Wreck of U-853

 Second World War 1939-1945, shipwreck, submarine

Unterseeboot 853 was a Type IXC/40 U-Boat laid down at the AG Weser Shipyard in Bremen in August 1942 and commissioned into Kriegsmarine service in June 1943. Spending much of her first year in operation engaged in training of submarine crews, the U-853 sailed from Kiel to Bergen in early 1944 where she departed on her first War Patrol on April 29th, 1944 to the North Atlantic.

Returning 67 days later to Lorient after finding no contacts, she departed on another unsuccessful patrol to the North Atlantic lasting 47 days before she returned to Kiel in October, 1944, only to be chased out of the U-boat pens by Allied bombing. Sailing for the East Coast of the United States as part of a last-ditch effort by the collapsing Nazi German state to disrupt Allied merchant shipping in the hopes of securing better surrender terms, the U-853 and her crew departed Stavanger on February 23rd and made for North America.

In American waters by April 1945 the U-853 searched for targets in the heavily defended waters off Maine, finding few targets worth attacking due to heavy anti-submarine patrols. Her luck changed on April 23rd when she spotted a US Navy patrol craft off Cape Elizabeth, Maine towing targets for American bombers. With a single torpedo she claimed her first kill of her career by sinking the USS PE-56, with the loss of 49 of her crew. Eluding two separate depth charge attacks following her attacks, the U-853 steamed South and took up a station off Point Judith, Rhode Island in the hopes of attacking any merchant or Naval ships entering or leaving the area. Likely submerged on the morning of May 5th to elude detection, the U-853 most likely did not receive the orders of Reichspräsident Karl Dönitz that all U-boat activity against allied shipping was to cease at 0800hrs on the 5th, or her Captain may have elected to ignore the order. Later that day the U-853 sighted, tracked, torpedoed and sunk the SS Black Point at 1740hrs off Point Judith, the last American merchant ship lost to U-boat attack during the Second World War.

U-853's second kill of her patrol provoked a large response by the US Navy which dispatched a hunter-killer group of the Destroyer USS Ericsson (DD-440), Destroyer Escorts USS Amick (DE-168) and USS Atherton (DE-169) and the Frigate USS Moberly (PF-63) to hunt down and sink the submarine. Arriving onscene mere hours after the attack, the US task force began actively scanning the area with their sonar and quickly discovered the U-853 trying to hide 110ft down on the seafloor. All four ships began what would eventually become a 16-hour attack on the U-boat, later called 'The Battle of Point Judith'. After the first depth charge attack ceased, the Captain of U-853 attempted to flee to deeper waters but was quickly penned in by the Veteran crews on the US Navy ships each time he tried to escape. The battle continued through the night and into the morning of May 6th, when US Navy blimps K-16 and K-58 arrived from Lakehurst, New Jersey and began calling out sightings and dropping bombs and rockets onto the hapless sub. Identified once again by sonar as she tried to hide silently on the bottom in 130ft of water, the U-853's crew were helpless to stop attack after attack by the USS Atherton (DE-169) and USS Moberly (PF-63), whose crews rained depth charges and 'hedgehog' anti-submarine mortars onto her position. After a final spread of 'hedgehog' mortars were sent down by each ship onto the submerged contact, planking, life rafts, charts, clothing, and an officer's cap floated to the surface of the Atlantic, marking the loss of U-853 with all 55 hands at this location on May 6th, 1945. The following day, Nazi Germany officially surrendered, ending the Second World War in Europe.

Today the wreck of U-853 is a popular deep-water wreck dive for experienced divers as her 130ft depth, high currents, tight confines and presence of live torpedo warheads make the U-853's wreck a dangerous dive. Two recreational divers have perished while diving on U-853 and after one soulless moron brought up the body of a crewmember in 1955 the site was declared a war grave and disturbing of any remains or artifacts onsite is illegal.

uboat.net/boats/u853.htm
njscuba.net/sites/site_submarines_2.html#U-853