[in_vino_vomitus]

It feels very good indeed to be back on dry land. And even better to know that when we begin our next patrol we won't be getting to know a new Captain. You heard of our Panamanian misadventure I assume? How it stayed out of the news is a mystery to me, but there are other channels, and I expect by now everybody with a relative in the Kriegsmarine will know that U-43 torpedoed a Panamanian cargo ship in the Golf von Biscaya. Have you heard the joke they're telling now? "What's the difference between the French flag and the Panamanian flag? - You don't know? - You must be the Captain of U43...." I have to say that it's not safe to repeat that in the presence of our crew, even though they have amused themselves at the Captains expense. I was forced to reprimand Stroesser and Dietrich for a piece of improvised theatre, whereby Stroesser, playing the Captain, saluted Dietrich and said "Mein Fuhrer, I have the honour to report a successful attack on a merchantman belonging to your enemies in Panama" To which Dietrich replied "You are mistaken - I have no enemies in Pamana." "You have now Mein Fuhrer." Returned Stroesser. It was well done and I'm sure my face betrayed me, when I told the chief to find them some more useful way to fill the time they obviously had too much of. Of course the crew will joke at the Captains expense - the punishment was for letting me catch them. Sailors should not be so careless.

As for the sinking. it was a rough sea and we were submerged. Grandfather's thinking was that a submerged attack, is in all cases preferable because a ship that can't see you, won't try to avoid you. He wasn't flying a flag at the masthead and the swell obscured the one at the stern. I won't tell you what Grandfather said when he saw it. One of the eels hit well astern and disabled the propellers. In all probability it flooded the engine room too. We radioed her position to BdU, but there was nothing else that we could do. At the time it wasn't clear that she was lost. She had settled in the water somewhat, and she wasn't making way, but it's not unknown for a ship to be torpedoed and not to sink, so we continued our patrol. Sooner or later, somebody was bound to do this. it's unfortunate that it should be us.

A consequence of this is that we now approach lone ships on the surface. If they are enemy ships we sink them with "Die Pistole" As the crew have taken to calling the deck gun. There's quite a rivalry between them and the torpedomen. On this patrol, the gunners sank four. I wonder how long it will be before the British start to arm their merchantmen? As it is, one tried to ram us. It's almost as if he didn't want to be sunk, and to give him his due - he almost wasn't.

I said once, that both sides would get better at this, and it's so satisfying to be proved right. The Captain of the British destroyer that almost sent us to the bottom, will likely never know he was the cause of my joy. We'd joined the convoy as usual, and hit a tanker and two freighters. We dived and stayed under them to reload tubes, and came back up to fire again. we finished off the tanker, hit another and dived once more. We had two torpedoes left for the forward tubes. Remember when Uncle Rudi told me why it was bad luck to take the third light off a match? Well that destroyer captain probably had an uncle Rudi too - An uncle Tommy perhaps? We thought we were pretty safe. We could still hear charges going off intermittently behind us and we were right in the middle of the convoy. Anyway, we came up to periscope depth, had a look around, and saw one of the freighters we'd hit earlier on fire. We turned towards it and dived to let one of its fellows pass over us, came back up and were preparing to shoot, when another ship passed in front of us. As it cleared our front, we heard PING!! PING!! PING!! PING!! and Dieter warned us of a warship approaching fast from astern. We dived, and went to flank speed and slalomed away from there like a champion skiier. Even so we took damage. Fortunately it seems their ASDIC can't reach us below 50 meters and we got away, but it seems that the British are trying harder now. So we must try harder too.

Your obedient Nephew

Philipp