Many thanks for the thoughtful comments! Your ideas, hints, clues and input are much appreciated.


OK - Ouch! 200 possible boats is a lot!

Hmmm … it must be possible to make it less than 200!

I would have guessed that it should be a boat that was actually operating in that area; i.e. Minch, North Channel, Irish Sea. I think for a boat just heading out to its hunting grounds it would be a slightly elaborate stopover. Just stopping the engines, sending the dingy ashore and snatching a sheep or two or three – ok – but carefully reversing (so we guess – there is no turning a U-boat in Clas Uig!) into a harbour, posting sentries and then sending out the hunting party. That sounds much ado for just a quick topping up the larders. So I was always under the impression that the boat must have worked in the area.

That – sadly – might be wrong. But I still think it most likely.

Many boats!

Well – still – the Captain survived the war and he was said to have visited from 1916 all to 1918. So it is not just a single chance landfall we are looking for. But – yes – he might have just visited on his tours out to hunting grounds far away.

Hm – let me think – would he have done that? Would that not have been dangerous? Clas Uig is on the east coast of Islay, right at the Sound of Jura, facing the Mull of Kintire. Would a boat heading out for the North Atlantic, the West of France taken the route inside the Inner Hebrides? I would not! It is slightly shorter but much easier to encounter the odd mine there or a U-boat hunter.

And how safe was the Irish Sea for U-boats in 1916 to 1918? Would only boats that operated there go there or would boats have used it in transit from and to France and the West Channel?

Sorry – your valuable input seems to trigger only more questions.




It is good news that enterprises like this were obviously tolerated and could thus be found in war diaries. So it might be out there … somewhere!

And – yes – I am very grateful for information about every other incident like that. That these things did take place at least props up the story somewhat … though it still needs a hero.

Thanks!
Ufo