After a nice breakfast Monday 13 September, we all boarded our deluxe $300,000 motorcoach headed for the Kiel area. Our first stop was at U-995, the boat of our dear friend HANS-GEORG HESS (125-LIFE-1985) and the last Type VII-C left in the world.

At right is the Marine Ehrenmall -- the Naval Memorial. It is not possible to show all the various displays, models and above all - the Memorial Hall for the men fallen in battle. It is a beautiful place.

The propeller in the foreground is off the heavy cruiser PRINZ EUGEN, which broke out in company with BISMARCK in May of 1941. She was surrendered to the Allies at the end of World War II and used in the atomic bomb test at Bikini along with a great many other 'ohsolete' ships and submarines.

She disappeared and it was thought that she, like so many other test ships, had gone down in the blast but that was not the case. PRINZ EUGEN was found some years later upside-down and stranded on a reef by the Keeling Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean.

She was still too 'hot' for anyone to approach but over the years, the radiation has dissipated and the prop is now here on the grounds of the Memorial -- along with a bronze plaque in memory of the 52 American submarines and the 3,505 men who perished with them.

Top photo is RUSS WITTENBERG and HARRY COOPER at the entrance into U-995. Photo below is a side view of U-995 with SUSAN BURILEIGH in the foreground. At the very bottom is the boat herself, U-995 shot from atop the beautiful Naval Memorial.

Around noon, we went to the restaurant that we always visit when we are here in Laboe (Kiel) and we had a great lunch along with much SHARKHUNTERS camaraderie - we always have that on our gatherings. More U-Boat veterans joined us here in Laboe and went to the U-Boat Memorial with us in the afternoon.

After Lunch

After lunch we drove a few miles to the other side of Kielerford (Kiel Bay) to the U-Boot-Ehremnal for our Memorial Service, led by SHARKHUNTERS President HARRY COOPER

Our SHARKHUNTERS sends about $1,000 each year to this sad but beautitruil place to help with the maintenance. This money comes from the sale of the hand-signed prints we offer. It is the old veterans and the widows of the men who did not return who keep this place neat and clean despite the all too frequent vandal attacks by idiots who splash paint all over and break the flowerpots that hold the memorial wreaths.

The curved wall design is not unfamiliar to Americans who know the Vietnam Memorial and it is from this U-Boot-Ehreninal that the idea for that design originated. There is a bronze plaque for each U-Boat that was lost with the name of the Skipper whether he was lost or not; then there is a listing of the names of all the men who died on that boat. It is a sobering place.

Then we went to the Schiffahrtsmuseurn in Kiel for a special treat.

In this museum on the Kiel waterfront we saw the very first German submarine -- perhaps the first submarine ever! This was the Brandiducher built by Wilhelm Bauer, generally considered to be the father of German submarines. When one looked at this early submarine, one must have wondered how it ever came back to the surface! It was big, heavy - lots of steel - and nobody could find anything that looked like ballast tanks. Obviously it had some way to come back to the surface - except one time. She sank and lay in the mud at the river bottom for decade upon decade until she was recently raised and placed in the museum of Germany.

Monday was a long day and many of our group slept comfortably in the, big MAN bus back to the Hotel - but not all were ready for bed. The 'Bunker Brigade' headed back to the 'Lost Bunker' to see if time and tide favored them this evening. Sorry to say, it did not. Tide was at the full again and although they got into the 'Lost Bunker', and there was nothing to see but a 'lot of high water.

It was so late when they returned that LAWRENCE HENNIGER called my room every half hour and around midnight was in the process of calling the police when his son KEN HENNIGER walked in. As a father who lost a 20-year-old son, I know what LAWRENCE was going through. However, everything ended well except that the 'Bunker Brigade' was not able to make it to the 'Lost Bunker' at a time of low tide. Doggone elusive Type XXI boats-anyhow.

1999 Patrol in Germany U-Boat Tour

Introduction
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday