Warsailors Forums

Hello again,

In some German documents it is alleged that the British submarine Seal, while returning to Rosyth on the 19th of April, 1940, crash dived in order to avoid a torpedo fired against her from a German u-boat. The reason for asking is that this attack is not mentioned on the uboat.net page dedicated to the submarine:

https://uboat.net/allies/warships/ship/3417.html

Did this attack really take place or is German document in error?

Best regards,

Jan-Olof

Hi Jan Olof,

I have checked the patrol report but there is no mention at all on this.
In fact the last entry is for 17 April and says something like; proceeded to Rosyth as ordered.

The last logbook of HMS Seal i have photographed is the one for March 1940.
The logbooks of April and May 1940 most likely were captured with the submarine, seems likely the german document you have is a translation of the captured logbooks.

As far as i know no German submarine reported attacking a submarine near the position HMS Seal would have been in on the 19th so most likely the attack was bogus.

Regards,
Brian Corijn
Admin Allied warships section Uboat.net

Duikboot-database also has no entry for this day:

https://historisches-marinearchiv.de/pr ... uik=search

Hello Brian and Thorsten,

thank you both for your replies, it certainly looks like a bogus attack unless it was an allied sub I guess.

Best regards,

Jan-Olof

Hello Jan-Olof and friends,

HMS Seal sighted what appeared to be a torpedo track at 1020 hours on 18th April 1940 (not the 19th) in 57°10' N, 00°20' E (source ADM199/1840).

The "attack" is certainly bogus as no German U-boats (or S-boats) operated in this area at that time.
All the best,

Platon

Hello Brian, Thorsten and Platon,

many thanks for your informative replies. Another mystery solved.

Best regards,

Jan-Olof