At a quarter to two the Invincible was being straddled—the Scharnhorst's shells, that is to say, were exploding on both sides of her—and Admiral Sturdee, consistently with his plan of action, drew away a little to avoid undue risks. The Scharnhorst had by this time been hit on several occasions, but had not been disabled, though she broke off the action; and, at ten minutes past two, the fight became a chase again, the Invincible reopening fire at a quarter to three. For eight minutes, again out-ranging them, the Invincible and Inflexible hammered the two German cruisers, forcing them round to port once more to reply as best they could. The heavier British guns had now begun definitely to tell, however, and the Scharnhorst was already on fire forward. "We hit again and again," wrote Midshipman John Esmonde in a letter to his father after the action. "First our left gun sent her big crane spinning over the side. Then our right gun blew her funnel to atoms, and then another shot from the left gun sent her bridge and part of the forecastle sky-high. We were not escaping free, however. Shots were hitting us repeatedly, and the spray from the splashes of their shells was hiding the Scharnhorst from us.... Down came the range—11,000, 10,000, 9,000, to 8,800. We were hitting the Scharnhorst very nearly every time. One beauty from our right gun got one of her turrets fair and square and sent it whistling over the side. Suddenly our right gun misfired—we had got a jamb and one gun was out of action. The breech had caught against one of the cages and would neither open nor shut. We opened up the trap hatch, and I jumped out, and down the ladder with two men to try and find a crowbar. The 12-inch guns were firing all round us, and our left gun was doing work for two now that the right was jambed. The German shells were whistling unpleasantly close and there were splinters flying all over the place. The Scharnhorst was firing heavily, but I could see she was in a bad way. She was down by the bows and badly on fire amidships. I got the crowbar and brought it in, but they wanted a hacksaw as well, so I jumped out again, and just as I was coming back I saw the Scharnhorst's ensign dip (never knew whether it came down or not, because just then one of the lyddite shells hit her and there was a dense cloud of smoke all over her).[1] When it cleared she was on her side, and her propellers were lashing the water round into foam. Then she capsized altogether, going to the bottom."
[1] As a matter of fact, the Scharnhorst's ensign was not lowered, but, as Admiral Sturdee afterward remarked, "Von Spee met his fate like a brave Admiral, though our foe."
That was at a quarter past four; her consort the Gneisenau was still firing with all her guns; and, by this time, the old Carnarvon had at last arrived upon the scene—she had in fact fired a couple of shots at the Scharnhorst. The three cruisers, therefore, now turned their attention to the Gneisenau, who, after a moment's hesitation, turned and stood at bay. Nothing in the whole day, indeed, was more gallant than her vain but desperate resistance. At half-past four she was still straddling the Invincible, though without causing casualties or serious damage. A few minutes after five, her forward funnel was knocked out and remained lolling against the second. Seven minutes later, just as she hit the Invincible for the last time, she was herself badly damaged again between the third and fourth funnels; and how accurate the British fire had become can be gathered from the notebook of one of her officers, afterward rescued. "Five ten," he wrote, "hit, hit; 5.12, hit; 5:14, hit, hit, hit again; 5:20, after-turret gone; 5:40, hit, hit—on fire everywhere; 5:41, hit, hit—burning everywhere and sinking; 5:45, hit—men lying everywhere; 5:46, hit, hit."
Listing heavily to starboard, and with her engines stopped, Admiral Sturdee had ordered the "Cease Fire" signal at about half-past five. But, before it could be hoisted, the Gneisenau began to shoot again, though now only spasmodically and with a single gun. She seems to have fired, indeed, until her ammunition was exhausted, when, at ten minutes to six, Admiral Sturdee ordered the "Cease Fire" again and, twelve minutes later, she turned on her side. "Then at last," wrote another officer, "away first and second cutters, man sea-boat. For the Gneisenau is heeling right over on her side in the water. The beggars are done for. All our efforts will now be to save life, having done our utmost for five hours to destroy it.... Three of our boats are away picking up survivors. The Inflexible's boats are doing the same, and so are the Carnarvon's. The sea, which, so different from its state at noonday, is now quite angry, is strewn with floating wreckage supporting drowning men. To add to the misery, a drizzling rain is falling. We cast overboard every rope's end we can, and try our hands at casting to some wretch feebly struggling within a few yards of the ship's side. Missed him! Another shot. He's farther off now! Ah! The rope isn't long enough. No good, try someone else. He's sunk now.... Many such do we see. Now we lend a hand hauling at a rope, pulling some poor devil out of the water. As they are hauled on deck they are taken below into the wardroom ante-room, or the Admiral's spare cabin. Here with knives we tear off their dripping clothing. Then with towels we try to start a little warmth in their ice-cold bodies. They are trembling, violently trembling from the iciness of their immersion. Some of them had stuck it for thirty minutes in a temperature of 35 degrees Fahrenheit!"
