Some scenes from Type IXB U-124's first war patrol, under Lt z. S. Friedrich Gunter, thirty-two days at sea, September to October 1940.

Our first victim was a large and heavily-armed merchantman sailing independently, sunk in a submerged torpedo attack. Our second was a freighter in a large and well-defended convoy, hit by one of a fan of three eels fired from outside the ring of escorts in a daylight submerged attack.



The convoy included this S Class submarine...



...and the new, super-detailed Flower Class Corvette model that's now included in GWX OneAlex Edition.





U-124 survived the counterattack...



... but lost contact with the convoy. We then ran into this tanker, which we hit with one of two torpedoes. She was unarmed but the seas were too rough to man the deck guns.



We dived under her to bring our stern tubes to bear...



...but after that, every torpedo fired was a miss, most apparently running under her without exploding, regardless of torpedo type and depth setting.



Having wasted all but out external reloads on her, and being unable to reload these in the heavy weather, we had to let her go.



When we finally left the stormy weather behind and started bringing in the external reloads, we were attacked by a pair of Swordfish, likely from a nearby carrier. Our flak was manned but ineffective and we were bombed and strafed, badly damaged in the bows and unable to submerge or increase speed. All we could do was turn slowly while I struggled to get the flak into action.



The Swordfish departed after expending their bombs, leaving us with a wrecked bow, flooding forward and all four bow tubes destroyer.



Repairs stopped the flooding but the pressure hull was damaged, leaving us able only able to crawl along at 3-4 knots on the surface. It was a long and tense few days getting back to Lorient. And when we got there, more aircraft - the place was under attack!



Fortunately, the RAF was concentrating on shipping in the harbour and left us alone. We were never so pleased to see the welcoming party on a quayside it looked like we would never see again!

What a struggle Good going 33 Lima