20 YEARS AGO in our KTB

KTB #5 was published in May of 1983 and there was more on that fellow named Roger Miklos, the one who claimed to have located a secret U-Boat which he said was a very special modified boat and it was full of gold and diamonds and naturally, art treasures of the Louvre. This fellow also said that he had not been inside the boat, but he knew that is was still dry and watertight inside. How he accomplished that was never answered.

URANIUM! We were trying to learn whether any U-Boats had been attempting to reach Japan with uranium on board. All our sources (at the time) and even the world-renowned Chicago TRIBUNE flatly stated that there was no possibility that any German U-Boats could be carrying uranium on board. As our long time Members know, it was Sharkhunters that proved that indeed, some U-Boats were indeed, attempting to make this voyage at the end of the war. Due to the broken Enigma codes, all were sunk on their way out of the North Sea – all but one. Clever U-Boat Skipper JOHANN-HEINRICH FEHLER (32-+-1984) had been Demolitions Officer on Schiff 16, the raider ATLANTIS and even before that, Skipper of a German merchant ship. At the end of the war, he was given command of U-234, a converted Type X-B mine laying submarine, and ordered to go to Japan with his passengers who included two Japanese officers (specialists in sections of special warfare), a new Luftwaffe General for the German Embassy in Tokyo, a Naval Judge to try some traitors, a top scientist Dr. HEINZ SCHLICKE (1820-1991), two Me 262 jet fighters in crates with the documentation to allow the Japanese to begin their production – and 560 kilos of uranium!

KTB #5 was just 3 pages long, done on that old manual typewriter.

15 YEARS AGO in our KTB

The big news in KTB #37 was the not one but three U-Boat wrecks had been found. They were U-534, U-548 and U-1018. There will be some really hot news on U-534 further on in this issue. You will remember that this boat was raised and is currently in England as an exhibit open to the public.

We explained the reason behind the Members numbers etc. Some years ago, HARRY COOPER (1-LIFE-1983) was Editor of the newsletter of the prestigious Adventurer’s Club and their method was adopted for Sharkhunters. The name of a Member in good standing is always in capital letters and bold. The first number is actually the Member’s number. No two Members have the same first number. The second number is the year in which the Member joined. In the instance above, HARRY was the first to join Sharkhunters so he has the number 1, and he joined in 1983. HANS-GEORG HESS (125-LIFE-1985) was the 125th Member to join, he came aboard in 1985 and he is a LIFE Member.

BILL SENN (144-1985) encountered a huge windfall – his uncle, who still lived in Germany, found a warehouse with a large quantity of Wehrmacht helmets with their liners, still in the original packing crates! He was trying to find a place to sell them, but there was no E-Bay back then…..

KTB #37 was just eight pages in length and done on that old manual typewriter. It would require only about 2 or 3 pages of today’s modern computer typeset version of the KTB. An interesting note – when we look back at this page in 15 years to do this same feature in the KTB then – will we laugh at what we think of as “modern” today in fifteen years? Technology is on the move!

10 YEARS AGO in our KTB

The header for KTB #76 “The Most Successful Submarine of World War II” let us know that we would read the history of U-48, the most successful submarine of any navy in World War II. This was the famed ‘Dreimal Schwartze Katzer’ or the Black Cat times three, which referred to the three Skippers – HERBERT SCHULTZE (191-+-1986), Hans-Rudolf Rösing (Knights Cross) and Heinrich “Ajax” Bleichrodt (Knights Cross and Oak Leaf).

There was a great article by Kplt. HORST DEGEN (116-+-1987), Skipper of U-701, concerning among other things, his patrol off the American east coast and the loss of his submarine. There was an article by Cdr. MILES GRAHAM (521-1988) about the Type XXI boats he was assigned to at war’s end.

We exposed another fake U-Boat officer. He claimed that he was a cousin of ERICH TOPP (118-LIFE-1985) and he was I.W.O. on U-552. His real name was Bill Rose, and it didn’t take a lot of work to prove that he was indeed, a fake. I called and asked him why he would do such a thing - he said that he wanted to see how Americans would accept a former enemy, and so he adopted this persona. There were those however, who felt that he really just wanted the money he was making from his speaking engagements.

KTB #76 was 28 pages lone and done on a new typewriter.

5 YEARS AGO in our KTB

The cover of KTB #122 showed the Russian submarine B-565, a FOX TROT, on which many Sharkhunters Members were made ‘Protchutnik Russki Podwodnik’ (Honorary Russian Submariners). This was during one of our “Patrols in Russia” and there was a report on the most recent “Patrol” in Russia in KTB #122.

We continued the memories of ERICH TOPP (118-LIFE-1985), the Doctoral thesis by PHILIP ATTENBOROUGH (441-1988) on military collaboration between Japan and Germany in WW II and we still had our column on the Royal Navy submarines in WW II by VICTOR HAWKINS (1364-A-1990), although he began his ‘Eternal Patrol’ all too soon afterwards. There was a new piece by A. J. TARANTINO (1496-1990) and his combat off Okinawa, and the story of the ‘tethered goats’.

KTB #122 was done with the newest computer technology of the day, was 40 pages in length – but the photos needed improvement.