U-86
U-86 under Kapitänleutnant Walther Schug was next into the region, to and from Brest on its fourth of eight patrols for the First Flotilla based there. It would be a six-day incursion into the region along a different path: the boat entered midway between Savannah, Georgia and Bermuda and popped out nearly a week later midway between Bermuda and Anegada. The dates were August 27th to September 1st 1942, and no ships were struck.
On the way home, on the 6th of August, Schug came across and sank the 342-ton Barbadian schooner Wawaloam under the indefatigable Captain Luis Kenedy. It would take three futile torpedoes and many rounds from the deck gun to sink the stately schooner. After abandoning in dories with six other men and a German Shepherd, Kenedy held his crew together until they were rescued five days later off Sable Island, southeast of Nova Scotia.
From there the survivors were transferred to HMS Camapanula(K-18) and landed in Argentia, Newfoundland (The Last Schoonerman). Kenedy would plant his and his family’s roots in the Bahamas. Schug was courteous – even humorous – with Kenedy, who spoke disparagingly of his antagonist’s torpedo aim. Of course a schooner draws a lot less water – provides less of a target to hit – than a large freighter.
Unlike Kenedy, who lived into his 90’s, Schug was killed in November 1943 when U-86 was attacked and sunk by HMS Tumult and HMS Rocket east of the Azores on the 29th – she had survived seven previous war patrols. Schug’s total tonnage was three ships of 9,614 tons. A member of the Crew of 1934, he also damaged one ship of 8,627 tons. Promoted to Kapitänleutnantin October 1941, Schug received no decorations. In eight patrols he accrued 415 days.
This patrol began on the 2nd of July and took the sub by Newfoundland. The boat participated in two patrol lines, both named Wolf, and went after convoy ON 113. U-86 was provided fuel from U-461 on the 29th and 30th of July. On her way back to Brest the boat may have been attacked and damaged by an Allied aircraft (Wynn, Vol. 1, p.65).
SOURCES: Gudmundur Helgason, Rainer Kolbicz, www.uboat.net, 2011, Kenneth Wynn, U-boat Operations of the Second World War, Volume 1 and Volume 2, 1997, Joe Russel, The Last Schoonerman, 2006