and toughness of these boats." Normally, in a surface engagement, the superior armament, speed and reserve buoyancy of the destroyer would have been decisive. But in this unusual case, the destroyer was unable to depress her 4-inch and 3-inch deck guns enough to hit the sub, while all of the submarine's machine guns could be brought to bear. One or two 4-inch gun crews attempted to fire, but their shells passed harmlessly over the target. Bories crew had a limited number of small arms, however, and the German deck mounts were completely open and had no protection. The executive officer had presented a virtually identical situation during drills on 27 October – a theoretical ramming by a U-boat on the port side – and as a result, after the ramming, Bories crew took immediate action without orders. In the extended and bitter fighting that ensued, several German sailors were killed in desperate attempts to man the submarine's deck weapons. As each man emerged from the hatch and ran toward the guns, he was illuminated by Bories spotlight and met by a hail of gunfire. Bories crew engaged the enemy with whatever was at hand: Tommy guns, rifles, pistols, shotguns intended for riot control, and even a Very pistol. Bories executive officer and a signalman fired from the bridge throughout the fight. One German sailor was hit in the chest with a Very flare. One of the Oerlikon 20 mm cannon was also able to fire. Bories crewmen could clearly see a polar bear insignia painted on the conning tower and the three numerals of the submarine. The bow of the sub had been badly damaged by the depth charges and she was unable to submerge. U-405s deck armament was extensive: in addition to the 88 mm gun, she also had six Flak 38 autocannons, in one quadruple and four single mounts. These weapons would have been devastating to Borie's exposed crew if they had been continuously manned. Occasionally, a German crewman would reach one of the Flak mounts, and open fire briefly before he was killed. Other German sailors kept up a sporadic small arms fire of their own from open hatchways. Sinking of U-405 Finally, U-405 and Borie separated and the crews attempted to engage each other with torpedoes, to no effect. At this point, about 35 of the German crew of 49 had been killed or lost overboard.