In April 1939 I had completed my eight years of public school and was looking forward to my apprenticeship .  I had obtained an apprenticeship with the telephone company and looked forward to working in the coastal region of the North Sea in a station which serviced the overseas cables. However, I was notified by the authorities that I would become a blacksmith. That was the end of my dream.

Subsequently, I became an apprentice in a blacksmith shop close to home. This shop mainly manufactured and repaired farm equipment. This also included farrier work.

Georg Feldhus, the master blacksmith, was a relatively young man in his early thirties. In the fall of that year he was drafted into the military for training. He didn’t come back because the war had begun. Gerhard Feldhus, the master’s father, from whom Georg had taken over the shop, came out of retirement to run the business once again.

We worked from seven in the morning to seven in the evening. Since I was the youngest and only apprentice, I had to clean up the shop afterwards. The long hours didn’t harm me. However, I wasn’t the youngest for very long. As the older workers were drafted into the military one by one, I soon was the oldest.

One day the owner of a greenhouse came to the shop and asked that a welder be sent to his farm to weld some pipes. The next morning I was sent to do the work. The farmer had told his farm hands to lay down some boards over the vegetables he grew in the greenhouse, so that I wouldn’t step on them.

I worked there for several days and always ate lunch with the farm hands which the farmer provided. On the third day, while eating our lunch, the telephone rang and since we were in the same room, we overheard one side of the conversation,  After the

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greenhouse owner listened to the caller for a while he said:” Can’t we get rid of that guy?” That got my attention. This could turn out to be an interesting diversion to my day. The farmer then said: “Are there no other conductors who can lead that ladies’ choir?” I realized that they were talking about my father. Again the farmer said: “Can’t we get rid of that guy; it’s time we found a way to get rid of him”

This made me furious and I stopped eating and when the farmer sat down again I just glared at him. When he looked up and saw that I wasn’t eating any more, he asked: “Walter, don’t you like the food, why aren’t you eating any more?”

I jumped up, upsetting the dishes in front of me, blurting out: “My name is Schmietenknop!” He was speechless with surprise.

I walked out of the house and went back to the welding job. His farm hand followed me. After about two hours the farmer came in and shouted at me, accusing me of having stepped on the vegetables and ruined them. I had not stepped off the boards which the farm hand had laid down and his accusation was obviously motivatead by our earlier confrontation.

At this point I turned off the welding machine and left.  Instead of going back to the welding shop, where I had a room at the master’s house, I went straight to my parents’ home. After I arrived home, I began to worry about what would happen next. How would my boss react to this situation. When my Dad came home I told him
what had happened. He was very understanding and in the evening he took me back to my master’s home to talk to him.

I went to my room while they talked. After an hour or so they called me down. My master said “it’s okay, you don’t have to go back to finish the job at the greenhouse”. However, I was still afraid of what might happen.

The next morning I was working in the shop when the greenhouse owner appeared on his bicycle. He was hopping mad because I hadn’t come back to finish the job. At that moment, my boss,

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Gerhard Feldhus, had a piece of iron in the red hot fire. Then, as I watched, he threw a handful of water on the anvil. The greenhouse owner put down his bicycle and shouted at Mr. Feldhus in very abusive language. My master put the hot iron on the anvil and gave it a mighty whack with his hammer. This caused a big bang and sparks went flying in all directions, giving the greenhouse owner quite a scare. My boss, the 68 year old blacksmith, jumped over the anvil and went after the greenhouse owner with his big hammer, making him run for all he was worth. While running, this man called Mr. Feldhus all kinds of names.

Then the old blacksmith shouted to the greenhouse owner that he better bring the welding equipment back within eight hours; and he did. Late in the afternoon he brought the equipment back on a horse-drawn wagon.

In the meantime, my father received further help against his enemies by some friends who were tradesmen. They all belonged to guilds which were hundreds of years old and membership in a guild gave a person some influence. My father’s friends, who belonged to these guilds, decided that they would protect my father by making him an air-raid warden. But, in spite of this, there were a few times during the war when his enemies tried to make trouble for my father. His friends, especially the mayor of our district, protected him by pointing out that he was needed as an air-raid warden.

After three years in the blacksmith shop I had finished my apprenticeship and became a journeyman. This usually takes three and a half years, but I finished early, because of the war and the fact that I would soon be called up for military service. At that time the army still used horses, especially in Russia and I feared that I would get assigned to the Russian front.

I knew what that meant and was eager to avoid this possibility. My plan was to join the navy. I had always liked the water and thought the Navy would be a good place for me. But, because I was only seventeen I needed my father’s permission. When I asked my father if I could join the navy he said no and added “you don’t have to volunteer, you will have to go soon enough”.

