Hello Barrie,

One of the U-407 survivors was Mechanikermaat (torpedo mixer) EMIL PIENTKA. He died in 1994. As it happens (quite a coincidence, I should think), his nephew. Miro Herold, at this very time is looking for information and photos of U-407. You can reach him at:

nc-heroldmi@netcologne.de

I'm sure he'd be thrilled to hear from you and very glad indeed to receive the Reichsmark note "liberated", meaning in plain English stolen or looted, as regrettably - surely in later retrospect - was the common practice when the British (or the Americans, for that matter) took German prisoners, decorations, Zeiss binoculars, and Leica cameras being their favorite objects of desire) by your valiant RN relative from that exhausted U-407 crew member lucky enough to be fished out of the water by the sailors of HMS Terpsichore (I wonder who it actually was, not Pientka, I'm pretty sure, but then who knows). An inveterate smoker no doubt, perhaps he used the note in exchange for a pack of good old English Players Navy Cut cigarettes (the pack with the Navy life-belt logo on it), humanly speaking the best possible explanation under those special circumstances. In 1944, one should remember, the Reichsmark actually was worth nothing in relation to the rather weak British pound sterling which however was strongly supported by the almighty US dollar.

Cheers.
Gert