The Hunters and the Hunted

by Bryan Perrett

  In return, Kronprinz Wilhelm transferred some of her coal to Karlsruhe. This operation had to be hastily abandoned when Suffolk, Cradock’s flagship, appeared over the horizon. Karlsruhe headed north at speed while Kronprinz Wilhelm veered away to the north-north-east on the first leg of a varied course that would take her to the Azores. Cradock quickly reached the conclusion that he was unable to catch the faster German cruiser and made radio contact with two of his own ships, Bristol and Berwick, which were located along the course line that Kohler had set. Bristol, commanded by Captain B.H. Fanshawe, was on a reciprocal course to Karlsruhe and at 20.15 spotted her 6 miles distant, illuminated by a full moon. He swung Bristol on to a parallel course and opened fire at 7,000 yards. Karlsruhe replied but neither ship scored a hit in the gathering gloom. Kohler turned away eastwards and soon outpaced her opponent. By 22.30 Bristol’s speed had dropped to 18 knots and she no longer had Karlsruhe in sight. There was a chance that Berwick might have intercepted the German cruiser at about 08.00 next morning, but at the critical moment she made an alteration of course which took her away from her quarry. However, when Karlsruhe entered San Juan harbour on the American island of Puerto Rico, the pursuit had cost her all but 12 tons of her precious coal.

  The American authorities enforced the strict requirements of neutrality, informing Kohler that his ship must leave San Juan within twenty-four hours of her arrival. During this period he loaded sufficient coal to take him to Willemstad on the Dutch island of Curacao where he obtained a further supply which enabled him to make a rendezvous with one of his supply ships, the Patagonia, on 17 August. The following day Karlsruhe began a raiding career that rivalled that of Emden, her more famous cousin, by sinking the freighter Bowes Castle, the crew of which he transferred to the Stadt Schleswig, another of Kohler’s supply ships, shortly after. On 28 August he was able to make good all his shortages off Fernando de Noronha where he met another three German supply ships.

  For the next two months Karlsruhe ran riot around the West Indies, capturing and sinking no less than fifteen more ships, bringing her total of British shipping destroyed to 72,216 tons. During this period three factors were constantly to the forefront of Kohler’s mind. These were the ever present need to acquire fuel, the constant danger posed by patrolling British warships and, of course, his primary mission of inflicting as much damaged as possible on the enemy’s commerce. Regarding the last, from 20 September onwards he began operating with a supply ship positioned 20 miles distant on either beam to increase the radius of his search, the only German raider captain to employ this method of detecting possible kills.

  On 14 September he was in the process of sinking the steamer Highland Hope when a Spanish merchantman came into view. Naturally, the Spaniard was curious and asked by radio what was happening. Kohler got his wireless operator to reply that he was part of a British convoy. This signal was intercepted by the British pre-dreadnought battleship Canopus, which had recently arrived on station. Those aboard Canopus would have known that the Admiralty was not in favour of convoys and their suspicions would have been aroused at once. She immediately asked the Spaniard for her position. The transmission alerted Karlsruhe to the fact that she might well be in some danger and Kohler gave the order for her to leave the area at maximum speed. Although he was unaware of the fact, Canopus was nearing the end of her useful life, and although her specification claimed that she was capable of up to 19 knots, long service had reduced that by a third and there was not the slightest chance of her being able to overhaul Karlsruhe. Against this, Canopus was invisible to Karlsruhe and Kohler was unaware of her precise range and position. On the other hand, if her call sign had been identified, Kohler’s recognition manual would have told him that her main armament consisted of four 12-inch guns, and to a light cruiser that was very serious opposition indeed.

  Kohler treated his captive crews according to international maritime law and sent them ashore on at least two occasions, the last being the despatch of Crefeld, one of his supply ships, to the Canary Islands on 13 October. The raider’s last capture was that of the 10,000-ton liner Van Dyke, on 28 October.

