Alaaaarm

[T.Von Hogan]

The IXB U-420 set off on her 5th mission august 6th 1940 bound for patrol in quadrant BE84. As she sailed around the northern side of scapa flow and down the west side of Ireland she had sunk 7 merchants but none had been bigger than 2000 tons. Her deck gun was down to 2 shells but she still had 13 eels on board so moral was still high amongst the crew. Not a contact was made as she angled thru the old tanker alley this trip headed in a slowly zig-zagging southwest course. Finally in BE61 we get a contact,then another,then another....its a convoy, we rise to periscope depth and start trying to identify the ships within thru the darkness. The effort was hampered by the winds whooping the sea into a frenzy. 14 merchants are identified and only 2 corvettes are escorting. Dawn is just starting to break as we slide into position for the 1st attack. I fired 2 eels at a large merchant and 2 at a medium sized tanker and make a u-turn to ready the rear tubes for the lead corvettes charge. He comes charging back at us but never locates us and returns to his duties. Only 2 of the 4 eels that were fired found thier mark and in each case they didn't even manage to slow the ships down. Torpedomen are working to reload as we start a 2nd pass this time going directly for the escorts, we came in at a 90 degree angle with the last row of the convoy and caught the trailing corvette as he was racing back to the convoy in a straight line. She must have had plenty of ammo onboard the way she blew up when the torpedo found its mark As the convoy went into a tizzy after seeing half thier defenses disappear i ordered the sonarman to follow the remaining escort, he was of course making a bull run for the spot we fired from, we changed course and started charging straight at him at flank speed also at 1200 meters we fire and go hard port cutting the engines to stop. After what seemed an eternity we hear the boom, next thing i hear is Bernard saying "torpedo missed sir" i order flank speed and quickly set up an aft tube as i'm locating the corvette thru the attack scope.....she is sitting about 1000 meters behind us in flames getting ready to sink. I look at Bernard and ask him what he was smoking to make him think the torpedo missed and he tells me he found a good sized roach in my ashtray when he cleaned my quarters. I tell him to stay out of my chit and to surface the boat we have an unprotected convoy to attack.
We make a contact report to Bdu then proceed to catch back up with the convoy, we decide to head up a columm that has 2 large merchants on 1 side and a large merchant and a large cargo on the other. "Its a glorious morning for a duckhunt" Bernard proclames, i tell him to shut up and watch for planes feeling that is my only threat since its august of 1940:hmm: we are traveling about 2 knots faster than the convoy zig-zagging in perfect harmony with them as if we had been dance partners for years, passing meduim cargos and small merchants along the way. Set all eels for 10 meters depth i order as we approach the large vessels, we will get the 3 large merchants 1st so don't fire untill the trailing 1 is hitable from the rear tubes. This will put all 3 merchants inside 1000 meters i explain to Bernard who seems more interested in cloud shapes than anything going on on the surface Another 200 meters and we will be in perfect position i'm thinking when i hear the watch commander " We are under attack sir"
In 1 ear i hear Bernard hollaring "Balz sez they only have popguns at this stage of the war don't worry about them"...in the other ear i'm hearing "we are taking damage sir"
I grab bernards binocs and do a quick survay, i quickly realize i have sailed right into a gauntlet as shells are raining on us from no less than 6 different merchants inside 3500 meters 3 of them inside 1200 "Periscope depth" i bellow as hull integrity drops below 50% Fire tubes 1 and 3 i order after locking onto a large merchant....."tube 3 still loading sir" i hear from the weapons officer,"fire tubes 2 and 4 then" i growl. "Tube 4 still loading sir" he responds. Ok lets at least slow them down i bark "fire tube 1" locking onto the other merchant i bellow "fire tube 2"! A few seconds later i hear the 1st torpedo explode prematurely...."torpedo missed" Bernard giggles. Ignoring him i bellow "fire tubes 5 and 6" having locked onto the 3rd large merchant. "Rudder full to port, ahead slow, dive to 25 meters" i order. We need to get out of gun range and reload torpedoes i explain to Bernard who is munching on some old stale potato chips. "Torpedo Impact" i hear 3 times then "she is going down" echoes twice. The convoy creeps ahead to a distance of about 8000 meters before i bring us to the surface. "Get those last 3 eels down" i order and grab Bernards binocs again since was just looking at cloud formations again to verify the convoys course. "Ship spotted" i hear from a deckhand. It seems 1 small passenger/cargo had stopped when we 1st made contact and was just sitting stationary in the water. "Thats curious" i exclaim wondering why he would just stop "lets take a look.... ahead slow" i commanded. "I bet she has precious cargo and was hoping we would follow the large fish" i proclaim. " I hope its as good as your stuff sir" i hear Bernard mutter. I hand bernard his binocs back and start plotting my torpedo attck for this sitting duck when i hear Bernard proclaim "it must be an aircraft carrier sir" I really must remember to lock my stash i'm thinking as i climb the ladder back up to the conning tower. I peer into the uzo and to my amazement i see 2 nice new hurricanes strapped to the deck of this tiny ship. "The winds are dying down sir" says Bernard."gun crew to the deck" i order. "we only have 2 shells" Bernard proclaims. "there is only 2 planes on board" i bark back. At 1500 meters i fire a torpedo, and bark"fire at will aiming for waterline"....my gunner promply shoots the 2 planes blowing them right off the deck....."close enough" i mutter. "ahead full, mark course for 060" I bellow. "we got 4 eels left and a convoy to catch"

Only thing U-420 caught from there was more shells as she was unable to get close enough after submerging to avoid being sunk and not enough battery power left.
She is limping home at 34% hull integrity but 41000 tons in the bank and new found knowledge that ships are heavily armed much earlier in the war than anticipated.:rotfl: