North Sea Battleground: The War at Sea 1914-1918 Read online

  Naturally, the Kaiser was delighted with the result of the Battle of Coronel, but the fact that the High Seas Fleet had actually carried out a raid into British home waters, despite its dubious results, almost certainly gave Wilhelm equal pleasure, for he awarded Hipper the Iron Cross. Hipper, well aware that far more was required to merit the decoration than blowing holes in someone’s holiday beach, declined to wear it as he had no wish to be regarded as a laughing stock.

  CHAPTER 5

  Admiral Ingenohl Decides to Go Home

  Even when formal operations were not taking place, some sort of warlike activity, often clandestine, was always happening in the North Sea. In October 1914 the minelayer Berlin managed to avoid the patrols of the Royal Navy’s northern blockade by passing between Iceland and the Faroes. She then laid the minefield off the northern Irish coast that had accounted for the battleship Audacious and, having negotiated the Denmark Strait, reached Trondheim in Norway, where she was interned.

  On 17 October the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla, consisting of the light cruiser Undaunted and the destroyers Lance, Lennox, Legion and Loyal, was patrolling an area known as the Broad Fourteens, about 40 miles south-west of the Texel, when it encountered four small German destroyers, S-115, S-117, S-118 and S-119, similarly engaged. Despite being heavily outgunned the Germans, all armed with three 1.9-inch guns while Undaunted mounted two 6-inch and six 4-inch guns and the four British destroyer three 4-inch guns apiece, put up a what has been described as a spirited fight before they were all sent to the bottom.

  Meanwhile, the light cruiser Karlsruhe had been creating mayhem in the West Indies, where she had sunk 70,000 tons of British shipping. Her career had come to a dramatic end when, some 200 miles off Trinidad, she sustained fatal damage and sank as a result of a major internal explosion for which there was no immediate explanation. During the period of coal firing, a number of ships had been lost because of explosions in their coal bunkers caused by the dangerous combination of coal dust and air, and this may have been Karlsruhe’s fate. Her supply ship Rio Negro picked up her survivors and also managed to evade the British blockade and reach Norway in November.

  In the major sphere of events, Admiral Ingenohl was so encouraged by the apparent success of the raid on Great Yarmouth that he pressed for greater activity by the High Seas Fleet in the North Sea itself, especially as the margin by which the Germans were outnumbered had been reduced by the despatch of two of the Grand Fleet’s battle cruisers to deal with von Spee’s East Asiatic Squadron. With the exception of the light cruiser Dresden, which had made good her escape, Spee’s command had been destroyed in a battle fought on 8 December south of the Falkland Islands. Aware that the two British battle cruisers were already on their way home, Ingenohl planned a second raid on eastern England at short notice, choosing multiple targets for greater effect.

  He decided that the strike would take place along the North Yorkshire coast. The area selected lay between known naval bases on the Tyne and the Humber and access to it was possible through minefields laid off the coast by the Germans themselves, by means of a gap opposite Scarborough and Whitby. Further advantages were that the British naval presence in the immediate target area consisted of elderly or obsolete light forces, and that it lay due west of the German naval bases in the Elbe and Jade rivers. A major disadvantage was that it was much closer to the Grand Fleet’s Scottish anchorages than Yarmouth and a real danger existed that the raiding force might be caught before it reached home. For this reason Ingenohl decided to support Hipper’s battle cruisers with the major part of the High Seas Fleet, which would intervene if Hipper was attacked and, hopefully, inflict serious loss on the enemy.

  The specific targets were the ports of Hartlepool, Whitby and Scarborough. Hartlepool was a busy, bustling place that over the years had become a conurbation including West Hartlepool. Its harbour possessed two major basins. Businesses included shipbuilding, engineering and the handling of general cargo including the export of coal and the import of millions of pit props every year from Scandinavia. Its defences included two permanent coastal defence batteries, the Heugh (pronounced Huff) Battery with two guns and the Lighthouse Battery with one gun, armament in each case consisting of 6-inch Mark VII guns with a maximum range of 11,800 yards. Some four miles to the south the South Gare Battery at Teesmouth was armed with two 4.7-inch guns with a maximum range of 15,500 yards, and a third 4.7-inch was being mounted on the Old Pier. All batteries were manned by the Territorial gunners of the Durham Royal Garrison Artillery with close defence provided by the 18th Durham Light Infantry, a Pals battalion raised shortly after the outbreak of war.