  Next, Kohler decided to destroy the British radio station on Barbados. During the early evening of 4 November Karlsruhe was gliding smoothly across a flat sea when the entire forepart of the ship, including the bridge and the first funnel, were ripped apart by a huge explosion and sank immediately. That portion from the second funnel aft remained afloat but was sinking and did so within thirty minutes. The supply ships Idrani-Hoffnung and Rio Negro headed for the scene at speed and picked up Karlsruhe’s survivors, of whom there were only 129. Kohler and over 250 of his men had been lost in the explosion and its immediate consequence. The cause of the disaster has never been fully explained. One cause commonly put forward is sweating cordite in the forward magazines. Another possibility is an explosion of coal dust, which was at its most dangerous in a hot, humid climate. In 1898 the American battleship Maine was lost to this cause in Havana harbour, and a secondary explosion in a coal bunker following a torpedo strike is widely regarded as contributing to the loss of the Lusitania in 1915.

  The Idrani-Hoffnung was scuttled shortly after, while the Rio Negro set out on the voyage to Germany. Incredibly she worked he way through the British blockade and reached Norway. As she had clearly been engaged in hostilities, both the ship and the Karlsruhe’s survivors were interned by the Norwegian authorities. They were, however, permitted to inform the German Admiralty of the details relating to the cruiser’s loss. The Allies, while aware that Karlsruhe was no longer active in the Caribbean, remained in ignorance of her fate until March 1915 when wreckage attributable to her was discovered.

  Merchant Vessels Sunk by the Konigsberg in 1914

  Bowes Castle, 18 August

  Strathroy, 31 August

  Maple Branch, 3 September

  Highland Hope, 14 September

  Indrani, 17 September

  Maria, 21 September

  Cornish City, 21 September

  Rio Iguazu, 22 September

  Niceto de Larrinaga, 6 October

  Lynrowan, 7 October

  Cervantes, 8 October

  Pruth, 9 October

  Condor, 11 October

  Glanton, 18 October

  Hurstdale, 23 October

  Van Dyke, 28 October

  CHAPTER 3

  Atlantic Rendezvous

  The South American coast is 3,000 miles long and punctuated at frequent intervals by bays, inlets and river estuaries, all of which offer suitable hiding places for anyone wishing to conceal a vessel of even moderate size. In addition, there are two locations off the Brazilian coast that offer far less obvious hiding places, both being formed by the peaks of submarine mountain ranges. The first, lying 220 miles from the mainland, is Fernando Noranha and consists of a tiny archipelago the principal island of which, 7 miles long and 5 miles across, supports some 300 inhabitants. The second, approximately 400 miles further out into the Atlantic, is known as the Islhas de los Trinidade, and amounts to little more than a collection of huge jagged rocks. These are uninhabited and offer little more than an anchorage, a beach or two, some stunted vegetation and a freshwater spring. The problem was that these hiding places were so remote that this fact alone attracted them to a potential searcher and because of this the Islhas de los Trinidade were to become the scene of one of the most remarkable encounters in maritime history.

  After exchanging captains with the Karlsruhe, the Dresden had headed south on the first leg of her journey to the Pacific. On 4 August she met the steamer Baden, which was carrying 6,000 tons of coal and became her personal collier. Two days later she stopped three British merchant ships, the Drumcliffe, Lynton Grange and Hostilius. Captain Ludecke has been accused of being insufficiently ruthless for total war, but it would be fairer to say that he was quite prepared to do his duty while retaining the values of a gentler age. In this case he released all three of his prizes; Drumcliffe because her passengers inclu
ded women and children, and the other two because their cargos were of no use to the belligerent powers. No doubt his officers expressed concern that the recent captives would report the Dresden’s presence at the first opportunity, but this did not alter his way of thinking. On 8 August he captured and sank the freighter Hyades, fully laden with a cargo of grain, but released the Siamese Prince on 16 August because her holds were empty. In the latter case Ludecke’s boarding officer made his own feelings clear by inscribing the ship’s log to the effect that he hoped that next time they met her holds would be full. Following this, Ludecke took Dresden to Fernando Noronha, where he anchored off the principal island to coal from the Baden.

  This task completed he headed for Trinidade, where he found several colliers and the gunboat Eber (Boar) in the principal bay. Eber, under Commander Julius Wirth, was a small river gunboat armed with two 4.1-inch guns and six 37mm heavy machine guns. Her usual station was on the coast of German West Africa where there was little for her to do except curtail the activities of diamond smugglers as far as possible. Launched in 1903, she was sorely in need of a refit and was a frequent visitor to Cape Town where she was able to replace worn engineering parts. On the outbreak of war, Wirth was ordered to take her, accompanied by a supply ship, across the Atlantic to Trinidade and await further orders. The ocean voyage had not improved the condition of the tiny gunboat, the constant pitching and rolling starting several plates in her hull so that her bilge pumps were in continuous use. Thus, when Ludecke brought the immaculate Dresden into the bay he was confronted by the least reputable looking ship in the entire Imperial Navy, her hull streaked with rust, her decks still grubby from the additional coal she had been forced to carry during her long voyage, and a constant stream of dirty water spewing out of her bilges. Ludecke had no intention of remaining at Trinidade and left as soon as he had replenished his supplies, telling Wirth that for the moment his task was simply to guard the precious colliers assembled in the bay and await further orders. In the meantime, he pointedly sent several tins of paint across to the smaller vessel. A few days later Eber received fresh orders by radio message from Dresden, now many miles to the south. An armed merchant cruiser would be arriving at Trinidade shortly. Wirth was to transfer Eber’s armament to her, take command, and prey on Allied shipping along the local trade routes. Eber was to be decommissioned as a unit of the Imperial Navy, make for Bahia Blanca in Brazil, and allow herself to be detained.

  The armed merchant cruiser was the recently completed luxury liner Cap Trafalgar, flagship of the Hamburg South America Line, commanded by Captain Fritz Langerhannz, the company’s senior captain. Her name might be considered to be unusual for a German liner, but had been conferred in the hope that she would attract British passengers. To this end her public rooms were decorated with portraits of Admiral Nelson, his mistress, his captains and paintings representing his ships and their various victories. Among her more unusual features was a sort of greenhouse at the after end of her superstructure. This was described as the Winter Garden and displayed various raised beds containing tropical plants, augmented by marble columns. When the war began she had just completed her maiden voyage to Buenos Aires and her chances of returning to Germany were remote. The Argentine authorities were far from helpful, but Langerhannz received what amounted to orders from a Lieutenant Commander Muller, who had recently taken up the post of German Naval Attaché in Buenos Aires, having travelled south from New York aboard the collier Berwind. He informed Langerhannz that the Cap Trafalgar was to be requisitioned as an armed merchant cruiser. For the moment Langerhannz would sail the ship and one of his reserve officers named Feddersen, nominated as First Lieutenant, would be responsible for fighting her. Langerhanz pointed out that the ship was unarmed, at which Muller said he would discuss the situation with the Admiralty in Berlin. Having done this he returned with more definite instructions. Cap Trafalgar would continue taking on fuel discretely, despite the attitude of the authorities; any shortfall of coal could be made good with railway sleepers. She would then leave without drawing attention to herself and drop down the River Plate to Montevideo in Uruguay, where the authorities were more kindly disposed. There, she would complete coaling and make up her crew numbers, replacing those reservists who had left the ship at Buenos Aires. Having completed these tasks, Langerhannz was ordered to take his command to Islhas de los Trinidade, where she would be supplied with guns.

