U-BOAT RESCUE

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 61, 3 November 1931, Page 5

U-BOAT RESCUE

SOLITARY SURVIVOR OF " SUNK GERMAN SUBMARINE. SAVED BY IRISHMEN. How three Irishmen saved the captain and solitary ' survivor oif a sunk German submafine in Waterford Bay, under the impression that he was the survivor of a British patrol, is told by Commander Ernst Hashagen, a U-boat oificer, in "The Log of a U-Boat Commander," lately published in London. The U-boat officer who was saved was Lieut-Commander Kurt Tebbenjohanns, who commanded UC44. On the evening of August 4, 1917, UC44 struck a mine oif Waterford and sank to the bottom. Commander Tebbenjohanns, the senior petty officer, and an enginer-apprentice were shut in the conning-tower. The rest of the crew had perished. Commander /Tebbenjohanns determined to try to escape. He and the petty ofiicer and apprentice took their places on the iron ladder of the con-ning-tower and unscrewed the hatch. The pressure threw them out, and they rose to the surface. They saw the lighthouse beacon and began swimming for the shore. The icy water claimed two vietims, and Tebbenjohanns was left swimming alone. He pulled oif his sea boots, leather coat and uniform jacket. He kept on his shirt, trousers and stockings, and, taking his Iron Cross off his jacket, before throwing it off, put the decoration in his trousers pocket. At last, after what seemed many hours, the swimmer saw a shadow on the water and shouted "Help!" A boat approached and he was pulled out of the water. British Patrol. "As I was afterwards told," he says, "the explosion had been heard at the fishing village of Dunmore." It was supposed that a British patrol boat had blown up. It was a small rowing hoat that picked up Tebbenjohanns. Her crew, he says, were two brothe?s named Power and a fisherman named McGrath. When they got ashore four men carried Tebbenjohanns on their shoulders to a house, where they rubbed him down and gave him hot milk and whisky. "By this time," the narrator says, "they had unearthed the Iron Cross in my trousers pocket, and now asked me in astonishment, 'Are you a German'?" "Yes." "A submarine commander?" "Yes." "Then you are a prisoner of war," "I spent the rest of the night in bed," says the commander, "carefully tended by the owner of the house, a Mrs. Chester, and a Mr. Austin A. Farrell. Early the next morning a policeman appeared and took charge of me. "I was taken, via Cork and Dublin, to London, and afterwards to the prisoners' camp at Colsterdale, in Yorkshire." '