While off Diamond Shoals on the night of January 23, 1942, U-66 under Robert-Richard Zapp detected the unescorted Empire Gem and the unarmed American merchantman SS Venore.

Both vessels sent out an SOS and shortly after an American motor lifeboat from Ocracoke Coast Guard Station arrived to rescue survivors.

A second spread missed their target but a final shot hit the ship at 5:08 am, sinking the vessel, killing twenty-eight men and sending another twenty-two into the water.

On May 10, the Bedfordshire and HMT Lowman were deployed from their base at Morehead City to Ocracoke Island to search for a U-boat spotted in the area.

At 5:40 in the morning on May 11, the U-boat fired a single torpedo at the Bedfordshire which missed but a second hit the trawler and it quickly sank with all thirty-seven hands.

On June 15, the Kingston Ceylonite was sailing off Virginia Beach in convoy KN-109 when she unknowingly entered a sea mine field laid by U-701 four days earlier.

German Captain Horst Degen decided to surface the submarine and engage with his deck guns in order to save torpedoes.

[12][13] William Rockefeller was a one-gun American tanker of 14,054 tons, sunk 16 nautical miles (30 km) east-northeast of Diamond Shoals on June 28, 1942.

At 6:16 pm, Horst Degen's U-701 released a torpedo which hit the William Rockefeller's pump room on portside amidships while she was steaming on a non-evasive course at 9.2 knots.

Nine officers, thirty-five crewmen and six armed guards evacuated the ship and were picked up twenty minutes later by USS CG-470 which then depth charged the area inconclusively.

While operating within sight of Bodie Island Lighthouse, the destroyer USS Roper detected the surfaced U-85 on radar at a range of 2,700 yards.

Some of the dead were wearing civilian clothing and had wallets with U.S. currency and identification cards, suggesting that the submarine had been involved in landing German agents on the mainland.

Then a short surface action occurred as Icarus opened fire with machine guns and prepared to ram the enemy U-boat.

Before the range closed, the crew of U-352 evacuated their ship and the Americans ceased fire after dropping one last depth charge as the submarine sank.

American Lockheed Hudson aircraft from the United States Army 396th Bombardment Squadron attacked the surfaced U-701 with depth charges.