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First World War U-boat
First World War U-boat
Here is a time machine that will fascinate every wreck-diver and enthral U-boat buffs - a 78-minute video of film taken by a German cameraman aboard a U-boat in 1917.
It was shot between March 31 and May 6 from the deck of U-35, during a stop-and-sink mission from her Mediterranean base at Cattaro. Her commander was Kapitanleutnant Lothar von Arnauld de la PeriÃ?re, holder of Germany's highest decoration, the Blue Max.
De la PeriÃ?re used up all his nine torpedoes on this mission, during which he sank 20 steamers and three sailing ships - 67,989 tons of shipping. But he preferred to stop a ship, let the crew abandon her, and then sink her with explosives from a boarding party, or hole her below the waterline with gunfire. He also fired 541 10.5cm shells and 29 demolition charges.
We see most of the victims being sunk, as it happened, not through the periscope but from the deck of the surfaced U-35. Steadiness of the camera was essential so it was not panned - instead, the submarine itself turned the camera onto the victim!
Captions detail each ship's name and cargo and you can see the U-boat captain crossing out their names in his copy of Lloyd's Register.
The original film was made with one of those huge wood and metal box cameras, which was hand-cranked and had to be reloaded every five minutes. There were no zoom lenses and no film able to cope with the poor light inside the submarine, so there are no interior shots.
This video, a joint venture between Lloyd's and the Imperial War Museum, holds two versions of the mission. The first, The Enchanted Circle, was released for propaganda purposes by the Germans and has a dreamlike quality - ships are sunk but they go quietly, with no sign of anyone being hurt, or any mention of the 44 seamen killed.
The second version is edited by the British who captured the film and released as The Exploits of a German Submarine. The captions, as you might expect, are slightly different!
The VHS cassettes are boxed as a presentation set with a useful. well-illustrated guidebook to the film and the background to submarine warfare of the time.
Kendall McDonald
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| First World War U-boat (Lloyd's Register of Shipping, 020 7423 1683, or Imperial War Museum). Two videos plus 220pp book, 78 minutes, £25 |
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