As luck would have it, a suitable unit was stationed near Ostend on the Belgian coast, oddly named for security reasons as the Ostend Brieftauben Abteiling, that is, the Ostend Carrier Pigeon Battalion. This was to be equipped with Gotha heavy bombers, which had already entered production, and the Giant super bomber, which was approaching its production phase. The twin-engined Gotha bi-planes were considered to be huge in their day and could initially reach a height of 15,000 feet, which was well beyond the capacity of contemporary British fighters. With a maximum speed of 87mph, they possessed a range of 500 miles and were capable of carrying a bomb load of 1,100-lbs. Defensive armament consisted of two machine guns. Depending upon mark, the Giants were powered by two to five engines and could also reach a height of 15,000 feet and had a maximum speed of approximately 85 mph. In addition to carrying a respectable bomb load, they possessed a formidable defensive armament of nose, dorsal, ventral and two upper wing machine guns.
Officially, the ‘Ostend Carrier Pigeons,’ commanded by Captain Ernst Brandenburger, were known as the Englandgeschwerder, or England Squadron. Nominally, this was subdivided into six flights each of six aircraft. Hoeppner’s view was that a small, specialist bomber unit such as this could achieve far better results than the Zeppelins. He pointed out, for example, that 18 Gothas carrying the same bomb load as three Zeppelins, were capable of arriving over London simultaneously, a feat never achieved by three Zeppelins, and thus represented far better value for money. The activities of the Englandgeschwerder were given the codename of Operation Turk’s Cross.
At first glance, Hoeppner’s ideas were entirely reasonable. There were, however, several factors that he had failed to take into account. The route of the raiders, having crossed the North Sea, was entirely predictable. They would overfly Essex to reach London then, having dropped their bombs, would turn left and leave England via the Kent coast. This meant that they would not only face the dense anti-aircraft belt already set up to counter the Zeppelin raids, but also be vulnerable to interception by the RFC and RNAS fighter squadrons based around Dunkirk. Again, their operational radius was far shorter than that of the Zeppelins, so that their potential target area was limited to London and a small segment of south-eastern England, leaving the rest of the country virtually untroubled. Furthermore, the civil population had become accustomed to air attacks and learned to live with them. Again, while there was something faintly other-worldly about Zeppelins, biplanes were familiar sights, even if these were far larger than usual. The element of shock had been replaced by stoicism.
The first Gotha raid, involving 21 aircraft, took place against Folkstone and Shorncliffe Camp on 25 May 1917. Ninety-five people were killed and 195 were injured, while damage caused was valued at £19,405. One Gotha was lost over the English Channel, precise cause unknown, while another crashed on landing. The second raid, by 22 Gothas, against Sheerness and Shoeburyness, took place on 5 June but produced disappointing results at the cost of one aircraft shot down. On 13 June the Englandgeschwerder’s third raid, involving 18 Gothas, was directed at London and Margate, killed 162, injured 432 and caused £129,498 worth of damage as well as one British aircraft forced down. And so it continued with several raids per month by day or night, reaching a maximum number of seven raids in September 1917, then trailing away to end in May 1918. The results achieved were mixed, varying between £238,816 worth of damage inflicted during a night raid on London and Margate on 18/19 December 1917 to just £129 on the night of 28/29 September when 23 Gothas and two Giants struck at London and the coasts of Suffolk, Essex and Kent. This attack was something of a disaster for the Englandgeschwerder as only three Gothas and the Giants reached their respective target areas. Three Gothas were shot down and six more crashed on landing, the cost being just one British fighter damaged on landing. This was also the first occasion on which the Giants were committed to action.
