Convoy had made the defenders’ task simpler, as had been expected, by drawing the U-boats to them instead of patrol ships having to search the vast expanses of the ocean for their prey. A further method of countering the menace was to destroy the U-boats in their bases, where they spent at least as much of their time as they did at sea. This had been considered from the earliest days of the war, but the difficulties were immense against well-defended harbours behind minefields.
As long before as 21 November 1916 the War Committee discussed a possible plan to neutralize Ostend and Zeebrugge, the Flanders bases for the major force of U-boats as well as the German light forces which remained a constant threat to the Channel communications. Over the following weeks it was decided that the main British effort on land in 1917 would be made in Flanders with the aim of destroying this wasps’ nest. At the same time, the Navy was requested to consider plans for the destruction of these bases by bombardment from the sea. Jellicoe gave a firm ‘thumbs down’ to this idea. It was ‘an operation which I am sure that no responsible naval officer would recommend, and it is, indeed, hardly practicable’,(21) he wrote in a memorandum.
At the same time Jellicoe was claiming ‘a naval bombardment alone will never turn the Hun out of Zeebrugge and Ostend’ he was emphasizing the absolute importance of capturing and occupying these two bases, or the U-boat would never be crushed. From the depths of his pessimism, Jellicoe further declared (20 June 1917) that because of the shortage of shipping ‘it would be impossible to continue the war into 1918’. This ‘startling and reckless declaration’, as Lloyd George called it, did not add to Jellicoe’s already declining stature among the politicians, and he knew it: ‘I have got myself much disliked by the Prime Minister and others… ‘
In June and July 1917 a combined operation with the Navy landing a division, complete with tanks and artillery, was proposed. This was conditional on a sufficient advance on land in a new offensive by Haig. But Haig never got near his target, and the joint operation was called off on 23 September.
In a paper written by Beatty and forwarded to Jellicoe on 26 August 1917, an idea was revised which had earlier, and independently, been promoted by both Bayly and Tyrwhitt. This was for a Navy blocking operation. There was no chance whatever of destroying the flotillas of U-boats and destroyers once they were inside their bases because they could simply lade away into the maze-like canals and channels inland. Bruges itself eight miles from Zeebrugge with which it was still linked by a ship canal, made a marvellous, virtually invulnerable, hide-out. There was, however, this alternating blocking in means of dealing with the intractable problem.
‘The port of Zceebrugge’, wrote Beatty, ‘is so narrow that blocking it is practicable. A blockship built of concrete, fitted with a crinoline with mine-mooring cutters to take it through the mindfields, and directed by wireless from aircraft, would have many chances in her favour of reaching the entrance to the locks.’(22)
The means and details of ‘putting a cork’ into these vital bases were modified over the following weeks, and it finally fell to Roger Keyes, now a vice-admiral and commanding the Dover Patrol, to put forward his plan to a new Admiralty administration. He received the green light in the last days of February 1918. The ‘cork’ was to be made up of three old cruisers loaded with cement which were to sink themselves against the main lock entrance and the mouth of the canal. In a subsidiary operation two old submarines loaded with high explosive were to blow themselves up under a railway viaduct.
As a preliminary and diversion to this main part of the daring operation, the old cruiser Vindictive, supported by two shallow draught ferry steamers, was to approach under a cover of a smoke screen and lay herself alongside the mile-long mole which covered the entrance to the Bruges canal. She would then put ashore a landing party of bluejackets and marines who were to storm the guns before the arrival of the blockships and then blow up as many installations as possible before withdrawal.
On the night before St. George’s Day, 23 April 1918, and in bright moonlight, this gallant little armada approached its objective. But the patron saint’s good fortune did not sail with it. The wind turned at the vital moment, blowing aside the smokescreen so that the Vindictive made its attack in the open and blasted by enemy gunfire. Clouds and drizzle hid the moon. All this led to the cruiser positioning herself incorrectly so that her guns could give no support to the landing party, whose leaders had already been killed.
Under withering fire, the blockships were unable to sink themselves in their allotted positions. One of the submarines failed to arrive in time, though the second completed her mission and blew a 100-foot gap in the viaduct. The Vindictive withdrew, towed by one of the little steamers.
