Hi,
Hello Hubertus,
I today spoke to two elderly sailors dressed in full naval uniform. They told me they were aged 87 and 85 years old. They were serving on HMS Cotton and were heading to the funeral of a fellow sailor on that ship. Amongst their tales of battle in the freezing rough seas of the North Sea, Northern Atlantic etc they told me their ship, HMS Cotton, was responsible for the sinking of the last U boat - U286.
Until today I knew nothing of this action so I checked on the web sites and found many sites including this forum.
Their account of the sinking is strikingly different to what has been reported.
On this site;
[www.naval-history.net] the quote says "sinking of U286 with HM Frigates ANGUILLA and COTTON in position 69.29 N33-37E by concentrated depth charge and SQUID projectile attacks.There were no survivors from U286."
Interestingly, the two gentlemen today explained that U286 surfaced and the first two sub mariners to appear were killed by British frigate fire. There were other survivors from the U Boat who did get off the U286 before it sank stern first. They were picked up by a Russian Gun Boat and they "took no prisoners", apparently this was a given due to what the Russians had endured earlier in the war and the bad blood.
I noticed there were several references to defenceless sailors being killed on the water by both Allied and Germans. If this recollection is true and given the facts that this was the last UBoat sunk and being so close to the end of the war (9 days), this was a poignant moment for me.

Stuart Currall
I received this e-amil,