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However, I filled out the forms for the navy and had them ready to go. One day, in the fall of 1942, I had a day off work and helped my dad dig peat, which we used for fuel in the winter. He asked if I could help for another day, but I couldn’t because my boss needed me back on the job. The shop was building sleds for the army to use in Russia and all the other employees had already left to serve in the military.

When I told my father that I couldn’t help him the next day, he was a little annoyed and said:”If your boss wants to be that stubborn, then  you might as well join the Navy” What he didn’t realize was, that I had all the papers ready. So I pulled the papers out and because he was angry, he signed them. I put them into an envelope and took it right down to the mailbox and the papers were gone! Half an hour later, my father said to me: “ Let me see those papers again, I shouldn’t have signed them, I was a bit too hasty.”

“It’s too late, Dad, they are gone” I replied. He got angry at me, but as it turned out, I had made a good choice. I joined the navy only a week before my contemporaries were drafted into the army. If I had waited to be drafted, I wouldn’t have had a choice about my service. So at least, I got to go where I wanted to go.

I was sent to Belgium for basic training. Here we learned all the basic skills that a soldier might need in a battle situation. We marched, we ran and crawled through the mud. We learned how to shoot and use various weapons.  Then we marched and ran and crawled through the mud some more. Our instructors were veterans of the Russian front and tried to teach us everything we needed to know in just eight weeks.

At the end of the eight week boot camp there was a little party in the barracks. Some of the fellows had bought some wine. I was not used to drinking wine, so when they offered me some, I refused. Even though, I wasn’t a believer at the time, I was living up to the standards of my parents. Nobody was getting drunk; they were just singing and having a good time. My friends asked me to join them, but I stubbornly refused. Finally the corporal came and gave me the order to join the celebration. I had a sip of wine along with some coffee and cake provided.

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After the basic training, I was sent to a transit camp in Neustadt, Schleswig-Holstein. I was there for about three weeks. We were kept busy with various chores and activities similar to our basic training. From there we were all sent to our assignments, some for more training, others to various postings. I was sent to do a diving course in Wilhelmshaven and I was very pleased with this assignment.

The journey to Wilhelmshaven provided a pleasant interlude in my routine. I was able to spend a night in Bremen with my oldest sister Emmi and her family. When I arrived in Wilhelmshaven, however, I was told that they were sending me back to the transit camp in Neustadt because they had too many people at this camp. Well, sometimes even the military makes mistakes.

Soon after this I was painfully aware of the difference between a mistake made by the military and a mistake made by a soldier in the lowest rank. Back in Neustadt I lost my passbook which included my identity papers. This was a serious problem. I told the corporal of this and he immediately reported the loss to his superior. They both helped me search for this lost passbook, even creeping under piles of wood and searching every corner, but to no avail. I lost a night’s sleep worrying about my predicament.

The next morning everyone was lined up ready to go and I still hadn’t found my book. One more time I went to the laundry where I had washed my clothes the previous day to look for my book, even though I had searched there before. I searched up and down the long rows of washtubs and just as I was ready to give up I saw something dark on the floor in a corner. What a relief, I had found my passbook, soaking wet, but I didn’t care. I had avoided a major problem, because losing a passbook was a major offence.

I ran out  to where the rest of the men were lined up waiting for the company commander to come out. I quickly showed my passbook to the sergeant and joined the ranks. The commander spotted me running and shouted:”Who is that running there?” The sergeant went and explained the situation and all was fine. However it was a very frightening experience for me.

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I was now given a new set of orders. My next posting would be to the submarine school at Pillau, East Prussia. The school was on a cruise ship, the Robert Ley. This was one of the ships which was normally
used for inexpensive vacations for the working people of Germany. The name of this inexpensive vacation program was “Strength through Joy” (Kraft durch Freude). There were seven such ships at that time.

The training session on the Robert Ley lasted for twelve weeks. We learned mainly about the workings of the submarine, but we also practiced swimming and other skills. I was assigned to specialize in the electrical equipment on a submarine. This included the electric motors which drove the sub when it was submerged.

From the school on the Robert Ley we went back to the transit camp in Neustadt, Schleswig-Holstein until we were given our permanent assignments. The submarine, I was assigned to, was being built in the naval shipyard (Kriegsmarinewerft) in Wilhelmshaven. So this is where I went for the next part of  my training.

I was one of the first of the crew to arrive at the camp in Wilhelmshaven. Only three other men were there when I arrived. There was a first lieutenant (Oberleutnant) in the reserves who was the commandant of this camp. He was a cheerful gentleman of over sixty years. Every day more of the crew arrived at camp from various training schools and a few from other subs with some battle experience.

