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The Kaiser’s U-boats
At the outbreak of the First World War, a terrible new weapon changed the rules of naval warfare. One hundred and ten years on, David Porter takes a deep dive into Germany’s submarine threat.
Commissioned on 14 December 1906, U-1 was the first in a long line of German U-boats (the name is a shortening of Unterseeboot, or ‘under-sea boat’). She was more of a trials vessel than an operational warship, but she successfully completed arduous endurance tests, including a voyage of 1,088 kilometres (587 nautical miles) between the German ports of Wilhelmshaven to Kiel in bad weather. U-1 formed the basis for the development of a series of seven larger and increasingly sophisticated submarines with heavier armament.
A U-boat on the surface after sinking a British vessel, as depicted in a 1916 painting by the German artist Willy Stöwer. Image: Alamy
Initially, there was no con
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