Smoke and Mirrors

by Deborah Lake

  Towards Herbert and Baralong.

  Captain William Finch, master of the White Star Line’s SS Arabic, bound for New York from Liverpool, was a careful captain. His ship, 50 miles off the Old Head of Kinsale at 0930 on that bright August morning, was ready for a torpedo strike. Watertight doors firmly closed, stores checked in the lifeboats, 600 lifebelts placed throughout the ship for the 186 passengers and the ship’s crew. Arabic ploughed through the sparkling water at a steady 16 knots, zigzagging to confuse an attacker.

  On the bridge, Finch saw a freighter ahead, on his right. Her head was down as she sank into the Irish Sea. Nearby, two small boats, sails set, headed for Ireland. Finch ordered a change of course to starboard to take Arabic across the bows of the steamer. Arabic slowed, although Finch did not intend to stop. He studied the sinking ship. No distress call but that was not unusual. Tramp steamer companies considered wireless a luxury.

  Arabic click-clacked a message on behalf of the merchantman. As Finch inspected the freighter, the 4,930-ton SS Dunsley, a sleek, grey shape, dripping water, surfaced from behind the sinking ship.

  Rudolf Schneider had come to call.

  U 24 fired a single torpedo. Someone shouted a warning as bubbles raced across the water. Finch rang for emergency power. The wheel spun to put the helm hard to starboard.

  Large liners move slowly. Small torpedoes move quickly. Schneider’s aim was good. His shot tore into Arabic, 30m from her stern. The explosion destroyed the wireless room. Arabic’s own SOS calls died in the air. The 15,801-ton liner slowed, listed, settled, started to sink. Eight minutes after impact, her bows rose in the water, the stern dipped under the waves and she plunged to the ocean floor.

  Schneider blandly claimed later that not only did he believe the liner to be a troopship but that her erratic course suggested she was attempting to ram him. Captain Charles Fryatt’s antics in the North Sea had something to answer for. Some 18 of the 186 passengers, along with 21 crew, died.

  Baralong heard the two cries for help. They galvanised Herbert into action. With Swinney beside him, Herbert quickly calculated they were a mere 25 miles away. Hectic work with the coal shovels could place the Baralong on the scene within two hours. A U-boat captain who waited to see his victims sink might still be there when Baralong arrived.

  Elation ran through the ship. The enemy was near. Steele and his gunners lounged conveniently close to the fore deck. Corporal Collins and his Marines took up post. Lookouts gazed ahead, eager for the first sign of the enemy. On the bridge, Herbert and Swinney checked the time. Seconds became minutes. The minutes became an hour, then more. The sea stayed empty.

  Seven miles from Arabic’s reported location, Herbert slowed his ship. If the U-boat was close by, it might try its luck. Closer still. Nothing. Not a single plume of smoke. No lonely lifeboat. Nothing.

  Herbert stood down the crew from action stations. Once again, they were too late. Herbert had no idea where the U-boat might be. He set course eastward. One direction was as good as another. What Herbert didn’t know, as Baralong slowly steamed towards the Scillies, was that Leonard Batchelor, Arabic’s 21-year old wireless operator, had keyed the wrong position. Herbert’s choice of course took Baralong towards Kapitänleutnant Wegener and a mule transporter named SS Nicosian.

  At 1505hr, 80 miles west of the Scilly Isles, 100 miles south of Queenstown, the loud chatter of Morse in his headphones nearly deafened Baralong’s wireless operator. The sender was about 20 miles away, if experience was any guide. Indelible pencil scribbled frantically. ‘SOS. Am being chased by enemy submarine.’ A messenger ran to the bridge to thrust the paper into Herbert’s hand.

  As Herbert read the words, a shout alerted the bridge. Steam from a freighter’s funnel. To the south-west, apparently making a radical change of course. Topmasts appeared in Herbert’s binoculars, perhaps 10 miles distant. Less than an hour away.

  Another message timed at 1508. ‘Captured by enemy submarine. Crew ready to leave. Latitude 50.22N, longitude 3.12W.’

  Word rattled around Baralong. There was a chance for revenge, after all. Revenge for the Lusitania, revenge for the drowned women, the innocent children, revenge for the dead sailors whose grave was the unforgiving sea. Revenge for the Arabic. It seemed certain the U-boat was the same killer, who had moved on to another victim. A third message at 1515. ‘Crew nearly all left. Captured by two enemy submarines.’

