This Date in History: August 27

On August 27, 1876, General Alfred Terry raced down O’Fallon’s Creek with the riverboats Yellowstone and Carroll in an attempt to ferry troopers to key points along the waterway in an effort to prevent the Lakota from moving north.  The following day, the general sent George Herendeen – now partnered with Buffalo Bill Cody – to Glendive, some 35 miles away, to assess the situation there.  George, a former member of the 1874 Yellowstone Wagon Road and Prospecting Expedition, and Buffalo Bill returned from Glendive on August 30, stating that they had seen no warriors, nor had they encountered General Crook.  (Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, Gold and Guns: The 1874 Yellowstone Wagon Road and Prospecting Expedition and the Battle of Lodge Grass Creek)

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The U-47 departed under Günther Prien from Kiel on August 27, 1940 for operations in the North West (north of Ireland, west of Scotland) Approaches.  Günther Prien hit seven ships on this patrol; six of these ships were in convoy.  The U-47 arrived at Lorient on September 25, 1940 after just over four weeks at sea.  As before, she spent the majority of the voyage on the surface; Prien calculated that the U-boat was surfaced for 5,103 sea-miles and submerged for only 213 sea-miles.  (Dönitz’s Crews: Germany’s U-Boat Sailors in World War II)