"The Invincible alone," reported Admiral Sturdee, "rescued 108 men, fourteen of whom were found to be dead after being brought on board. These men were buried at sea the following day with full military honours." Few will say that they were undeserved.
By now the battle had been distributed over many leagues of sea; the units engaged were not only out of sight of each other, but even beyond the sound of each other's guns; and it is time to return to Captain Luce in his war-scarred Glasgow, who, with the Kent and Cornwall, was pursuing the three light cruisers. More perhaps than to any others of the officers and crews engaged did their part in this struggle mean to those of the Glasgow. The sole survivors of Coronel, they had lived, as none of their comrades had done, for a bitter five weeks, with the picture of it before them. When all would fain have stayed and fought to the last, they had been compelled, in the interests of their service, to take the harder way. They had a peculiar debt to discharge, and now, if they could but seize it, their hour had come to repay it with interest.
It was at about twenty minutes past one when the three German cruisers had broken away toward the southwest, the Dresden leading with the Nürnberg and Leipzig following her on each quarter. The distance then separating them from the Glasgow, Kent, and Cornwall, was from nine to eleven miles; all were speedy, the Dresden being the fastest; and a long, stern chase therefore ensued. Of the three British cruisers, the Glasgow, in spite of her late experiences, was still considerably the swiftest; and she soon drew away from them, overhauling the Leipzig and Nürnberg, until at three o'clock she was within seven miles of the former. Her idea was now, if possible, so to outrange the Leipzig as to turn and delay her until the arrival of the Kent and Cornwall, far slower vessels even than the Leipzig, but carrying fourteen 6-inch guns to the Glasgow's two. At three o'clock, therefore, she opened fire with her 6-inch guns, and, for more than an hour, engaged the Leipzig until the arrival of the Cornwall. By that time she had already hit her many times over, but had had to draw away on several occasions, owing to the accuracy of the Leipzig's gunners. With time and speed and the range on his side, Captain Luce, like his admiral, could afford to be deliberate; and yet even so, with a little more luck, the Leipzig might have damaged the Glasgow rather severely. Two of her officers stationed in the control-top had a very narrow escape from losing their lives, a shell passing between them, and carrying away the hand of a signalman—three other men being wounded and one killed at about the same time. After an hour and a quarter, and having had an early tea, the Cornwall arrived on the scene, and was soon, as one of the Glasgow's seamen, admitted, "shooting very well."
We have last seen the Cornwall, not wholly to her liking, upon the quarter of the even slower Carnarvon; but, a little after noon, to her great satisfaction, she had received orders to go ahead. When the three light cruisers had broken to the south in their endeavour to escape, she had turned after them, as we have said, with her sister ship, the Kent, in the wake of the nimbler Glasgow. Now, thanks to the Glasgow and the superhuman efforts of their two engine-room staffs, both the Kent and Cornwall were at last in action, the former being ordered in pursuit of the Nürnberg—where we may leave her for a moment performing imperishable conjuring-tricks in the way of stoking and engine-driving, while her luckier consorts, already at close grips, were battering the Leipzig to pieces.
At twenty minutes to five, a shot from the Cornwall, at a range of between four and five miles, carried away her foremast; but, ten minutes later, after delivering a broadside, and as she was being hit herself, the Cornwall drew away a little. The Leipzig had now lost one of her funnels as well as being on fire aft, many of her guns being already silenced; but at six o'clock she was still firing well enough to hit the Cornwall severely and once more to force the latter away a little. This was only for a moment, however, the Cornwall reopening with lyddite shell at a quarter past six, and now pressing her attack home with tremendous force and accuracy to a range of less than three miles. In this the Glasgow joined her—it being obviously useless now to hunt for the Dresden miles away in the mist—and, by ten minutes to seven, the Leipzig was on fire everywhere, though her flag was still flying and her guns occasionally responding. The two British cruisers then stopped firing for a little, but dared not draw near for fear of a torpedo-attack. Blazing in every corner, with her sides red hot, and with great gaps in her torn by the lyddite, it seemed now that every moment must be the Leipzig's last; but still she floated and would not strike her colours. Fire was again reopened, therefore, although, as one of the Cornwall's officers said, "We all hated doing it," and, half an hour later, she sent up a couple of rockets signifying that she surrendered and asking for help.
What her condition was then has been vividly described by Private Whittaker of the Royal Marine Light Infantry. "When we went right close," he wrote to his mother, "she looked just like a night-watchman's fire bucket, all holes and fire." Searchlights were now playing upon her through the rain and darkness, but, in view of possible explosions, the boats could not approach too near; out of her crew of over three hundred, less than a score were saved; and, at just about nine o'clock, she rolled over to port, seemed to recover a moment, and then slipped out of sight.