  During this period much was done to disguise the ship. No German liner on the South American route had more than two funnels. Her rearmost funnel, a dummy housing equipment that was easily relocated, was therefore taken down. The glass of the Winter Garden was painted white, leaving circles of clear glass to simulate portholes in a solid structure. The boot-topping was painted red to resemble that of Cunarders, while the two remaining funnels were painted black-over-red, which were also the Cunard colours. In this way the Cap Trafalgar now bore a remarkable resemblance to the Cunard liner Carmania, which had also been requisitioned as an armed merchant cruiser. There were, however, some notable differences. Battleship grey paint now covered the latter’s hull, superstructure and funnel, while her boot-topping had been over-painted in black.

  In peacetime Carmania was commanded by Captain James Clayton Barr, one of Cunard’s most senior captains who would become Commodore of the line. Now aged fifty-nine, Barr was of short stature but his eyes indicated a shrewd knowledge of the sea, ships and men gained during a lifetime afloat. He had first gone to sea in 1877, serving in sail and before the mast before gaining his officer’s ticket. As a teenager he had rounded the Horn several time and been involved in three shipwrecks. Having graduated to steam he joined Cunard as a junior deck officer and his upward progress to master had been rapid. Prior to taking over Carmania in 1905 he had commanded several of Cunard’s better known liners, including the Mauretania. Such was his skill at handling his 19,000-ton command that he was able to dispense with the use of tugs when berthing or leaving harbour, thereby saving his employers a considerable bill and earning himself a bonus.

  He had first come to the public’s attention in 1913 when, on 10 October, he had answered a call for assistance from the immigrant liner Volturno, on fire and battling a gale in the mid-Atlantic. When the fire began to gain ground, several lifeboats were launched with disastrous consequences. Some were swamped or capsized in the heavy seas, while others were smashed against the ship’s hull as they were being lowered, pitching their occupants into the water below. Some 120 lives were lost in this way.

  The Carmania was first to arrive, followed by nine more ships of various types. Barr took control, instructing the rescuers to circle the burning ship to avoid collisions while he illuminated the scene with his searchlights throughout the night. Some of the rescue ships launched their own lifeboats but very few of those aboard the Volturno were willing to jump into wild, bone-chilling waves below. Those aboard the stricken vessel were now confined to the after part of the ship. Shortly before dawn Volturno was shaken by a heavy internal explosion. It was now felt that it would not be long before she foundered but shortly after the oil tanker Narrangansett reached the scene and discharged part of her cargo on to the water, calming it sufficiently for the lifeboats to complete their tasks. Altogether, 520 passengers and crew were rescued. As the day wore on it became apparent that while Volturno had been reduced to a burned-out hulk, she refused to sink and therefore represented a serious hazard to navigation. A party was therefore sent aboard to open her sea cocks and she finally slid to the bottom. Several members of Carmania’s crew, including Captain Barr, received awards for gallantry in respect of their actions during the rescue. Carmania had been Liverpool bound and on 27 October was mentioned in The New York Times on completion of her return trip: ‘The Cunard liner Carmania arrived yesterday from Liverpool with forty-three survivors from the Volturno, including twenty-two women and children who had been rescued by the Leyland steamship Devonian and landed at Liverpool.’

  The onset of war di
d not please Barr at all. He got on well with his German passengers and on his most recent trip to New York had particularly enjoyed the company of a Lieutenant Commander Muller. It would be too much to believe in this strange story of coincidences that this officer was not the same Lieutenant Commander Muller who had given the Cap Trafalgar her orders in Buenos Aires, who is known to have recently arrived there from New York. Be that as it may, Barr had a far more personal reason for being averse to a major war, and that was the fact that he would lose command of his ship to a regular Royal Navy officer. Cunard had an agreement with the Admiralty that if the need arose she could be ‘taken up from trade’ as the saying goes, and to that end traverse rings had been built into her deck to house the eight 4.7-inch guns with which she was about to be armed as a merchant cruiser. There would, of course, be much else to do before the ship could set out on her new role, including the fitting of armour plate to vulnerable areas and the replacement of older or unsuitable crew members by Royal Navy and Royal Marine personnel and the stripping out of passenger cabins.