Lothar-Günther Buchheim – Das Boot

Postwar signature and grave photograph of Lothar-Günther Buchheim. Buchheim was a Sonderführer in a propaganda unit of the Kriegsmarine in the Second World War, writing as a war correspondent about his experiences on minesweepers, destroyers and submarines. He also made drawings and took photographs. As a Leutnant zur See in the autumn of 1941, Buchheim joined Kapitänleutnant Heinrich Lehmann-Willenbrock and the crew of U-96 on her seventh patrol in the Battle of the Atlantic. His orders were to photograph and describe the U-boat in action. In 1973 he published a novel based on his wartime experiences, Das Boot (The Boat).