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~ A lone U-Boat Captain fighting a battle of wits in the Atlantic…completely unarmed
Taken from the personal War Diary (Kriegstagebuch) of Captain J. Smitlack.
10 June 1941 â€" 6 July 1941 (Shore Leave)
I spend most of the leave on duty readying the U-1 for her next patrol. Socko disappears shortly after we dock, which is not uncommon for him as he usually likes to spend most of the leave drinking or at the local cat house, or breathing in the diesel fumes from the gas tanks of trucks or all of the above.
The boat undergoes an engine upgrade and refit. While refitting I find an old cigar box and line it with cotton for Socko. We carve out a niche above my bunk, add a shelf and place the box within. The Chief supervises the loading of the torpedoes. We are carrying 3 of the T-II’s, two in the forward tubes and one in reserve. We are also carrying 2 T-1’s, one in the forward tube and one in reserve. We are just finishing when Socko stumbles along the pier screaming Yeet ever four of five feet pausing only long enough to throw up balls of sock lint. The Chief and I run to him. His single blood shot brass button eye seems to swim in and out of focus as he tries to lock his gaze down on the Chief or myself. He says that we should have a Crazy Sock Day aboard U-1 and I can smell the diesel and salt water on his breath as he calls me a Nancy Boy Pansy and then passes out. The Chief and I exchange a glance and against the protests of the Chief I load the bombed Sock onto the boat and tuck him in. I remember thinking at the time that our patrol was only a few days away and we would need him.
A crew from another U-boat stops by and presents me with a consolation prize of a replacement deck chair. I am truly touched by their kindness and sympathy to my plight. I load the chair about the boat and set it up in a place of honor in the conning tower.
The next day I am introduced to my new first officer and it occurs to me that since we started the war back in September of 39 I have had 24 first officers. This new one makes 25, so I call him Lucky Number 25 hoping for the best but as always fearing the worse. I pat him on his head and send him off to duty on the boat. We were going to BF12 and I had a strange feeling that this was not going to be like any other patrol we had taken before… then again it could just be gas.
7 July 1941 (Sailing Day)
09:30 We depart Brest at slow ahead. The groupies have gathered and are shouting Socko’s name over and over again but the little sock is still inebriated even though he passed out four days ago. The Chief and I agree he really must have tied one on this time. We cross the harbor and engage the diesels the thrum of the engines are comforting. We head out into the Atlantic.
Nothing sighted. The sea is calm and the sun high warming the boat and all within it. I check in on Socko from time to time truly concerned about his condition. Alas it remains unchanged he continues slumbering occasionally calling out the name of ladies of the evening a different one each time. I have the hydrophone operator start a log on it and press him for details later. Does he give out the addresses? But the hydrophone operator assures me that it is just the names.
That night Loppy comes to me in a dream (see Patrol 18). I find myself in Donitz’s laundry hamper, his dirty laundry hamper, I wander among the uniform jacket’s, ties, thongs and other clothing items. Loppy emerges from a pair of soiled underwear, spots me and darts back in. I almost follow him in but think better of it and sit down to wait. Before long the long eared rabbit bounds out of the underwear. He drops to my feet sobbing. I ask him what is wrong.
“The Evil One Eyed Sock is going to kill me!” He announces while looking around. Great it’s bad enough that I’m paranoid, now the figments of my imagination are crazy. I ask him what he is talking about he bounds off hurtling a pair of trousers while shouting over his shoulder, you must kill the evil one. I wake up sweating. Socko is still tucked safely in his box. I hear him mutter, Nancy Boy, under his breath before ripping a ripe one that makes my eyes water. A short time later he rolls over and commences snoring again. I fall into a shallow and troubled sleep.
8 July 1941
I wake up to the sight of Socko standing on my chest with a crude spear that he has no doubt fashioned from several paper clips. He notices the alarm in my eyes and merely says,
“Shhhhhhhhhhh, be very very quiet… I’m hunting wabbits.”
I’m about to ask him what the heck a wabbit is when he jumps down to the deck and stalks aft with the spear held out in front of him a homicidal glint in his eye.
I shake my head and go top to check the weather. The ocean is calm almost like a pond. I stand watch looking out at the flat water and thinking about Socko. When I head down to grab lunch I come across a ghastly sight. Lucky Number 25’s body with several crudely made paper clip spears lodged in his throat. Standing over my dead first officer is Socko. He is sharpening another spear and before I can stop him he tosses it with all his might into the crotch of my former first officer. I stand aghast but not surprised. After several moments I ask Socko if he would like to join me for lunch. He answers my question with a question of his own.
“Is it wabbit season or is it duck season?” We stare at each other for several long moments his single brass button eye betraying nothing except an insane fire burning in his lint trap of a soul. A short time later I realize that he isn’t hungry, or does not want to eat, or does not want to eat with me. I back slowly out of the compartment my eyes never leaving his. As I sit down to lunch I hear, “It’s First Officer Season,” followed by an insane cackling laugh that raises goose bumps on my neck.
After lunch I head topside to see what is happening on the deep blue sea. The wind has picked up a bit causing a slight chop on the water and the sky has gone overcast. In the distance I hear the rumble of thunder but do not see any lighting as of yet.
Socko joins me in the tower. There was barely enough room with the watch crew, my deckchair, myself and Socko. The nasty little cuss actually starred at me for a long moment before deciding the toss the deck chair that had been a gift to me from another caring crew over the side. My jaw drops as Socko looks around the tower and says…
“You know I don’t really want to be up here anyways.” As the deck chair slips below the waves, Socko tramps down below.
I spend the afternoon logging in my journal and filling out paperwork. I head off to grab a late supper when I realize that I have not seen Socko in a while. I ask around the boat but no one else has seen him. I should be concerned by the cook has dinner ready. I ask the cook if Socko has eaten anything since he woke up. The cook tells me that Socko came by just that afternoon but was only interested in looking over the forks. He said that the sock had hefted one and peered down it as if he was sighting down a gun. He said that Socko smiled and muttered much better then a paper clip spear before he held the fork over his head and charged out of the galley screaming a Zulu war chant.
I sit down and have a nice dinner. As I am eating Socko walks past carrying what looks like an armload of dead rats. The rat on the very top of the pile has a fork from the kitchen sticking out of it. Socko is tottering back and forth like a drunk under his burden. I finish lunch and find Socko standing on my bunk skinning his catch. He has lined the outside of his cigar box with rat fur and has even fashioned himself a furry vest and hat out of the skins. He finishes his work and wraps a pair of rat fur grips around the fork handle.
“Do you want to talk about Number One?” I ask. He merely ignores me and jumps off the bunk heading in the direction of the head.
“No time to talk about Number One, going to make Number Two.” He grunts over his shoulder.
Later in the evening I see him stalking around the boat on another hunting expedition. I half expect to wake up with a fork lodged in my throat… or YEET, somewhere else.
9 July 1941
Just after midnight I awake from a nightmare screaming “Spoon!” I peer through the darkness and do not see Socko anywhere. Perhaps he has turned in or is still stalking the boat. I climb up on top of my bunk and part the rat fur curtain he has hung in front of his niche. A single brass button eye stares out at me from the darkness. Socko raises the fork roughly my eye level and holds it there. I drop the curtain back into place and with a shudder head up top. The wind drops to zero and shortly there after the sea turns eerily calm.
We pass over a merchant-shipping lane but spot nothing. When the sun starts to rise in the east the sea is still calm.
05:34 The watch spots a ship on the horizon. Socko emerges from below clutching his fork close to him. He peers through the UZO and by this time I have identified the ship as a V&W Destroyer. Socko mutters to himself. He steps back from the UZO and looks down at the fork muttering about needing a bigger one. He drops down to the ships deck and runs for the Flak Gun. He is able to shoot off two clips at the now fast approaching DD before we are able to rip him from the gun. We dive.
We rig for silent running and dive deeper. The hydrophone operator reports multiple screws… a convoy!!!
Socko runs for the galley and starts rooting around in the silverware drawer.
“We have plenty of forks!” He announces after the sound of rummaging subsides. Socko orders us towards the convoy, setting a course to try and intercept it. The V&W however is having none of it, she pings our boat and moves in for the kill.
The depth Charges fall like rain. U-1 is rocked worse then I have ever seen, sending things to the floor and breaking the crockery.
Several leaks spring, the sal****er is knocking and wants to come in. Socko hurls curses towards the heavens. He orders us ahead at flank speed and brings us up to periscope depth. He sights the V&W and even though I ask him not to he sends one of our torpedoes towards the DD. After it is away, he lowers the scope and orders a crash dive. We go deep yet again as the V&W swings around for another attack. The depth charges rain down once again causing the boat to lean over 90 degrees over on her starboard side. The boat takes more damage.
Socko continues to press on towards the convoy as one of our dim bulb crewmembers announces that the torpedo we had fired has missed. Socko eyes him with a steely glare but is too busy trying to press the attack on the convoy.
Eventually it is simply too much for the boat to take. We have several severe leaks, our compressor is damaged and our radio antenna does not seem to be working. Not that there is anyone down here we could send a message to, besides Elvis or Jimmy Hoffa perhaps?
