“An indispensable reference work for anyone studying either the U-boat campaign or WW2 at sea . . . copiously illustrated, fascinating—and harrowing.”—Navy News During the Second World War over 250 Allied warships from a dozen navies were sent to the bottom by German U-boats. This ground-breaking study provides a detailed analysis of every sinking for which source material survives from both the Allied and the German sides, resulting in detailed treatment of the fate of 110 vessels, with the remainder summarized in an extensive appendix. Uniquely, each entry is built around a specialist translation of the relevant segment of the war diary (log) of the U-boat in question, taken directly from the surviving originals—remarkably, this represents the first large-scale publication of the U-boat war diaries in any language. The book offers a wealth of new information, not only with respect to the circumstances of the sinkings from both the Allied and German perspectives, but also to the technical environment in which they lived as well as the fate of the crews. The entries include background details on the vessels concerned and the men involved, with a selection of rare and carefully chosen photos from archives and collections around the world. Each entry is itself a compelling narrative, but is backed with a list of sources consulted, including documents, published works and websites. A decade in the making, this is probably the most important book on the U-boat war to be published for many a year. “Offers significant new information on many of the most famous incidents.”—Maritime Advisor

In 1942 German U-boats turned the shipping lanes off Cape Hatteras into a sea of death. Cruising up and down the U.S. eastern seaboard, they sank 259 ships, littering the waters with cargo and bodies. As astonished civilians witnessed explosions from American beaches, fighting men dubbed the area "Torpedo Junction." And while the U.S. Navy failed to react, a handful of Coast Guard sailors scrambled to the front lines. Outgunned and out-maneuvered, they heroically battled the deadliest fleet of submarines ever launched. Never was Germany closer to winning the war. In a moving ship-by-ship account of terror and rescue at sea, Homer Hickam chronicles a little-known saga of courage, ingenuity, and triumph in the early years of World War II. From nerve-racking sea duels to the dramatic ordeals of sailors and victims on both sides of the battle, Hickam dramatically captures a war we had to win--because this one hit terrifyingly close to home.

“Describ[es] the Type VII and its place in the history of warfare . . . probably the finest book on German submarines of WWII available in print.”—Firetrench First conceived in the mid–1930s, the Type VII was still in production in the closing stages of the Second World War a decade later. Subject to continuous improvement through six major variants and with around 650 completed, it was built in larger numbers than any other submarine design in history. It formed the backbone of the Kriegsmarine’s campaign against merchant shipping for the whole of the war, and in terms of tonnage sunk was by far the most successful U-boat type. This encyclopedic work combines a technical description of the type in all its variations with a history of its development and an overview of its most significant operations—especially those convoy battles that were to have a crucial impact on the evolution of the design and its equipment. A particular attraction of the book is the comprehensive visual coverage—photographs of virtually every aspect of design, construction, fittings and shipboard life; highly detailed general arrangement plans and close-up scale drawings; and, with modelmakers in mind, a stunning collection of full-color three-dimensional illustrations of every external feature and variant of the boats. There have been many books on U-boats reflecting an enduring public interest so any new offering has to be special. With its unique concentration of information and illustrative reference, Type VII is unrivalled. “A comprehensive history of the Kriegsmarine’s most potent weapon . . . includes detailed modelmakers’ plans together with over 320 photographs.”—Maritime Advisor

Reprint of the account of WWII submarine operations in the Caribbean, originally published by Paria Pub. Co., Trinidad in 1988, with a new (one page) foreword. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

The U-boats constituted a serious threat to North American security and a major challenge to coastal and convoy defence. Hadley reveals the military and political impact on Canada of in-shore submarine warfare and vibrantly documents the successful German strategy of deploying daring long-range solo sorties to pin down the enemy close to home.

Starting weeks after Hitler declared war on the United States in mid-December 1941 and lasting until the war with Germany was all but over, 73 German U-Boats sustainably attacked New England waters, from Montauk New York to the tip of Nova Scotia at Cape Sable. Fifteen percent of these boats were sunk by Allied counter-attacks, five surrendered in the region, and three were sunk off New England--Block Island, Massachusetts Bay, and off Nantucket. These have proven appealing to divers, with a result that at least three German naval officers or ratings are buried in New England, one having killed himself in the Boston jail cell. There were 34 Allied merchant or naval ships sunk by these subs, one of them, the 'Eagle', was not admitted to have been sunk by the Germans until decades later. Over 1,100 men were thrown in the water and 545 of them made it ashore in New England ports; 428 were killed. Importantly, saboteurs were landed three places: Long Island, Frenchman's Bay Maine and New Brunswick Canada, and Boston was mined. Very little was known about this.

