Of course, we also felt an equal level of contempt for Zschech, who just stood there watching with smiling approval as his lap dog meted-out this abuse. It also brought back to mind the poor wounded Petty Officer who, by all rights, should have been here to receive his submarine badge, too. My God, how we missed our old skipper Löwe, who was so generous with praise and rewards for those who had earned them!
In all fairness to the Exec, however, he eventually did mature as an officer. Some thought it was the unity of our reaction to the awards ceremony incident that finally made him change. Others thought he finally realized that Zschech’s method of command-by-fear didn’t work as well as leading by example. Whatever it was, in the following months Thilo Bode gradually transformed from a martinet into an officer men could have confidence in. Certainly his attitude toward discipline made a 180-degree turn! By the time he transferred off our boat, he recognized us for the tough and able crew we knew we were. He even wrote us a letter to that effect. “If I ever become the skipper of a boat,” he explained, “I hope I have a crew that demonstrates the same pluck and courage that you have.”
We were gratified Bode finally came around to our way of thinking—that it was sweat and blood that win wars, not spit and polish. Unfortunately, unlike the Exec, Zschech was unable to overcome his personal demons before it was too late.
Soon after the war, an amateur historian took the side of Zschech in all of this. He expressed the opinion that Sillcock’s bombing attack had cracked our morale and that we had lost the ability to fight or obey orders. He suggested that Zschech and his Exec were only trying to restore discipline and that it would have been better to split up our crew and distribute us to other boats. This so-called historian would have been better off using his common sense instead of using his fingers to hammer out such groundless nonsense! Sure, we were disappointed we had not returned to Lorient with more victory pennants flying from our conning tower. Of course we would bend the rules to have a bit of fun when in port. But none of that mattered when we went into combat. To suggest we had lost the will to fight or were anything less than a first rate crew is absolutely absurd. Such fairy tales are based on ignorance and pity for what happened to Zschech, rather than the facts as I personally know them to be.
After the awards ceremony, we were given permission to go into town on liberty until 2200 hours that night. Of course, we had no intention of returning by the appointed hour because we had discovered secret routes that would allow us to sneak back into base undetected any time we wanted. Before we left, however, we had to leave our bunks looking like someone was sleeping in them. By using a steel helmet, a few bundles of rolled-up clothing, and a pair of shoes, it was easy. Our bunks thus prepared, we stuffed some money into our pockets and strode out the gate, eager to shower our girlfriends with our accumulated pay and pent-up passion.
Once outside the base, we were shocked to see the utter devastation the British bombers had visited upon the city center of Lorient. Whole sections of the town were nothing but dusty piles of rubble. We walked wide-eyed through the desolate streets, surrounded by absolute silence save for the crunching of stone and broken glass beneath our shoes.
A few blocks from our favorite district, however, we were surprised and heartened to hear the familiar strains of saxophone music echoing faintly in the distance. Sure enough, it was still there: our favorite entertainment district had miraculously escaped damage! All around were hundreds of beautiful girls in colorful dresses. The air was filled with the sweet scents of perfume and exotic cocktails, making the street seem like a magical kind of garden. The girls, of course, were the lovely, fragrant flowers of this garden, waiting to be plucked by us lonely sailors.
The military police, as usual, were also out in force. They walked in pairs, wearily eyeing us as we passed. They knew, as well as we did, that we would be brawling with them before the night was through. A crew on its first night of leave needs to blow-off a lot of steam, and there was no better way to do that than to get into a good fight with the Chained Dogs.
First, though, we needed some drinks and a little taste of female companionship. We couldn’t wait to show our favorite girls our shiny new medals, so we split-up into small groups, promising to rendezvous later that afternoon. The ladies were certainly happy to see us, especially since we had plenty of money and more than enough will to spend it.
Inside my favorite house, the Madam at the reception desk greeted me by name. With a wide smile on her face, she helped me off with my heavy, gray leather coat and bade me enter. I tossed my fur cap through the air and scored a perfect hit on the hook on the wall…surely a sign of good luck! In the blink of an eye, I had a drink in my hand and a pretty girl on my lap.