We are forced to call off the attack. We dive almost to the bottom and slip through a thermal layer in the process. We move the boat slow ahead and begin making repairs. Once we are sure the boat will not continue to the bottom and the absolutely necessary repairs are made we rig for silent running and the boat goes silent except for the ranting curses of Socko.
We manage to slip away. Once the V&W and the convoy she was screening have disappeared from our hydrophone I rig for standard and we begin repairs on the boat once again.
11:59 Repairs on the boat are complete. Socko wants to go after the convoy again but I tell him to go hunting aboard the boat instead. We reload torpedo tube one and continue on our way towards are our patrol area.
12:45 The watch spots a ship on the horizon and we go to periscope depth. It turns out to be a C3.
Socko returns from hunting with blood lust in his eyes. I want to engage the C3 and we argue over who will fire the torps for several minutes as we creep closer. Socko convinces me that I am too much of a Nancy boy to take such an important shot and that he is the only one on board who can send the ship to bottom. I let him take the shot.
Socko fires a single torp.
The explosion reaches us and the crew cheer. We surface the boat and Socko machine guns the survivors.
He wants to collect souvenirs from the dead. I tell him forget it and he calls me a spoilsport.
We continue on towards our assigned patrol sector.
14:09 We reach BF12 and begin our search. It seems like we have been out here forever. The crew is suffering from a lack of moral and the fact that Socko is moving about the boat while they are sleeping does not bring them any measure of comfort.
16:32 We face a severe thrashing from the boys of the RAF.
U-1 sustains more damage. I order the flak gun manned. The planes circle like flies over a… well over a stinky U-boat.
Socko compliments the gunner on his fine shooting.
“Nice shooting, that is if you were aiming at the sky!” Socko says before he plunges a salad fork into the gunner’s groin. The watch crew groans and looks away. A high-pitched scream and a splash later and Socko is behind the gun. The Hurricanes swing back for an attack run. The bombs bracket the boat.
Socko cackles madly through the sal****er raining down. He sights in on the first Hurricane and opens up. Socko takes out the two hurricanes and the entire watch crew with what in my estimation is some crack shooting. I remind myself to put him in for a commendation when we get back. We make repairs on the surface while Socko scans the horizon just begging the RAF to send some more targets.
Day turns into night I set up the new night watch crew and go to sleep.
10 July 1941
I check the watch log when I wake up and see that it started raining just before 04:00.
The boat is rocking and rolling as I sit down to breakfast. High seas and a thunderstorm have found us. We continue patrolling our sector not really expecting to find anything in this soup and of course we don’t.
14:25 Our patrol of BF12 complete we head out for more promising weather and hopefully better hunting. Socko is in his niche sharpening a knife on Lucky… let me change that name, Not So Lucky Number 25’s skull. The great white sock hunter regards me for a brief moment before going back to his knife and skull.
The diesels thunder into the night as we lose another day.
11 July 1940
The rain has stopped by the time I get up yet the seas are still high. Socko continues to hunt through out the boat. I have not seen him at any of the meals served on board and suspect that he is living off what he catches on board. I come across him in the forward head with my former first officers head. He has hung it from the overhead pipes and appears to be worshiping it. Several bones litter the floor and Socko crouches among them bowing to the skull above and asking “God 25” as he calls it to bless him with a good hunt. I decide to just whiz off the side of the boat.
17:20 We spot small merchant at close range.
Socko comes up to the conning tower wearing his rat fur hat and rat fur coat. He does not hesitate but merely peers through the UZO lets out a grunt and a yeet and fires a single torp. He does not even wait to see if the torp hits but goes below to continue the hunt.
The small merchant goes to the bottom.
Socko finishes his hunt a short time later. I am just sitting down to dinner watching him out of the corner of my eye as he cleans his latest kill and trying not to toss my cookies.
17:50 The watch calls out a ship on the horizon. Socko and I crowd into the conning tower. Out of the darkness steams an armed C2.
I am about to look through the UZO when,
“I fart in your general direction!” reaches us across the waves from the megaphone clutched in the C2’s Captain’s hand. Ahhhhh. Well I guess we know that his is our C2. I am about to ask Socko how he wants to handle this… but he is already ramming the engine telegraph to full speed ahead. The boat surges forward and we close with out prey.
I peer through my binoculars and find my deck chair on the deck of the large ship. I pull Socko back into the tower before he could jump down to the flak gun. I explain to him that there is no way I am letting him take on the C2 from the gun. He curses me a coward and turns to press the attack as the first shell from the C2 screams in and slams into the bow of the boat. U-1 starts to submerge and just as I’m thinking she may have been fatally holed, she pops back up through the crest of a wave. Another shell screams overhead going long as Socko prepares to fire our last two torps.
