German submarine ''U-578'' was a

Type VIIC Type VII U-boats were the most common type of German World War II U-boat. 703 boats were built by the end of the war. The lone surviving example, , is on display at the Laboe Naval Memorial located in Laboe, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. Conc ...

U-boat of Nazi Germany's ''

Kriegsmarine The (, ) was the navy of Germany from 1935 to 1945. It superseded the Imperial German Navy of the German Empire (1871–1918) and the inter-war (1919–1935) of the Weimar Republic. The was one of three official branches, along with the a ...

'' during World War II. She carried out five patrols, sank four ships of and sank a warship of 1,090 tons. She was posted missing in the

Bay of Biscay The Bay of Biscay (), known in Spain as the Gulf of Biscay ( es, Golfo de Vizcaya, eu, Bizkaiko Golkoa), and in France and some border regions as the Gulf of Gascony (french: Golfe de Gascogne, oc, Golf de Gasconha, br, Pleg-mor Gwaskogn), ...

since 6 August 1942, with no explanation for her loss.

Design

German Type VIIC submarines were preceded by the shorter Type VIIB submarines. ''U-578'' had a displacement of when at the surface and while submerged. She had a total length of , a pressure hull length of , a

beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially localized grou ...

of , a height of , and a draught of . The submarine was powered by two Germaniawerft F46 four-stroke, six-cylinder

supercharged In an internal combustion engine, a supercharger compresses the intake gas, forcing more air into the engine in order to produce more power for a given displacement. The current categorisation is that a supercharger is a form of forced induct ...

diesel engines producing a total of for use while surfaced, two Brown, Boveri & Cie GG UB 720/8 double-acting electric motors producing a total of for use while submerged. She had two shafts and two

propeller A propeller (colloquially often called a screw if on a ship or an airscrew if on an aircraft) is a device with a rotating hub and radiating blades that are set at a pitch to form a helical spiral which, when rotated, exerts linear thrust upon ...

s. The boat was capable of operating at depths of up to . The submarine had a maximum surface speed of and a maximum submerged speed of . When submerged, the boat could operate for at ; when surfaced, she could travel at . ''U-578'' was fitted with five torpedo tubes (four fitted at the bow and one at the stern), fourteen torpedoes, one SK C/35 naval gun, 220 rounds, and a C/30 anti-aircraft gun. The boat had a complement of between forty-four and sixty.

Service history

The submarine was laid down on 1 August 1940 at

Blohm & Voss Blohm+Voss (B+V), also written historically as Blohm & Voss, Blohm und Voß etc., is a German shipbuilding and engineering company. Founded in Hamburg in 1877 to specialise in steel-hulled ships, its most famous product was the World War II battle ...

, Hamburg as yard number 554, launched on 15 May 1941 and commissioned on 10 July under the command of '' Fregattenkapitän'' Ernst-August Rehwinkel. She served with the

5th U-boat Flotilla The 5th U-boat Flotilla (German ''5. Unterseebootsflottille''), also known as Emsmann Flotilla, was a U-boat flotilla of Nazi Germany's ''Kriegsmarine'' during World War II. The flotilla was formed in December 1938 in Kiel under the command of '' ...

from 10 July 1941 and the 7th U-boat Flotilla for training from 1 September. She stayed with the latter organization for operations until her loss, from 1 October 1941 until 6 August 1942.

First and second patrols

''U-432''s first patrol was from

Kirkenes Kirkenes (; ; Skolt Sami: ''Ǩeârkknjargg;'' fi, Kirkkoniemi; ; russian: Киркенес) is a List of towns and cities in Norway, town in Sør-Varanger Municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, in the far northeastern part of Norway. The town ...

in Norway, she was rammed by a Soviet escort on 25 November 1941 off the Kola Peninsula; damage was slight. She arrived back at Kirkenes on the 27th. She then headed for the Atlantic Ocean via the gap separating the Faroe and

Shetland Islands Shetland, also called the Shetland Islands and formerly Zetland, is a subarctic archipelago in Scotland lying between Orkney, the Faroe Islands and Norway. It is the northernmost region of the United Kingdom. The islands lie about to the no ...

. She arrived at

St. Nazaire Saint-Nazaire (; ; Gallo: ''Saint-Nazère/Saint-Nazaer'') is a commune in the Loire-Atlantique department in western France, in traditional Brittany. The town has a major harbour on the right bank of the Loire estuary, near the Atlantic Ocean. T ...

in occupied France, on 28 January 1942.

Third patrol

Having left St. Nazaire on 3 February 1942, as part of Operation ''Drumbeat'', (U-boat operations off the eastern seaboard of the United States), ''U-578'' hit R.P. Resor on the 27th with a torpedo east of Manasquan Inlet, New Jersey. The tug attempted to take the ship in tow, but she capsized and sank 48 hours after the initial attack east of Barnegat, also New Jersey. The next day she sank the American destroyer . The 'four-stacker', completed in October 1919, was the first warship to be lost to enemy action in US waters.Gannon, Michael – ''Operation Drumbeat – the dramatic true story of Germany's first U-boat attacks along the American coast in World War II'', 1990, Harper and Row publishers, , p. 310 On the return leg toward France, she sank the in-ballast ''Ingerto'' on 12 March 1942 in mid-Atlantic. She docked at St. Nazaire on the 25th.

Fourth patrol

Patrol number four was the boat's longest (58 days), but in terms of tonnage sunk, her most successful. She attacked ''Polyphermus'' on 27 May 1942 north of Bermuda. She also sank ''Berganger'' on 2 June southeast of Cape Cod.

Fifth patrol and loss

The boat set out from St. Nazaire for the last time on 6 August 1942. She was posted missing in the

from that date, with no explanation for her loss. Forty-nine men died with ''U-578''; there were no survivors.

Previously recorded fate

Sunk on 10 August 1942 in the

by depth charges from a Czechoslovak aircraft of

No. 311 Squadron RAF No. 311 (Czechoslovak) Squadron RAF was a Czechoslovak-manned bomber squadron of the Royal Air Force in the Second World War. It was the RAF's only Czechoslovak-manned medium and heavy bomber squadron. It suffered the heaviest losses of any Cze ...

. This attack was on . Damage was minor.

Summary of raiding history

References

Notes

Citations

Bibliography

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:U0578 German Type VIIC submarines U-boats commissioned in 1941 U-boats sunk in 1942 Missing U-boats of World War II U-boats sunk by unknown causes 1941 ships Ships built in Hamburg Ships lost with all hands World War II submarines of Germany Maritime incidents in August 1942