There were over 500 casualties, and a similar operation on Ostend failed as badly. The overall result provided only a mild inconvenience to the Germans. For a few days the larger U-boats and destroyers were obliged to use Ostend instead, but a new channel was soon dug, and within a few weeks it was as if no raid had taken place. On the other hand, the Zeebrugge raid was a resounding morale-raiser at home, in the Fleet, and in the trenches. Paradoxically, the preliminary reports on Jutland issued by the Admiralty implied limited defeat while the Germans, without any justification, proclaimed a great victory. Zeebrugge in its relatively much smaller way, was an expensive British rebuff and defeat, and was instantly hailed as a great victory, with St. George slaying the dragon in accordance with tradition. It was put about that the nest of the hated U-boats had been destroyed. Keyes, the hero of the hour, was made a baron.
Zeebrugge was a courageous and thrilling exploit deserving its place in history, not for its tangible results, which the Admiralty really believed for a time were considerable, but for its inspiration. An example and inspiration were sorely needed in April 1918. The people of Britain had never lost their faith and confidence in the Royal Navy, only repeatedly in its administration. Zeebrugge confirmed this faith in the most glorious manner, and gave to the Board of Admiralty the reputation for high quality which it deserved in spite of the Zeebrugge failure.
German minefields and the threat of the U-boat prohibited any consideration of a return to the close blockade abandoned in 1912. But it was a reflection of Beatty’s more daring approach to the command of the Grand Fleet that he abandoned Scapa Flow for the base he knew best and had favoured for the Grand Fleet in order to take it closer to the High Seas Fleet. ‘Beatty always felt that the Battle Fleet at Scapa Flow was too far away from the enemy, [wrote Chalmers,] and… he took the whole Fleet to the Forth. Many people doubted the wisdom of this, as the waters above the bridge are congested and the tide runs fast. Strong nerves were needed to turn thirty battleships ‘at rest’ through 180 degrees on an ebb tide after the anchors had been weighed. Under Beatty’s leadership it soon became a matter of routine, and at no time did weather conditions prevent him from taking this huge armada of 150 ships to sea at any state of tide by day or by night… the superb seamanship of the Captains and Navigators overcame all hazards.’(23)
In 1918 the Grand Fleet was a magnificent fighting force which had come to terms with the realities of twentieth-century sea warfare. It had secure bases, boasted excellent gunnery, possessed efficient shell in its well-protected magazines, improved its signalling. No contingency was uncatered for, the U-boat was respected but no longer feared, all that had been unknown in 1914 was now known.
The vast superiority in numbers and improved matériel generally (even the mines worked now) had been multiplied by American reinforcemcnt, so that an unlikely German decision to face a full-scale battle would be an act of suicide.
In only one important branch had the old tradition of conservatism prevailed. Jellicoe’s failure to recognize the value of an aircraft-carrier with his Fleet at Jutland was compounded by his failure, and the failure of the administration that succeeded his at the Admiralty, to develop the air arm with the resolution and speed it warranted, in spite of the earlier successful pioneering work in
the Dardanelles. It was left to a small band of dedicated enthusiasts, like Rutland, Williamson home from the Dardanelles, Commodore Murray Sueter, Squadron Commander E. H. Dunning, Flight Commander C. H. K. Edmonds, and others to fight the battle fix the aircraft-carrier and the production of machines like the Sopwith ‘Baby’ seaplane and highly effective Sopwith ‘Cuckoo’ torpedo plane.
On 20 December 1916 Sueter put forward proposals for a mass torpedo plane attack on the German Fleet at Wilhelmshaven and the Austrian Fleet in the Adriatic. These were at first received sympathetically at the Admiralty, but with the loss of Sueter’s driving force when he was sent to Italy the momentum was lost, and Beatty (always an air enthusiast) never had a chance to prove the devastating power of the airborne torpedo before the Armistice.