The next shell from the C2 slams into the conning tower and I am thrown down to the deck. Over the laughter of the crew on the C2 I hear Socko call down from the conning tower.
“Good trip? Did you have a nice fall?” cursing I pick myself up from the deck and climb back into the tower. A call comes up from below that we are taking on water. Socko continues forward. The crew below protest that the boat is flooding. Socko yells down to flood the final two tubes he then floods the speaking tube with a stream of curse words. Between swears the crew report both tubes flooded and outer doors open as another shell hits perilously close drenching the entire watch crew in a salt-water shower.
I tell Socko that this is madness we must call off the attack. Socko merely smiles at me.
“You’re relieved Nancy Boy… FIRE!!!” The torpedoes leap from the tubes flying on a collision course with the C2.
The first slams into the stern of the C2 sending up a geyser of water.
A few moments later the second torp slams home.
The crew cheers. As the crippled C2 starts to go down her gun team prepares one last shot.
I order the crew below deck and am heading for the ladder when the shell impacts the conning tower. I am thrown overboard by the impact of the exploding shell. The last thing I hear before I hit the water is Socko telling me to have a nice swim. U-1 drops below the waves and I am left to watch the C2 slip below the waves. I watch in awe as the nude Captain of the crippled vessel makes an elegant swan dive off the bow of the boat into a section of burning ocean. The C2 slips below the waves as I swim madly to get away from the displacement of the water that wants to pull me to my death.
Swimming has never been my strong suit however and I am pulled under.
My lungs scream for oxygen. Just as I spot my deck chair the darkness closes in…
I don’t know for how long I am out but I come to on top of the water clinging to a piece of wreckage from the C2. When I open my eyes I see that the piece of wreckage is actually my beloved green and white deck chair. I have never been happier.
Several minutes later U1 breaks the surface. Clutching my deck chair I swim towards the boat. I can’t wait to show Socko. As I draw near the boat I see that Socko has manned the flak gun and is training the barrels an me as I swim closer.
“This boat ain’t big enough for the both of us pard,” he says as a tumble weed blows across the surface of the water. I clutch the chair even closer. If I’m going to the bottom my deck chair is going with me. Socko sights in on my head and pulls the trigger.
CLICK The gun is empty. Socko’s eye is wide in anger and surprise. CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK. Socko continues to pull the trigger calling for more ammo. The crew responds that there is no more. I climb aboard the boat as Socko continues to track me with the gun pulling the trigger. CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK. I climb the conning tower and descend the ladder taking my chair with me. CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK.
I order the crew to repair the boat and make for home. I change into some dry clothes and curl up on my bunk clutching my chair which I have set up beside. The engines fire up and we turn back towards Brest.
11 July 1941
I wake up holding my chair. It feels like Christmas. I go topside and pull Socko off the Flak gun. I carry him to his bunk and drop the exhausted sock in. I get him a glass of water and read him three bedtime stories and eventually he drifts off into a deep sleep.
12 July 1941
At Ahead Standard we pull into Brest in the late afternoon. The crew is exhausted. Socko stalks off the boat pulling a cart of various vermin furs behind him. As he passes by me he pulls out a fork and jabs it into my foot and then, without breaking stride he heads right for the Port Hole Bar muttering under his breath that he never did get the Wascally wabbit. I should be upset but I’m just too happy to have my chair back. I climb off the boat with my chair and head off for a shower, shave and a relaxing sit in my chair.
Hope you enjoyed reading the adventures of J. Smitlack, that lovable scamp Socko and the very very nervous crew of U-1.
Had the parents and the in-laws in for a visit this weekend. A good time was had by all. My dad and father in law went down to the musuem of Science and Industry and got aboard the U-505. It really makes you appreciate the sacrifice those men who fought and died went through. Thanks again and keep Hunting.
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Hey Psych did I read that you thought Noob Patrol #4 was lost? Well dunno if you found it but heres a link to it: http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/857101043/...401047033#1401047033
Noob Patrol 4 (Christmas Cruise)
Also how do you turn these into PDF's I love to be able to keep them in a consice area as oppose to bookmarked, thanks!
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as always, this eagerly awaited addition was much enjoyed. bizzarely enough, i've found myself chuckling about poor smitty... everywhere. either i'm officially off my rocker (quite possible) or this is the greatest thing since sliced bread. and if i had any graphical skills at all, i'd be inclined to draw a picture of socko in his robinson caruso finements!
keep it up, great stuff.
if he just had a single flak gun clip more 
......
But good read as allways. 
