British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Moderators: KML, Siri

Post Reply
jan-olof
Posts: 66
Joined: Mon Jul 08, 2019 7:07 pm

British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Post by jan-olof » Wed Jan 06, 2021 7:55 pm

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
Attachments
seal.jpg
seal.jpg (139.51 KiB) Viewed 7846 times
Brian Corijn
Posts: 15
Joined: Sun Dec 22, 2019 1:31 pm

Re: British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Post by Brian Corijn » Wed Jan 06, 2021 10:12 pm

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
User avatar
t-geronimo
Posts: 45
Joined: Tue Jul 09, 2019 8:39 am

Re: British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Post by t-geronimo » Wed Jan 06, 2021 10:47 pm

Duikboot-database also has no entry for this day:

https://historisches-marinearchiv.de/pr ... uik=search
jan-olof
Posts: 66
Joined: Mon Jul 08, 2019 7:07 pm

Re: British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Post by jan-olof » Fri Jan 08, 2021 9:48 pm

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
Platon Alexiades
Posts: 131
Joined: Mon Jul 08, 2019 2:49 pm

Re: British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Post by Platon Alexiades » Thu Jan 14, 2021 4:28 pm

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
jan-olof
Posts: 66
Joined: Mon Jul 08, 2019 7:07 pm

Re: British submarine Seal 19.4.40

Post by jan-olof » Sun Jan 17, 2021 1:24 pm

Hello Brian, Thorsten and Platon,

many thanks for your informative replies. Another mystery solved.

Best regards,

Jan-Olof
Post Reply