A Naval History of World War I

by Paul G. Halpern

  In reality, the Japanese intervention on a large scale was not always welcome and posed certain delicate problems. Those relating to diplomatic matters, such as Japanese demands in China or ambitions for the German islands in the Pacific north of the equator, are beyond the scope of this book.51 On strictly naval matters, the British were not happy to see a Japanese vice admiral senior in rank to the British commander in chief East Indies, and to get around the difficulty, the Admiralty suggested separate spheres of action with the Japanese working east of the meridian of 90° east, which bisected the Bay of Bengal. The Japanese Squadron guarded the focal points of Cape Negrais, Acheh Head, and Sunda Strait and had the use of Singapore, Penang, and Rangoon as bases. Racial feeling also played a role in causing the Admiralty to alter the original Japanese proposal for division of the Pacific that would have had the First Japanese South Sea Squadron and the Australian Squadron operating east of 140° east and both Australians and Japanese ships reinforcing the French Islands east of 160° east as necessary. This would have entailed placing the Australian Squadron under a Japanese vice admiral and was rejected.52 Too much should not be made of this. There had been a tradition of pro-Japanese feeling in the Royal Navy—quite evident during the Russo-Japanese War. Moreover, jockeying for position between Allies as to who would have command was probably the norm rather than the exception. The situation vis-à-vis the British and Japanese was no different than that between the British and French or the French and Italians at other times and places during the war.

  Spee in the meantime had gone to Nukuhiva in the French Marquesas Islands where he spent a week, 26 September to 3 October, coaling and replenishing his provisions. He also sent two of his supply ships, the Ahlers and Holsatia, now empty, to Honolulu with dispatches and more precise instructions for colliers to meet him at Easter Island and Mas a Fuera in the Juan Fernandez group, extremely remote islands under Chilean sovereignty, where he could hope to coal in peace. Spee’s wireless operators were also able to intercept wireless transmissions from the Dresden to the Leipzig, so that he learned for the first time that both German cruisers were on the west coast of South America. On the night of 6–7 October, the Scharnhorst managed to reach the Dresden with her wireless, enabling Spee to coordinate a concentration of the German warships. When Spee arrived off Easter Island on 12 October, the Dresden was waiting with her tender, the Baden. The Leipzig joined on the 14th, with three steamers of the Kosmos line. The German concentration—two armored cruisers and three light cruisers—was complete.

  What was the Admiralty doing as Spee headed inexorably away from the South Seas to South American waters? On 5 October they were able to read a German signal intercepted by the wireless station at Suva that the Scharnhorst was on her way between the Marquesas and Easter Island. Two days later there was another wireless message, this time en clair, warning that the Australia and other large ships had left Rabaul going eastward and that “the Japanese squadron was all over the place.” This could only confirm Patey’s and Jerram’s belief that the Germans were on their way to South America.

  The closest British force to the southern portion of the west coast of South America was the squadron of Rear Admiral Christopher Cradock, who had begun the war in Caribbean waters and who had been working his way down the eastern coast of South America, searching for raiders and attacking German trade. On 14 September the Admiralty had informed Cradock that there was a good chance Spee might arrive on the west coast of South America or pass through the Strait of Magellan and that Cradock was to concentrate a squadron strong enough to meet the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Until the arrival of the armored cruiser Defence, ordered from the Mediterranean as a reinforcement, Cradock was to keep the old battleship Canopus and at least one County-class cruiser with his squadron. As soon as he had superior force, he was to search the Strait of Magellan, ready according to information either to return to the Plate area or search the Chilean coast as far north as Valparaiso. In the light of the tragedy that followed, the Admiralty cables to Cradock and what he assumed them to mean became controversial. The Admiralty was probably more concerned with protection of trade and the Australia-New Zealand troop transport in the Indian Ocean than with the situation on the west coast of South America. The destruction of Spee’s squadron apparently was not, considering the navy’s many responsibilities of the time, given a high priority. The Admiralty were also deceived, at least temporarily, by Spee’s departure in a northeasterly direction after his appearance at Apia. There could have been little doubt in their minds, however, of his intentions after the bombardment of Papeete, and even less after interception and decoding of a wireless message indicating the Germans were on their way to Easter Island.