When I asked about Jeanette, however, the Madam told me that she had quit without notice and left town. I was stunned by the news. I pushed the girl off my lap and began drinking. The more drinks I had, the more angry I got about her leaving without saying goodbye. How could I have been so wrong about her feelings? How could I have been so foolish?
After a while, with much encouragement from my buddies, I found consolation in the arms of another young woman who said she had always liked me. I didn’t believe that for a minute, but it was a nice gesture designed to get me over my hurt and disappointment.
A couple of hours later, we stumbled out of the house into the painfully bright light of the afternoon sun. Our faces were covered with lipstick, rouge…and very broad smiles. Despite my clown’s face, however, I still felt a deep, lingering ache inside because of Jeanette.
As a group of us ambled toward another favored haunt, air raid warning sirens began to wail. Combat-seasoned (not to mention, very drunk) warriors such as we felt total contempt for the enemy bombers. After all, if Sillcock’s bombs couldn’t hurt us, what could a few dozen high-flying bombers do?
Even when the naval base’s anti-aircraft batteries commenced to fire, we refused to seek shelter. Indeed, we didn’t even quicken our pace when bombs began hitting the vicinity of our barracks. In our tipsy state, the action intrigued us, but it somehow seemed distant and unreal…like the combat newsreels we watched in the cinemas.
As we entered the town’s central square, however, we were slapped out of our complacency by the sharp crack of a 37mm Flak gun opening fire from the roof of the adjacent six-story building. For such a small gun to be firing meant that the enemy bombers were very close indeed. Suddenly, we realized that a rolling carpet of exploding bombs was heading directly towards us.
Windows began to rattle and break as the literally earth-shaking wave of explosions came closer and closer. All thoughts of nonchalance were forgotten as we sprinted for the main air raid shelter in the central square. It was a large underground bunker, built to accommodate three or four hundred people. We ran down the flight of 20 stairs to the shelter entrance, only to have the big iron door slam shut and lock in our faces. We were too late! There was nothing for us to do except crouch in the corners of the stairwell and await our fate.
The shaking of the ground became more violent. The concussion from each deafening blast felt like a punch to the chest. I curled up as tightly as I could into a fetal position in a desperate attempt to make as small a target as possible. The tension was excruciating as the line of thundering blasts approached the shelter entrance.
Then came four or five blasts that were virtually on top of us. We were stunned to the very edge of unconsciousness by the violence of the concussions. Miraculously, we were not struck by any bomb splinters, though for several minutes we could see nothing because of the dust and smoke. When we finally recovered our senses, we realized that the curtain of explosions was past us and heading away.
We were determined to get some cover over our heads, but no amount of pleading or pounding would convince the occupants of the shelter to open the door for us. Animal fear finally took over and we decided to make a run for it. Someone suggested we take cover in the building with the flak gun; perhaps the presence of
the gun would make the bombers veer around us. We reckoned that we had a minute or so before the next group of bombers arrived, so on the count of three, we ran up the shelter stairs to the ruined streets above.
Debris was everywhere. Scattered here and there, dazed survivors wandered senselessly about. Blood streamed from their noses and ears, their mouths frozen wide open in silent screams.
We quickly made our way through the nightmarish scenery back to the tall building with the rooftop flak gun. The pressure from a bomb blast had smashed the entrance door inwards, so we entered without hesitation. We were familiar with 37mm guns, so rather than quiver like frightened children on the ground floor, we decided to climb the stairs to the roof and assist the gunners.
We were about half way up when we heard the unmistakable sound of heavy bombers droning overhead, interspersed with frantic bursts of fire from the flak gun on the roof. Before we could say a word, the entire building shook with a deafening roar. A bomb had hit the top of the building, collapsing one entire exterior wall and sending a landslide of smoke, dust, and debris thundering down our stairwell.
