German Auxiliary Cruisers

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I think they took a bit of idea of Q-ships. But not only, as Germans had camouflaged auxiliary cruisers in service during I World War. For example "Wolf". During I WW 17 single-operating cruisers were searching for merchant ships on the seas oceans. 10 of them were auxiliary cruisers, mostly camouflaged. These 17 cruiser sank something about 1 mln BRT, which is not big amount.
 
a quick note to say that the Pinquin before her demise sunk more ships that any other Hilfkreuzer with 32 claimed, 4 of these were Allied ships sunk by her mines. This was also the only Aux. Kreuzer to be sunk with the Kapitän going down with the ship
 

The idea for Armed Merchant Cruisers came about before WW1, the building of the Liners Lusitania, Mauretania Carmania were part funded by the government on the proviso that in time of War, the government would be able to turn them into Armed Merchant Cruisers, although only Carmania was turned into an Armed Merchant Cruiser out of the 3 I have mentioned. There were others but I have no info on them.

 

Reading about the Aux Cruisers. The Michel also was sunk with the Kapitän zur See Günther Gumprich KIA when torpedoed by the USS Tarpon. Another time was the Kapitän zur See Ulrich Brocksien KIA on the breakout of the 2nd cruise of the Komet. The Komet didnt even get out of the Channel before being blown to pieces.
 
Read all about Hilfskreuzer on the following site.

Hilfskreuzer (Auxiliary Cruiser / Raider) - Introduction

In the book "On Seas contested " , O Hara etal, they report that the German HSK sank 133 vessels, while the above site notes 142 vessels sunk by about 9 HSK. 6 were lost for an exchange rate of 23:1, which makes them the most efficent commerce wafare vessels in the German fleet. Maybe they should have had dozens more of these HSK in service?
 
If you look at the stories of Orion and Widder you will see that they sailed with absolute useless engines.

The main role of the raider was as a pain in the backside. it meant naval resources had to be spared to find them and shipping had to be re routed to avoid them.

If the KM had more raiders then they would need more supply ships and crews removed from the U-Boot war which was where the action was. It just becomes a downward spiral of resources the KM did not have.

An earlier post was stating how dangerous a HSK was. I would rather serve on one of these than a U-boat!
 
The German navy total personnel counted nearly 1/2 million by 1941 and included 150,000 sailors on ships by then. Of these the Uboat fleet only counted about 10%. The bulk of all ships were coastal defense shipping fleet. Each of these HSK required 300-350 personnel but the ships could remain at sea for 1/2 year continuous steaming and Germany had plenty of supply ships. They were the most effective commerce raiders the Germans had and easily the most cost effective too.

I recall that 3/4 of the shipping in WW-II sailed without convoys so there was a real need for these pirate ships.
 
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So why not then? why not fill the seas with HSKs?

The Atlanis was at sea for 602 days. And the later HSKs were told that they could never return back to Germany. The KM tried to sail KSKs in 1942 and eventually had to give up as too risky.
 
The Basket said:
So why not then? why not fill the seas with HSKs?

The Atlanis was at sea for 602 days. And the later HSKs were told that they could never return back to Germany. The KM tried to sail KSKs in 1942 and eventually had to give up as too risky.
Click to expand...


To answer the last question first....Up until 1942/43; most German vessels sent through the English channel to the Atlantic ,got through unchallenged, while after that time most attempts were intercepted and destroyed or sent back.

Up until 1942 most Uboat sortie was positive, netting significant results [up to 16:1 kill ratio in first half of war]. By late 1943 the situation had reversed and more Uboats were being sunk than Merchant ships.

German Kreuzers lead flotillas were still attacking convoys until about end of 1942, after this time they were just coastal defense forces.

Up until 1943 Germans did well in most naval clashes sinking/damaging more enemy vessels than they lost themselves.

So what changed in 1943? The allied usage of Ultra allowed them to anticipate KM movements by 1943 and even operational surprise disappeared by then. This was especially true of the Uboat wars as the allies were able to steer Convoys away from Uboats and steer ASW groups into their path instead. Combined with long-range airpower and CVE the U-Boat war took a turn for the worse. For the surface fleet things were worse. With Hitler's increasing micro management and attempt to sell off the surface fleet, the morale of the German fleet evaporated. Its hard to fight and win when crews are merely going through the motions.

As to why more were not employed, that's basic to understanding WW-II. Germans were being prepared for a war that would occur in the mid to late 1940s, while Hitler dragged Germany into war before this time. At best he gave them 2 years warning but even this was ambiguous until war broke out in Sept 1939. Had they more time to prepare, more would have been possible.
 
My favorite is "Atlantis, The story of a German Surface Raider"

Supposedly "Hitler's Secret Pirate Fleet: The Deadliest Ships of World War II" is pretty good, but I've not read it.
 
My first book I read about the raiders was written before the Enigma secret was revealed.

So the loss of the Atlantis is not revealed in its entirety.

The fact it was replenishing a U - boat meant its location was revealed by reading the u boats code.

In my book its luck and the spotter plane.
 
If you want to watch a movie I would highly recommend "Under Ten Flags" which talks about the Atlantis. Her Capt (Bernhard Rogge) was one of the few officers of Flag rank not arrested after the war, and in fact eventually became a NATO Commander. The book I mentioned above has a forward written by a Capt of a ship which he had sunk.
 
the most comprehensive book written on the Atlantis is by friend Joe Slavick. the man has had the privilege of interviewing first hand many of the HSK crews.
 
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