From Jutland to Junkyard: The raising of the scuttled German High Seas Fleet from Scapa Flow - the greatest salvage operation of all time

by George, S. C.

  In 1902 British anxieties were aggravated by the unintentional disclosure of German plans to build even more heavy ships, while a study of plans of the battleships disclosed all too clearly that they were intended to provide a short-range striking-force. Her navy was based mainly at Kiel and Wilhelmshaven, two convenient sites for rapid entry into the North Sea.

  In 1906 Britain secretly built a new type of battleship, the Dreadnought, whose armament was all of the same calibre. This class of ship had ten 12-inch guns mounted in five twin-turrets. Four of these guns could be trained in the same direction, which enabled them to fire a broadside two-and-a-half times heavier than had previously been possible. Displacement was doubled to 18,000 tons to enable better armoured protection to be provided, and speed was 21.5 knots. Two years later a battle-cruiser was brought into service with 12-inch guns mounted in four twin-turrets and, as these could all be trained in the same direction, their broadside equalled that of the Dreadnought’s, while their speed of 26 knots rivalled that of the fastest cruisers.

  In 1907 the German Reichstag passed a vast naval construction bill. The programme was to be completed by 1917. Besides battleships and torpedo craft it included 38 small cruisers. Larger dry-docks were built and the Kiel Canal was widened.

  Germany’s programme of reconstruction started with the Nassau class of ship armed with 12 11-inch guns and 12 5.9-inch guns. Succeeding classes were equal both in size and power to contemporary British ships. These classes were: Helgoland (four ships), Kaiser (five ships), König (four ships) and Bayern (three ships). The first three classes, armed with 12-inch guns, had speeds of 20 to 21 knots; the last class carried eight 15-inch guns and had speeds of 23 to 24 knots. All ships had a secondary armament of 12 to 16 5.9-inch guns. The first of the series of battleships was Blücher, 15,500 tons displacement, speed 24 knots, armed with 12 8.2-inch, eight 5.9-inch and six 3.4-inch guns and four 18-inch torpedoes. This was followed by von der Tann, Moltke, Goeben, Seydlitz, Derfflinger, Lützow and Hindenburg. About three light cruisers were built each year ranging from the Dresden class with a displacement of 3,650 tons and a speed of 24 knots to the Königsberg class with a displacement of 5,600 tons and a speed of 27½ knots.

  At the beginning of the 20th century two great modern dockyards were built, one at Wilhelmshaven on the North Sea and the other at Kiel on the Baltic; these were connected by a ship canal. Smaller establishments were maintained at Cuxhaven, Bremerhaven, Flensburg, Swinemünde, Danzig and Kiaochow in the Far East.

  It was a time when political intrigue consumed Europe. Great nations entered into alliances to preserve the balance of power, and the small nations, jealous of their sovereignty and fearful of being swallowed by their greedy neighbours, plotted with and against each other. Serbia resented having two-thirds of her blood-brothers oppressed by Austria–Hungary where they lived. The quarrels of these two states involved the great powers. Russia and France supported Serbia; Germany, fearing both, supported Austria–Hungary. England, apprehensive of Germany’s naval programme, leaned towards Russia and France. Europe was divided into hostile camps and fear dominated all politics, thus creating fresh problems and difficulties. Serbia was incensed because the great powers ignored her grievance and were scarcely sensible that her dream of unity existed, though this was the chief threat to European peace. A crisis in 1908 was averted, but relations between England and Germany deteriorated, and when Sir Charles Hardinge warned the Kaiser of the dangers of naval competition, the Kaiser answered that he would rather fight than submit to the dictation of his naval programme by a foreign power.

  In the autumn of 1908 the British Admiralty learned that the German naval programme of 1909–10 was already being acted upon. In fact, in that year Admiral von Tirpitz laid down four ‘all-big-gun’ ships to Britain’s two, and in 1909 he laid down four more. When, in the spring of 1909, this was revealed in the House of Commons, agitation began for an increase in the Government naval building programme and for eight Dreadnoughts to be laid down; a popular slogan of the times was: ‘We want eight and we won’t wait’.