  Cradock’s force was inferior to the German Squadron. The Good Hope and Monmouth were weaker than the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau to begin with. The Monmouth was described as having been practically condemned as unfit for further service when she was “hauled off the dockyard wall” and commissioned with a scratch crew of coastguardsmen and boys, arriving in South American waters only half-equipped and kept going only by “superhuman efforts.” The German squadron was markedly superior in gun power, with a far heavier weight of broadside, and the German superiority was increased still more by the fact that neither the Good Hope nor the Monmouth could have used effectively the guns in their lower casements in a heavy sea, whereas the casement guns of the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were mounted farther above the water line and were less affected by the state of the sea. The old battleship Canopus might have helped to even the odds, although there is some doubt she would have given Cradock superiority. She too was manned by a scratch crew from the training schools, coast guard, and Naval Reserve. Her 12-inch guns were characterized as antiques, with a maximum range that was actually three hundred yards less than the 8.2-inch guns of the German cruisers. The Canopus’s guns were also difficult to load and lay in heavy seas.53

  The major problem with the Canopus in Cradock’s mind was probably her speed. Would he have been able to bring the German Squadron to action if his force was tied to her? Moreover, it is now apparent that Cradock was deceived as to the real speed the Canopus was capable of by erroneous and exaggerated reports of her defects issued by her engineer commander, who had broken down under the strain of war.54 Cradock therefore believed he could not bring the Germans to action if he remained in company with the Canopus and that in the Admiralty’s eyes this was his primary objective. The Admiralty did nothing to discourage him, although Churchill, who consistently denied any responsibility for the disaster, and Battenberg did have serious doubts about the situation and thought Cradock should concentrate his main force at the Falklands and send only the light cruiser Glasgow around to search the west coast of South America. They did not make this clear to Cradock, who was not the man to flinch, especially when the Admiralty’s orders implied they considered his force adequate. The Admiralty finally did signal Cradock to concentrate his squadron with the Canopus and wait for the arrival of the Defence—whose voyage they had delayed—but the signal was only issued on 3 November, and by then the battle had already been fought.55

  Spee left Mas a Fuera on the night of 26 October, steaming eastward, and on the 31st he learned of the presence of the Glasgow at the little Chilean port of Coronel. He proceeded to intercept, and in the late afternoon of 1 November encountered not only the Glasgow but Cradock in the Good Hope with the Monmouth and the armed merchant cruiser Otranto. Cradock was searching for the Leipzig, whose wireless transmissions had indicated she was in the area. Spee had been clever in using only the Leipzig’s transmitter to conceal the presence of the other German cruisers. The Canopus was then 300 miles astern, convoying Cradock’s colliers.

  The Glasgow was first to spot the German Squadron and fell back on the Good Hope at around 5:00 P.M. Cradock formed his line of battle with the Good Hope, Monmouth, Glasgow, and Otranto against the Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, Leipzig, and Dresden—the Nürnberg joined only later in the battl
e. Cradock altered course toward the Germans and tried to force the action immediately, when the Germans would have had the setting sun directly in their eyes. Spee declined and kept his distance. The armed merchant cruiser Otranto really could have accomplished little in this type of encounter, and Cradock sent her away. The Otranto survived and took no further part in the action.

  The conditions altered to the great disadvantage of the British once the setting sun dropped below the horizon just before 7:00 P.M. Now it was the British who were silhouetted against the afterglow, whereas the German ships were lost in the gathering dusk. This was the moment for the Germans to begin the action in earnest, and their superior gunnery quickly began to tell. By the time the battle ended in the darkness, the Good Hope and Monmouth had been sunk with no survivors. The Glasgow reluctantly had to abandon the Monmouth after 8:20—there was nothing she could do, and someone had to warn the Canopus steaming toward the scene lest she be surprised and overwhelmed: German jamming blocked wireless transmissions until the Glasgow was well out of range. An officer in the Glasgow remarked on the “heartbreaking hours of depression that followed, the compulsory abandonment of our ‘chummy ship’ weighed more on us than the bitterness of the general defeat.”56