The aircraft-carrier was regarded with the same suspicion as the submarine little more than a decade earlier, and development was slow. After the battle-cruiser losses at Jutland, the Fleet did not welcome the completion of Fisher’s ‘large light cruisers’ he had ordered back in 1914. The ultimate Fisher battle-cruiser was the Furious, armed with two 18-inch guns, protected by 3-inch (maximum) side armour, and capable of 32 knots. Before she was completed, her forward turret was removed and a flat deck, like the Campania’s, built forward off the bridge for aircraft to fly off. Unfortunately, Dunning attempted to land on her and, after succeeding once, was drowned in a subsequent attempt when a tyre burst. The uncompleted battleship Eagle was also put in hand for conversion to a carrier role along with the ex-liner Argus. But none of this work was pursued with any great vigour, and the world’s first designed and laid-down carrier, Hermes, which was started in July 1917 was not in commission until 1923. The RNAS became known more for its land-based operations in Flanders than for its operations in the North Sea. This lack of enthusiasm by the Admiralty was a very important factor in the decision to form the RAF in 1918 and, later, the loss to the RAF of the Navy’s control of its aircraft between the two world wars.
In spite of tepid official encouragement and the limited resources available, by the end of 1917 Beatty had wrested control of the air over the North Sea from the Germans. One of the objections put forward against the early carriers was that they were too slow to keep up with the Fleet. In January 1917 Beatty set up the Grand Fleet Aircraft Committee to work on this problem before really fast carriers could be made available. One of the successful solutions was to construct platforms over the conning tower and forward gun of light cruisers. These were a mere 20 feet long, but this was quite enough to get a Sopwith ‘Pup’ fighter airborne with the ship steaming into wind. When the first of these platforms was used operationally in August 1917, Flight Sub-Lieutenant B. A. Smart made history by taking off when a Zeppelin was sighted and shooting the huge craft down in flames, subsequently ditching his ‘Pup’ in the sea.
An alternative to the ship’s platform was a lighter fitted with a 30-foot flight deck and towed at high speed by a destroyer. On 31 July 1918, Flight Lieutenant S. D. Culley took off in a Sopwith ‘Camel’ and shot down the Zeppelin L-53. By this time most battle-cruisers and light cruisers had been fitted with fixed or turntable platforms so that quite a swarm of reconnaissance as well as fighter aircraft could be launched. Now the sky as well as the sea was dominated by the British Fleet, in spite of the opposition of numerous gunnery officers and encrusted old salts, the senior admirals with ‘solid ivory from the jaws up, except for a little hole from ear to ear to let useful knowledge go in and out’.
Beatty’s most important contribution to the successful pursuit of the Great War at sea was his sustaining of the optimism and spirit of the Grand Fleet from June 1916 until the end, during which time his own popularity among the officers and men never wavered. ‘The outstanding characteristic of British Sea Power’, wrote one American officer, ‘was its extraordinarily high morale in the face of great handicaps.’(24) Beatty himself never gave up hope that a second opportunity of meeting the enemy in strength might occur. Like many of his captains and squadron commanders, Beatty found the awful winter weather and boredom of life at Seapa Flow and Rosyth a great burden. There was additionally the sense of helplessness when the Army continued to fight and suffer so heavily. ‘It frets me terribly that with all this terrible fighting going on that we cannot help’,(25) Beatty once wrote in anguish to his wife.
On 21 March 1918 the German Army attacked the British front on the Somme in great strength. A dense fog, far thicker than the North Sea mist which had assisted the German Fleet at Jutland, concealed the German attack until it was too late. The Germans advanced deep into British – and French-held positions, deeper than at any time since 1914. In the throes of this crisis, Marshal Ferdinand Foch took overall command. The Allied armies were forced at last into a war of movement, and the farther they fell back the more disadvantaged were the Germans. Moreover, like the British battle-cruisers at Jutland – ‘the many-headed hydra’ – there seemed to be no end to the Allied reserves. By the end of April the German attack had run out of steam. Supplies could not be sustained; nor could the spirit of the men. Germany knew she was beaten in spite of victory against Russia earlier in the year. Food was becoming desperately short and certain factions were fermenting revolution.