  A compromise was reached whereby four ships were laid down at once and four more were to be laid down ‘upon need being shown’. But public opinion caused the whole eight to be laid down at once, and between 1909 and 1911 England had built 18 Dreadnoughts against Germany’s nine.

  In 1909 Bethmann-Hollweg was appointed Chancellor of Germany. Although sincere and earnest, he had no influence with the Kaiser or the heads of various ministries, and this included von Tirpitz at the Admiralty. In his memoirs he says he could do little for peace. Actually he could do little to reduce the naval programme either, for Tirpitz had the public and the press behind him and they were not at all disturbed that the rate at which the building of the fleet continued was arousing increased antagonism against Germany. By 1910, for example, her steam-fleet was three times as great as that of France.

  One crisis followed another over the acquisition of territory in Africa by the European powers. Then Italy annexed territory from Turkey who had done her no harm, while the outbreak of the Balkan War in 1912 compelled Turkey to accept the position. Russia and England were also at loggerheads over Russia’s attempts to annex Tehran from Persia. Then Winston Churchill offended Germany in a speech which described German’s fleet as a luxury, but England’s as a necessity; a few months later he aggravated the situation when he informed the House of Commons that Germany’s new programme involved not only an increase in ships and personnel but also an increase in the fighting efficiency of her peacetime forces. A Franco– British naval convention was signed in September 1912, and this sealed British estrangement from Germany. England now concentrated her fleet in the North Sea, and France hers in the Mediterranean.

  The Balkan War ran into 1913. To the amazement of the great powers, Turkey’s German-trained army was thrashed; despised Serbia emerged as a triumphant victor and her allies, Greece and Rumania, joined with her in the expectation of uniting all their kinsmen in the Balkans and extending their territories. The balance of power was upset. The great powers were drawn into the Balkan struggles where the victors were already dissatisfied with their gains. The Bulgars secretly attacked the Serbs and refused to surrender Salonika to Greece. Another war left Bulgaria helpless. Turkey and Rumania had contributed to her downfall and the decisions of the great powers were ignored by all the contestants, none of whom really expected that any treaties made in 1913 would be permanent. Russia and France came near to war with Germany over her penetration into Turkey’s military machine but decided against it in view of England’s possible reactions.

  In Serbia, student agitation was bubbling over. Some of their demonstrations had ended in bloodshed and, in March 1914, the attempted assassination of an Austrian Archduke was narrowly prevented. Inside Austria–Hungary, anti-government agitation was even worse than in Serbia. It needed only a spark to explode the powder-barrel and there was not long to wait. ‘The lamps are going out all over Europe,’ said Sir Edward Grey, Foreign Secretary, ‘we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime.’

  At the end of June, Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, took his wife Sophie to Sarajevo in Bosnia where she was to make her first appearance in state. No special security arrangements had been made for the four cars which drove swiftly through the suburbs to the City Hall. A crack like a rifle shot was heard and a bomb exploded. A colonel was wounded and taken to hospital; the Archduke was uninjured. The bomb-thrower, an Austrian Serb, was caught. No military guard had been arranged to protect the Archduke who now altered the arranged programme and, accompanied by his wife, set off with the same cars to visit the wounded colonel.

  By mistake the first car took the wrong turning; the others followed, then all the cars slowed down. Two shots were fired at less than ten feet. The Duchess sank unconscious upon her husband’s breast. Blood was gushing from his mouth. The cars were driven to the Government building where doctors found a bullet in the Duchess’ stomach and the Archduke dyi
ng from a severed artery in the neck. Both victims were given absolution by a Franciscan monk. Fifteen minutes later they were dead. The murderer, a Serbian high school student named Gabriel Princip, was seized by the crowd. He swallowed cyanide but vomited it up again.

  The Kaiser received the news on the Imperial yacht Hohenzollern in Kiel Bay. He wore an admiral’s uniform, for the first English ships to visit Kiel for 19 years were there.

