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Updated live from Wikipedia, last check: June 02, 2012 08:12 UTC (48 seconds ago)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other ships of the same name, see German submarine U-47.
U-47 returns to port after sinking HMS Royal Oak. The battlecruiser Scharnhorst is in the background
October 1939. U-47 returns to port after sinking HMS Royal Oak. The battlecruiser Scharnhorst is seen in the background.
Career (Nazi Germany)
Name: U-47
Ordered: 21 November 1936
Builder: Germaniawerft, Kiel
Yard number: 582
Laid down: 27 February 1937
Launched: 29 October 1938
Commissioned: 17 December 1938
Fate: Disappeared, 7 March 1941, in the North Atlantic near the Rockall Bank and Trough.
General characteristics
Type: VIIB
Displacement: 761 metric tons (749 long tons)
865 metric tons (851 long tons) submerged
Propulsion: 2 × 1400 PS (1 MW) diesel engines
2 × 375 PS (280 kW) electric motors
Speed: 17 knots (31 km/h) surfaced
7.6 knots (14.1 km/h) submerged
Range: 6,500 nautical miles (12,000 km)
Crew: 47
Armament: 4 × bow torpedo tubes, 1 × stern torpedo tube
88 mm gun, Oerlikon 20 mm cannon
Service record
Part of: Kriegsmarine
7. Unterseebootsflottille
Identification codes: M 18 837
Commanders: Günther Prien
Operations: 10 patrols
Victories: 30 ships sunk for a total of 162,769 gross register tons (GRT)
1 warship sunk for a total of 29,150 tons
8 ships damaged for a total of 62,751 GRT

German submarine U-47 was a Type VIIB U-boat of the German Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was laid down on 25 February 1937 at Krupp Germaniawerft in Kiel and went into service on 17 December 1938.[1]

Contents

Service history

Conning tower art

U-47 carried out ten combat patrols and spent a total of 238 days at sea. She sank 30 enemy merchant ships (totalling 164,953 tons) and damaged eight more. She did lose a crewman, Heinrich Mantyk, who went overboard on 5 September 1940.

U-47 went missing on 7 March 1941 and was once thought to have been sunk by the British destroyer HMS Wolverine west of Ireland, but it turned out that the ship attacked there was actually the U-A, part of the Foreign U-Boats corps. To date, there is no official record of what happened to the U-47 or her 45 crewmen, though a variety of possibilities exist, including mines, a mechanical failure, a victim of her own torpedoes, or possibly a later attack that did not confirm any kills, by the corvette team of HMS Camellia and HMS Arbutus.

Sinking of HMS Royal Oak

U-47 became famous when, on 14 October 1939, under the command of Günther Prien, she managed to enter the base of the British home fleet at Scapa Flow through a hole in the defence line, and sank the battleship HMS Royal Oak, which was in Scapa Flow in a largely unprepared state, although World War II had recently begun.

A model of Günther Prien's U-47, German WWII Type VII diesel-electric hunter

U-47's first two salvos did nothing more than sever an anchor chain. After reloading the bow tubes the last salvo of three torpedoes struck the Royal Oak causing severe flooding. Taking on a list of 15 degrees, her open portholes were submerged worsening the flooding and increasing the list to 45 degrees; she sank within 15 minutes with the loss of over 800 men.

Many years later, in September 2002, one of the unexploded torpedoes that the U-47 had fired off-course during the attack on Royal Oak rose to the surface from its resting place at the bottom. The unexploded torpedo, minus its warhead, gradually drifted towards the shore, where it was spotted by a crewman aboard the Norwegian tanker Petrotrym. A Royal Navy tugboat intercepted the torpedo, and after identifying it as belonging to the U-47 63 years earlier, EOD personnel detonated it a mile from shore.

Raiding career

Date Ship Nationality Tonnage Fate
5 September 1939 SS Bosnia Belgian 2,407 Sunk
6 September 1939 SS Rio Claro British 4,086 Sunk
7 September 1939 SS Gartavon British 1,777 Sunk
14 October 1939 HMS Royal Oak British 29,150 Sunk
5 December 1939 SS Novasota British 8,795 Sunk
6 December 1939 MV Britta Norwegian 6,214 Sunk
7 December 1939 MV Tajandoen Dutch 8,159 Sunk
25 March 1940 SS Britta Danish 1,146 Sunk
14 June 1940 SS Balmoralwood British 5,834 Sunk
21 June 1940 SS San Fernando British 13,056 Sunk
24 June 1940 SS Cathrine Panamanian 1,885 Sunk
27 June 1940 SS Lenda Norwegian 4,005 Sunk
27 June 1940 SS Leticia Dutch 2,580 Sunk
29 June 1940 SS Empire Toucan British 4,421 Sunk
30 June 1940 SS Georgios Kyriakides Greek 4,201 Sunk
2 July 1940 SS Arandora Star British 15,501 Sunk
2 September 1940 SS Ville de Mons Belgian 7,463 Sunk
4 September 1940 SS Titan British 9,035 Sunk
7 September 1940 SS Neptunian British 5,155 Sunk
7 September 1940 SS Jose de Larrinaga British 5,303 Sunk
7 September 1940 SS Gro Norwegian 4,211 Sunk
9 September 1940 SS Possidon Greek 3,840 Sunk
21 September 1940 SS Elmbank British 5,156 Damaged
19 October 1940 SS Bilderdijk Dutch 6,856 Sunk
19 October 1940 MV Shirak Belgian 6,023 Damaged
19 October 1940 SS Wandby British 4,947 Sunk
20 October 1940 SS La Estancia British 5,185 Sunk
20 October 1940 SS Whitford Point British 5,026 Sunk
20 October 1940 MV Athelmonarch British 8,995 Damaged
2 December 1940 SS Ville d'Arlon Belgian 7,555 Sunk
2 December 1940 MV Conch British 8,376 Damaged
26 February 1941 SS Kasongo Belgian 5,254 Sunk
26 February 1941 MV Diala British 8,106 Damaged
26 February 1941 MV Rydboholm Swedish 3,197 Sunk
26 February 1941 MV Borgland Norwegian 3,636 Sunk
28 February 1941 SS Holmlea British 4,233 Sunk
The crew of the U-47

U-47 had a crew of 47 officers and men during her fated North Atlantic patrol in the spring of 1941, all of whom are presumed dead.

References

  1. ^ U-Boat Operations

External links

See also








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