U-boat-1105 is an historic ship. As a complete novice when it comes to all things nautical, I was able to read this book with comparative ease and understand what made “Black Panther” special. But, this book was equally accessible to those who are U-boat fanatics or ship fanatics or even World War II fanatics. Somehow, Hamilton wrote simultaneously for many audiences and made it work for all of them.

Equipped with all three late war German submarine advances, 1105 was a modern engineering marvel. It spent only a few months in active deployment during the war before surrendering to the British. In that time, it saw little action. But its significance is not in the prowess or valor of its missions or how many ships it torpedoed. Its value lies instead in its history and its engineering. And today, that engineering lies mostly submerged in silt at the bottom of the Potomac River. 

Of the three advances, the Schnorkel was the most significant in u-boat evolution, allowing the u-boat to go from submersible to full submarine. It was the advance that allowed the u-boats to remain underwater for months and still use the diesel engine propulsion system. 

The GHG Balkon sonar array was the least discussed of the advances. It was also the one I understood the least. As far as I can tell, it gave the u-boat a wider field of vision, so to speak.

But it was the Alberich advance that most caught my imagination. It’s a name I recognized instantly because of my Wagner-fascination and I was immediately captivated by the name of it. Alberich was an anti-sonar rubber coating placed over and adhered to the hull to help escape detection. In short, it was stealth technology. Tuned to specific depths, this coating was unique based on where the u-boat would be operating. “Black Panther’s” Alberich design was for shallower water as that was typically where u-boats operated in the late stages of the war. 

Hamilton walks us through the why these advances were conceived, the building and testing of 1105, and her deployment. That is followed by testing done by the British on the advanced technologies and her perilous journey across the Atlantic to the U.S. Lastly, he discusses the detonations testing and final sinking in the Potomac as well as diving the wreck today.

This book is full to the brim with first person accounts as well as extensive photos of both the u-boat intact and the dive site and artifacts. Significant and extensive research has been done over the course of years to write this book. It shows in the meticulous detail. 

I picked this book because it sounded interesting and it proved to be quite a find. I’d recommend this book to technical enthusiasts, dive enthusiasts, and anyone who might be interested in anything about this boat, whether it be history, engineering, diving, Maryland, Germany, or even the Cold War. I certainly learned a great deal as a novice.

Three and a half stars.

A slightly flawed book, although one still worth considering.  I would deem this ultimately as too specialist for the general browser.  The U-1105 was certainly a unique Nazi U-Boat, with a ground-breaking (sic) audio detection system, and a new snorkel technology for longer submersions, AND a nice rubber coating to cloak it from Allied sonar detection.  After getting all that gear, it spent months in getting its young crew shipshape, then had one sortie into the Atlantic off Ireland, with one enemy ship sunk, only for VE Day to be declared.  The British Navy spent ages testing it to see what the rubber cloaking did and how the snorkel affected operations, then the Americans took over, and – well, I'll keep at least some of her story in reserve.

The book as I saw it certainly needed a little work – one point some exit vent is above something else, the next below it, one point some island is to the port, then it was on the starboard or vice versa.  The way my e-arc was formatted made it impossible at times to work out what was the documentation regarding her wartime activity and what was the author's editorialising about the same.  But if you have much interest in submarine warfare, this individual story showcasing not one but three Nazi innovations to the craft should appeal somewhat.  To an average browser like me I found it a little too technical-minded, and too keen on the completist detail.  It still, however, made me much closer to this U-Boat than to any since I was on the set of Das Boot in a certain Bavarian film studio...