German submarine U-188

German submarine U-188 was a Type IXC/40 U-boat of the Nazi German Kriegsmarine built for service during World War II.

Laid down on 15 August 1941 by AG Weser of Bremen as 'werk' 1028, she was launched on 30 March 1942 and commissioned on 5 August under the command of Oberleutnant Siegfied Lüdden.

The boat carried out three patrols and she was a member of three wolfpacks. She sank eight ships and one warship; she also damaged one ship.

She was scuttled at Bordeaux, France in August 1944. The wreck was broken up in 1947.

1st patrol
U-188 sailed from Kiel on 27 October 1942. She steamed through the 'gap' between Iceland and the Faroe Islands, into the Northern Atlantic Ocean.

The boat's first victim was an old 'four stacker' destroyer, HMS Beverley in mid-Atlantic on 11 April. Less than a month later, the inbound submarine was attacked by an Armstrong-Whitworth Whitley of No. 612 Squadron RAF in the Bay of Biscay on 2 May. The Commander and one crewman were wounded. The crewman died in hospital in Paris on 12 May.

U-188 docked at Lorient in occupied France on 4 May.

2nd patrol
Having left Lorient on 30 June 1943, U-188 headed for the Indian Ocean. She sank the Cornelia P. Spencer about 300 mi off the coast of Somalia on 21 September.

She was also successful when she damaged the Britannia in the Gulf of Oman on 5 October. This ship was held together by wires and chains on the orders of the master who was known as the 'crazy Norwegian' by the British naval authorities in Bombay. The ship loaded 6,000 tons of oil in Abädän, Iran. She was eventually repaired in Baltimore in March 1944.

The boat crossed the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal before docking at Penang in Malaya (now Malaysia) on 30 October.

3rd patrol
U-188's third and final foray was her longest and most successful. Operating off the Horn of Africa, she sank seven ships in a 171 day patrol. Two of them, the Fort la Maune and the Samouri were sent to the bottom with no casualties. It was a different story concerning the fate of the Chinese registered Chung Cheng. Twenty men out of seventy-one were lost. The ship sank quickly, probably due to her cargo of 8,350 tons of ilmenite ore.

The boat returned to France, but to Bordeaux on 19 June 1944.

Fate
U-188 was scuttled in Bordeaux to prevent her being captured by the advancing Allies on 20 August 1944. The wreck was broken up in 1947.