crew Returned to Leningrad in September 1939 for substantial rebuild - new conning tower, weapons, and equipment installed Scheduled to leave Leningrad by May 17th, 1941, and rejoin the Northern Fleet Historical note: D-2 did not in fact leave Leningrad, and was caught up in the Baltic as the war started. It had remained in the Baltic Fleet ever since, serving as a static crew trainer from the 1950s until the 1980s, and survives today as a museum ship. It is the oldest surviving war veteran submarine in existence (with the possible exception of the CSS Hunley, however unlike the Hunley the D-2 returned from all of its patrols intact). It fired 19 torpedoes in 17 attacks during 4 war patrols, and is known to have sunk one German ship during its career, and severely damaged another. This is an alternate story that assumes that the D-2 left Leningrad on schedule, and rejoined the Northern Fleet in the Soviet arctic. Q: What did you think of the submarine?* We all thought she was outstanding. Now, you might think that it being a Series I sub, that is the oldest submarines of Soviet production, there would be griping about how it’s old and obsolete, but about our sub there was none. As far as we were concerned, this was a ship that had just finished a complete modernization, had some very progressive equipment installed, brand new guns, brand new rubka [conning tower/deck house], all machinery in good shape. It even smelled freshly-painted. We knew the series had its flaws of course. Her sister, the D-1 “Dekabrist”, was lost without a trace November. It was probably something mechanical. That affected all of us, because all of the Northern Fleet had comrades and friends on that boat. But we didn’t let it get to us too much. More importantly, it was also a better sub to live in than most - relatively, of course. She held a steady ride with a heavy keel, and had a good amount of living space. The working spaces - diesels, command room, compass room - were very crowded, but not more so than in other boats. The aft room with the electric motors and two torpedo tubes was fully livable. Q: When did you first sail on her? In early May 1941, right after the 1st of May celebrations. The boat was already working up before us and some of the crew had already been with her for weeks, including the chief mechanic and the B.Ch-5 commander [chief engineer]. We took her out briefly for some shakedown tests in the Gulf of Finland and everything went well. We signed off on the factory papers, set off up the Belomor waterway, and by the end of the month we were in Murmansk. There, we had to get her to combat readiness, and we determined that we want to meet the readiness milestones as soon as possible. We did a pair of three-day training cruises and drills, and then we began a 2-week stay in port, while the sub was outfitted with its combat load. The division command helped us along in meeting the milestones and getting us the best technical and personnel support. We were one sub short after the loss of the Dekabrist, so it was just us and our sister ship D-3 Krasnogvardeyets (“Red Guardian”) in the division, and the D-3 was scheduled for an overhaul before the end of June. So there was an order - we have to be a combat unit by the end of June. They wanted the division to be known for good performance, not the lost of D-1. We also had a very keen politruk [political comissar, communist party representative] on board, I remember him well - Khokhryakov was his last name, very funny-sounding. It sounded like a name for something very short, fuzzy and grumpy. Sure enough, when he arrived on the boat, he was short, hairy, and very grumpy - but a good man. He gave some of the men a hard time but as a commanding officer I never had difficulties with him. A good politruk was a good man to have on board, especially once the war started. Q. How did your first war patrol begin? Well, we didn’t really think war was coming, we were very busy in all the details of getting to sea. We had a sailing date of 21st of June for our full battle readiness exercise - basically a mock patrol, full combat load, lots of drills. We had a couple of extra men on board from the division technical staff to keep notes. If everything went well, we planned to be out for 2 weeks at least and to make a stop at Novaya Zemlya. Now, the night of 21st-22nd of June for us back then only meant one thing - brightest night of the year. We were in the arctic, of course, and well north of the Polar Circle, which meant that during our cruise we’d see constant sunlight. That made certain things easier for training, and the weather forecast was excellent too. Nobody thought of war the day we sailed. We left just before noon. I tried to pick out my old ship Tuman on the way out of port, but didn’t find it. There were some new ships that recently arrived, warming up in the Kola Bay - so we got to watch them as well. D-3 just returned from exercises at Motka Bay and their crew was waving at us from the dock as we left. When we got to sea, we had a great dinner cooked up from fresh supplies - submarines always had good provisions - and the gramophone was playing, records all picked out by the politruk of course. We got to our patrol station by 10pm, did a trim dive, then a motor calibration and some maneuver checks, and then I went to bed and left my starpom [first officer] Malyshev in command. To be continued... __________________ There are only forty people in the world and five of them are hamburgers. -Don Van Vliet (aka Captain Beefheart)