Nice story... one small niggling detail, I don't think smoking of any kind was allowed except up on deck. The commander might fill his pipe and chew on it, but I don't think he'd light it anywhere but on the bridge.
One of my favorite stories... and for the life of me I can't remember for sure who was involved, but it might have been when a new commander took over U-48. The previous commander - I think it was "Vati" Schultze - had a superstition about only setting a course divisible by 7; so whatever heading he would order, the crew would automatically adjust it to the nearest number divisible by 7 as a standard procedure.
The next commander found this out when he ordered one heading and had the helm confirm the order with a slightly different heading. He repeated the order and again it was nonchalantly confirmed with the same slightly different heading. This went on until the commander didn't know if his helmsman was insubordinate, hard of hearing, or just plain crazy until somebody finally let him know what the boat's SOP was.
IIRC, the new commander decided the SOP was good enough for him. Not a surprise if it was U-48, one of the most successful boats/crews of the war. Why mess with a good thing?