  The Battle of Coronel was the first defeat suffered by the Royal Navy in a naval action in more than one hundred years. German losses in men and matériel were trifling, although they had expended 42 percent of their 8.2-inch ammunition, which could not be replaced away from home. The British loss of life—more than 1,600—was tragic, but the matériel loss—two elderly cruisers—was insignificant as far as the naval balance was concerned. The psychological effects were much greater. It was a nasty shock, but the effects did not last long. Spee is reported to have had a premonition of this. On 3 November the Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, and Nürnberg entered Valparaiso for the twenty-four hours allotted under international law to coal and reprovision—only three ships were allowed under the law; the other two cruisers had to return to Mas a Fuera to coal. As Spee was about to depart, an admiring lady presented him with a bouquet of flowers. “Thank you, they will do very nicely for my grave,” he is reported to have said.57

  The British reaction was swift. Fisher had become First Sea Lord on 31 October. On 4 November the Admiralty received word of the Coronel disaster. Fisher, whatever his faults, now appeared at his best. He ordered not one but two battle cruisers—the Invincible and Inflexible—to the South Atlantic, and when the dockyards pleaded for more time to make them ready he implied they would sail with dockyard workers aboard if necessary. The work that had to be accomplished at Devonport in only three days was, according to an officer in the Invincible, “colossal,” but the two ships sailed on the 11th.58 The command was given to Vice Admiral Sturdee, the chief of staff. Fisher detested Sturdee and was anxious to get rid of him, but Churchill did not want it to appear as if he was being dismissed because of the Coronel disaster.

  The detachment of the battle cruisers was a calculated risk, for as we have seen, Jellicoe’s margin of superiority in this type over the High Sea Fleet was virtually nonexistent. Jellicoe did not relax until they returned. Fisher had in this respect considerable nerve and moral courage, for he correctly foresaw the need for overwhelming force at the decisive place, even if he could not foresee how long the ships would be gone. Furthermore, the Admiralty sent yet a third battle cruiser—Princess Royal—to North American waters.

  This deployment demonstrated the far-reaching effects a single powerful naval force could have. The Admiralty had to guard against the prospect that Spee would proceed north and then pass through the Panama Canal into the Caribbean. He might then defeat the relatively weak Allied forces in the West Indies (two British armored cruisers and two old French cruisers) and steam north to “liberate” the sizable number of German liners sheltering in New York. Here Admiral Hornby had only the old battleship Glory, three equally old armored cruisers, and an armed merchant cruiser to oppose him. United States regulations placed a limit of three belligerent warships in transit through the Panama Canal at any one time, with another three allowed at either terminal, for a maximum of six in United States territorial waters at one time.59 Spee’s five cruisers would therefore have been able to transit from the Pacific to the Caribbean in less than a day’s time. There were also rumors that a German battle cruiser might slip out to attack the North Atlantic sea lanes in a move coordinated with operations off the Plate should Spee proceed around Cape Horn. The prospect seems far-fetched now, but at the time it was considered real enough for the very great risk of sending the third battle cruiser to be taken. The Princess Royal sailed for Halifax on 12 November in a move so secret that Admiral Hornby, commander in chief North America, did not even know she was coming. Hornby concentrated the armored cruisers Essex, Lancaster, and Berwick and the French Condé in the West Indies to guard against Spee’s breaking through the Panama Canal. The Admiralty rejected his proposal to send the Princess Royal to the West Indies until a false report on 29 November that the Germans were off the north Chilean port of Iquique indicating a move toward Panama gave Hornby sufficient justification for ordering the battle cruiser to Jamaica.

  The other British forces in South American waters under Admiral Stoddart, the armored cruisers Carnarvon, Cornwall, and Defence, together with the Canopus and Coronel survivors the Glasgow and Otranto to be reinforced by the Kent from the Cape Verdes Station, would concentrate at Montevideo (later altered to Abrolhos Rocks) to await Sturdee’s arrival.

  Like a powerful magnet exerting lines of force, the influence of Spee’s powerful squadron was felt throughout a considerable portion of the world. The mobility of sea power meant that each of the widely scattered British squadrons had to be powerful enough to deal with a sudden appearance of the German Squadron. What if Spee passed around Cape Horn and made for South Africa? Here the Germans might encourage an anti-British revolt, particularly if Spee convoyed transports with German reservists from South America.

