Your greatest escape from a Destroyer

[Sailor Steve]

U-boats were ordered never to use the Channel, under any circumstances. This included pre-war patrols.

[Kptlt. Neuerburg]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

U-boats were ordered never to use the Channel, under any circumstances. This included pre-war patrols.

Thats not 100% true, as it turns out in 1944 with the D-Day invasion looming the Bdu issued the most bizzare orders since trying to get U-Boats into the Med. A quote from the book Iron Coffins "The group grew quiet. Kaptiaen Roesing patted his silvery hair, which seemed to interfere with his thinking. Not until he had caressed it into submission was he ready to speak. "Gentlemen, as you know, the Allied invasion is expected momentarily. You must be in the postion to sail at any hour. Because our Intelligence has been unable to discover the exact date and location of the landing, I only have general instructions for you. We shall be prepared to counter the blow wherever it falls. In Norway we have twenty-two boats on alert. The Biscay ports of Lorient, Saint Nazaire, La Pallice, and Bordeaux are staffed with another twenty-one boats. Most likely, however, the invasion fleet will simply cross the Channel and try to land some twenty to fifty miles from England. This is where you gentlemen step in. Headquarters' directive is short and precise: ATTACK AND SINK INVASION FLEET WITH THE FINAL OBJECTIVE OF DESTORYING ENEMY SHIPS BY RAMMING." Sorry about the caps at the end but thats the way it was in the book, but later in the book when the D-Day landings happen the U-Boat are sent from their ports on the French coast but many never return because the Allies had used the Normandy landings as a trap to destory as many U-Boats as possible.

[Sailor Steve]

Fair point, and you're right. Doenitz ordered that all boats departing in August were to use the North Sea route, and yet two boats did venture into the Channel in October 1939, and both were lost. I'm not sure if any boats braved the channel between then and 1944, but it would seem that no less than eleven boats tried their hand against the invasion. There may have been more, but that's how many were lost between June and August 1944. Several more tried in 1945, with similar results.
http://www.uboat.net/maps/channel.htm

My point was the standing order against using the Channel for transitioning to the North Atlantic from Germany.

[Kptlt. Neuerburg]

That too is a good point, but ofc any U-Boat commander who knew the waters of the Channel wouldn't dare enter it unless they had a suicide wish, or was Bernard . Back on topic one of my greatest escape from a DD was in early or mid 1939, I had come across a convoy that happened to have a battleship in the center. I played a trick that was a gamble to get the attention of the starboard side DDs by going to flank speed thus distracting them, a few seconds after they had turned towards my boat I went silent and crept up on the rear starboard quarter. Now in a normal situation I would have gone after the largest or most valuble ship in the convoy like an oil tanker but not this time. The chances of finding a battleship where already slim to none let alone in a convoy so the battleship became the target. Now within the convoy itself and felling confident I went up to standard speed to get to a good shooting distance while using a tanker as a "hat" a-la-Down Periscope. Then came the time to strike, up to periscope depth, all foward tubes open, torpedo speed set to high, magenetic detonators, three torpedos where set to go under the battleship and detonate under the keel, the other two would hit just below the water line. Then the torpedos where fired, I veered the boat to port at flank speed again this time to distract the the DDs on the port side. Again the trick worked, down to 150, silent running. The port side DDs where now within the convoy moving towards the last known sound contact, meanwhile I was moving my boat up the port side of the convoy zig-zagging to confuse the DDs and make it more difficult to be tracked. Once the DDs had reached the center of the convoy, I made a 90-degree turn to port and slipped away with the DDs still searching around the area of the slowing sinking battleship.