U-155 exhibited near Tower Bridge, after the 1918 Armistice

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From 1914 to 1918 Germany launched a U-boat campaign against the trade routes of the Allies. It took place largely in the seas around the British Isles and in the Mediterranean. The German Empire relied on imports for food and domestic food production (especially fertilizer) and the United Kingdom relied heavily on imports to feed its population, and both required raw materials to supply their war industry; the powers aimed, therefore, to blockade one another. In the course of events in the Atlantic alone, German U-boats sank almost 5,000 ships with nearly 13 million gross register tonnage, losing 178 boats and about 5,000 men. Other naval areas saw U-boats operating in both the Far East and South East Asia, the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean and North Seas.

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'Deutschland' was a blockade breaking German merchant submarine used during World War I. It was developed with private funds and operated by the North German Lloyd Line. She was the first of seven U-151-class U-boats built and one of only two used as unarmed cargo submarines.

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After making two voyages as an unarmed merchantman, she was taken over by the German Imperial Navy on 19 February 1917 and converted into U-155, armed with six torpedo tubes and two deck guns. As U-155, she began a raiding career in June 1917 that was to last until October 1918, sinking 120,434 tons of shipping and damaging a further 9,080 tons of shipping.

U-155 made her final cruise on 12 November 1918 and was surrendered to the Allies at Harwich 24 November 1918 with other submarines as part of the terms of the Armistice. She was exhibited at St Katharine's Dock, London, in December 1918, and then at Liverpool, before being laid up at Rosyth. There, she was sold on 3 March 1919 to James Dredging Co. for £3,500, and then rapidly sold-on to Noel Pemberton Billing for £17,000, and the to John Bull Ltd (£15,000), a vehicle for Horatio Bottomley, who demilitarised the boat and embarked on a commercial tour that began at Great Yarmouth in September 1919, with the vessel

re-christened 'Deutschland'. At the end of the tour, in June 1921 she was taken into dock for stripping at Clover, Clayton Birkenhead, where, on 17 September 1921, an explosion in the engine room killed five apprentices. The hulk was sold to Robert Smith & Son, Birkenhead, for £200 in June 1922, and broken up at Rock Ferry.

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Source: Wikipedia