Pilkington could tell Mortimer, if he wanted to. The tubes were his affair. Nick began to check over in his mind, as he pushed past Garret to the ladder, the various things he had to see to. What had been done with the bodies, anyway?
‘Enemy battleships have opened fire with their main armament, sir!’
Hastings had seen it, as he’d swept round to the quarter with his binoculars and seen the flashes of gunfire from the leading German ships: the head of Scheer’s battle line had now crossed Lanyard’s stern from her port quarter to starboard. Mortimer swung round, raising his glasses to take a look, and at the same moment they all heard the whistling roar of high-calibre shells passing overhead towards the German fleet.
Hastings observed, ‘Fifth Battle Squadron’s engaging ’em.’
Garret thought, right over our bloody heads!
Chapter 6
At 4.19 a new squadron consisting of four or five ships of the Q.E. class… appeared from a north-westerly direction, and took part in the action with opening range of about 21,000 yards… The new opponent fired with remarkable rapidity and accuracy.
Admiral Scheer’s official Despatch.
The guns of the Fifth Battle Squadron fell silent as the battle cruisers rushed towards them. In half a minute Beatty’s ships would be passing between these battleships and the enemy. Hugh Everard moved out to the port wing of his bridge as the gap between the squadrons closed at roughly fifty sea miles per hour. Lion, with foam streaming from her enormous bow and black smoke pouring from all three funnels rushed by now… too fast for any detailed assessment of what Hipper’s guns had done to her: but certainly her ‘X’ turret was out of action – it was trained to the disengaged side with the guns tilted up to maximum elevation ‒ and the smoke of an internal fire was pouring from her after superstructure, while great black splashes of charred paintwork showed here and there on her port side.
Now a string of flags broke at her port yardarm, close enough to read easily with the naked eye: Fifth Battle Squadron alter course in succession sixteen points to starboard.
Rathbone’s yellowish face showed concern as Hugh came back to him at the binnacle.
‘A red turn, sir?’
Hugh had been considering exactly that point. A turn in succession, each ship following her next ahead and turning on virtually the same spot, and the German gunnery officers knowing, once Barham had led round, that each of her squadron would be paddling round after her like tame ducks… well, sitting ducks!
The Huns would make a meal of it. Hugh didn’t answer Rathbone, or look at him. What could he have said ‒ Our Admiral’s an idiot?
A ‘blue’ turn, all ships turning at once and ending on a reversed course in reverse order, would have been far better in these circumstances: and that signal should in any case have been hauled down by this time. It couldn’t be acted on while it was still flying, and even if the turn was started now, this second, the interval needed for reversing the course of a squadron of battleships would mean there’d be a gap of several miles between this squadron and Beatty’s. It wasn’t just the time it took to turn, but the loss of speed involved in it: every second’s delay now was increasing that ultimate distance apart. German shells were falling into the sea ahead and short, and those were salvoes from Scheer’s battleships, from guns that had never before been fired in anger. Hugh had his glasses trained on the enemy as Nile, rearmost of the squadron, drew clear of the last of Beatty’s smoke. Just as he was wondering why Brook hadn’t yet opened fire, Nile shuddered from the concussion of her first salvo at the High Seas Fleet.
‘Executive signal, red sixteen points, sir!’
About time… Hugh stepped up on to the central platform, and took over again from Rathbone.
‘Shift down to the conning-tower, Pilot. Then you can take over when I call down.’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
The conning-tower, lower down, was the action control position. You could only see out through a periscope and through slits in the protective amour, but it would be senseless to stay up here, exposed, when things warmed up. Hugh told his second-in-command. ‘You’d as well go down too, Tom. It’s likely to get fairly brisk, presently.’
Crick eyed Scheer’s distant battleships ‒ mile upon mile of them, pouring northwards. He enquired, ‘And you, sir?’ As calm, Hugh noticed, as a parson at evensong. He nodded. ‘I shan’t be long.’
