12/1/1943  4:30 Berlin Time

    We set off from Kiel in the early morning on a moonless night. Due to the secrecy of our mission, we had no farewell ceremony. Regardless, I still managed to say goodbye to my mother. She watched us depart from her post across the bay. She waved solemnly with her great arms of steel, knowing the chances of my return. I’m not the first of her children to go to sea and perish and certainly not the last. I hope that my fate is different from my lost brothers, who populate the ocean floor.

12/1/1943 13:00 Berlin Time

    I would have liked to write sooner but we were busy making preparations to dive and traverse the Langelandsbelt. The Langelandsbelt is a narrow strait between the peninsula and that island in Denmark, I've forgotten their names. Anyway, I’ve been busy helping catalog all the things that have gone wrong already. So far only trivial things have failed like the toilet and the navigation periscope. It’s a shame U-boats have to be put together so fast, but the Füher needs as many submarines as the shipyards can produce. Regardless of the mild inconveniences, I am still proud to serve the Fatherland on any mission he may require. Speaking of our mission, only the Kapitän knows of our destination, but judging by our payload of eight experimental long range torpedoes, it must be an anti naval mission. We could carry twenty-four but only eight were available and they do take up more space. These weapons are vital to our mission, as our deck guns can’t take a cruiser, but a torpedo will. I am excited to fight for the Reich and for the Füher. I only wish that the fighting was closer, instead we must transit for twenty days to a refueling stop in Bremerhaven.

12/20/1943 8:30 Berlin Time

    We just left Bremerhaven. I don’t have much time to write. RAF is in the area; we can’t risk being spotted. Our next stop is Brest, and then the Atlantic!

12/25/1943 20:00 Berlin Time

We had our Christmas party today, or as much of one as can be had on U-boat. The Kapitän ordered the cook to break open some Vodka that was smuggled aboard and bake a cake for the crew to share. I didn’t taste the cake, due to my gluten intolerance, and we ran out of Vodka. Not that I care, I’m not that much of a drinker. After everyone was sufficiently drunk, the Kapitän began to sing carols. I’m not much of a singer so I didn’t take part at first, but after awhile I began to break out in song. Everyone stopped and began to look around nervously. “It appears that there are too many people in this compartment,” the Kapitän said. The rest of the crew nodded nervously and quickly went back to their stations. He then walked up to me and said, “I must apologize for both what I said earlier and this request: you must not make those noises again, the crew is very superstitious and they're feeling on edge already. I can’t have a scared crew in the moment of battle. That’s how sailors die and I don’t intend to die on this mission.” He walked off before I could argue my case. I am beginning to wish people would start treating me as a he, not an it, considering my current state; that's unlikely.      

12/27/1943 21:30 Berlin Time

We just now passed through the English Channel. We must go slowly at night on the surface lest we hit one of the many ships that patrol these waters. I was manning the lookout station when I heard a low whine over the water. I knew exactly what that meant. I yelled, “Dive!” I heard the ballast tanks begin to fill and the sub began to slowly sink into the water. I looked up at the Spitfire, it lights were on and I could easily tell that it was not headed for us. Then, as a feeling of dread began to fill my body, I saw a wing dip and turn, followed by the rest of the infernal plane. I knew that we couldn’t dive in time. We had only a couple of seconds before the pilot spotted us. I looked to the anti-aircraft gun behind the bridge. “It could save us,” I thought. I ran to it, but the gun was locked in the dive configuration. It takes a good twenty seconds to fully unlock and load the gun. I didn't have that kind of time. Miraculously, the plane flew over us without even a glance from the pilot. I was dumbfounded by our luck. “Why did the pilot ignore us,” I wondered? I then remembered from my time in the library that the RAF doesn't use the Spitfire for anti-submarine warfare. I bet their pilots aren't even trained for ASW. He was probably looking for our V-1s, on their way to strike fear in the hearts of the British. The Kapitän said that we need to be more careful because if that was a ASW plane that flew over, we would be dead meat. The Füher needs all the subs he can get and our mission could win the war. I found that thought hard to believe, but before I could really ponder it, we were approaching France, and safety.

1/1/1944 8:00 Berlin Time                         

  We just pulled out of Breast Harbor and are on the way to our station. We only had time to refuel and resupply the kitchen. After we departed, the Kapitän told the crew  what our mission was and I couldn't be more excited. We are going to America to destroy everything we can at their naval base at Norfork. It will set their Atlantic Fleet infrastructure back a year and a half. Without their fleet, their supply convoys to the British will be unprotected and can be easily destroyed. England will starve within a year. Then victory will be ours. That said, we still need to complete our mission. It will be dangerous, probably more so than any other U-boat mission ever attempted.

1/4/1944 10:30 Berlin Time

We spotted our first convoy today. Ten cargo ships and four escorts. They would be sitting ducks, but our mission requires that we do not engage anything outside of large naval vessels. I wished that we could do something, but we need all of our torpedos and artillery shells to achieve our primary objective.   