  The Austro–Hungarian Government accused the Serbian Government of complicity in the plot, although their own investigator had reported that it was ‘definitely improbable’. Germany knew that to support Austria–Hungary would lead to war with Serbia, and in turn that would mean war with Russia also. On 26 July England’s fleet, which had completed manoeuvres, did not disperse and was thus mobilised. On 29 July Russia executed a general mobilisation. Austria–Hungary followed suit the following day. On 31 July Germany heard of Russia’s mobilisation, and on 1 August declared war upon her. France immediately declared general mobilisation and prepared to defend her frontier. Germany sent an ultimatum demanding to know if France would remain neutral in a Russo– German war. On the same day Belgium mobilised. Sir Edward Grey, who for some days had been living with Lord Haldane, Minister of War, received a despatch after dinner that an ultimatum had been delivered in Brussels demanding the free movement of German troops through Belgian territory. The two men walked across to the Prime Minister, Mr Asquith, and obtained his agreement to order immediate mobilisation of the army. Thanks to Churchill, the Navy was already prepared for war. Throughout Sunday 2 August, the Germans were marching towards the Belgian frontier, and by 18.30 hrs it was certain that they were about to cross it. Making a final bid to keep England neutral, Germany offered to preserve France’s integrity, though not that of her colonies. She also hinted that Belgium’s neutrality might be violated. This offer Grey stiffly refused. Churchill and Kitchener had always maintained that Germany meant to invade, and on 2 August their prophecies were fulfilled. A telegram from King Albert of Belgium appealing for help reached London.

  On 3 August Germany declared war on France. At 09.30 hrs on 4 August, Grey demanded an immediate reply from Germany as to their intentions towards Belgium’s neutrality. At 14.00 hrs, upon hearing that it had been violated, he instructed the British Ambassador in Berlin to demand ‘a satisfactory reply’ and to ask for his passports if he did not receive one by midnight. Upon the German Chancellor stating ‘we must advance into France by the quickest and easiest route’, relations were broken off, and at midnight England was at war. By the time peace returned, nine million people had died.

  The British Navy faced the war with confidence. Despite Germany’s utmost efforts in building a dozen ships of the Dreadnought class and eight large battlecruisers, the British fleet outranked Germany’s by a ratio of three to two.

  2

  The Battle of Jutland

  ON 31 MAY 1916 the German High Seas Fleet, under Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer, clashed with the British Grand Fleet under Admiral Sir J.R. Jellicoe in the battle of Jutland, called by the Germans the battle of Skagerrak. The main action took place about 75 miles from the German coast in latitude 57°N and longitude 6°E.

  The British fleet was based at Scapa Flow, an area of sea in the south of the Orkneys bounded by the island of Pomona, or Mainland, on the north, by the islands of Burray and South Ronaldsay on the east, and by the islands of Flotta and Hoy on the south-west and west. Scapa Flow contains several small islands, and other islands lie in the channels leading into it. From north to south it measures some 15 miles and its average breadth is about eight miles. Its waters are sheltered, and its good anchorage had led to its selection by Admiral Jellicoe as the main naval base of the British fleet in preference to Cromarty Firth, though everything had to be improvised and guns landed from ships to strengthen the defences. One great disadvantage was the lack of a fully equipped dockyard nearer than those in the south of England. The Admiralty therefore despatched a floating dock to Invergordon in the Cromarty Firth, and work was accelerated on a new dockyard at Rosyth on the Firth of Forth. The yard was later used for breaking up salvaged German ships.

  The British fleet consisted of the Admiral’s flagship and attached ships, two battle squadrons of the British Grand Fleet, three cruiser squadrons, two complete flotillas and part of a third.

  Vice-Admiral Scheer in his flagship Friedrich der Grosse commanded the Third Battle Squadron consisting of König, Grosser Kurfürst, Kronprinz, Markgraf, Kaiser, Kaiserin and Prinzregent Luitpold, scouting forces which included Seydlitz, Moltke, Derfflinger and von der Tann, together with several cruisers. The ships named above were among those later to be surrendered under the terms of the Armistice. The Fourth Scouting Group was commanded by Commodore Ludwig von Reuter, later Vice-Admiral.

  The British Grand Fleet was supreme at sea, and the British naval command had no intention of gambling with it in night actions or where it might be at a disadvantage. British policy was to bring the enemy to action only when there was a fair degree of certainty that it could be destroyed.