Ahead, shells pock-marked the sea round Barham as she swung away to starboard. One hit her, when she was halfway through her turn; starboard side for’ard, that sickeningly pretty orange glow, black smoke rising to enfold it like foliage around a flower; then the flame was disappearing, smothered, and the smoke dissipating astern. If only Beatty had signalled, ‘Follow me’ or ‘Alter course to north’, Evan-Thomas could have exercised his own judgement on the method and the timing. His flag ‒ white, with the red St George’s cross and the two red balls in the cantons next to the halyard ‒ stood out as stiffly as a weather-vane as Barham ‒ hit again ‒ steadied on the new course. Valiant was going round now, through a barrage of falling shell; it was going to be worse for each ship in turn, worst of all for Nile, the last. Warspite’s helm had gone over and she was turning into a forest of shell-spouts, a curtain of high-explosive shrieking down, raising the sea in fountains. She’d been hit for’ard, two hits together and both on her foc’sl; the Hun salvoes came closely spaced, so if you got hit at all the chance was you’d get hit hard. Their gunners were firing fast, seeing this opportunity and loth to let it go, but Malaya was showing good sense, turning half a cable’s length before she should have. If she’d held on, she’d have run into a real plastering. You could see now exactly what she’d managed to avoid, the sea leaping, alive with falling shell just off her bow as she hauled round. As it was, she’d suffered; as he bent to the voicepipe he’d seen the sudden gush of smoke. He called down, ‘Starboard ten!’
‘Starboard ten, sir! Ten of starboard helm on, sir!’
A diversion to port. An impromptu zigzag to throw their range out before Nile became the next Aunt Sally.
’Midships!’
‘Midships. Helm’s amidships, sir.’
He watched Malaya’s turn. You had to do it right, when it was a 30,000-ton battleship you were handling, mistakes couldn’t be corrected easily or quickly. He told himself, judging it by eye while fresh salvoes lacerated the sea on Malaya’s starboard quarter, now…
‘Port fifteen!’
‘Port fifteen, sir!’
Round she goes… The gunners over there in Scheer’s battleships, with their sharp eyes on Malaya until about this moment, might not have noticed Nile’s small excursion out to port. If they hadn’t, their shots as she went round now would ‒ hopefully ‒ be ‘overs’…
Hearing them tearing the air like ripping calico as they passed overhead, a degree of satisfaction helped him resist the urge to duck.
‘Ease to five!’
‘Ease to five, sir!’
By prolonging the turn, he’d slide his ship back into line astern of Malaya… Smoke drifting in streaks and patches at masthead height might be confusing, he hoped, to Scheer’s spotting officers. Another salvo crackled over, and spouts rose like the fingers of a dirty hand poked up through the surface forty yards to port.
‘Midships!’
‘Midships, sir. Wheel’s—’
‘Meet her!’
Beatty’s ships were seven or eight thousand yards ahead, sparking with gun flashes as they continued to engage the German battle cruisers. Hipper had altered course, reversing it to accompany Beatty northwards and at the same time placing himself ahead of Scheer’s battle squadrons. There was a gap of six miles between the two German forces: and neither could have any idea yet that Jellicoe was coming south like Nemesis.
A flag-hoist was climbing to Barham’s yard, curving on an arc of halyard in the wind’s force and straightening as it was hauled taut. Peppard, the chief yeoman, reported that it was a distribution of fire signal
. He used the manual to get its meaning: that Barham and Valiant were to engage Hipper’s battle cruisers while the others took on Scheer’s battleships.
Hugh called down to the conning-tower. ‘Pilot?’
Rathbone answered. Hugh told him. ‘Take over. I’ll be with you shortly.’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
‘Quartermaster, obey your voicepipe from the conning-tower, now.’
‘Aye aye, sir!’
He used the telephone to talk to his gunnery lieutenant in the control top.
‘Brook concentrate all your fire on the quarter, second battleship in the line. If you have to shift from him take the third.
‘Aye aye, sir.’
‘Your shooting’s looked good so far. Keep it up. Brook.’
‘I do believe we’ve scored a few, sir.’
