Wreck of U-185

 Second World War 1939-1945, navy, shipwreck, submarine

Unterseeboot 185 was a Type IX C/40 U-boat laid down at the AG Weser Shipyard at Bremen in August 1940 and commissioned into Kriegsmarine service in June 1942. Following five months of intensive training, U-185 reported to Kiel where she departed on her maiden War Patrol in October 1942.

Returning to Lorient 67 days later with her first confirmed kill in the mid-Atlantic, U-185 and her crew quickly returned to sea for their second patrol, travelling to the Caribbean Sea and claiming a further three ships before returning to Bordeaux 85 days later. Maintaining their high-paced operations, U-185 and her crew were back at sea in less than a month on their third war patrol, and shaped a course for the coast of Brazil where they sank a further five ships and damaged a sixth before shaping a course Northward to escape the heavy Allied air cover in the area.

Pulled from her withdrawal to lend assistance to the heavily damaged U-604 off St. Helena, U-185 and U-172 arrived to assist their fellow U-Boat on August 11th but found the U-604 to be in such dire straits that the decision was made to scuttle her. As U-604's crew set about arming scuttling charges and abandoning their ship, an American B-24 Liberator suddenly appeared and attacked the ships. Though U-604 took yet another round of damage that further sealed her fate, U-185's anti-aircraft gun crews were quick to respond to the threat and succeeded in downing the American bomber with her entire crew. With further aircraft likely enroute, U-185 took aboard all 44 of U-604's crew and made her way Northward at speed in order to outrange any enemy aircraft, and though she was carrying double the crew she would normally have aboard U-185 managed to safely rendezvous with U-172 several days later.

After offloading all but 14 of U-604's crew onto the France-bound U-172, U-185 continued her patrol and proceeded Northwest toward the Central Atlantic convoy lanes. While enroute, U-185's Commander was alerted that the boat's her heavier load and long high speed surface run away from U-604's sinking site had consumed far more fuel than originally thought, leaving the U-Boat without enough fuel to return to France. Alerting his shoreside command of their situation, U-185 was ordered to meet up with the "milk cow" fuel submarine U-847 Northwest of the Azores on August 24th, but upon arrival at the designated coordinates shortly after dawn U-185’s Captain received word that U-847 was running two days late. With no choice but to remain in the rendezvous area, U-185’s crew posted a topside watch and settled in to wait for their fuel delivery.

Steaming under a low ceiling of patchy fair weather clouds as the day wore on, U-185’s lookouts were unable to sight a US Navy F4-F Wildcat and a TBF Avenger flying from the USS Core (CVE-13) on patrol as they passed between the could banks. Moving broadside to each other in opposite directions, the navigator aboard the Avenger caught a sun reflection from the surfaced U-185 and quickly identified the U-Boat as it steamed under the midday sun. Immediately moving to attack the two American aircraft utilized the high sun and cloud cover to mask their movements as they closed in on U-185, ensuring that when Wildcat banked out of formation and roared directly out of the sun onto the submarine, the surprise was total.

Raking U-185’s conning tower with machine gun fire, the Wildcat pilot killed or mortally injured every man topside and paved the way for the following Avenger, whose pilot succeeded in dropping both his depth charges directly alongside U-185’s Port side midship. Rocked by the immediate detonation of one depth charge alongside her conning tower, the explosion of the second depth charge directly beneath the hull caused extensive damage to U-185’s engine and battery compartments. Seawater began pouring into U-185’s rear hull where it came into contact with the batteries and produced a lethal cloud of Chlorine gas that began killing or severely injuring every man aft of the conning tower, while internal and external fuel leaks quickly caught fire and added thick black smoke to the rapidly deteriorating air quality aboard the sub. Ordering the sub to flank maneuvering speed, U-185’s Captain climbed topside to find the slain gun crews covering the wrecked conning tower and the sub’s Stern beginning to swamp. As he was passing the order for a replacement gun crew to man the sub’s AA guns, U-185’s Port engine failed and caught fire, releasing a pall of toxic smoke that killed every engineer aboard, cut all electrical power and left the boat steaming in circles. Seeing that the U-Boat was clearly lost, the order was passed man-to-man for the surviving crew to abandon ship, and those who were not grievously injured or already dead from Chlorine poisoning clambered topside as U-185 began to sink by the Stern. Still underway thanks to her unsecured Starboard diesel, U-185 was strafed several more times by American aircraft as her crew assembled on her deck, causing more casualties. With her conning tower awash and her bow rising quickly to a 60 degree angle, the last of U-185’s living crew took to the sea as she plunged Stern-first to the bottom of the Atlantic at this location on August 24th, 1943 with at least 30 crewmen still aboard. American Destroyer Escorts would later rescue 36 survivors from the sinking who would spend the rest of the war as POW’s.

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