  It was almost a year to the day that Herbert had missed his opportunity to sink Rostock. Now he had two chances to destroy a pirate of the seas. He called for every last ounce of speed. In the engine room, sweating stokers frantically thrust more coal into the furnaces.

  Five long minutes ticked by. Baralong shuddered her way through the waves. Every minute that passed was one minute closer to destroying a bunch of Hun baby-killers. A hasty message: ‘Main fuses blown.’ Another five minutes paced by. Nicosian’s final signal, spluttered out on the emergency transmitter. ‘Help, help. For God’s sake, help.’

  Baralong pounded towards the lone plume of steam on the horizon. A single funnel. Masts. The Red Ensign at her stern. Herbert assessed the scene. Nicosian sat at right angles to him, her stern to port. Further left, about 900yd away, the low silhouette of a U-boat, men clustered around her forward gun. In front of the steamer’s bows, a gaggle of lifeboats pulled clear.

  Herbert swung his binoculars towards the sinister, stark black outline against the bright horizon. The U-boat’s bridge came into focus. An officer in the conning tower gazed back through Zeiss lenses. Herbert ordered a turn to starboard to show the United States markings on the side and the Stars and Stripes at the stern. Long moments of waiting before the U-boat sidled towards her victim. Her deck gun fired. Nicosian and her cargo of mules had little time to spare.

  Herbert snapped an order. Bunting, a red cross on white, a yellow flag with a black ball in its centre, coloured stripes, crosses, followed each other up the Baralong halyards. The International flag code. V I C Q R A. ‘To save life only’. The U-boat continued to close on the far side of Nicosian. Herbert headed towards the lifeboats. Within minutes, the doomed freighter would be between him and the enemy. The sound of a shell echoed across the morning. On board the Nicosian, a mule screamed.

  Herbert rang down to the engine room. Baralong lost way precisely like a would-be rescuer. U 27 continued the business of sinking an enemy freighter. Within moments, the bulk of the Nicosian shielded the decoy. At which point, Baralong shed her disguise to become a ship of His Majesty’s Royal Navy.

  ‘Clear away guns!’

  Three black muzzles appeared. The US colours vanished. The White Ensign rippled out from stern and masthead. Collins and his men peered along rifle barrels. Gunners waited to open fire.

  ‘Marines! Concentrate on the forward gun. Twelve-pounder crews! Aim at the conning-tower and hull!’

  Baralong moved clear of the mule-ship. Seconds later, U 27 was visible, 600yd away. Collins grunted the command. ‘Fire at will!’A dozen rifles spat bullets.

  The gunlayer fell first. His crew ran towards the conning tower. The Marines continued to fire, picking their targets in the bright air.

  At the 12-pounder gun on the port side of Baralong, Gordon Steele yelled his firing orders. The gun banged. A miss. Again. Another miss. A third try. Silence. A breech jam.

  If regulations meant anything, they were specific about misfires. No matter what the cause, electrical, percussion or the personal interference of the Almighty, nobody touched the breech mechanism until thirty minutes passed. As gunners wryly observed, removing a temperamental round was bad enough after the allotted time. Shells were capricious creatures with a nasty habit of exploding without warning. If someone was foolish enough to pull it out before thirty minutes and it detonated, the miscreant faced a court martial. Piece by individual piece.

  Steele did not hesitate. He warned his gun crew to get back, wrenched open the breech, pulled out the round, ran to the rail, heaved it as far as he could. The shell sp
lashed docilely into the water. By the time Steele rejoined his gun, another round was already in the breech.

  While Steele took his chances, the other guns dealt U 27 its death blow. The periscope and black-crossed Ensign vanished on the second salvo. A third shell crashed into the conning tower. The fourth hit the pressure hull amidships. More shells rained on the boat. Survivors abandoned the sinking wreckage. Most struggled free of their green leather clothing before they jumped clear.

  U 27 heeled over. Months of careful work by the men of the Imperial Dockyard at Danzig sank beneath the water. Two huge bubbles of air escaped to the surface to mark her passing.

