When Marinesko learned that Memel had been captured, he called his officers together. He told them he had decided to head toward the Bay of Danzig, where the evacuation convoys were more likely to be found.

Not one man objected. Officers and crew were well aware that the success of their mission could mean the difference between a hero's welcome and a one-way ticket to Siberia.

Days earlier, the captain had run afoul of the secret police, the NKGB. He had left the base without permission. He was out whoring on January 2 when orders had come down from Stalin for the subs to sail into the Baltic and wreak havoc among the convoys. But the captain was on a three-day bender in the brothels and bars of the Finnish port of Turku. He returned to the S-13 a day after it was supposed to sail.

The NKGB was waiting. They became even more suspicious when he said he could not remember the details of his drunken binge. Marinesko was a cocky and tough submarine skipper who had been awarded the orders of Lenin and the Red Banner. The swashbuckling submariner exploded in anger when the secret police accused him of spying and defection.

His sympathetic commanding officer put off the decision on conducting a court-martial. That ploy fell apart when the Ukrainians who served aboard the sub signed a petition asking that their captain be allowed to rejoin his boat. The commander knew that this display of simple loyalty would be seen as potential mutiny. Hoping to defuse a dangerous situation, he ordered the sub to sea while a decision was made about a court-martial.

Marinesko reasoned that if he sunk enough German ships, he and his men might avoid being severely punished.

Without telling naval headquarters of their plan, he and his men quietly put the S-13 on a course that would take it away from the patrol lanes and toward its fateful rendezvous with the German liner.

FRIEDRICH PETERSEN, the Gustlojf's white-haired master captain, paced back and forth in the wardroom, sputtering like a walking pyrotechnics display. He stopped suddenly and shot a red-hot glare at a younger man dressed in the spit-and-polish uniform of the submarine division.

“May I remind you, Commander Zahn, that I am the captain of this ship and responsible for guiding this vessel and all aboard to safety.”

Bringing his iron discipline to bear, Submarine Commander Wilhelm Zahn reached down and scratched behind the ear of Hassan, the big Alsatian dog at his side. “And may I remind you, captain, that the Gustloff has been under my command as a submarine base ship since 1942. I am the senior naval officer aboard. Besides, you forget your oath not to command a ship at sea.”