Did I hit a mine?

[atleiker]

April 3, 1940

I was assigned to patrol AN11 and did so. I bagged a tramp steamer and after 48 hours decided to make my way SE to patrol AN55, north of Hartlepool before heading home. I had been to sea for 16 days at this point.

I was ahead slow at 25 meters in 70 meters of water and picked up a merchant so steered west to intercept. Having some time to kill I speed up to 32x to kill off the hour or so needed to get within periscope range.

It was at this point in 32x that suddenly we sank to 70 meters with all kinds of reports coming in of damage and heavy flooding. I came out of TC as fast as I could and started assigning damage control. We couldn't control the flooding and perished.

Of course I never heard anything because of the TC.

Did I hit a mine? We were closer to shore than the last patrols in the area, but not close to shore, still at least 100km or so away. I was in the high traffic lane from Hartlepool going NW though.

Had I been in 1x would I have heard the impact of the mine?

Are mines visable in external views?


Thanks,

Ted