The following list of German losses gives some idea of how efficient the British air defences had become:
25 May 1917 1 Gotha lost, 1 crash landed
5 June 1917 1 Gotha shot down
7 July 1917 1 Gotha shot down, 4 crash landed on return
22 July 1 Gotha crash landed on return
12 August 1917 1 Gotha shot down, 4 crashed on landing
22 August 1917 3 Gothas shot down
4/5 September 1917 1 Gotha missing
25/25 September 1917 1 Gotha crashed on return
25/26 September 1917 1 Gotha missing
28/29 September 1917 3 Gothas shot down, 6 crashed on landing
29/30 September 1917 1 Gotha shot down, 1 forced down in neutral Holland
31 October/
1 November 1917 5 Gothas crashed on landing
5/6 December 1917 5 Gothas crashed on landing
18/19 December 1917 2 Gothas shot down by AA fire, 1 missing, 1 crashed on landing
28/29 January 1918 1 Gotha shot down, 1 crashed on landing
7/8 March 1918 2 Giants crash landed on return
19/20 May 1918 1 Gotha forced down over England, 5 shot down,1 crashed on return journey
The last raid listed above was a night attack directed at London, Faversham and Dover. As planned, it involved 38 Gothas, three Giants and two reconnaissance aircraft, but only 28 of the Gothas, the Giants and the reconnaissance aircraft reached their targets. The raid was something of a swan song in every sense of the word. Indeed, despite all the casualties caused and the damage inflicted, as a strategic offensive the operations carried out by the heavy bombers had been no more successful than those of the Zeppelins. During the last months of the war, responsibility for air attacks on the United Kingdom was handed back to the Navy’s Zeppelins which, as described in the last chapter, were only capable of conducting a kind of broken-backed warfare that achieved nothing.
A generation later, many of the lessons learned defending the United Kingdom against attack by Count Zeppelin’s airships and General Hoeppner’s heavy bombers were put to good use against Hitler’s Luftwaffe.
CHAPTER 12
North and South – Destroyer Actions, Attacks on Scandinavian Convoys, Second Battle of Heligoland Bight
In the aftermath of Jutland and Scheer’s abortive foray in August 1916, a calm descended upon the central area of the North Sea. In one way this may have seemed curious as this was the very fulcrum of the naval war, yet in others it was entirely reasonable. Jellicoe, for example, was not only aware of technical shortcomings in some of the Grand Fleet’s ships, notably the battle cruisers, but was also wary of potential traps posed by the enemy’s mines and U-boats. He therefore decided that his ships would not proceed further south than 55° 30’. For his part, Scheer knew that he dared not risk the High Seas Fleet in another general action. The result was that, for the first time in the war, both sides possessed numerous destroyers that had previously been tied down escorting the capital ships.
There were only two exits to the Atlantic from the North Sea. One, in the north, lay between Scotland and Norway and was not only patrolled incessantly but was also adjacent to the Grand Fleet’s anchorage at Scapa Flow. The second, in the south, was the Straits of Dover. Control of this was absolutely vital because of the constant passage of troops and supplies across the English Channel from southern English ports to France. Two naval forces had been established in the war’s early days to provide security. The larger of the two was Commodore Reginald Tyrwhitt’s Harwich Force, which in 1916 consisted of the 5th Cruiser Squadron’s five ships, plus the 9th and 10th Destroyer Flotillas with 36 destroyers and four flotilla leaders or light cruisers. As we have seen, the Harwich Force frequently had responsibilities in the North Sea, and was usually unable to detach more than one flotilla for operations in the Straits. The principal burden of responsibility for the Straits rested with the Dover Patrol, commanded by Vice Admiral Sir Francis Bacon. This consisted of two light cruisers or flotilla leaders, 24 destroyers, eight patrol vessels and 14 big-gun monitors. In addition, further patrolling was undertaken by a collection of arme
d drifter, trawlers and requisitioned yachts. Ships detached from the Harwich Force and the Dover Patrol formed a third force, based on Dunkirk, that patrolled the far side of the Channel.
Across the water, the advancing German armies had overrun much of the Belgian coast in 1914. A destroyer and U-boat base had been established at Bruges, inland, with canal exits to the sea at Zeebrugge and Ostend. Through these, U-boats managed to slip past or over the Channel nets and minefields which, it had been hoped, would deny them access to the open sea. With typical thoroughness, the Germans had protected their investment with numerous coastal defence batteries. As can be imagined, this was a very warm corner of the war at sea, with reciprocal bombardments, attacks by float planes, mining and small ship actions.
The tempo of activity increased after Jutland. With the High Seas Fleet now rusting quietly in its anchorages, there was little for its many escorting destroyers to do. However, it was essential for Scheer to give the impression that active operations were still undertaken. On 23 October he despatched no less than 24 destroyers to Zeebrugge under the flotillas’ commodore, Captain Michelsen.