One day the commandant saw me in the hall, called me over and asked “where do you come from?” I told him that I came from Oldenburg and he mentioned that it was close by. Then he assigned me to become his orderly. This meant that I would be cleaning up his room and looking after his needs. There wasn’t much to do, since he was living on base only part-time and the rest of the time in his house in town. I enjoyed this job, because I didn’t have to go out to the parade grounds and march like the others.

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Then our engineer, Lieutenant (Leutnant Ingenieur) Schuster, arrived. He had been on another submarine and had experienced battle already. Lieutenant Schuster chose my friend, Heinz, as his orderly. He lived across the hall from the camp commandant, whom I was serving as orderly.

One day, for fun, I phoned Heinz across the hall and asked him what he thought of the new lieutenant. Then I started to talk about how we would soon train this new lieutenant to be the way we wanted him to be. As I kept on in this vein, I suddenly realized that Heinz wasn’t responding anymore. So I said:”What’s the matter, aren’t you there anymore?” He replied “Oh yes, I am and there is someone else here as well” Then Lieutenant Schuster’s voice ordered me to come right over. He had come in while Heinz had phoned with me and had listened in on the conversation and what I had to say about him.

I put the phone down and went across the hall wondering what would happen to me now. Lieutenant Schuster growled at me:”So, that is what you think about me” I replied: “No sir, we were just joking around” He said: “Yes, I know. We’ll see who will train whom. He sent me back, and I didn’t hear anything about this incident  ever.

Lieutenant Schuster turned out to be one of the best officers we had on our sub. At the time, though, Heinz and I were really shaken up.

When the whole crew had assembled Lieutenant Schuster said: “At  six o”clock in the morning I will blow the whistle and you are to be outside in your swim trunks.” The next morning we went out and ran across the exercise square to the quay. Wilhelmshaven is situated on the North Sea which is quite cold. Lieutenant Schuster was the first to jump into the water, which was about ten meters deep at that point, and a few of the men followed him. When he came up the ladder, he looked at the rest of us and said: “What’s the matter with you guys? You claim to be soldiers, are you afraid?”

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Well, it was cold. This was in June and the air was still a bit chilly and the water was really cold. One minute we were sleeping soundly and two minutes later we were to jump into this icy water! But Lieutenant Schuster didn’t force us to jump. He gave us a few days and soon we got used to jumping into the water regularly every morning.

The eight week training in Wilhelmshaven was the best time I had in the Navy. In the mornings we went to the shipyard where our submarine was being built and we learned about the structure and the various parts of the sub. In the afternoon we had to study the manuals for the sub so that we would learn how things worked and where everything went. We had to know where the various parts were when the submarine was completed and some of the machinery was covered. After we did our studying, we were free to do what we wanted.

One of the skills we learned and practiced during our training was how to get out of a submerged submarine. There was a diving tank which was set up for this purpose. At first we went into the tank with an instructor. After we had practiced the maneuver a few times we could go in by ourselves.

The diving tank consisted of two parts. The upper section, three meters deep, was filled with water. This section represented the ocean. The lower section was filled with air and represented the inside of the submarine. This lower section could be flooded. In the wall between the upper and lower sections was a vertical shaft with a hatch in it. This was to simulate the hatch in the submarine.

We would get into the botton section through a hatch in the side of the tank. Then the side hatch was sealed and water was let into the lower section. When the water came above the bottom of the shaft we had to dive down into the water and up through the hatch into the upper section which simulated the ocean. At first it was sort of frightening, but we got used to it and I enjoyed these diving sessions. There were usually two or three of us who practiced this for about an hour every afternoon. This probably helped me later on when I was in real trouble on the submarine.

The second week the camp commander came in and asked why I hadn’t 

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requested weekends off because my home was not far from the camp. I had not asked because I enjoyed myself. “For next weekend” he said “I want to see that request form on my desk.

A few times after this I forgot to ask, but he always made sure that I had permission to go home for the weekend. On Friday evenings I would take the last train to Oldenburg and would find various ways of getting home from the end of the trolley line in Oldenburg, about ten kilometers from where I was at home. On one such occasion, my sister Hanna came to pick me up from the trolley station on her bicycle, leading my bicycle. It was just getting dark as we were riding home and when we came to the outskirts of Kleefeld, the local policeman stopped us because I had no light on my bike. Hanna lit into the poor gentleman and told him that her brother had come home on leave from the military and should not be treated this way. It wasn’t fair to the policeman, of course, but he let us go without further ado.

Copyright © 2006/2007 Walter Schmietenknop. All rights reserved.