Peter Cszhech

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kapitanleutnant Peter Cszhech (?–October 24, 1943) was the second commander of the German submarine U-505, which was captured by the U.S. Navy. He is notorious for being the only known German officer to commit suicide in battle during World War II.^{[citation needed]}

U-505's first and very successful commander was Kapitanleutnant Axel Löwe, who was relieved for illness in October 1942. Löwe was replaced by Cszhech, a veteran U-boat officer, who served for a year as watch officer in U-124. Cszhech was a "hard" commander, ambitious in his first command, indifferent to the morale of his men, and bad-tempered.

On November 11, 1942, a month into her first war patrol under Cszhech, U-505 was heavily damaged by air attack in the Caribbean Sea. The deck guns were torn from the boat and the hull was breached. Cszhech ordered his men to abandon ship but his officers refused and managed to keep her afloat.^{[citation needed]} She became the most heavily damaged U-boat to return to port.^{[citation needed]}

U-505 returned to Lorient on December 12. Repairs took six months. Then when Cszhech took her to sea, mechanical failures forced him to turn back for repairs after only a few days. This happened six more times, usually due to sabotage by French dockyard workers in the Resistance.

On October 10, 1943 U-505 finally got to sea. But after only 14 days, she came under depth charge attack from an Allied destroyer. Cszhech broke down and committed suicide by shooting himself in the head. His second-in-command, Oberleutnant Paul Meyer, took command, escaped from the attack and returned the boat to port.

Cszhech’s collapse devastated the morale of U-505’s crew. But Grossadmiral Karl Doenitz did not break up the crew, fearing the effect on fleet morale if the story spread. Thus when U-505 was attacked on her next patrol, the crew panicked almost at once. The captain surfaced and abandoned ship, leading to U-505’s capture.