Admiral Bacon knew of their presence, but during the inky darkness of the night of 26/27 October, they slipped out of harbour. Michelsen’s 3rd Flotilla surprised the drifters guarding the net between the Goodwin Sands and the Outer Ruytingen Banks, sinking seven and setting an eighth on fire. When a single British destroyer, Flirt, attempted to intervene, she too was sent to the bottom. The German 9th Flotilla entered the Straits where it sank the empty transport Queen, permitting her crew to escape in the boats. Returning to Zeebrugge, the flotilla became involved in a running fight with three British destroyers, blowing the bows off Nubian and scoring hits on Amazon and Mohawk. Michelsen could congratulate himself on carrying out a successful operation without loss. Nubian was towed into port safely and subsequently married to the bows of another Tribal Class destroyer, Zulu, the stern of which had been blown off by a mine. In this form the composite destroyer returned to the fray as HMS Zubian.
Coming on top of the Jutland casualties and the death of Field Marshal Lord Kitchener aboard the cruiser Hampshire when she was mined off the north coast of Scotland, this episode produced a wave of public dissatisfaction at the way the war at sea was being conducted. Arthur Balfour, the First Lord of the Admiralty, issued a politician’s typically bland statement to the effect that if the raid was repeated ‘it would be severely dealt with.’ It was repeated on a smaller scale during the evening of 23 November, but the Germans retreated unharmed as soon as opposition was encountered. The press tartly reminded Balfour of his promise, echoing the public view that there seemed to be a sad lack of aggression in the upper echelons of the Navy.
There was certainly no lack of it further down the chain of command. As luck would have it two U-boats, U-20 and U-30, ran aground in the fog off the west coast of Jutland. Scheer despatched a half-flotilla of destroyers to rescue them, covered by no less than four dreadnoughts and the battle cruiser Moltke. Only U-30 could be recovered and, while returning to base on 5 November, the German ships ran close to the patrolling British submarine J-1, commanded by Commander Noel Lawrence, a veteran of the successful British submarine campaign in the Baltic. Lawrence spotted them through his periscope at a range of 4,000 yards. Although a heavy swell was running, it was decided to attack. At one point J-1’ s bows broke the surface, fortunately without attracting the attention of the enemy lookouts. Lawrence dived, running his motors hard, and at that moment the four German battleships entered his sights. Doing a rapid calculation, he fired his four bow tubes with a spread of five degrees, then took J-1 down to rest on the sea bed. There was silence in the control room while the range was counted off. There was a distant boom, then another, followed by cheering throughout the boat. One torpedo had hit the Kronprinz Wilhelm and another had found a home in the Grosser Kurfurst, both of which would spend months in dock. To have torpedoed one battleship during a patrol was a considerable achievement, but to have torpedoed two was almost beyond belief. Lawrence later commented that he wished he had fired at a single ship and sent her to the bottom, but had been reasonably certain that he could account for two. The Kaiser flew into one of his rages and gave Scheer the benefit of his wide experience: ‘To risk a squadron, and by so doing nearly risk the loss of two armoured ships in order to save two U-boats, is disproportionate and must not be attempted again!’
Ostensibly, 1917 began well for the Allies. Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare, having calculated that this would probably bring the United States into the war on the side of the Allies, without being able to contribute anything significant in either the military or naval spheres for the next two years, a calculation that proved to be flawed. On 13 March American merchantmen bound for the war zones were defensively armed, and on 6 April America declared war on Germany. Against this, Russia collapsed into revolution and civil war, enabling the Central Powers to transfer large numbers of troops from the Eastern to the Western Fronts, while the French Army was beginning to show signs of exhaustion.
