Ken Dunn Wrote:
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> Hi Joe,
>
> There were no U-boat pens on Bear Island. These
> are all of the cases where a U-boat had anything
> to do with Bear Island during the war:
>
> U-212 VIIC Helmut Vogler. Landed reconnaissance
> troops on Bear Island to destroy the remains of an
> Allied weather station in June 1943. (Note that
> the Luftwaffe bombed the island before this
> operation and that there was no active weather
> station there when the U-boat men got there. KD)
>
> U-629 VIIC Hans-Helmuth Bugs. Set up an automatic
> weather station on Bear Island on 6 July 1943.
>
> U-657 VIIC Heinrich Gö1lnitz. Set up an
> automatic weather station on Bear Island 30
> November-2 December 1942.
>
> U-668 VIIC Wolfgang von Eickstedt. Evacuated one
> man from a weather detachment on Bear Island on 10
> April 1945. The other member of this two-man team
> failed to return from a hunting trip on the island
> and was presumed to have died.
>
> U-737 VIIC Paul Brasack. Set up a weather station
> on Bear Island during August 1943. Carried out a
> general reconnaissance of Spitzbergen in October
> 1943. Set up an automatic weather station on Bear
> Island on 17 June 1944. Evacuated a weather team
> from Spitzbergen on 30 June 1944 and set up an
> automatic weather station at around the same time.
> The leader of the team, which had over-wintered,
> H. R. Knoespel, was killed by a mine explosion
> shortly before the pick-up. Landed on Bear Island
> on 6 July 1944 to check an automatic weather
> station already installed there.
>
> U-992 VIIC Hans Falke. Set up an automatic weather
> station on Jan Mayen and later supplied a weather
> station on Bear Island. It is possible that the
> boat called twice at Jan Mayen, on 17 July 1944
> and on 25 September 1944.
>
> U-994 VIIC Volker MeLzer Was due to have
> established an automatic weather station on Bear
> Island in April 1945, but the war ended before
> these plans could be put into operation.
>
> U-l163 VIIC Ernst-Ludwig Balduhn. Set up a weather
> station in northern Norway on 11 November 1944 and
> another on Bear Island 16-20 November 1944.
>
> Source: Showell, Jak P. Mallmann. U-boats at War
> Landings on Hostile Shores. Shepperton: Ian Allan
> Publishing Ltd., 2000. ISBN: 1-55750-864-X.
> Copyright: Jak P. Mallmann Showell, 2000.
>
> I haven’t seen the movie so I have no idea
> what the plot is but anything about U-boat pens on
> Bear Island is pure fantasy.
>
> Regards,
>
> Ken Dunn