German submarine U-140 (1940)
| Career (Nazi Germany) |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | U-140 |
| Ordered: | 25 September 1939 |
| Builder: | Deutsche Werke, Kiel |
| Laid down: | 16 November 1939 |
| Launched: | 28 June 1940 |
| Commissioned: | 7 August 1940 |
| Fate: | Scuttled, 2 May 1945 |
| General characteristics [1] | |
| Class and type: | IID |
| Type: | Coastal submarine |
| Displacement: | 314 t (309 long tons) surfaced 364 t (358 long tons) submerged |
| Length: | 43.97 m (144 ft 3 in) |
| Beam: | 4.92 m (16 ft 2 in) |
| Draft: | 3.93 m (12 ft 11 in) |
| Propulsion: | 2 × propeller shafts 2 × MWM four-stroke diesel engines, 700 shp (520 kW) 2 × Siemens-Schuckert electric motor, 410 shp (310 kW) |
| Speed: | 12.7 knots (23.5 km/h; 14.6 mph) surfaced 7.4 knots (13.7 km/h; 8.5 mph) submerged |
| Range: | 3,450 nautical miles (6,390 km; 3,970 mi) at 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph) surfaced 56 nmi (104 km; 64 mi) at 4 knots (7.4 km/h; 4.6 mph) submerged |
| Test depth: | 80 m (260 ft) |
| Complement: | 3 officers, 22 men |
| Armament: |
|
| Service record | |
|---|---|
| Part of: |
Kriegsmarine: |
| Commanders: |
|
| Operations: | One patrol |
| Victories: |
Three ships sunk for a total of 13,204 GRT One submarine sunk for a total of 206 tons |
German submarine U-140 was a Type IID U-boat of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. She carried out only one combat patrol, but still managed to see action as a training boat in the summer of 1941. Built at the Kiel shipyards during 1939 and 1940, as a Type IID U-boat, she was too small for major operational work in the Atlantic Ocean, which was now required by the Kriegsmarine as the Battle of the Atlantic expanded.
War patrol
U-140 only carried out one raiding patrol, under her first captain, Hans-Peter Hinsch. He took her round the north of Scotland in December 1940 following her work-up program, and it was here that she sank her first victim, twelve days into the voyage. Six days later north of Ireland, on 8 December she sank the steel 3-mast barque Penang of neutral Finland, inbound from Stenhouse Bay, South Australia to Cobh in neutral Ireland with a cargo of grain. The Penang and her 18 crew were all lost at 55°15′N 10°09′W / 55.25°N 10.15°W.[2] Later that day she heard the British freighter Ashcrest broadcast that she needed assistance as her rudder was broken, at 54°35′N 09°20′W / 54.583°N 9.333°W. U-140 sank Ashcrest with the loss of the entire crew of 37.[3]
She then headed home towards retirement. U-140 was docked, her crew transferred and she was converted into a training boat, designed to operate solely in the Baltic Sea, training submariners for the main U-boat force.
Training boat
It was during this onerous yet necessary duty that her new captain, Hans-Jürgen Hellriegel, found himself facing a small Soviet submarine on the surface, well into the Baltic, a month after the invasion of the Soviet Union. In a careful attack, U-140 torpedoed and sank her rival with his scratch crew of new recruits. Orders had been pushing U-140 further into the Baltic during the preceding months, with the hope that she might achieve just such a victory.
Following this excitement, U-140 returned to training duties, which she continued for the remainder of the war without further incident, save in the final months, when she was transferred to Wilhelmshaven in a general shipment of equipment and personnel to the West. It was there, on the 2 May 1945 in Jade Bay, that U-140 was scuttled by her crew to prevent her seizure by the advancing British forces. Post-war she was raised and scrapped.
Summary of raiding career
| Date | Ship | Nationality | Tonnage | Fate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 December 1940 | Victoria City |  United Kingdom |
4,739 | Sunk |
| 8 December 1940 | Penang |  Finland |
2,816 | Sunk |
| 8 December 1940 | Ashcrest | United Kingdom |
5,652 | Sunk |
| 21 July 1941 | Submarine M-94 |  Soviet Navy |
206 | Sunk |
References
- ↑ Gröner 1985, p. 67.
- ↑ Helgason, Guðmundur. "Penang". German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net. Retrieved 29 April 2010.
- ↑ Helgason, Guðmundur. "Ashcrest". German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net. Retrieved 29 April 2010.
Bibliography
- Busch, Rainer; Röll, Hans-Joachim (1999). Deutsche U-Boot-Verluste von September 1939 bis Mai 1945. Der U-Boot-Krieg (in German) IV (Hamburg, Berlin, Bonn: Mittler). ISBN 3-8132-0514-2.
- Gröner, Erich (1985). U-Boote, Hilfskreuzer, Minenschiffe, Netzleger, Sperrbrecher. Die deutschen Kriegsschiffe 1815-1945 (in German) III (Koblenz: Bernard & Graefe). ISBN 3-7637-4802-4.
- Sharpe, Peter (1998). U-Boat Fact File. Midland Publishing. ISBN 1-85780-072-9.
External links
- Hofmann, Markus. "U 140". Deutsche U-Boote 1935-1945 - u-boot-archiv.de (in German). Retrieved 30 January 2015.
- Helgason, Guðmundur. "The Type IID boat U-140". German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net. Retrieved 6 December 2014.
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