#u 505

[deutschland-im-krieg]

Großadmiral Erich Raeder, left, and Karl Dönitz with the crew of the Kriegsmarine (German navy) submarine U-505, Lorient, France, 7 May 1942. The U-505 was a Type IXC submarine that was captured by the US Navy on 4 June 1944 during her 12th combat patrol. She is now a permanent display in the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, Illinois, in an underground climate controlled area

[proud-spaniard]

1200x839 The U-505 was a Type IXC U-boat of German Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was captured by US naval units in 1944 off the coast of today Mauretania (former French West Africa). Colour by Edward Tambunan.

[oledavyjones]

The German sun U-505 captured

U-505 is a German Type IXC U-boat built for Germany's Kriegsmarine  (in Hamburg) during World War II. Launched  24 May 1941.   She was captured by the U.S. Navy on 4 June 1944.

In her uniquely unlucky career with the Kriegsmarine, she had the distinction of being the "most heavily damaged U-boat to successfully return to port" in World War II (on her fourth patrol) and the only submarine in which a commanding officer took his own life in combat conditions (on her tenth patrol, following six botched patrols).

She was one of six U-boats that were captured by Allied forces during World War II. She was captured on 4 June 1944 by United States Navy Task Group 22.3 (TG 22.3). All but one of U-505's crew were rescued by the Navy task group. The submarine was towed to Bermuda in secret and her crew was interned at a US prisoner-of-war camp where they were denied access to International Red Cross visits. The Navy classified the capture as top secret and prevented its discovery by the Germans. Her codebooks, Enigma machine, and other secret materials found on board helped the Allied codebreakers.

In 1954, U-505 was donated to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois. She is now one of four German World War II U-boats that survive as museum ships, and, along with U-534, just one of two Type IXCs still in existence.  WIKIPEDIA.

Look at http://www.net-maquettes.com/da/pictures/u-505-type-ixc-u-boat/

[hometownhistorychicago]

June 26, 1954: Nearing the end of its strange, 13-year journey from the Deutsche Werft shipyard in Hamburg on the shores of the Baltic to the Palace of Fine Arts on the shores of Lake Michigan, the U-505 arrives in Chicago under tow and is docked in the river near the Michigan Avenue bridge with veterans of the action aboard. The only enemy warship captured by the US Navy on the high seas since the War of 1812, U-505 was seized by Task Force 22.3 under the command of native Chicagoan Captain Daniel V. Gallery.

Gallery was raised in a well-to-do family in the West Side Irish neighborhood just south of where the University of Illinois-Chicago is located today. Gallery attended St. Ignatius Prep, but his father was infatuated with the Navy and planned for Daniel to go to Annapolis; Gallery dropped out of St. Ignatius to cram for the Naval Academy entrance exam, which he took and passed at age 16, becoming a midshipman.

Originally intended to be destroyed as a target, Gallery got the idea of saving her as a monument to US Navy veterans. He contacted his younger brother, Father John Ireland Gallery, who knew Lenox Lohr, the President of the Museum of Science and Industry and asked if MSI would be interested — which, of course, it was. The Chicago Tribune led a fundraising campaign to get the boat to Chicago, and the boat was towed from Portsmouth through the Great Lakes to the city — the Trib following her every movement (even volunteering McCormick’s own vessel).

Once U-505 arrived at MSI, the question remained what to do with her. The Navy had completely stripped bare all the interior compartments, so Gallery, by then a Rear Admiral, suggested Lohr contact the German companies that manufactured U-boats during the war to ask if they could provide some assistance. Every one of them agreed, writing to Lohr, “We are sorry you have our U-boat, but since you do we want her to be a credit to German technology,” and provided all the parts free of charge.

Other than the holes cut in the hull to allow visitors to move in and out of the boat, U-505 could put to sea again to this day. She is one of only four surviving U-boats in the world.

[navalarchitecture]