  In addition to the coastal defence artillery, a number of small warships were based in the harbour. These included four E (River) Class destroyers (Doon, Moy, Waveney and Test) which possessed a fair turn of speed at 26 knots and were armed with four 12-pdr guns and two 18-inch torpedo tubes apiece. With the River Class of 1904, destroyers had become sea-going ships capable of escorting the fleet at sea. At Hartlepool they carried out daily patrols offshore with the support of two larger warships officially classed as Scouts, Patrol and Forward. These had entered service in 1905 and were designed as light, fast cruisers specifically designed to work with the River Class destroyers. They were capable of 25 knots and armed with nine 4-inch guns and two 14-inch torpedo tubes. Also present in the harbour was the tiny C Class coastal submarine C-7. When surfaced the boat was capable of 14 knots and driven by a petrol engine that made an already dangerous profession even more hazardous; submerged, the boat’s electric motors could produce a maximum speed of 10 knots. With a complement of sixteen, C-7 possessed two 18-inch torpedo tubes in the bow but could only employ these when surfaced, which destroyed the element of concealment necessary in submarine warfare.

  It can therefore be seen that Hartlepool was making a very considerable contribution to the national war effort. This consideration did not apply to quite the same extent at Whitby, which was primarily a fishing port situated in a long, steep-sided valley, although it did possess a number of claims to fame. Even today, most people have heard of the Synod of Whitby, if not that it was an assembly of learned divines who met in AD 664 to decide how to crack the problem of calculating the date of Easter. Then there was Captain James Cook, the renowned navigator and hydrographer who was born not far away and completed his apprenticeship aboard a Whitby collier carrying coal to London before enlisting in the Royal Navy. More recently, Count Dracula, the novelist Bram Stoker’s unpleasant brain child, had attracted the curious to the town by coming ashore at Whitby, having travelled by ship from Romania inside a comfortable coffin. Of more practical interest were nearby deposits of alum, used in tanning and dyeing, and good quality jet that could be expertly carved into mourning jewellery. However, the only military installation in the area was a coastguard signal station on the sea cliffs above the town, and that scarcely merited a special visit from Hipper’s battle cruiser force.

  The same could be said of Scarborough, an elegant and rather stylish resort some miles to the south. In this respect German intelligence was hopelessly at fault. In German eyes, Scarborough, was a ‘fortress town,’ although the only ‘fortress’ was a ruined medieval castle on the headland separating the resort’s North and South Bays. It had undergone a protracted siege during the English Civil War, after which it had been thoroughly slighted to prevent its ever being defended again. During the Napoleonic Wars Scarborough’s coast defences had consisted of 15 guns, some at least of which had been mounted on the headland, but in 1914 the only gun present was a trophy captured from the Russians during the Crimean War, almost sixty years earlier. Yet, when the German Navy’s official history of the war was written, with appropriate access being granted to British records to its authors, it was claimed that ‘at Scarborough it was known that during peacetime there was a battery of six 6-inch quick-firing guns and three other guns of this calibre that were not mounted.’ Perhaps this was included as an attempt to save face in vie
w of what actually happened, but the majority of Germans sincerely believed that the town was defended. During the 1950s I encountered a former German seaman who had taken part in the raid and he, along with the rest of the crew, had been assured by his captain that this was the case. In fact, although a small barracks existed, it was home to a few Yeomanry troopers, who exercised their horses on the shore, and a handful of infantrymen. Otherwise, the only legitimate targets available were the coastguard station, the lighthouse, the gasworks and a wireless station behind the town.

