Mike was watching The Battle of the Atlantic on Sunday last, with Jules Holland talking about German casualties from WWI and the finding of submarine wrecks on the seabed. Once again, my cheeks sizzled with the electric current along which lost souls travel and 12 of them arrived in my safe house for onward transmission via the angels.
“We have suffered in silence for so long ~ Thank you!” a spokesperson said gratefully. (Thank you Jules Holland and everyone involved in the conception and making of the programme too!)
A little later on in the programme the focus was on one particular German U boat, identified as U1014. It was destroyed while under water in 1945 and all 48 men on board were killed by the depth charge….most younger than 22…so sad. Just one of these men remained stuck, unable to come to terms with what had happened to his men. He simply called himself the Kapitan. He was very young, and very good looking. He saluted as he moved over to join his comrades, but it was not the salute of a Nazi, rather a salute of Gratitude. Husband Mike was excited that we had the number of the U-boat as he could find out this young Kapitan’s name and details. Sure enough, it was Wolfgang Glaser who was the ‘Oberleutnant zur See’ of that submarine (and who had touched my heart and my soul so strongly)…He was just 25 years old, and had commanded for less than 3 weeks. The year before, the sub had rammed her sister boat U1015 in the Baltic Sea, which sank, costing the lives of 36 ~ Is it any wonder that this young man could not rest in peace?
To put all this into perspective though, 36,000 merchant seamen, 30,000 German submariners and 37,000 Allied sailors lost their lives in WW2.
I have just asked whether any of these men are still lost and just 9 needed a helping hand…and 7 from The Lusitania.
The majority of us pass safely and smoothly at the end of our physical lifetimes on earth ~ onto bigger and better things, of course!
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