  Cheers rippled along the Baralong’s decks. More cheers came from Nicosian’s lifeboats. On board the Q-ship, the jubilation lasted only a few seconds before Herbert shouted more orders. The section of his official account that dealt with the next events was a trifle skimpy:

  The Nicosian’s boats were now called alongside and whilst clearing the boats, I observed about a dozen Germans who had swum from their boat swarming up ropes’ ends and the pilot ladder which had been left hanging down from the Nicosian. Fearing they might scuttle or set fire to the ship with her valuable cargo of mules or fodder, I ordered them to be shot away; the majority were prevented from getting on board, but six succeeded.

  As soon as possible I placed my ship alongside and put a party of marines on board under Corporal Collins, RMLI, warning him to be careful of snipers in case they had found the rifles which I was informed by Nicosian’s captain had been left in the charthouse.

  A thorough search was made which resulted in six of the enemy being found but they succumbed to the injuries they had received from Lyddite shell shortly afterwards and were buried at once.

  No. 17036 Corporal Frederick Collins, a long-time Marine, told a different story nearly fifty years later. His testimony, preserved, insisted that Herbert’s instructions ended with the firm injunction, ‘Don’t forget, Collins – no prisoners aboard this ship. Get rid of them.’ His statement continues:

  I sent a couple of parties to each hatchway to start with. Then I told three men to search the upperworks. We searched the boat decks and the bridge. I heard someone scuffling down below and a shot was fired. We never discovered who fired that shot. Then the marines went down each hatchway to the next deck, which was the cabin deck. After this, the marines just shot them.

  After I got down below I heard the shots and turned to go aft and on the after deck I saw somebody disappear through an alley and into a cabin. I kicked the door open, the bloke shouted out and I shot him. He toppled over the side the moment he was shot. Herbert was standing on the bridge and saw him floating past. Herbert had a revolver in his hand and threw it in the face of the man in the water and said, ‘What about the Lusitania, you bastard?’ I don’t know about any of them being shot in the water swimming.

  No. 16021 Marine Thomas Henry Haywood had no qualms about the action. He recorded the events in his diary, written that evening:

  Rifles opened fire and cleared the Germans from the Guns, our second shell hit the Conning Tower and blew it into scrap Iron everything sunk in 4½ mts. We then picked up the Nicosian’s lifeboats, meanwhile the Huns were doing their best to get aboard the liner by climbing the lifeboats falls. We fired 2 shells and hit a few of them. We then ran up to Nicosian and shot all of them in the water and the Sea turned red. Next the 10 Marines were ordered to fix bayonets and search the liner for any Huns that were aboard her so we got aboard and found 5 and shot them but it was a pitiful sight to see the Mules who had got wounded by the Shell fire.

  Baralong’s log laconically noted the event: ‘4.10 Submarine sunk. 4.20 took crew from lifeboats. Captured vessel proved to be SS Nicosian’.

  With no prisoners to concern him, Herbert concentrated his efforts on Nicosian. He had either forgotten, or dismissed, the story that the muleship’s captain claimed she was captured by two U-boats. His hour of triumph would have been severely marred if a torpedo had sent Baralong to the bottom of the sea.

  The master of the Nicosian, Captain Charles Manning, and a scratch crew returned to their ship. The holes could be patched enough to allow a tow. The pumps would clear the 20ft or so of water from number 1 hold, which had been badly hit. The long journey from New Orleans might end with a certain lack of dignity but his ship was saved.

  Herbert’s report to the Admiralty continued: ‘The Nicosian had two shot holes in No. 1 hold below water line, and several above water line further aft, also one boiler damaged. I took her in tow at 6.20 p.m., and as she made no more water, though No. 1 hold was flooded, headed for Avonmouth, for which port she was bound, reporting same to Admiralty, via Land’s End.’

  The tow parted the next morning. Manning decided that his command could reach Avonmouth under her own power. The remainder of Nicosian’s men rejoined their ship to commence the dismal task of clearing the mess of slaughtered mules, urine, dung and blood in the stables. Twenty-four animals were dead. Another six were shot. Others were injured but could be treated.

