[Kaptain Hans Wolf]

my first patrol, sailing aboard a type ii. i wasnt expecting much from the small boat, but my crew seemed optomistic. we creeped out of port at night, engines slowly humming at ahead one third. we left port and headed for our patrol zone, a relativly boring routine comenced, slowly chugging towards my patrol square, with occasional hydrophone checks and tests to see how much depth she could take.

the crews morale was low, living onboard this boat was no cake walk, especially as she was a very unstable being on the surface. after days at sea, we reached our patrol zone. we were orderd to patrol here for 24 hours, but i stretched our time there by about 12 hours, trying to salvage something from this patrol. no such luck. with fuel low , i decided to head for home, rather annoyed at the fact we had not encounterd a single ship.

on the way back to home port, a miracle occured. we happend to pick up propeller sounds off the starboard bow during a hydrophone check. i ordered periscope depth, the crew were on edge, hoping for a victory. i felt our chances were slim, as with the fuel we were on we couldent chase her for very long, we had to hit her here if we wanted to have sufficent fuel to make it home. i edged the periscope out of the water. she was a coastel merchant, travelling alone and very slowly, two to three knots at the most. we manouvered untill we were in a good place to make a torpedo attack.

i gathered information for my tdc, and waited till we were at the perfect angle for a shot. i ordered for tubes one and two to be opened. "tubes opened sir". "fire one" i whispered."firing one sir". "fire two". "tube two fired sir". i looked at her through the periscope, waiting for the hit. two should ensure a hit, i thought to myself, one would be enough to sink her, but two eel's, 1 should hit. i sat and waited. time for torpedo 1 was up, a miss. i was cursing myself when i heard the second eel hit, what a sound. it broke her back, but amazingly she was still afloat. now i prepared to fire tube 3, getting the tdc information was simple, a stationary target. with the gyro angle sorted, i fired tube 3. a brilliant hit, an awesome explosion. that did it, she was heading for the bottom.

when we arrived at port, morale was good, at least we had sunk something. we were pleased with ourselves, but i craved for a better boat, maybee a transfer to the flotilla at kiel, a type VII would be an amazing vessel to command. only time will tell, for now the officers club is calling!