(the following was researched and supplied to The Alberni Project by K. Belcher sourced by UK Ministry of Defence - Navy publication: German Naval History - The U-Boat War in the Atlantic 1939-1945 & Hitler’s U-Boat War - The Hunted 1943-1945 by Clay Blair )
"U-480 sailed from Brest, France on 3rd of August 1944 as part of the U-Boat evacuation of France, U-480 was attached to Group “Landwirt”. Boat now equipped with “Alberich”.
Of the last six boats to operate in the Channel, U-480 distinguished herself by sinking a minesweeper – HMS Loyalty – and about 14,000 tons of shipping. She was the second Atlantic U-Boat to be treated with Alberich – a coating of rubber designed as a protection against asdic location – and the following extracts from her log give an excellent idea of the conditions in the Channel at that time:
“8.18.44. 0257. North of Seine Bay. My intention is to make for the buoyed route with the westerly current; there to lie on the bottom until 16:30 – the time at which the previous observation has shown traffic to be at a maximum – when I shall rise to periscope depth, heading the current and using my motors as necessary to remain hove in sight of the chosen buoy. I shall attack only largish ships
0653. Bottomed one mile south-west of buoy situated 34 miles north-west of Cape Barfeur
1500. North-bound convoy suddenly passes overhead
To explain the situation in the operational area, let it be said once more that barely five minutes pass without the sound of depth-charge detonations. Asdic impulses are constantly audible on all bearings. The noises made by ‘circular saws’ and sonic buoys complicate our hydrophone listening, so that it is often impossible to use the hydrophone tactically. Machine-gun and pom-pom fire is frequently audible, apparently fired by patrol vessels. Landing-craft are to be encountered everywhere, not only on the defined routes, so that by day it is impossible to identify a convoy by hydrophone
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(Author’s Note - By circular saws he probably alludes to Foxers. Reference to sonic buoys is not understood)
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1530. Left bottom. Hove to at periscope depth
2050. Since my expectation of an evening convoy is unfulfilled, I head away to the eastward, with the current, to schnorkel. In future I shall carry out the same procedure every afternoon, since I regard this as the only way of coping with these difficult tidal conditions
”
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U-480 sank the SS St. Enogat on 19th August and HMS Loyalty on 22nd. She was passed over by Convoy FTM74 on the 25th, from which she sank a straggler - SS Orminster - with a T5 torpedo, and was then hunted for seven hours.
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“25.8.44. 1508. Am being pursued by four A/S vessels, two of which are operating asdics; the third, which apparently acts as depth-charge dropper, approaches at intervals of from five to ten minutes and drops charges; the fourth can be heard to be running her engines at very low speed. Listening conditions are particularly good.
2140. Beginning of dusk. Pursuit lasts until 2200, during which time we have covered five miles over the ground. I have stopped the gyro and refrain from using the hydrophones. I maintain my depth by shifting the crew. One of the A/S vessels frequently lies directly above us with her engines just ticking over, when the least sound aboard her is clearly audible and asdic impulses are extremely loud. In these circumstances, any boat with a mechanical fault which causes the smallest noise must, at all costs, locate and rectify it. The depth-charge dropper, which has lately been lying stopped, approaches and drops five or six depth-charges, at intervals. These cause such trivial damage that I am convinced that the enemy is unable to locate us by Asdic and so is without an accurate range. He has merely a hydrophone contact which, because of the absence of noise in the boat to be vague. I attribute the enemy’s failure to locate me, mainly to the protection afforded by Alberich
”
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U-480 arrived in Norway on October 10th 1944.
(CB)
The U-480, commanded by Hans-Joachim Förster, sailed from Brest on August 2nd to patrol the south coast of England near the Isle of Wight. Conducting one of the most aggressive patrols of that time (perhaps emboldened by his Alberich ant sonar coating), Förster attacked ships on August 18, 21, 22, 23 and 25th and sank or destroyed four. The sinkings included the Canadian Corvette Alberni and the 850-ton British minesweeper Loyalty. Alberni plunged under within a few minutes with the loss of fifty-nine men. British PT boats rescued the thirty-one survivors. Förster’s other two victims were freighters: the 5,700-ton British Orminster, and the 7,200-ton British Liberty ship Fort Vale, which beached, a total wreck.
Förster proceeded to Bergen, where he arrived on October 4th to high praise. On October 18th, Dönitz presented him a Ritterkreuz, the fourth and last such award to skippers engaged in attacking Neptune forces (Neptune - Amphibious operations in support of operation Overlord).
3rd Patrol
(MOD)
Sailed from Norway on the 6th of January 1945, reached its patrol area in British coastal waters on the 1st of February. Furthermore U-480 reached the mouth of the channel during the 19th of Feb; she was later attacked by surface forces on or around February 24th where she sunk in a minefield.