The gunners were surely in need of help, so we clamored over the piles of wood and plaster clogging the stairwell up to the top of the building. When we got to the roof, we could see that a bomb had scored an almost direct hit on the little anti-aircraft position. We heard a soft groan and found one man still alive, covered from head to foot in blood. The other gunners were nowhere to be found; they must have been blown to pieces or thrown off the top of the building by the force of the explosion.
As gently as we could, my buddy Willi and I carried the injured man down the stairs. When we reached the ground floor, Willi suddenly dropped the man’s legs. When I turned around to see what the trouble was, I saw Willi frozen in terror, staring saucer-eyed at the biggest bomb I had ever seen in my life. It was a giant monster, its bent tail fins sticking straight out of a pile of rubble. The memory of that sight still chills my blood to this day.
We knew that the British often dropped bombs that appeared to be duds, but were actually time bombs with the detonation times on the fuses purposely calculated to kill firemen and rescue workers sifting through the rubble for survivors. Willi and I didn’t want to wait around to find out if it was one of those. We carried the wounded man as quickly as possible out of the building and into the relative safety of the main square. We knew that the big air raid shelter had a medic assigned to it, so we headed back there.
On the way, we passed an old Catholic church. Twenty minutes ago it had been a beautiful landmark, one of my favorites in all of Lorient. Now it was nothing but a smoking shell of a building. It angered me that nothing was to be left sacred in this war. I cursed the unholy alliance between the British capitalists and the Russian communists, whose brutal determination to conquer Germany and incorporate it into their empires was bringing such destruction to Europe.
We handed the wounded gunner over to the shelter medic and headed back to our barracks. The streets of Lorient looked like one of those medieval paintings of the underworld. Deep craters pockmarked the roads and there were burning houses all around. The air was filled with a hellish symphony of ambulance sirens and the frightened cries of women and children.
With the sounding of the “All Clear” siren, the streets suddenly filled with thousands of panicky civilians. Military policemen shouted and gestured angrily at the crowds, helpless to restore order or prevent looting. Soon, dozens of horse-drawn carts appeared on the streets, piled high with family members and their worldly possessions. Weeks ago, the RAF had dropped leaflets on the city, warning the civilians to evacuate. It appeared now that these civilians were finally ready to heed the advice.
We arrived back at our barracks compound a little while later, covered from head to foot with dust and soot. The sour-faced guards at the gate scrutinized our identity papers more carefully than usual. We were surprised to find the harbor area totally undamaged. Apparently, the bombing attack had not been targeted at our U-boat base at all. Rather, the British seemed to be deliberately taking aim at the civilian population of Lorient, presumably to deprive us of our shipyard workforce.
Once we got back to our barracks, we were relieved to find that everyone in our crew had survived the bombing raid more or less intact. We spent the next few hours drinking Cognac and telling each other of our experiences during the attack. Our drunken conclusion: we had met old friends, fraternized with the Mademoiselles, had a bit of excitement, and none of us got seriously hurt. In sum, a very good first day in port!
The tension of the day finally caught up with me and I slept very soundly that night. The next morning, half the crew was allowed to go on furlough. For the rest of us, it was more infantry training. Luckily, the bombers did not visit us again. When we returned to the barracks that afternoon, construction was well underway on two large air raid bunkers next to our billets.
Naturally, we again spent the evening in downtown Lorient. Amazingly, the entertainment district was once again carrying on as if there had never been an air raid. Music, girls, brawling with the military police—nothing had changed! The same was true for us; the horrors we had witnessed the previous day seemed like distant, ancient history.
Security was tighter than usual, so we all got back to the barracks on time that night. Sometime after midnight, I was awakened from a deep slumber by the ear-splitting scream of air raid sirens. Almost immediately, our base anti-aircraft batteries began a furious barrage at the unseen intruders. We didn’t move an inch out of our warm bunks except to try to drown out the sirens with our pillows.
A moment later, the boy on barracks watch came down the hallway yelling, “Everyone go down to Bunker Number One! Hurry, U-505 crew, out! OUT!”
Still, we would not budge. The five minutes of silence that followed the first flurry of fire seemed to vindicate our feeling that we were not in any danger. Then, suddenly, three or four extremely large bombs exploded right next to our barracks. The whole building shook crazily with the force of the blasts. We didn’t need the barracks watch to get us out of bed now! We grabbed our stuff and ran toward the stairs.