  The force which Hipper would employ against this motley selection of targets included his 1st and 2nd Scouting Groups. The former consisted of the battle cruisers Seydlitz, Moltke, Von der Tann and Derfflinger, plus the heavy cruiser Blücher. Seydlitz and Moltke which were armed with ten 11-inch guns, twelve 5.9-inch guns and twelve 3.4-inch guns; Von der Tann was the first German battle cruiser to have been completed and, being somewhat smaller than her successors, was armed with eight 11-inch guns, ten 5.9-inch guns and sixteen 3.4-inch guns; Derfflinger, the most recently commissioned, was also the most heavily armed with eight 12-inch guns, twelve 5.9-inch guns and eight 3.4-inch guns. Blücher was something of a hybrid. Originally conceived as a battle cruiser, her designers had been deceived into believing that the main armament calibre of the British Invincible Class battle cruisers would be 8.2-inches. By the time it was discovered that the Invincibles mounted 12-inch guns it was too late. Blücher was down-graded to the status of armoured cruiser, but as she carried reasonable protection and was capable of 26 knots, just one knot slower than the German battle cruisers, she was attached to the 1st Scouting Group. In any event, the plan was to use only the ships’ secondary and tertiary armaments against the British shore targets and save the larger calibre shells for use against a major enemy naval vessel, should the chance arise.

  Following prior reconnaissance by U-27 under Lieutenant Commander Wegener, Hipper’s force put to sea at 02:00 (times quoted are British unless otherwise stated) on 15 December, heading for a point 170 nautical miles north-north-west of Heligoland at a common speed of 15 knots. With the light starting to fade, at 14:30 the German destroyers and the four light cruisers of the 2nd Scouting Group formed a screen four miles ahead and to port and starboard of the battle cruisers. Until now, visibility had been good and the wind light, but at about 18:00 the wind freshened, bringing with it a rainsquall, and a steady deterioration in the weather followed. At about the same time course was altered to west-south-west by west, which would take Hipper’s force past the northern edge of Dogger Bank on a heading for the target area.

  Meanwhile, between 16:00 and 21:00 the High Seas Fleet’s I, II, III and IV Battle Squadrons had put to sea and assembled 20 nautical miles north of Heligoland. In total, Ingenohl had 14 dreadnoughts and eight older battleships at his disposal, plus escorting cruisers and destroyers, which he led on a west-south-westerly course towards the eastern edge of Dogger Bank, from which he could cover Hipper’s withdrawal once the bombardments had taken place. Far away to the west, Moltke‘s radio operators were monitoring the British frequencies. Between 19:00 and 20:30 the traffic on these decreased and finally tailed off altogether. The conclusion drawn was that British submarines in the Heligoland Bight were reporting the emergence of the High Seas Fleet.

  If Ingenohl and Hipper had known the truth they would have been horrified. The naval codes taken from the wreck of the Magdeburg by the Russians and passed to the British Admiralty had just been broken and Room 40 of Naval Intelligence was fully aware that Hipper’s battle cruisers had embarked on another raid, though not of Ingenohl’s presence. Early on the morning of 15 December Vice Admiral Sir David Beatty was despatched south from Cromarty with his four available battle cruisers: Lion, Princess Royal, Queen Mary and New Zealand. Simultaneously, Vice Admiral Sir George Warrender’s 2nd Battle Squadron, consisting of the dreadnought battleships King George V, Ajax, Centurion, Orion, Monarch and Conqueror was ordered down from Scapa Flow at full speed. This was easier said than done, for outside the Flow the weather conditions were atrocious and the seas so heavy that two attached cruisers, Blanche and Boadicea, were forced to return to the anchorage. Boadicea, in fact, had her bridge washed away and several of her crew were swept overboard without any prospect of rescue. The destroyers were unable to get out of the Flow at all, but seven of those based at Cromarty were ordered to put to sea and join Beatty, which they succeeded in doing. Warrender caught up with Beatty at about noon and three hours later was reinforced by the 3rd Cruiser Squadron, consisting of the heavy cruisers Antrim, Devonshire, Argyll and Roxburgh. As the combined force ploughed southwards parallel to the Scottish coast in the gathering darkness with the destroyers covering the eastern flank, the weather eased a little although the night remained exceptionally dark. Beatty was steering towards a point south of Dogger Bank, little suspecting that this was just 30 nautical miles beyond the rendezvous area in which the High Seas Fleet was to await Hipper’s return from the English coast. In fact, at about 01:00 Hipper crossed Beatty’s intended course some 10 to 15 miles ahead of the British battle cruisers.