By now, Jellicoe had reached the top of his profession and become First Sea Lord. Beatty took over as commander of the Grand Fleet, an appointment welcomed by many who believed that he was more of a fighter than his predecessor and would bring on the decisive battle everyone had hoped for. In fact the only decisive battle being fought at sea was being won by the U-boats. Even Scheer had now been converted to the view that the High Seas Fleet existed solely to safeguard the U-boats’ return to base. The recently appointed German Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Henning von Holtzendorff, calculated that if 600,000 tons of Allied shipping could be sunk every month and 40% of neutral shipping persuaded not to enter British ports, then Britain would be forced out of the war within five months. Jellicoe reached a similar conclusion, predicting that unless the U-boat menace could be brought under control, the United Kingdom’s supplies of food and vital raw materials would run out by July. Yet, he stubbornly refused to alter the official Admiralty view that as long as the main trade routes were patrolled, only troop and coal convoys required escorts. With monthly losses actually exceeding those considered necessary for a British defeat by Holtzendorff, the situation became desperate. Under intense pressure from Prime Minister Lloyd George, Beatty and the Americans, the Admiralty finally gave way. The effect was magical. U-boats began to find difficulty in making their attacks and Allied losses dropped dramatically. Suddenly, U-boats encountered much strengthened defences in the Straits of Dover and were unable to make their usual night passage save at terrible risk. They therefore had to burn valuable fuel making the passage round the north of Scotland, which clearly reduced the amount of time they could spend on patrol. They also had to face the depth charge, a new and very dangerous weapon they were not aware of until May 1917, although it had been used in small quantities for ten months. British destroyers which had been used to idling their time away with the Grand Fleet now found themselves back in the war and being reinforced by American warships.
Although the battle against the U-boats took place mainly in the outer reaches of the Channel and the Western Approaches to the United Kingdom, there was still fighting in the North Sea. Having received intelligence that more German destroyers were being despatched to Zeebrugge during the evening of 22 January, the Admiralty ordered Tyrwhitt to intercept them. Leaving Harwich at 17:30 with six light cruisers, two flotilla leaders and 16 destroyers, by midnight he had deployed his force across all the likely approach routes. The German force, consisting of one flotilla leader and ten destroyers, was led by Commander Max Schultz. At 02:45 they ran into some of Tyrwhitt’s cruisers, which promptly opened fire. V69, Schutlz’s flotilla leader, struck by a shell that temporarily jammed her steering, smashed into another destroyer, G41. The remainder headed directly for Zeebrugge, concealed by a dense smoke screen.
At 03:40 V69 ran into several more British cruisers and received such a battering that his opponents thought she had sunk, although she
managed to limp off in the direction of the Dutch coast. Despite the rip in her side, G41 managed to get into Zeebrugge. A third destroyer, S50, had become separated and was straggling towards the base when she ran into several British destroyers with whom she engaged in a spirited gunnery duel. Finally, after slamming a torpedo into the destroyer Simoom, she escaped and made her way back to Germany. By dawn, the action had clearly ended and, after sinking the crippled Simoom, Tyrwhitt’s force returned home, less than satisfied by the night’s work.
At last light on 25/26 February, Commander Tillesen left Zeebrugge with six destroyers to attack Dover while a further five under Commander Albrecht headed for the Downs anchorage, hoping to create mayhem among the merchantmen waiting to enter the Thames. Neither group managed to complete its mission. At 22:30, the destroyer Laverock, commanded by Lieutenant Binmore, was patrolling above the central portion of the anti-submarine mine barrage when Tillesen’s ships came into view. Laverock was hit several times, but by manoeuvring cleverly and opening fire from different positions, Binmore managed to convince Tillesen that he was dealing with three ships and he turned for home in the belief that heavy British reinforcements were on their way. Albrecht did very little better, managing only to bang a few shells into Margate, Westgate and the North Foreland radio station before shearing off.
It was unfortunate that the poor results of this raid induced a sense of complacency both at Dover and in the Admiralty. In March, Bacon was warned that another raid was in the offing, he did not think it necessary to strengthen the mid-Channel patrol, which consisted of just four destroyers and relied on reinforcements that would be despatched from Dover or Deal. Tillesen left Zeebrugge during the evening of 17 March with two flotillas. The 6th, with seven destroyers, would cross the central area of the barrage while five vessels of Z Flotilla, under Albrecht, crossed some way to the east. At this point the remaining four destroyers of Z Flotilla, under Lieutenant Commander Zandler, was to attack shipping in the Downs.
North Sea Battleground: The War at Sea 1914-1918 Page 11