  The only important clash before the Battle of Jutland had been off the Dogger Bank fishing grounds in the North Sea where, on 24 January 1915, the Germans had intended to scatter the east-coast trawlers which, they believed, performed reconnaissance work for the Admiralty. The German intentions were known, as the Admiralty had a salvaged copy of the German navy’s code-book. Beatty left Rosyth with a strong force, made a chance contact with the enemy, chased them across the North Sea but narrowly failed to bring them to battle. However, Lion, Beatty’s flagship, set alight with her 13.5-inch guns two gunturrets of Hipper’s flagship, Seydlitz. This caused cordite fires, but three members of Seydlitz’s crew averted an explosion and saved their ship by managing to flood the magazines. Moltke was also hit, but British gunfire and communications were poor and advantage was not taken of it. Then Derfflinger’s 12-inch guns scored a hit on Lion. Beatty had to transfer his flag to a destroyer, and during this time his second-in-command, misled by the reading of a signal, let all the enemy ships escape except for Blücher which was sunk.

  Thereafter the German High Seas Fleet had been kept ineffective by the British blockade, its crews chafing under inactivity. The policy of the German High Command was to avoid decisive action until the British fleet had been so weakened as to make a successful attack upon it probable. To this end German cruisers were to have bombarded Sunderland to tempt British cruisers into pursuing them into a pack of U-boats lurking off England’s east coast. But as the weather was too bad for aerial reconnaissance, Scheer delayed his operations, unwilling to risk an approach to the English coast without full knowledge of his enemy’s movements. However, his submarines could not lie in wait indefinitely, so Scheer changed his plans and on 30 May 1916 ordered a scouting force to demonstrate off the coast of Norway. This, he hoped, would draw out the British fleet and, by keeping out of sight behind his scouting force, he might fall upon and destroy a detached part of the enemy.

  Jellicoe had been warned of impending German movements, and the battlecruiser fleet was ordered to proceed from Scapa Flow to a specified point off the Scottish coast. A similar order was sent to the sections of the Grand Fleet based at Invergordon and Rosyth. The few German submarine attacks were ineffective and failed to halt the fleet’s progress.

  On 31 May Jellicoe received a misleading telegram from the Admiralty that the German fleet was still in the Jade River in Heligoland Bay. To economise on fuel and believing that he had plenty of time in hand, he slowed down his destroyers. But the German fleet had sailed in the early hours of that morning, and its battle fleet was 50 miles astern of its scouting force. The German Commander-in-Chief, too, was misled by the wireless reports from his U-boats. Now, quite by chance, the British light cruiser Galatea and the German light cruiser Elbing simultaneously sighted a stray merchant steamer, the N.J. Fjord. Proceeding to investigate it, they sighted each other, and their signals to their respective flagships b
rought together sections of the opposing forces. The two cruisers had exchanged shots. Elbing was the first to claim a hit, though the shell failed to explode.

  Unaware of greater German forces further south, Beatty, with his six battlecruisers Indefatigable, Lion, Princess Royal, Queen Mary, Tiger and New Zealand, began a brisk running fight with five German battlecruisers: Lutzow, Derfflinger, Moltke, Seydlitz and von der Tann. The British Fifth Battle Squadron was unfortunately five miles in the opposite direction to that in which the enemy had been sighted, and an imprecise signal from the cruisers’ flagship led to further delay in bringing this force into action. As a result, the British battlecruisers suffered heavily. On the only occasion during the operations when a British aircraft was used for reconnaissance, its report was not received by the battlecruisers’ flagship, while the flagship’s signals for the distribution of fire were also interpreted incorrectly. After three minutes the Germans had scored eight hits on Lion, Tiger and Princess Royal. The first British hit was on Seydlitz, whose ammunition caught fire, and the ship was saved only by having her magazines flooded. Another misunderstanding had saved Derfflinger from being fired upon, but now she was engaged by Queen Mary who was soon scoring hits upon her. Von der Tann sank Indefatigable in a furious duel after three shells had exploded in her magazines, and 57 officers and 958 men of Indefatigable’s complement were lost, the only two of her men saved being picked up by a German destroyer.