German submarine U-530

German submarine U-530 was a Type IXC/40 U-boat of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was laid down at the Deutsche Werft in Hamburg on 8 December 1941 as yard number 345, launched on 28 July 1942 and commissioned on 14 October 1942 with Kapitänleutnant Kurt Lange in command, who led her in six patrols. Lange was replaced in January 1945 by Oberleutnant zur See Otto Wermuth, who led her escape to Argentina after Germany's surrender. The submarine's voyage to Argentina led to legends, apocryphal stories, and conspiracy theories that she and U-977 had transported escaping Nazi leaders and/or Nazi gold to South America, or even that it sank the Brazilian cruiser Bahia as the last act of the Battle of the Atlantic.

U-530 after her surrender at Mar del Plata Naval Base
History
Nazi Germany
Name: U-530
Ordered: 15 August 1940
Builder: Deutsche Werft AG, Hamburg-Finkenwerder
Laid down: 8 December 1941
Launched: 28 July 1942
Commissioned: 14 October 1942
Fate:
General characteristics
Class and type: Type IXC/40 submarine
Displacement:
  • 1,144 t (1,126 long tons) surfaced
  • 1,257 t (1,237 long tons) submerged
Length:
  • 76.76 m (251 ft 10 in) o/a
  • 58.75 m (192 ft 9 in) pressure hull
Beam:
  • 6.86 m (22 ft 6 in) o/a
  • 4.44 m (14 ft 7 in) pressure hull
Height: 9.60 m (31 ft 6 in)
Draught: 4.67 m (15 ft 4 in)
Installed power:
  • 4,400 PS (3,200 kW; 4,300 bhp) (diesels)
  • 1,000 PS (740 kW; 990 shp) (electric)
Propulsion:
Speed:
  • 18.3 knots (33.9 km/h; 21.1 mph) surfaced
  • 7.3 knots (13.5 km/h; 8.4 mph) submerged
Range:
  • 13,850 nmi (25,650 km; 15,940 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph) surfaced
  • 63 nmi (117 km; 72 mi) at 4 knots (7.4 km/h; 4.6 mph) submerged
Test depth: 230 m (750 ft)
Complement: 4 officers, 44 enlisted
Sensors and
processing systems:
  • FuMO-61 Hohentwiel U
  • FuMB-26 Tunis
Armament:
Service record
Part of:
Commanders:
  • Kptlt. Kurt Lange
  • 14 October 1942 – January 1945
  • Oblt.z.S.. Otto Wermuth
  • January – 10 July 1945
Operations: Seven patrols
Victories:
  • Two ships sunk for a total of 12,063 GRT
  • one ship damaged of 10,195 GRT

Design

German Type IXC/40 submarines were slightly larger than the original Type IXCs. U-530 was powered by two MAN M 9 V 40/46 supercharged four-stroke, nine-cylinder diesel engines for surface propulsion and two Siemens-Schuckert 2 GU 345/34 double-acting electric motors for submerged propulsion. She had two shafts and two 1.92 m (6 ft) propellers.

The boat had 48 crew.[2]

Sensors

Radar

U-530 was one of the few U-boats that was fitted with a FuMO 61 Hohentwiel U Radar Transmitter. It was installed on the starboard side of the conning tower.

  • FuMO-61 Hohentwiel U Radar Transmitter

Radar Detection

U-530 was fixed with the FuMB-26 Tunis antenne. The FuMB 26 Tunis combined the FuMB Ant. 24 Fliege and FuMB Ant. 25 Cuba II antennas. It could be mounted in either a direction finder antenna loop or separately on the bridge.

  • FuMB-26 Tunis Radar Detection.

Service history

She served with the 4th U-boat Flotilla while training, then the 10th flotilla from 1 March 1943 to 30 September 1944 and the 33rd flotilla from 1 October 1944 to 8 May 1945. U-530 completed seven war patrols, sinking two ships totalling 12,063 gross register tons (GRT) and damaging another of 10,195 GRT. She surrendered in Mar del Plata, Argentina on 10 July 1945.

1st patrol

The submarine left Kiel on her first patrol on 20 February 1943. Her route to the Atlantic took her through the gap between Iceland and the Faeroe Islands. On 9 March she sank the Swedish ship Milos in mid-Atlantic, at a point roughly equidistant from the southern tip of Greenland, Iceland and northwest Scotland. She also sank the American Sunoil on 5 April after the tanker had already been hit by U-563. She then made her way to the port of Lorient in occupied France, arriving on 22 April.

2nd, 3rd and 4th patrols

These three forays were relatively uneventful, apart from her home port being moved to Bordeaux and then La Pallice.

5th patrol

Her fifth patrol took her to the Caribbean Sea where she attacked and damaged the American tanker Chapultepec on 26 December 1943. She was forced to return to France when she was rammed by the tanker Esso Buffalo on 29 December. She arrived at Lorient on 22 February 1944.

