Unterseeboot 20
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Unterseeboot 20 (U-20) has been the designation of three submarines of the German Navy.
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[edit] First World War
The first U-20 was launched on December 18, 1912, and commissioned into the Kaiserliche Marine on August 5, 1913. During World War I, she took part in operations around the British Isles.
On May 7, 1915, U-20 was patrolling off the southern coast of Ireland under the command of Kapitänleutnant Walther Schwieger. Three months earlier, on February 4, the Germans had established a submarine blockade around the UK and had declared any vessel in it a legitimate target.
At about 1:40pm Schwieger saw a vessel approaching through his periscope. From a distance of about 700 m Schwieger noted that she had four funnels and two masts making her a liner of some sort. He recognised her as the RMS Lusitania, a vessel in the British Fleet Reserve, and fired a single torpedo. The torpedo struck on the starboard side, almost directly below the bridge. Following the torpedo's explosion, the liner was shattered by a second explosion, possibly caused by coal dust, or by munitions in the hold, so huge that Schwieger himself was surprised. The Lusitania sank rapidly (in not more than 25 minutes) with the loss of nearly 1,200 lives, among them 128 Americans.
Fifteen minutes after he had fired his torpedo, Kptlt. Schwieger noted in his war diary:
- "It looks as if the ship will stay afloat only for a very short time. [I gave order to] dive to 25 metres and leave the area seawards. I couldn't have fired another torpedo into this mass of humans desperately trying to save themselves."
There was at the time, and remains a great controversy about the sinking. Not only over whether the rules of engagement permitted Schwieger to attack and whether Lusitania was smuggling contraband war material to England, but also over minutiae such as the number of torpedoes Schwieger fired. The controversy is covered under RMS Lusitania.
Before he got back to the docks at Wilhelmshaven for refuelling and resupply, the United States had formally protested to Berlin against the brutality of his action.
The Kaiser wrote in the margins of the American note: "Utterly impertinent" and "outrageous" and "this is the most insolent thing in tone and bearing that I have had to read since the Japanese note last August." Nevertheless, to keep America out of the war, in June the Kaiser was compelled to rescind the unrestricted submarine warfare order and require that all passenger liners be left unmolested.
On September 4, 1915 Schwieger was back at sea with U20, eighty five miles off the Fastnet Rock in the south Irish Sea. This rock held one of the key navigational markers in the western ocean, the Fastnet Lighthouse, and any ships passing in and out of the Irish Sea, would be within visual contact of it.
The RMS Hesperian was now beginning a new run outward bound from Liverpool to Quebec and Montreal, with a general cargo, also doubling as a hospital ship, and carrying about 800 passengers.
She was attacked off the Fastnet, a landmark islet in the north Atlantic, off the south-west coast of Ireland. The "History of the Great War: The Merchant Navy, Vol. II", by Hurd, reads:
- "Only a few days before, Count Bernsdorff, the German Ambassador, had assured the United States government that passenger liners will not be sunk without warning and without ensuring the safety of the non combatants aboard providing that the liners do not try to escape or offer resistance."
This time, Schwieger was received with official disgust upon his return to Wilhelmshaven. Ordered to report to Berlin to explain himself, he was required to apologise for having sunk another passenger liner in defiance of a direct order not to do so again. He complained about his treatment in Berlin thereafter.
On 4 November 1916 U-20 grounded herself on the Danish coast. Her crew blew her up the following day.
After his death in 1917, Schwieger was forgiven in Berlin. He received Germany's highest decoration: For Merit, having sunk by that time 190,000 tons of ships.
Clive Cussler claims his National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA) located the remains of the WWI-era U-20 in 1984 [1]
[edit] Second World War
The second U-20 was a Type IIB submarine of the Kriegsmarine. Her keel was laid down August 1, 1935 by Germaniawerft, of Kiel. She was commissioned on February 1, 1936. During the Second World War, she conducted operations against enemy shipping. U-20 went on 17 patrols, sinking 16 ships totalling 39,637 tons and damaging one more of 1,846 tons. On June 26, 1943, U-20 was attacked with depth charges in the Black Sea by a convoy escort. The damage was such that she had to return to base. She was scuttled on September 10, 1944 in the Black Sea off the coast of Turkey.
She did not suffer any casualties to her crew during her career. She had numerous commanding officers over her eight-year career:
- February 1936 - September 1937: Kapitänleutnant Hans Eckermann
- October, 1937 - January, 1940: Kptlt. Karl-Heinz Moehle
- January, 1940 - April, 1940: Kptlt. Harro von Klot-Heydenfeldt
- April, 1940 - June, 1940: Oberleutnant zur See Hans-Jürgen Zetzsche
- June, 1940 - January, 1941: Oblt. Ottokar Paulshen
- January, 1941 - May, 1941: Kptlt. Herbert Schauenburg
- May, 1941 - December, 1941: Oblt. Wolfgang Sträter
- December, 1941 - March, 1942: Kptlt. Kurt Nölke
- March, 1942 - May, 1942: none
- May, 1942 - September, 1942: Oblt. Clemens Schöler
- September, 1942 - May, 1943: none
- May, 1943 - October, 1943: Kptlt. Clemens Schöler
- November, 1943 - September, 1944: Oblt. Karl Grafen
[edit] Cold War
The third U-20 was a class 206/206A submarine of the Bundesmarine of the Federal Republic of Germany. She had the NATO designation S-199. U-20 entered service on the 24 May 1974 and served until 26 September 1996.
See Also: List of U-boats