  The Admiralty had considered this possibility even before the Coronel disaster, and ordered the old battleship Albion to the Cape Station to cover the expedition against German South West Africa. After Coronel the Admiralty ordered the armored cruiser Minotaur to leave the Australia–New Zealand convoy in the Indian Ocean and join the Albion. In the light of what had happened to Cradock, deprived of the support of the Canopus, the Admiralty warned the commander in chief at the Cape, Admiral King-Hall, that the Albion and Minotaur “must always act in concert to avoid defeat in detail.” The armored cruiser Defence, a sister ship of the Minotaur, was ordered to proceed to the Cape from Brazilian waters. The situation on the east coast of Africa and in the Indian Ocean also had been eased by the discovery and immobilization of the Königsberg and the destruction of the Emden. The light cruiser Weymouth could therefore be ordered to South African waters to give King-Hall (who already had the small cruisers Hyacinth and Astraea) a force capable of handling Spee’s squadron. The seaborne South African expedition to Walvis Bay was postponed until the Defence joined.60

  A new squadron was formed farther to the north on the West African coast to guard against the possibility that Spee might seek to interfere with the Cameroons expedition or attack the British and French West African colonies. The powerful armored cruisers Warrior and Black Prince were detached from the Mediterranean to join the cruisers Donegal and Highflyer, with the Cumberland also available from Duala if needed. The old battleship Vengeance came south from the Channel Fleet. The command was given to Admiral de Robeck of the Ninth Cruiser Squadron, who flew his flag in the Warrior. The squadron did not last very long. By 19 November the Admiralty decided it was no longer necessary, and de Robeck was ordered to resume command of the Ninth Cruiser Squadron, and the Warrior, Black Prince, and Donegal were to join the Grand Fleet, where the addition of the first pair of armored cruisers would be particularly welcome after the three battle cruisers had been detached for distant service.

  The British and Japanese
ordered similar measures to block Spee in the Pacific. The Newcastle and Idzumo would move south from Canadian waters to San Clemente Island off California, where they would be joined by the Japanese battleship Hizen and Admiral Patey in the Australia. The Hizen and the armored cruiser Asama had been off Honolulu, where the German gunboat Geier finally turned up on 15 October. Once the American authorities agreed to intern the warship on 8 November, the two Japanese warships were free to proceed to the American coast. The combined British and Japanese force then would sweep southward toward the presumed position of Spee in Chilean waters. The Japanese also agreed to move their First South Sea Squadron (battle cruisers Kurama and Tsukuba, armored cruiser Iwate) to the area between Fiji and the Marquesas, reinforcing it with another battle cruiser (the Ikoma) to ensure superiority over Spee. After the Emden had been accounted for, the light cruisers Chikuma and Yahagi from the Indian Ocean also would join the squadron. The battle cruiser Ibuki and armored cruiser Nisshin would join the Second South Sea Squadron, with headquarters at Truk in the Caroline Islands. These powerful Japanese squadrons would guard against the possibility of Spee attempting to double back into the Pacific and toward the Indian Ocean. The destruction of Spee’s squadron ultimately made the deployment of the First South Sea Squadron to Fiji unnecessary.61

  The role of Patey and the Australia is usually overlooked. The admiral, convinced that the Germans were heading for South America, had been anxious to follow since before the middle of October, but the Admiralty held the Australian Squadron in the waters around Fiji. There was a period of nearly four weeks in which, as described by the Australian official history, the Australia, “like a dog tethered to his kennel, made darts into neighboring waters and was pulled back before any results could be obtained.”62 The Australia finally was allowed to sail from Suva on 8 November with a collier in company. She coaled at Fanning Island and joined the Newcastle and the Japanese warships at Chamela Bay, just south of Manzanillo on the Mexican coast on the 26th. Patey assumed command of the squadron, and Captain Moriyama of the Idzumo was promoted to rear admiral by his government to work the Japanese warships under Patey’s general direction. The combined force steamed south to search the Galapagos Islands and were just off the Gulf of Panama for a search of the waters between the Gulf of Panama and the Gulf of Guayaquil in Ecuador when they received word of the Falklands battle, to the chagrin of the ship’s company of Australia, who felt they and their powerful ship had been wasted.63 Would the timely dispatch of the Australia to the west coast of South America, coupled with a clear order to Cradock to join her at some prearranged rendezvous, have avoided the disaster of Coronel? This is another “what might have been” of history that can never be answered.