As we approached the stairwell, a bomb hit the corner of our building. The lights went out and the air was filled with choking dust and the sounds of heavy falling rubble. The stairs that we had intended to use to evacuate the building were no longer there. Nevertheless, bombs were still falling and we were desperate to get out of the building, fast! We dropped our sea bags down the shaft of the stairwell to form a sort of cushion, then jumped.
It was bright as day outside of our barracks because of all of the burning buildings around us. We ran like greyhounds to the entrance of Bunker Number One. A man was holding the door of the bunker open, screaming at the top of his lungs at us.
“You assholes! Hurry up, because we’re closing the doors right now!”
We emerged from the bunker the next morning to find that the entire barracks complex had been reduced to a pile of smoking rubble. Buses brought us and the other U-boat crews to our new barracks at Lager Lemp, a former physical rehabilitation camp about eight kilometers east of Lorient. We spent the rest of the morning moving into our new billets. In the afternoon, we were ordered to return to U-505 for maintenance duties.
While we were all having so much fun, boat was moved. She was now tied-up at the Keroman repair docks on the other side of the city. Since the regular longboat service only went to the submarine pens, my buddy Willi and I decided to walk to the boat. Our route took us through Lorient, or rather, what was left of it. About a half-kilometer from the pens, with no warning from the air raid sirens, the anti-aircraft guns began to fire. Sure enough, there were the bombers again, dropping their deadly eggs and heading straight for us.
Close to us, perhaps 25 meters away, was an old French cemetery surrounded by a tall stone wall. Yesterday’s air raid had blown a large hole in the wall fairly close to us, which instantaneously gave Willi and me the same idea. Without a word ne
eding to be said, we sprinted through the breach and into the graveyard. We gave the place a quick looking over, then jumped into a large crater for extra cover.
Bombs began hitting all around us, so Willi and I instinctively huddled for protection on either side of a stone coffin that had been partially unearthed by one of the previous day’s bombs. After a few moments, we noticed that the coffin’s marble cover had been dislodged. Peeking inside, we found ourselves staring into the hollow eye sockets of the coffin occupant’s skull. The man had apparently been a naval officer, judging from the dark tattered uniform he wore. Confirmation came from a brass plaque on the casket’s cover which identified him as a French Capitain de Fregatte [sic: Fregate Joigniere].
We crouched next to our silent host, the good Capitain, for what seemed to us like an eternity. Sailors are naturally a superstitious lot. To us the situation was a clear premonition of death. As soon as the bomb blasts began moving away from us, Willi and I looked at each other and nodded. “Raus hier!”
With that, we ran nonstop to the U-boat bunkers. With a seven-meter thick concrete roof over our heads, we finally felt safe. Other members of our crew were quite relieved to see us, for they assumed we had been killed in the raid because of the rain of bombs that had fallen along our planned route.
All of the excitement was over within an hour. It was good to be close to the U-boat bunkers, where we felt so secure from the enemy bombs. When our comrades began returning from leave, however, we began to hear firsthand of the terrible agony being inflicted by the bombers on our families back home. Our reaction? A greater determination than ever to send the enemy’s ships to the bottom of the sea, where their cargoes of airplanes and bombs could do no harm.
We slept aboard U-505 that night, but for the next month, Lager Lemp was to be our home. Crews from both the Second and Tenth U-boat Flotillas were to be housed there. We weren’t very happy about the situation, but the army soldiers stationed in the area liked it even less. For one thing, there was only one small town in the vicinity, Pont Scorf. Soon all of the Army’s favorite pubs and bistros were overflowing with sailors. Adding insult to injury, the few mademoiselles in Pont Scorf clearly preferred us U-boat men over ordinary infantry. Nonetheless, I began to spend more time in the U-bootsheim recreation center because, unlike Lorient, there wasn’t much entertainment to be found in the little town.
Steel Boat, Iron Hearts Page 14