German submarine U-156 (1941)

German submarine U-156 was a Type IXC U-boat of the Nazi German Kriegsmarine built for service during World War II. The keel for this boat was laid on 11 October 1940 at the AG Weser yard in Bremen, Germany as 'werk' 998. She was commissioned on 4 September 1941 under the command of Kapitänleutnant Werner Hartenstein (Knight's Cross) and took part in five patrols which included attacks on shipping and the refinery on the island of Aruba, as well as the sinking of the ocean liner RMS Laconia (1921) west of Africa and torpedoing and damaging the American destroyer USS ''Blakeley'. The city of Plauen, Hartenstein's home city, adopted the submarine within the then popular sponsorship programme (Patenschaftsprogramm), organising gifts and holidays for the crew.

Service history
Built and commissioned in Bremen, the boat conducted her first patrol during which her crew trained from September 1941, at the end of which she arrived at her operations base in Lorient, France, in December 1941.



During her three operational patrols in 1942, U-156 sank 20 ships for a total of, three ships were damaged for a total of 18,811 GRT and one warship was damaged for a total of 1,190 tons. Matrosengefreiter (equivalent to Able Seaman or Leading Seaman) Heinrich Bussinger was killed when the deck gun he was manning exploded because the cap or tampion in the muzzle of the gun preventing water from entering the barrel was not removed before firing. This occurred at the beginning of the attack on the Lago Oil and Transport Company refinery in Aruba. It was this freak accident that saved what was then the world’s largest refinery. Gunnery Officer Dietrich von dem Borne lost his right leg in the explosion. He was taken below and the boat submerged and left the waters off the coast of Aruba. Von dem Borne was put ashore on the island of Martinique for medical treatment and survived the war.

Fate
During her fifth patrol, in which she sank no shipping and made no attacks, U-156 was attacked twice, during the second of which she was sunk east of the island of Barbados, in position 12.63333°N, -54.65°W, by depth charges dropped from a PBY Catalina (VP-53/P-1) on 8 March 1943. All 53 hands were lost.

Ships attacked
U-156 is credited with the sinking of 20 ships (including the motor boat Letitia Porter on board Koenjit), for a total of 97,504 GRT, further damaging three ships of 18,811 GRT and damaging one warship, the USS Blakeley, of 1,190 tons.