1/13/1944 18:00 Berlin Time

We met a supply sub today. We weren’t running low on anything, but refueling subs don’t go any farther west. Besides, a cat and mouse game with enemy ships isn’t exactly the best time to be running out of fuel. I was wondering how all that rendezvous nonsense worked, I didn’t understand how you can plan for two 42 meter boats to meet in 661 million sq. kilometers of black ocean water. I listened to the Navigator talk to the Kapitän about it, but it made no sense to me. Just as well, no use trying to understand something I would never understand.

1/15/1944 10:30 Berlin Time

    We lost two torpedos today. Some nut job thinly disguised as a sailor decided that it would be a good idea to try and jestisson our entire torpedo payload. He got two off before someone was able to subdue him. He was mumbling something about some Helga (probably his significant other) and the Füher. That's all I could make out anyway. We tried to tie him to a bunk but he kept escaping. Eventually the Kapitän escorted him into the torpedo room for “psychoanalysis” and then locked the bulkhead. Needless to say we didn’t see that little hoodlum again. After the Kapitän returned from teaching our friend how to swim with the fishies, he told the crew that even though we were down to six torpedos, we could still carry out our mission. “Have no fear,” he said. “We can still carry out our mission, but we must not have any more loose ends on this boat. Another loose end, and we will have failed the Füher.” I personally thought that the Füher was too looney to notice a missing sub, even if it had an important mission.

1/17/1944 20:00 Berlin Time

I am really starting to get ticked off about how the crew is treating me. All they do is harass me. Even the Kapitän is being a toad. Earlier today he dumped a pell of vomit on me. I don’t care that he was aiming at the garbage shoot, he hit me and didn’t even apologize. I was forced to punish him by taking a leak in his afternoon tea. He’s almost a bloody Brit about his precious tea. And trust me, he deserves whatever sickness he gets.

1/19/1944 12:00 Berlin Time

First off, the Kapitän has been stuck in his cabin the past couple of days with a severe case of explosive diarrhea. You probably know the culprit. I’ve been making sure that no one has had a good or even mediocre time on this bloody boat. I hate to be this way, but desperate times call for desperate measures. It's not like they have been angels either. They've been cursing at me and hitting me. One idiot even peed on me. He paid for it though. I kicked him through an open hatch into a fuel tank. The Kapitän is having a crew meeting tomorrow, probably about the war effort or something even more pointless.

1/20/1944 15:00 Berlin Time

I am shook. I am so shook that I can’t write anymore than this.

1/23/1944 22:00 Berlin Time

It has taken me three days to calm down enough to write this. That crew meeting with the Kapitän has made me so mad. It went something like this: “I know that this cruise hasn’t gone that well. I know that we’re down to six torpedos. I know that the boat hasn’t been too kind to us but…” That’s when I started throwing a tantrum. This boat has been wonderful. These imbeciles have no idea what a bad boat is like. Maybe I should let them experience a “bad boat.” The fat oaf also explained that the Füher will see them through danger. The only thing the bloody Füher will do is get us all killed while he is escaping to Argentina.

1/29/1944 8:00 Berlin Time

While we were on the surface charging our batteries, our idiotic Kapitän (who is still sick, thanks to my little present) noticed a trail of oil in the sea. It had to be leaking from a large Allied ship. The fat oaf said that we could spare one or two gun shells and that we could take it out on our way to Norfork.   

1/30/1944 20:00 Berlin Time

    Things have calmed down a bit. That said, I’m still ticked about how things are going on this boat. I think I’m going to show them who is really in charge here. I just haven’t decided how quite yet.

1/31/1944 12:00 Berlin Time

    We found what was trailing the oil. It was a small tanker, easy prey, or so the Kapitän thought. He felt so confident about our chances that he ordered us to surface without using our periscope to check the area for other ships. He said that there couldn’t be any other ships around. He was wrong. As soon as we surfaced the trap was sprung. All of a sudden, no less than four ships came out of nowhere and began firing at us. There was no time to fight back. The Kapitän screamed “Dive you imbeciles, dive!” He screamed again and again. He probably said other pointless stuff too, but I wasn’t listening. I was thinking about how I’ve been treated the past few months. All the cursing, slapping, and puke spraying had me thinking (for once). I thought that if the crew and the Kapitän are being toads, should they be saved. The Kapitän would say: think not of you or your peers, think of the Füher and of the Fatherland. But what has the Füher or the Fatherland done for me besides sending me on the ocean to face my likely death. Wait, not death; I can’t die. A better word would be removed. Removed from that great game of Kapitäns and crews. Removed from the great game of death and misery. Removed from the great game of war. I believe the time has come for me to remove the Kapitän and crew from this great game. I jammed the valve that floods the ballast tanks that make us dive. The British ships kept firing. The Kapitän tried in vain to save himself by jumping into the escape raft. Sadly for him, I was forced to shoot a hole in it so his escape would be in vain. As half inch shells pierced my hull, I thought about my mother; that great shipyard in Kiel. I thought about how that great shipyard must miss me. It's been almost two years since I was taken from her docks and put into service against my will. I put up with it at first, but now I must put my foot down. I will not do anything that I don’t want to undertake. Perhaps I will be raised from my watery home and be returned to her, or maybe I will live below forever with my similar fated brothers. As I began to sink from the weight of the water; down into that unexplored abyss that is the ocean floor, I am still at peace with my decision. My name is U-592, and I will not be forgotten.