  Some form of contact between Beatty and the High Seas Fleet was now inevitable. It was provided by a Lieutenant Buddecke, the acting commander of the destroyer S-33, which formed part of Hipper’s screen. The destroyers forming the advance screen had difficulty in maintaining their correct station ahead of the battle cruisers and had been told to maintain contact with S-33, which seems to have been located in an intermediate position between the forward screen and Seydlitz, the flagship. At about 02:00 Buddecke lost contact with everyone. Overwhelmed with the responsibility he panicked and, contrary to strict instructions, broke radio silence on four occasions between 02:14 and 02:43 in an attempt to contact the screen commander aboard the cruiser Strassburg. Declining to respond, Strassburg jammed his signal. Buddecke did not know the location of the High Seas Fleet’s rendezvous area and, feeling rather lonely by now, he set course for the island of Sylt. Suddenly, at about 06:00, the shapes of four destroyers in line ahead appeared only 150 yards distant, steering south at slow speed. What Buddecke did next almost certainly saved him from the court martial he had undoubtedly earned. Recognising that the destroyers could only be British, he swung on to a parallel course and reduced his speed to conform to theirs. As there was no reaction he slowly turned away to the east and by 06:20 had broken contact altogether. An hour later he observed the flashes of gunfire away to the west but avoided his earlier misdemeanour by not reporting his encounter until 10:55.

  The gunfire resulted from an engagement between the German destroyer V-155, commanded by Lieutenant Carl, which formed part of the High Seas Fleet’s advance screen and, having been detached by the screen commander to investigate a steamer, had run into Beatty’s destroyers. Carl’s report on the action was imaginative, to say the least. Having reported the enemy’s presence by radio, as he was entitled to do by virtue of the fact that he was already in action with them, he comments that he was chased away to the north by no less than 12 and possibly as many as 16 destroyers, an estimate corrected to seven by the German official historian after the war. The chase was abandoned at about 08:38, by which time it was becoming light, enabling Carl to rejoin the screen forty minutes later. Despite the heroics, he had done well against the odds, scoring hits on the Lynx and the Ambuscade.

  That, however, was not quite the end of the matter. On receiving Carl’s radio report, the light cruiser Hamburg under Lieutenant Commander von Gaudecker, and two destroyers, V-158 and V-160, promptly headed towards the gunfire flashes to assist Carl. Fifteen minutes later Hamburg’s searchlight illuminated a destroyer that failed to answer the flashed recognition signal. The destroyer turned as though to release a torpedo at Hamburg and Gaudecker took evasive action as well as opening fire. His first salvo went wild but he believed, incorrectly, that his second and subsequent salvos had sunk his opponent. Simultaneously, Hamburg was herself hit by two shells, one of which exploded beneath the
forward searchlight while the other burst in a wing passage, wrecking a cabin and wounding a gun crew. Gaudecker turned south-east to avoid losing contact with the fleet. His two destroyers conformed, but their fire was masked by Hamburg herself and they played little part in the action.

  These contacts came as a severe shock to Ingenohl. If British destroyers were involved, he reasoned correctly, they were screening a force that contained much larger warships. Just what was the size of the force opposing him he had no idea, but it might just be the whole Grand Fleet. The truth was that the relative strengths of the two fleets was everything that the German planners had hoped and prayed for. One can only speculate on what might have happened if an engagement had been fought. Beatty was a fighter. He commanded a gunboat during Kitchener’s Nile campaign against the dervishes and he had seen yet more fighting in China during the Boxer Rising, but in the present circumstances he had no idea that he had almost run into the High Seas Fleet. If he had attacked he would have been dangerously out-numbered and probably lost ships in a general engagement. If he had opted for retreat, the German ships were slower and would have had to abandon a tail chase, but the public reaction to the Royal Navy running away, to say nothing of the international implications, would be horrific. The brawl between the destroyers warned him that something very big was taking place, but he had no idea what. Before he could reach a decision he received two signals. The first came from the Patrol at Hartlepool and the Tyne guard ship Jupiter to the effect that they were engaged with two German battle cruisers. The second came from the Admiralty and was a report that Scarborough was being bombarded. Beatty now knew what he had to do. He and Warrender must go after Hipper, catch and destroy him.