The untold story of 142 German and one Italian submarines, which patrolled the waters around BermudaThe Axis powers sank eighty Allied ships, one of them naval, for the loss of two submarines1,224 Allied sailors and passengers were landed in Bermuda during the warMore than steel on steel: this book tells of their survival voyages, rescue and reception For the first time, a book exposes an obscure theatre of the Second World War in great detail and comprehensively, not just in terms of geography, but also from the perspectives of both Allied and Axis participants. U-Boats off Bermuda provides details of specific U-Boat patrols and their commanders, as well as a general overview of the situation in the theatre of war around Bermuda. It is a detailed analysis of individual casualties, broken down by a) background of ship, b) background of U-Boat, c) attack method (surface and/or submersed), d) details of survivors and their plight at sea and e) their rescue, recuperation and repatriation. Detailed maps and illustrations provide a human face to what were often tragic attacks with fatal consequences. Did you know that half a dozen German submarines came close enough to the US Naval Operating Base in Bermuda to see Gibbs Hill? Or that hardy Canadians from a sunken trading schooner rowed and sailed their way to the remote island on their own? Allied pilots based in Bermuda sank two German U-Boats, rescued dozens in daring water landings and several crashed.

The success of the Allied codebreakers at Bletchley Park was one of the iconic intelligence achievements of World War II, immortalised in films such as The Imitation Game and Enigma. But cracking Enigma was only half of the story. Across the Channel, German intelligence agencies were hard at work breaking British and Allied codes. Now updated in paperback, The Third Reich is Listening is a gripping blend of modern history and science, and describes the successes and failures of Germany's codebreaking and signals intelligence operations from 1935 to 1945. The first mainstream book to take an in-depth look at German cryptanalysis in World War II, it tells how the Third Reich broke the ciphers of Allied and neutral countries, including Great Britain, France, Russia and Switzerland. This book offers a dramatic new perspective on one of the biggest stories of World War II, using declassified archive material and colourful personal accounts from the Germans at the heart of the story, including a former astronomer who worked out the British order of battle in 1940, a U-Boat commander on the front line of the Battle of the Atlantic, and the German cryptanalyst who broke into and read crucial codes of the British Royal Navy.

The success of German submarines during the First World War in almost cutting off Britain's vital imports had not been forgotten by Adolf Hitler and when, in March 1935, he repudiated the Treaty of Versailles, Britain, magnanimously, signed up to an Anglo-German Naval Agreement. This allowed the Germans to build their submarine strength up to one third of the British Royal Navy's tonnage. When war broke out in 1939, German U-boats went quickly into action, but with only four years of production and development, the main armament of these submarines was considerably weaker than equivalent boats in other navies and many of the other main features, such as living and the fighting conditions, were also significantly inferior. Nevertheless, the German U-boat onslaught against British merchant ships during the autumn of 1940 was highly successful because the attacks were made on the surface at night and from such close range that a single torpedo would sink a ship. Soon, though, Allied technology was able to detect U-boats at night, and new convoy techniques, combined with powerfully-armed, fast modern aircraft searching the seas, meant that by 1941 it was clear that Germany was losing the war at sea. Something had to be done. The new generation of attack U-boats that had been introduced since Hitler came to power needed urgent improvement. This is the story of the Types II, VII and IX that had already become the 'workhorse' of the Kriegsmarine's submarine fleet and continued to put out to sea to attack Allied shipping right up to the end of the war. The Type II was a small coastal boat that struggled to reach the Atlantic; the Type VII was perfectly at home there, but lacked the technology to tackle well protected convoys; whilst the Type IX was a long-range variety that was modified so that it could operate in the Indian Ocean. In this latest book by the renowned Kriegsmarine historian Jak Mallmann Showell, these attack U-boats are explored at length. This includes details of their armament, capabilities, crew facilities, and just what it was like to operate such a vessel, and of course the story of their development and operational history.

This unique WWII history combines the memoirs of a Nazi Admiral with secret British naval reports for a comprehensive view of the U-Boat war. The memoirs of Admiral Karl Dönitz, Ten Years and Twenty Days, are a fascinating first-hand account of the Battle of the Atlantic as seen from the headquarters of the U-boat fleet. Now, noted naval historian Jak P. Mallmann Showell has combined Dönitz's memoirs in a parallel text with the British Admiralty's secret Monthly Anti-Submarine Reports to produce a unique view of the U-boat war as it was perceived at the time by both sides. The British Monthly Anti-Submarine Reports were classified documents issued only to senior officers hunting U-boats. They were supposed to have been returned to the Admiralty and destroyed at the end of the War, but by chance a set survived in the archives of the Royal Navy's Submarine Museum in Gosport. They offer significant and hitherto unavailable insight into the British view of the Battle of the Atlantic as it was being fought. With expert analysis of these firsthand sources from opposing sides of the conflict, Jak P. Mallmann Showell presents what may be the most complete contemporary account of the desperate struggle in the North Atlantic during the Second World War.