‘Score some more, a lot more.’ He hung up the navyphone. Now Beatty’s four surviving battle cruisers, plus the two leading ships of this squadron, would be engaging Hipper’s five ships ‒ leaving Nile, Warspite and Malaya with Scheer’s leading division of nine or ten dreadnoughts to hold off…
He ought, he knew, to go down to the protection of the conning-tower; and he would, in a moment. He wanted to see first what sort of practice Brook might make against those looming, pursuing battleships. He went out into the starboard wing of the bridge ‒ it seemed particularly spacious, with only himself and the chief yeoman sharing it ‒ and trained his binoculars on the leading ships just as Nile’s four turrets roared and smoked: he began to count, reckoning on a time-of-flight of something like twenty-five or thirty seconds. To his left, Malaya sent off a salvo, and the concussion of it with her guns firing as it were past one’s ear was indescribably powerful. It wasn’t only noise that split your head; it was like being hit on that ear with a sandbag at the same time. He put his hand to it, and found the plug of cotton-wool still in place: he’d thought it might have been blown into the eardrum. Focusing on the German battle- ships, it seemed to him that the range had closed somewhat. If it had, either Scheer’s ships had more speed than was officially credited to them, or their course and this squadron’s were converging… Twenty-six, twenty-seven ‒ there! Brook’s salvo spouted between the first and second ships. So there was no clue to range, you had to get the line right before you could usefully correct up or down. The guns fired again. Warspite’s did too, while at the same moment Malaya’s salvo fell, short and in line with the leading ship. Hugh decided to stay where he was for just one more salvo; he wanted to see Nile straddle her target, and from the tower his view would be so restricted the tower itself so crowded. Still watching the line of Scheer’s battleships he was thinking of that shortening range: if he was right and it was shortening. And looking harder taking advantage of an improving light as the mist in that quarter thinned, he saw that Scheer was indeed converging; this squadron was following Beatty on a course of about north, while those inimical grey shapes with white flecks at their stems and gun-flashes rippling constantly up and down the steadily oncoming line, must have been steering something more like north-west-by-north.
It would make sense from Scheer’s point of view. His ships didn’t have the guns to shoot effectively at the long ranges with which these QE’s could cope. Just as it would have been making the best use of the British advantage in long-range gunnery to have kept the enemy at arm’s length.
Well, you couldn’t sheer off westward when the object was to lead the Germans north, into Jellicoe’s embrace.
Scheer’s dreadnoughts were getting the range. In the last minute two salvoes had fallen close but short, and one had gone over. Hugh watched Nile’s ‒ he thought it must be hers ‒ straddle the second ship in Scheer’s line: two spouts went up short, one only showed its top beyond her quarterdeck, and the fourth struck a spark and then a flare on her stern turret. Nile’s guns roared again – that must have been her effort ‒ and again within half a minute; Brook was firing double salvoes now he had the range. Warspite and Malaya were also keeping up the pressure, each getting a salvo into the air at about one-minute intervals. Now two or three German salvoes had gone over, and out of the corner of his eye Hugh saw a burst and blossom of flame on Malaya’s stern and another between her funnels. Lowering his glasses he swivelled round to look at her and saw that her after superstructure had been hit. Smoke was pouring out of both sides ‒ from the entry-hole, probably, and another the shell had made when it exploded.
He was feeling sorry for Malaya when a lone shell came whirring like a bluebottle and burst on Nile’s foc’sl.
It didn’t penetrate. It had landed close to the port cable-holder and burst against the armoured deck. All ships were firing fast now and there were practically no intervals between the falls of German salvoes: by the time one lot of spouts had collapsed back into the torn sea, another lot were leaping in their places. And hits were being scored; with any luck the Germans were being walloped too, but at this end one couldn’t have denied it was becoming reasonably uncomfortable. Hugh decided that the time for loitering in such an exposed position was past: he’d go down now.
‘Peppard ‒ carry on down on the conning-tower.’
Chief Petty Officer Peppard looked surprised. ‘All the same to you, sir, I’d as soon—’
‘That was not an invitation, Chief Yeoman.’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
With an entire division of battleships letting rip at one squadron ‒ and probably concentrating, at that, on Nile and Malaya who were their nearest targets ‒ one could hardly expect to emerge unscathed. He picked up a different navyphone and at the same time, glancing round, saw Peppard hesitating at the top of the port ladder, looking back at him. Then the chief yeoman started down. At the same moment a sailor’s cap rose into view on the other side. Hugh stared at it exasperatedly: Bates…
His coxswain was carrying a tray.
