Bernard Spots Two Ships (Balz)

[Brag]

Lt. Hegeman writes:

03 February 1941
We have been a month at sea and other than pursuing a convoy in fog and rain, which yielded 25,000 BRT at great risk to us, nothing has happened. Like a caged gorilla, Balz sat on the chart box and picked imaginary lint from his tea cozy.

At dawn, Bernard yelled, "Shiff gesichted." A few seconds later, he shouted, "Zwei Shiffen gesichted. One behind the other. The second ship is following the first ship and the first ship is in front of the second ship. The second ship is on the same course as the first ship."

"Mache deine klappe zu," Balz said as he came to the bridge. "An Empire freighter followed by a torpedo-eating bastard passenger/cargo."

"Yes," Bernard said. "The Empire freighter is in front of the Passenger cargo, who is behind the Empire freighter. And the--.

"Shut orrfff." Balz growled. "Sehror tiefe. New heading two seven zero."
At periscope depth, Balz called out the data for the TDC.
"Are we hitting the front ship first because it is ahead of the second one?" Bernard asked.
"No, we're hitting the first ship because it is first. Number on stays number one. Alles klar?"

"So the second one is number two because it is behind number one?"
"No. We're hitting number two because he's second in line."
Balz twirled his tea cozy on his head and the choir began singing the Torpedo Loss Hoochie-woochie song.

The first torpedo hit into hold number one of the Empire freighter, which began sinking immediately.

The miserable passenger/freighter required two torpedoes to sink.
Bernard asked, "How come we used one torpedo on the larger than the smaller ship and two torpedoes on the smaller than the larger ship?

Balz slapped the tea cozy on the chart table. "Because number two gets two torpedoes. Two torpedoes and number two ship add to four, you imbecile. Alles klar? That's hoochie woochie."