  Herbert became aware that some of the Nicosian’s crew were Americans. A few were working their passage to Europe to join the war. Although undoubtedly sympathetic to the Allied cause, they saw the use of their country’s flag. They witnessed apparent civilians sink the U-boat from a ship flying the White Ensign. They noticed the disguised guns. They discovered the Baralong’s name, for it showed through a hastily applied coat on the bows.

  Under his assumed rank and name of Captain William McBride, Herbert asked Manning to speak to his crew and urge them to remain silent. Manning agreed in a polite letter addressed to ‘Captain William McBride’.

  And that would have been the end of the matter except that the Americans and British talked anyway. They spoke of what they had seen, the tales becoming more lurid with every recounting. Some accounts were fantasy. Others had an uncomfortable ring of truth.

  By September, the stories reached the American press. The American crewmen expanded on their experience. The Baralong had not replaced the Stars and Stripes with the White Ensign. The struggling swimmers were used as target practice. The British shot men trying to surrender. The muleteers, stewards, stokers had all heard Baralong’s captain order his men to take no prisoners. The U-boat captain had surrendered when he was gunned down. The name of the ruthless master, Captain William McBride, went round the globe.

  Outrage shook Germany. Military honour demanded that enemies be properly uniformed. Men in civilian clothes with guns were francs-tireurs.

  Karl Goetz produced another commemorative medal. On one side, King George and Queen Mary presented an award to a sailor. On the other, a hand with a Union Jack cuff held a dagger. The legend, BARALONG MOERDER ‘19 AUG 1915 U27’ completed the decoration.

  This time, nobody copied it.

  SEVEN

  A BLACK AND BLOODY OCEAN

  In response to the fierce demand from Berlin for an explanation of the ‘Baralong Affair’, the British counterattacked by reciting a list of German misdeeds. In both diplomacy and war, attack is often the most effective defence. Whitehall firmly believed that the mote in the British eye was nothing compared to the beam in the German one.

  Fortunately, the British press and officialdom agreed that nothing would be gained by telling the public about the controversy. The papers stayed silent. Four months passed before the first information appeared. The British government released a White Paper: In Regard to Incidents Alleged to Have Attended The Destruction of a German Submarine.

  By that time, the furore had washed through London, Berlin, Washington and most other cities of the world. The German propaganda machine took very good care to pass on the gory details, true or false, to more than 1,000 papers and journals across the globe.

  Ninety years on, sifting the fanciful from the likely becomes a thankless task. Steele, near the end of his life, confirmed that he heard Herbert give the instruction to take no prisoners. Corporal Collins was positive about his orders. Ce
rtainly, every man on board U 27 perished.

  Herbert fudged the course of events when he claimed the men who boarded Nicosian ‘succumbed to Lyddite shell injuries’. Bizarrely, he also assured the Admiralty that he had never adopted the name and identity of ‘Captain William McBride’.

  To Berlin, Herbert was a murderer. Wegener became a slaughtered hero. After the Second Reich passed into history, when a new, perverted regime held sway in Germany, Hitler’s Kriegsmarine named its VI U-boat flotilla ‘Flottille Wegener’ to commemorate the officer killed by the treacherous William McBride.

  Herbert received the DSO for his exploit. To preserve the secret of the Q-ships, a fraudulent citation accompanied the announcement of the award. That it was for services in the Dardanelles was the official explanation.

  Rumours persisted. Writing after the war, a former RNVR lieutenant from the 10th Cruiser Squadron recounted the full-blown legend that was the bitter business of the Baralong:

  One account depicts a terrible scene when the British Marines rushed at the Germans with iron bars, and in more than one case strangled the murderous Germans who had so wantonly fired on a defenceless passenger steamer. The ghastly fight continued in the tunnel leading from the engine room to the stoke-hold, where the doors were thrown open, and the Germans pitched headlong into the flames. Another account describes the British Marines discovering the German sailors in the Nicosian’s engine room drying their wet clothes over the hot steam pipes, and before they could escape, fired into them at close range, until every German had paid the penalty for their murderous crime.

  Given that men swimming in the water can hardly raise their arms in surrender; given that once the survivors had reached the Nicosian they could have made positive signs of submission; given that some of the stories are fanciful – there is a certain unlikelihood about the Marines finding the survivors in the engine-room drying their clothes – it is hard to resist the conclusion that, in strict terms, Herbert’s men committed a war crime.