‘Torpedo control tower!’
‘Torpedo Lieutenant, please.’ That had been the midshipman who worked the plotter for Knox-Wilson.
‘Lieutenant (T) here, sir.’
‘Knox-Wilson, are you ranging on the quarter?’
‘Yes, sir. Down to sixteen thousand, closing quite fast.’
‘We’re in a good position on their bow to try a long shot. This visibility’s none too reliable, so don’t wait for ever.’
‘No sir. But—’
‘But?’
‘Starboard for’ard tube’s stuck, sir. They can’t shift the bar.’
‘Use the starboard after tube then. And keep ’em working to clear the other.’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
Knox-Wilson would have wanted to clear his for’ard tube for action before he took a long-range chance, so as to make sure of having one of the two starboard tubes functioning in case a much surer chance cropped up. But the enemy was there; you couldn’t always play safe, you had to take your chances. Hugh told Knox-Wilson, ‘Send Mr Askell to see what they’re up to down there.’ He hung up the navyphone. The action was getting hotter all the time: six to eight salvoes a minute were dropping round them. He’d felt a hit aft and seen another for’ard, and Malaya had been hit three times in succession, all amidships. But all guns still fired, which was not the case with the enemy. The fire from the battle cruisers had been considerably reduced ‒ as a result, one imagined, of Barham’s and Valiant’s influence. Looking that way, he couldn’t see Hipper’s ships now: they’d vanished swallowed in the mist. It freed the two leading Queen Elizabeths to join the three astern of them in this rather uneven fight with Scheer. But mist ‒ falling visibility ‒ Hugh murmured in his mind, please. God, don’t let it get worse! Just when Jellicoe should be on the point of joining in, if Scheer at just that moment should be presented with a mist to run away and hide in… Whose side would the Almighty seem to be on if that happened?
Bates said behind him, ‘Cup o’ coffee, sir. Thought you was likely getting’ a bit—’
Hugh whipped round. ‘For God’s sake, man, get below.’
Nile trembled to a double explosion aft.
‘I could leave it ’ere, sir, or—’
‘Yes.’ Hugh made himself speak levelly: his ship’s guns crashed out another salvo, and Bates’s hands, he noticed, holding the tray with the coffee on it, were completely steady. ‘Yes, thank you. Bates. Leave it here.’
He remembered ‒ perhaps inconsequentially ‒ as he turned for’ard again, that Bates couldn’t swim. A salvo screeched overhead. He didn’t see it fall, because he’d glanced round to make sure his coxswain had left the bridge, almost dreading, as he turned his head, that he’d find those brown monkey-eyes still watching him.
The coffee was there, steaming on the ledge below the starboard Battenberg. Bates had gone below.
This patchy mist: Jellicoe wouldn’t pursue an enemy at night or in bad visibility. He’d put this to the Admiralty, and their Lordships had approved the principle that the Grand Fleet must not be put at risk in circumstances where pure chance might play too great a part. The Germans had equipped their cruisers for mine-laying, they could lay a field of mines, unseen, ahead of a pursuing fleet, actually during the course of battle. And the newer destroyers with their new long-range, high-speed torpedoes were an unknown quantity. Britain’s survival depended on the continued existence of her fleet: the way to handle it was not to handle it the way the Germans would like it handled, in conditions which gave advantages to the techniques of sneak-attack.
Barham was altering course to port, as Beatty had at that same point She seemed to have a fire amidships, but it could be just her boats that were being incinerated. Valiant, following her in the two-point turn, had blocked off his quick view of her. Warspite had taken a lot of hits, and Malaya was suffering again as she put her helm over. Nile was surrounded with shell-splashes. Hugh felt her shudder, heard the explosion and the deep clang of metal striking aft: looking back there he saw a seepage of smoke drifting down-wind from her quarter but no evidence of damage. A navyphone buzzed harshly, and he crossed over to it, waiting for the guns to fire before he answered.
The Blooding of the Guns Page 13