[Kpt. Franz-Josef Lemmle]

Well, one he just retold me was when the first got into the Med. and were going on a quick "shakedown" patrol to get used to the area and the waters in the Med. They weren't expecting to see any action, only a quick patrol. Well, they came across some German merchant barges along the coast. The capitan decided to attack them! They opened up the throttles for the attack run (about 44 knots!) and launched 3 of their 4 torpedoes. They were a late war boat so they had torpedo roll off racks, not the tubes you see on early boats. The tubes were very heavy even when empty so they were replaced with roll off racks to make the boats faster. Anyway, one of the torpedoes got hung up in the rack and they couldn't launch it. They tried and tried to get it out of the rack...all the while they are still going full speed at the barge! The torpedo was already running full speed but still stuck in the rack! Finally they got the torpedo free...but were now VERY close to the barge! My grandfather said he could see the sailors running around on the deck of the barge and clearly see the German flag flying. They made a hard turn and bolted! Unfortunately, all of the torpedoes ran too deep and went under the barge. This was very common of our American torpedoes during the war...notorious for running too deep. They didn't get the barge on their first patrol, but did manage to sink a ship on their second!