6th patrol

For her sixth sortie, U-530 departed Lorient on 22 May 1944 ultimately for operations in the Trinidad area. On her outward voyage she was to rendezvous with the Japanese submarine I-52 and supply the larger boat with a Naxos radar detector, a radar operator and a German navigator to help I-52 complete her journey.

The two submarines rendezvoused on 23 June in mid-Atlantic, 850 nmi (1,570 km; 980 mi) west of the Cape Verde Islands. The Allies had been informed of the rendezvous and directed the escort carrier Bogue (CVE-9) to the scene; her aircraft managed to sink I-52 with an acoustic torpedo.[3] U-530 returned to base, this time Flensburg, after 133 days at sea.

A short journey from Kiel to Horten Naval Base in southern Norway was her recorded next move, but it did not count as a patrol.

7th patrol and surrender

U-530 did not initially surrender at war's end, as ordered by Admiral Dönitz; instead the crew headed for Argentina and ultimately surrendered to the Argentine Navy on 10 July 1945 at Mar del Plata.

Her captain, Oberleutnant Otto Wermuth, did not explain why it had taken him more than two months to reach Mar del Plata, why the submarine had jettisoned its deck gun, why the crew carried no identification, or what had happened to the ship's log.

The unexpected arrival of U-530 started many rumors. Brazilian Admiral Jorge Dodsworth Martins said he believed that U-530 could have sunk the cruiser Bahia, while Admiral Dudal Teixeira, also a Brazilian, believed that U-530 had come from Japan. An Argentine reporter claimed that he had seen a Buenos Aires provincial police report to the effect that a strange submarine had surfaced off the lower Argentine coast and had landed a high-ranking officer and a civilian who might have been Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun in disguise.[4] U-977, which arrived in Mar del Plata on 17 August, was also accused of sinking Bahia; however, an inquiry eventually found that the cruiser had been sunk due to a gunnery accident.[5]

The Argentine Naval Ministry issued an official communique stating that U-530 did not sink the Bahia, that no Nazi leader or high-ranking military officers were aboard, and that U-530 had landed no one on the coast of Argentina before surrendering.[4]

The crew of U-530 were interned. They and the boat were then transferred to the United States. The submarine was sunk as a target on 28 November 1947 by a torpedo from American submarine USS Toro.

Summary of raiding history
Date Name Nationality Tonnage
(GRT)		 Fate[1]
9 March 1943 Milos  Sweden 3,058 Sunk
5 April 1943 Sunoil  United States 9,005 Sunk
26 December 1943 Chapultepec  United States 10,195 Damaged
gollark: It would actually be almost as fast as a regular array, except some iteration/indexing would be slower.
gollark: Yes, that was my idea.
gollark: You just need to think outside the box.
gollark: No, it's possible.
gollark: It's a joke language, actually.

See also

References
  1. Helgason, Guðmundur. "The Type IXC/40 boat U-530". German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net. Retrieved 7 December 2014.
  2. Gröner 1991, p. 68.
  3. Samuel, Wolfgang W. E. (2004). American Raiders: The Race to Capture the Luftwaffe's Secrets. Univ. Press of Mississippi. p. 114. ISBN 978-1-60473-136-1.
  4. "U-530", TIME, 23 July 1945
  5. Rohwer, Jürgen: Chronology of the War at Sea, 1939–1945: The Naval History of World War Two. Naval Institute Press, 2005, page 423. ISBN 1-59114-119-2

Bibliography
  • Busch, Rainer; Röll, Hans-Joachim (1999). German U-boat commanders of World War II : a biographical dictionary. Translated by Brooks, Geoffrey. London, Annapolis, Md: Greenhill Books, Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-186-6.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Busch, Rainer; Röll, Hans-Joachim (1999). Deutsche U-Boot-Verluste von September 1939 bis Mai 1945 [German U-boat losses from September 1939 to May 1945]. Der U-Boot-Krieg (in German). IV. Hamburg, Berlin, Bonn: Mittler. ISBN 3-8132-0514-2.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Gröner, Erich; Jung, Dieter; Maass, Martin (1991). U-boats and Mine Warfare Vessels. German Warships 1815–1945. 2. Translated by Thomas, Keith; Magowan, Rachel. London: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-593-4.
  • Los Verdaderos Últimos Días de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, Parte II: "La verdad sobre la llegada de sumergiles alemanes a la Argentina". Julio B. Mutti, HistoryBook 2013, ISBN 978-987-29109-1-4

Further reading
  • Juan Salinas & Carlos De Nápoli (2002) Ultramar Sur: la última operación secreta del Tercer Reich ("South Overseas: the last secret operation of Third Reich") (in Spanish) Grupo Editorial Norma ISBN 9789875450752
  • Report of the interrogation of Otto Wermuth
  • Helgason, Guðmundur. "The Type IXC/40 boat U-530". German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net. Retrieved 7 December 2014.
  • Hofmann, Markus. "U 530". Deutsche U-Boote 1935-1945 - u-boot-archiv.de (in German). Retrieved 1 February 2015.

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