Convoy HX 112

15–17 March 1941, Western Approaches, south-east of Iceland

British victory; U-99 and U-100 sunk for the loss of six ships

HX 112, 41 ships from Halifax, was found south of Iceland on 15 March 1941 by Fritz-Julius Lemp in U-110, who called in other boats. Its escort was the new 5th Escort Group under Commander Donald Macintyre in Walker. On the night of 16 March Otto Kretschmer took U-99 into the convoy on the surface and sank five ships in an hour. But the escorts had now trained together. Walker drove Joachim Schepke's U-100 deep with depth charges; when she came up, Vanoc found her by radar in the dark, the first time a ship's radar found a U-boat, and rammed her. Schepke was crushed on his bridge. Minutes later U-99, out of torpedoes and diving to avoid Walker, was picked up on Walker's ASDIC and depth-charged to the surface. Kretschmer, the most successful U-boat commander of the war, scuttled her and was taken prisoner with most of his crew. With Prien's U-47 lost a week earlier, Germany's three best-known U-boat commanders were gone in a fortnight.

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