1 Jul 1940
The sinking of U-26

In the afternoon on 30 June, U-26 spotted the convoy OA-175 south-southwest of Ireland, reported its position and overtook the ships for a night attack. Lookouts on the ship of the convoy commodore had apparently spotted the U-boat shortly before it dived for a torpedo attack and the sole escort of the convoy, HMS Gladiolus (K 34) (LtCdr H.M.C. Sanders, RNR), went to investigate the sighting report. At 01.18 hours on 1 July, the surfaced U-boat torpedoed the Zarian and this alerted the corvette to return at full speed to the convoy. The Germans spotted the approaching escort and due to constant troubles with the diesel engines could not evade it on the surface, so they had to crash dive. Immediately the Asdic operators on HMS Gladiolus got a firm contact at a range of 1200 yards and she dropped the first depth charges already 10 minutes after the torpedo attack, followed by a second pattern shortly thereafter. U-26 had dived to 80 meters and was seriously damaged by the attacks, one of the ballast tanks aft flooding uncontrollably and causing the U-boat to sink by the stern to a depth of 230 meters. The corvette made four more attacks and used up almost all available depth charges, retaining only five of them and waiting stopped amidst a big patch of diesel oil for the U-boat to surface, calling for help in radio messages. With the starboard electric motor and one compressor out of order, U-26 finally had to surface after six hours only 800 yards from the corvette, but remained unseen and managed to get away.

At 08.15 hours, the Sunderland Mk.I P9603 (10 Sqdn RAAF/H, pilot F/L W.N. Gibson) spotted the fleeing U-26 and attacked the crash-diving boat with four 250 lb (113 kg) anti-submarine bombs, forcing the U-boat to surface again almost at once. The Sunderland attacked again, dropping a second stick of four bombs that detonated about 40 meters away. Simultaneously with the aircraft, the corvette had spotted the cloud of smoke from the diesel engines of the U-boat and headed for it, but HMS Rochester (L 50) (Cdr G.F. Renwick, RN), arriving from the dispersed convoy OB-174, was faster. Unable to dive, the crew of U-26 prepared the boat for scuttling and began to abandon ship when the sloop approached firing over their heads in an attempt to discourage them from scuttling their U-boat. The LI was the last man leaving the boat when she already sank by the stern. The entire crew was picked up by the sloop and taken prisoner.

1 recorded attack on this boat.