Musings from the Bathtub

Capt Bathtub · 12-24-06, 09:16 AM

February 25th 1941

We've been assigned to Brest now for about 6 months.

I am sitting at the deck gun, early in the evening while the boat heads out to its patrol area. The crew have gotten used to the fact that their captain sometimes needs to sit out here, on his own, watching the sun go down and at the moment the weather in the Bay is favourable.

The crew of the U-1 is quite an odd bunch, most of us have been together since the start of the war when we roamed the east coast of England in a type II, affectionately known as "The Bathtub". They have a few quirks which I am willing to allow, as long as they keep sending Britisher ships to the bottom.

For instance, the chief engineer, O. Totenhagen, he never seems to walk anywhere. He just glides, somewhat disconcerting and not altogether uncomical. And, there have been moments when I have ducked into the command room only to see him and the three seaman on duty hurriedly resuming their stations from what looked like a rather compromising clinch. That and his lack of sense of propriety whereas I have ordered the boat to silent running notsomuch to avoid detection but more to put a dampener on his incessant shouting. He has realised this and we have a laugh about it, especially when I order flank and he whispers "Yes sir", then shouts "AHEAD FLANK!"

And the Forward Dive Planesman, W. Barsch, has an annoying habit of constantly looking over his shoulder at me. This behaviour earned him several reprimands, but to no avail. If it wasn't for his uncanny ability to provide the boat with the finest French champagne, I would send him off to the Infantry.

The First Watch Officer, A. Mayer, also has shifty eyes that never look at you. At first I thought he was perhaps having deeply profound thoughts, the way he would look into the distance at nothing in particular but alas no, he is unfashionably stupid and tends to lack concentration. Several times in the past I have ventured to the bridge and asked him, "What is that?" to which he diligently replies "SHIP SPOTTED!". Genius.

But we do have a laugh though, such as yesterday when we reminisced about our very first patrol up the west coast of Norway. I allow a fair amount of discussion amongst the officers about tactics and procedures, though it irks the rest of us that A. Carlewitz is always the first to quote from "The Handbook", so we had a fine time cruising north practising various procedures. Then we surfaced on the fifth night at our patrol area to fog thicker than a panzer driver, heavy rains and waves that made going forward more of an up and down thing.

The running gag went something like this-
"But this is a coastal boat, we shouldn't even be here."
"Yes but we are off a coast'"
"Where?"
"Apparently there's one over there, might even be Norwegian"
"Ship spotted!"
"Where?"
"On the forward deck!"
"Well get them off, don't they know there's a war on"
"Sir, BdU says we should be more aggressive!"
"Right, number one, plot a solution, attack that wave"

Good times. It wasn't all rain and no ships though, we still talk about other stand-out patrols such as the Hartlepool Raid, the first convoy we ran into off the north coast of Ireland, the foggy convoy and the English Channel transfer which can best be summed up with the exchange I had with the chief -
"How fast should we make our run through the channel, cap'n?"
"We should run like we stole something"

For the last few months we have been interdicting the shipping lanes off Portugal where we have had alot of success albeit with a fair amount of dashes at flank speed over several hundred miles in response to ship reports from our fellow uboats. I do have to say though that boredom is our worst enemy at the moment. The English aren't very active, they must be regrouping, building up their forces, having cups of tea. Or perhaps our attacks on the mercantile fleet is proving costly and we could be home by Christmas...

12-24-06, 09:16 AM	#1
Capt Bathtub Swabbie Join Date: Dec 2006 Location: in the bathtub Posts: 7 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Musings from the Bathtub February 25th 1941 We've been assigned to Brest now for about 6 months. I am sitting at the deck gun, early in the evening while the boat heads out to its patrol area. The crew have gotten used to the fact that their captain sometimes needs to sit out here, on his own, watching the sun go down and at the moment the weather in the Bay is favourable. The crew of the U-1 is quite an odd bunch, most of us have been together since the start of the war when we roamed the east coast of England in a type II, affectionately known as "The Bathtub". They have a few quirks which I am willing to allow, as long as they keep sending Britisher ships to the bottom. For instance, the chief engineer, O. Totenhagen, he never seems to walk anywhere. He just glides, somewhat disconcerting and not altogether uncomical. And, there have been moments when I have ducked into the command room only to see him and the three seaman on duty hurriedly resuming their stations from what looked like a rather compromising clinch. That and his lack of sense of propriety whereas I have ordered the boat to silent running notsomuch to avoid detection but more to put a dampener on his incessant shouting. He has realised this and we have a laugh about it, especially when I order flank and he whispers "Yes sir", then shouts "AHEAD FLANK!" And the Forward Dive Planesman, W. Barsch, has an annoying habit of constantly looking over his shoulder at me. This behaviour earned him several reprimands, but to no avail. If it wasn't for his uncanny ability to provide the boat with the finest French champagne, I would send him off to the Infantry. The First Watch Officer, A. Mayer, also has shifty eyes that never look at you. At first I thought he was perhaps having deeply profound thoughts, the way he would look into the distance at nothing in particular but alas no, he is unfashionably stupid and tends to lack concentration. Several times in the past I have ventured to the bridge and asked him, "What is that?" to which he diligently replies "SHIP SPOTTED!". Genius. But we do have a laugh though, such as yesterday when we reminisced about our very first patrol up the west coast of Norway. I allow a fair amount of discussion amongst the officers about tactics and procedures, though it irks the rest of us that A. Carlewitz is always the first to quote from "The Handbook", so we had a fine time cruising north practising various procedures. Then we surfaced on the fifth night at our patrol area to fog thicker than a panzer driver, heavy rains and waves that made going forward more of an up and down thing. The running gag went something like this- "But this is a coastal boat, we shouldn't even be here." "Yes but we are off a coast'" "Where?" "Apparently there's one over there, might even be Norwegian" "Ship spotted!" "Where?" "On the forward deck!" "Well get them off, don't they know there's a war on" "Sir, BdU says we should be more aggressive!" "Right, number one, plot a solution, attack that wave" Good times. It wasn't all rain and no ships though, we still talk about other stand-out patrols such as the Hartlepool Raid, the first convoy we ran into off the north coast of Ireland, the foggy convoy and the English Channel transfer which can best be summed up with the exchange I had with the chief - "How fast should we make our run through the channel, cap'n?" "We should run like we stole something" For the last few months we have been interdicting the shipping lanes off Portugal where we have had alot of success albeit with a fair amount of dashes at flank speed over several hundred miles in response to ship reports from our fellow uboats. I do have to say though that boredom is our worst enemy at the moment. The English aren't very active, they must be regrouping, building up their forces, having cups of tea. Or perhaps our attacks on the mercantile fleet is proving costly and we could be home by Christmas...