German submarine U-547

German submarine U-547 was a Type IXC U-boat of the Nazi German Kriegsmarine during World War II.

She was laid down at the Deutsche Werft (yard) in Hamburg as 'werk' 368 on 30 August 1942, launched on 3 April 1943 and commissioned on 16 June with Fregattenkapitän Kurt Sturm in command.

U-547 began her service career with training as part of the 4th U-boat Flotilla from 16 June 1943. She was re-assigned to the 2nd flotilla for operations on 1 January 1944, then the 33rd flotilla on 1 October.

She carried out three patrols and sank three ships; two of them totalled 8,371 GRT. She also sank an auxilary warship of 750 GRT. She was a member of four wolfpacks.

She was damaged by a mine in France in August 1944 and possibly scuttled at Stettin (the German name for what was then a city in Germany, but now is Szczecin in Poland), December 1944.

1st patrol
U-547's first patrol began with her departure from Kiel on 25 December 1943. She passed through the 'gap' separating Iceland and the Faroe Islands before heading out into the Atlantic Ocean.

She entered Lorient, on the French Atlantic coast, on 23 February 1944.

2nd patrol
For her second foray, the boat headed for the west African coast. There, she sank the French ship Saint Basile off Liberia on 14 June 1944.

On 2 July, she sank the Dutch Bodegraven 200 mi south of Monrovia. The survivors were questioned, the master was taken prisoner.

She returned to France on 11 August 1944, but this time to Bordeaux.

3rd patrol and fate
U-547 was damaged by a mine on 13 August 1944 in the Gironde (where the mouths of the Garonne and Dordogne rivers merge), near Pauillac in western France; she then retraced part of the route of her first patrol, arriving at Marviken in Kristiansand on 29 September and moving on to Flensburg on 4 October. She was taken out of service and possibly scuttled in Stettin (the German name for what was then a city in Germany, but now is Szczecin in Poland), on 31 December 1944.