Unrest in the High Seas Fleet was sharpened by well-founded rumours that they were to participate in some sort of ‘death ride’. What had the C.-in-C. in store for them at the end of October, when all seemed lost on land and an armistice could not be long delayed? ‘It is impossible for the Fleet to remain inactive in any final battle that may sooner or later precede an Armistice’, Scheer declared. ‘The Fleet must be committed. Even if it is not to be expected that this would decisively influence the course of events, it is still, from the moral point of view, a question of the honour and existence of the Navy to have done its utmost in the last battle.’(26)
When the Fleet was ordered to assemble in Schillig Roads outside Wilhelmshaven on 29 October 1918, mutiny broke out in varying degrees, from insubordination and refusal to report for duty to threats of violence. Cheers for peace were heard throughout the Fleet, and even cheers for the American President, Woodrow Wilson. By 4 November, the red flag of revolution was flying at all the German naval ports.
After some inter-service and inter-Allied altercation, the naval terms for an armistice were agreed. ‘The war of exhaustion’, as Scheer described it, was heading for ‘Germany’s certain defeat.’ To be surrendered for internment in neutral ports – or failing them, Allied ports – were 160 submarines, 10 battleships, 6 battle-cruisers and a proportionate number of cruisers and destroyers.
So neglected were the ships of the High Seas Fleet, that it was difficult to get even this reduced force to sea. But at last they did, and Beatty, denied a second Trafalgar, reached the summit of his life and his achievement when he sailed to meet them and take the surrender on 21 November 1918, just ten days after the armies had ceased fighting, with 370 ships and 90,000 officers and men under his command.
Like 31 May 1916, the date on which the Fleets had last met, the weather was sunny but misty. The filthy, neglected condition of the German ships, the scruffy, ill-disciplined state of the German crews on deck, told their own story of what had happened during the previous thirty months to one of the toughest, most professional and skilful fighting forces in the world. Here, forty miles cast of May Island off the entrance to the Firth of Forth, was the tangible proof of British naval omnipotence, and the meaninglessness of Jutland’s pluses and minuses in ship losses.
By 11 a.m. the two Fleets were safely inside the Firth of Forth, where Beatty made a general signal: ‘The German flag will be hauled down at sunset today, Thursday, and will not be hoisted again without permission.’ The German ensigns were duly hauled down as all hands in the flagship Queen Elizabeth were piped aft. On the sounding of the bugle ‘making sunset’, Beatty was given a great round of cheers by the ship’s company and the men of the entire Grand Fleet as well as the American 6th Battle Squadron and the r
epresentative French ships.
Beatty answered the cheers With his famous hat held aloft, smiling at the unprecedented scene. ‘I always told you they would have to come out’, he told his men.
Any last pride left to the German Fleet was sunk just seven months later in the biggest act of self-immolation in naval history. On 21 June 1919, in a well-kept conspiracy, the High Seas Fleet scuttled itself in Scapa Flow. The spectacle could also be interpreted as a symbolic act of genuflection at the scene of Britain’s power-base during those years of blockade which had brought about the enemy’s downfall.
The victory of 21 November 1918 was a bloodless and silent one. But it was none the less the greatest naval victory in history, brought about by the sustainment of spirit and distantly and continuously applied superiority in a battle lasting 1571 days and nights. From time to time during this long-drawn-out conflict the two protagonists had brushed up against one another, exchanged fire, suffered and caused losses. Sometimes the engagements had occurred for all to see, as at the Falklands, at other times in the dim visibility of sunset as at Coronel and Jutland, and more often blindly and beneath the ocean. But whether the Grand Fleet was lying at its anchorage at Scapa Flow or engaging enemy destroyers in a tumult of fire and North Sea darkness early on 1 June 1916, the application of superiority remained unchanged. The date 21 November 1918 was important only because it was the day Germany finally resigned herself to the state of affairs which had applied since 11 p.m. on 4 August 1914.
It is no reflection on the prodigious and continuing effort and glorious courage of the armies in France and the numerous other theatres of war, or of the airmen who gave them such valiant assistance, to say that the Royal Navy provided the greatest contribution to victory by its perpetual and mainly unseen and soundless pressure. It was the blockade that finally drove the Central Powers to accept defeat. At first mild in its application, the blockade’s noose gradually tightened until, with the American entry, all restraint was cast aside. Increasingly deprived of the means to wage war, or even to feed her population, the violent response was insurrection; apathy and demoralization the mute consequence of dashed hopes and thin potato soup.
The Great War at Sea: 1914-1918 Page 42