completion of yet another KM grouping

[BubbaZ]

What an awsome film from Swinemünde (Swinoujscie)!!! Thanks a lot Hirschstein
This is my place, I spent 19 years there and still visiting quite often. Evangelical church seen on the film is still there, it survived luckily two heavy allied carpet bombings on march and april 1945 destroing 80% of the city buildings. WW1 panzership seen on the port entrance most probably is Schliesen not Schleswig - Holstein which in 1944 was used as a residential hulk in Danzig (Gdańsk).
Enclosed my 2nd pattern RS S-boot badge found in Swinemünde
Cheers,
Hubert

[Hirschstein]

yes you are correct about the KM heavy ship Hubert becoming a flak fixture if we want to call it that in defense of Swinemunde along with the shore MA Flak batteries in place. A wonderful S-Boot abzeichen you have and period wear too in memory of that time.

[Norm F]

Enclosed my 2nd pattern RS S-boot badge found in Swinemünde
Cheers,
Hubert

Hi Hubert,

Wow, did you find that ground dug Souval yourself? Is there any story behind that?

Best regards,
---Norm

[BubbaZ]

I did not find it myself but it was found by a friend of mine in a water slime next to the place were KM barracs were situated. My brother who still lives there also has 1st pattern tombac Schwerin S-boot in superb condition and tombak Schwerin HSF found in burried cask with various KM gear I do not have pictures of those unfortunately.
Cheers,
Hubert

[Terrence]

I suspect, but do not know for sure, these S-boots were used in the Kurland pocket and then later evacuation. Thoughts? These are the kind of discussions the spirit of the forums were created for. More fun, less "is it real" posts.

Terrence

[pantherv]

I suspect, but do not know for sure, these S-boots were used in the Kurland pocket and then later evacuation. Thoughts? These are the kind of discussions the spirit of the forums were created for. More fun, less "is it real" posts.

Terrence

[Hirschstein]

yes in the case of the 5th S-flottille under Holzapfel they did as the 2. S-Schule Flottille was under their jurisdiction as they were feeding personell into the 5th S-flt during the fall of 1944. Both were taking on operations from Windau, Libau and of course took part in the Courland pocket evacuations providing see support for the freighters originally and taking on any Soviet torpedo G-5's or D-3's they could engage to stop repeated torpedoing's of the rescuing ships to the Reich, later used off the shores of Hela bay themselves in the support civilian/military evac role with up to 100 per S-Boot. Interestingly enough in the official KM documentation the 5th S-Flottille is given credit for about 6 Soviet D-3 torpedo boots but when one searches through the very broken up KTB's of this late dates -spring of 1945 it has been found that the 2nd Training Flottille engaged these adversaries with cannon fire.

out of hopeful interest let me include that the SKL in mid-June of 1944 requested the FdS to make it's presence known in the Baltic with the immediacy of forming a Flottille of 8 Boats with the armored Kalottebrücke from the Boats on hand from the Schnellboot-Lehr Division. In this case the Boots shown in the photos in this thread from the 2nd Training Flottille with the retrofittings of the skull cap bridge protectors and increased MG and Cannon arms.

thanks to Peter for the Kurland Ukrunde for the man from the 5th S-Flt, though the 2nd and 3rd Training Flt's would of been eligible as well as the reformatted 1st S-Flottile with new later versions of the S-Boats/ 200, 300 and 700 series craft.

have you gents seen the 1-2 pics on the net of overcrowded Schnellboots with the poor gunners trying to man their weapons ..... ?

[Hirschstein]

hopeful this will continue some interest in the last days of the war o this thread with the 2. Training Flottille, a portion of October 1944 in Finnish waters from the units KTB via friend John.

Terrence hopeful you can scan and enlarge for your files, note the mining mission accomplished mid-waay down the page with signature of CO KptLt. Klose