| Born | 16 Jun 1910 | Berlin | |
| Died | 6 Nov 1943 | (33) | North Atlantic |
|
Ranks
Decorations |
U-boat Commands
| U-boat | From | To | |
|---|---|---|---|
| U-842 | 1 Mar 1943 | 6 Nov 1943 (+) | 1 patrol (33 days) |
Wolfgang Heller joined the Reichsmarine in 1930. From Sept 1937 to Feb 1940 he served as a range-finder officer on the heavy cruiser Deutschland when he transfered to the heavy cruiser Lützow. In Nov 1941 he became a staff officer on the general staff for Battleships and cruisers. From march to April 1942 Kplt. Heller served with Station Command Baltic (Busch & Röll, 1999).
In April 1942 Heller joined the U-boat force and went through U-boat training until Sept 1942. Heller went through U-boat Commander training with the 24th Flotilla from Sep to Oct 1942 (Busch & Röll, 1999).
Heller joined the veteran boat U-155 (Piening) as Commander-in-training to gain sea experience under battle conditions in Oct 1942. On 7 Nov U-155 left Lorient, France for a patrol in the North Atlantic west of Portugal (Busch & Röll, 1997). 55 days later the boat returned to Lorient having sunk 3 ships and damaging another one (Rohwer, 1998). Heller witnessed the sinking of the British escort carrier HMS Avenger, one of Piening's greatest successes.
The British escort carrier HMS Avenger (D 14) sunk by U-155 (Piening) on 15 Nov 1942.
From Jan to Feb 1943 Heller went through his U-boat familiarization (Baubelehrung) in preparation for his own command. On 1 March 1943 he commissioned the U-842, a near-sister ship of the U-155 (Busch & Röll, 1999).
Heller spent the next 6 months training both boat and men in the Baltic. Finally on 14 Sept 1943 he left Kiel for Bergen, Norway reaching base there on 17 Sept (Busch & Röll, 1997).
On 6 Oct KorvKpt. Heller left Bergen, Norway for his first war patrol (Busch & Röll, 1997). He headed into the North Atlantic east of the United States. Heller was lost when his U-842 was sunk at 1400hrs on 6 Nov 1943 in the western North Atlantic, in position 43.42N, 42.08W, by depth charges from the British sloops HMS Starling and HMS Wild Goose. 56 dead (all hands lost) (Niestlé, 1998).
Sources
Busch, R. and Röll, H-J. (1999). German U-boat commanders of World War II.
Busch, R. and Röll, H-J. (1997). Der U-Bootkrieg 1939-1945 (Band 2).
Niestlé, A. (1998). German U-boat losses during World War II.
Rohwer, J. (1998). Axis Submarine Successes of World War Two.
Patrol info for Wolfgang Heller
| U-boat | Departure | Arrival | ||||||
| 1. | U-842 | 14 Sep 1943 | Kiel | 17 Sep 1943 | Bergen | 4 days | ||
| 2. | U-842 | 5 Oct 1943 | Bergen | 6 Nov 1943 | Sunk | Patrol 1, | 33 days | |
Ships hit by Wolfgang Heller
No entries found.
About ranks and decorations
Ranks shown in italics are our database inserts based on the rank dates of his crew comrades. The officers of each crew would normally have progressed through the lower ranks at the same rate.
Media links
|
