U511 An Eyewitness Account

I have heard from a fellow named Fred Staab. What makes this so interesting is that Fred's father was Engineering Officer on U-511! For the first time I have heard from someone related to the U-511 crew. Fred has promised to send photos of the U-511 crew!

Here is what Fred Staab said:

"I just found the website dedicated to your Uncle Stewart's service in WWII. It is outstanding ! Since I live in Denver, his picture in front of the State  Capitol is very memorable, my office was across the street for years.

"Unfortunately, our family paths crossed before, my father was the Engineering Officer on U-511, then en-route to Japan, returning Admiral  Nomura, who wrote a book, in French, called "Le Sort de Sousmarine 
U-511" I still have numerous pictures of the crew in Japan and the transfer 
ceremony for the U-Boat to the Japanese Navy, which is mentioned on your site. 

"My family came to the US in 1954 and I served 27 years in the US Navy,  active and reserve, 10 as Tactical Navigator on P-2 Neptune and P-3 Orion 
Anti-Submarine Aircraft. Life does deal us some interesting cards . . . "

Best Regards,
Fred Staab
CDR - USNR (ret.)

  

In a follow up message Fred continues the story:

"For background, U-511 was on a unique transport mission, the re-patriation of Admiral Nomura Naokuni, the Japanese Naval Attaché in  Berlin, involved in the development and signing of the Tripartite Pact, the AXIS treaty.

"According to my father, U-511 was prohibited from engaging any Enemy Naval Units, due to their own VIP passengers, so freighters were the only targets.

"As a rule, submarines have a distinct listening advantage, so unless the meeting with the Heintzelman was pure coincidence, the sensor operator heard the Heinzelman, perhaps many miles away and alerted the crew. We  still use the same basic techniques today, in my case, we dropped various patterns of differently set acoustic sonar buoys to find potential targets ... it  works for all ships, surface ships are much noisier than other subs. 

"Before leaving, my father confided to my mother that they were headed to  Japan to teach the Japanese U-Boat operations, U-511 was given/bartered/sold to Japan for rate commodities like Natural Rubber, Tungsten, etc. which were unavailable in Europe. The U-511 crew was divided upon arrival and they took over several Italian Submarines, subsequent to the Italian Capitulation in Sept 1943. My father became Chief Engineer (LI) of UIT-22 (former Cappellini), they attempted to return these cumbersome boats, turned into "freighters" ... back to France, but their fuel supply ship was sunk off South Africa, so they turned back, ending the war in Japan ... another story !

"The exact events of the U-511/Heitzelman encounter may be contained in the KTB (Kriegstagebuch = War daily log) which may still be in a repository in Germany or some are here in the US. I recall a reference in my father's pocket calendar about an ammunition ship ... all of my materials and pictures are in storage, while I'm waiting for a house completion after recently returning to Denver to be with my kids and take care of mother now 88 years.

"It was a most unfortunate meeting of very young men, during a time when major countries were fighting for influence and control of world resources. Alliances were made, twisted and broken ... and even the respective allied nations did not trust and co-operate completely (Allied and/or Axis).

"Unfortunately eager, patriotic young men and women, world wide, are lured or pressed into patriotic service and often sacrificed ... we had our own Vietnam Era ... which is now getting some more objective analysis and we're in the middle of another unnecessary disaster, for hundreds of families with killed or wounded sons and daughters .. in IRAQ ... where there was no catastrophic "imminent threat" from Iraq ... for the continental USA. 

"Perhaps, someday the world will learn from the tragic mistakes of their politicians and leaders. A most important tool in getting there ... is objective, honest, frank analysis of what really happened and what caused things to  happen in the past. Perhaps we're doing just a little bit of that very thing ...  right now.

Best Regards,
Fred Staab
CDR - USNR (ret.)

Finally here it is. An actual eyewitness account of the sinking of the S.S.  Samuel Heintzelman directly from Admiral Nomura's book. This account existed for many years but at the time of writing it is doubtful that anyone knew the ship that was being written about was the Heintzelman.

This account is remarkable. It describes a darkened ship, on a zigzag course trying to avoid a submarine attack. The account does not mention the name  of the ship since it is clear that the identity of the ship was not known by the
submarine crew and it appears that it was quite dark at the time of the attack.

Most significantly this account leaves no doubt as to the explosive nature of the ship's cargo.

Le Sort de Sousmarine U-511
By Admiral Nomura Naokuni

It was the evening of 10th July (1943) that we sited a darkened ship and the alarm bell rang through the boat. I heard the orders of the Kommandant (Schneewind) who was on the bridge. Then a crewman asked me if I would like to come to the bridge. So I came up and there the Kommandant said to me, "We are following the ship. It is sailing zigzagging with no lights. I have received no reports any Japanese ship is here, so it must be Allied. I will conduct a surface attack. See what will happen."

And he brought the boat to the attack position. It took time to get the side-position of the target, and from a distance of about 1,500m he shot two torpedoes.

They cut through the water side by side leaving traces. Moments later a flash happened covering all our sights and a roar struck our ears, and almost at the same time we, on the bridge, bent ourselves with faces down.  Then what seemed pieces of steel fell like rainfall. This unexpected roar surprised me very much. If we didn't turn our faces down, almost all of the people on the bridge would have died or wounded. It was lucky for us. The Allied freighter must have been loaded with a lot of ammunition. This view is proven by the facts that unlike normal freighter a big column of fire arose from the ship and its pieces reached us as far as 1,000 meters away.

Translation provided by NAMIKI Hitoshi a U-Boat researcher. 

(The part of the book describing the S.S. Samuel Heintzelman encounter in the Nomura book is found on p174-175.)

...U-511 was on a unique transport mission

Finally here it is. An actual eyewitness account...

... from a distance of about 1,500m he shot two torpedoes...

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