So perished the Leipzig, not less gallantly, but as condignly as the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, news of whose destruction had been wirelessed to the Cornwall and Glasgow. Whatever might happen now, victory was assured; the Good Hope and Monmouth had been amply avenged; and to the Cornwall and Glasgow, buffeting home to Port Stanley, few happier moments were likely to come. Into the feelings of Captain Luce it would be impertinent to pry; but a little may be guessed, perhaps, from what follows. "About half an hour ago," said one of his crew, writing home on December 11th, "the Captain made a speech, or rather tried to, but failed. He first of all read out the King's message to the Fleet, and then tried to say a few words himself; 'I have seen the Glasgow's ship's company fight twice, and I thank you for the way in which you fought. I couldn't have a better ship's company.' Then he said, 'I can't say any more.'"
That is to leap forward, however, three days and to leave the Kent still ploughing after the Nürnberg—out of sight of everybody now and with the impossible task of making a doubtful 20-knot vessel catch one five knots faster; and not only overtake her, but bring her to action, with the weather changing and darkness not far off. But to the engine-room staff of the Kent and to her stokers no less than to Captain Allen—"Sink-her" Allen, they called him—the word impossible, for to-night at least, might not be whispered with impunity. There was the Nürnberg flushed from Coronel, and here was the Kent with her fourteen good guns; coal might be short and the engines in their second childhood, but if those guns did not find the Nürnberg, it would not be the fault of the engine-room. First out of harbour in the early morning, a spirit of extreme cheerfulness seems to have reigned in the Kent from the beginning of the action. Thus, at half-past ten, we find her officers drinking the toast of Deutschland unter Alles in sloe-gin. Soon afterward they lunched; and then—as many of them as could be spared—established themselves on the top of the forward gun-turret to watch the fun.
This was christened "the stalls" and seems to have been well patronized till half-past one when they went to Action Stations again. Falling out at twenty minutes past two, watch was resumed from the bridge, which then became known as "the upper circle." At five minutes to four tea was served in the gun-room, and, twenty minutes later, Action Stations were taken up again. At that time the Leipzig and Nürnberg were well in view, with the Dresden almost out of sight on the horizon—the Leipzig on the starboard bow, nearer at hand, and being engaged by the Glasgow, and a moment afterward by the Cornwall, and the Nürnberg away to port and considerably more distant. Then came the order to pursue the latter, the Leipzig being given a salvo or two in passing; and it was then that there began the race that was destined to become traditional in every engine-room of the navy. With no coal to spare, everything combustible was crammed into her long-suffering furnaces. Tables and chairs, officers' furniture, wooden companion-ladders, even planks from the deck, were knocked to pieces and thrust into the flames for the ultimate destruction of the Nürnberg.
"The entire staff," afterward wrote one of her engineer officers, "was doing its best, and, my word it was a best. We pushed her along, more, more, more. The revolutions of the engines at the first time of starting were more than the revolutions the dockyard could get out of her, and she was worked up gently bit by bit, easying down occasionally when things looked as if they were not going quite right, or when they threatened to do so. An anxious moment was reached when we got on every ounce of steam that the engines could take. We were just then going some sixteen revolutions a minute faster than the Admiralty full power, and also the designed power of 22,000 horse-power, some 5,000 horse-power more than we ought to have done. In times of peace we should have been court-martialled for this, but we came out top.... We were doing from 2-½ to 3 knots faster than the old Kent had ever done before. We were doing over 25 knots 'full speed,' the highest ever attained being 22 knots."
Fortunately for the Kent, too, the Nürnberg had her own boiler troubles, but they were of a different order, and she was unable to make her usual speed; and, after about an hour, the Kent was near enough to open fire at a range of a little over six miles. It was now the gunners' opportunity, and though they were reservists, drawn, as one of the officers put it, "from all sorts of weird places," they rose to the occasion, like first-class experts, and found their target almost at once. Nor could Captain Allen afford himself the license that had been the right policy for the other commanders. It was now past five; rain was falling; his supply of combustible bric-à-brac was strictly limited. It was a case of now or never, and the Kent, taking her punishment as it came, pushed the action for all she was worth.
With her foretop shot away down to the crows' nest, and her silk ensign cut to ribbons; with her wireless knocked out, so that she could no longer send, though she was still able to receive, messages; with half a dozen holes through her funnels and several more in her side—she gained a quarter of a mile with every salvo until she was pounding the Nürnberg at less than three miles distance. Struck in all thirty-six times, and with five men killed and eleven wounded, the behaviour of all on board was, in their captain's own words, "perfectly magnificent"—a typical example being that of Sergeant Mayes, whose courage and presence of mind probably saved the ship.
A bursting shell had started a fire among some cordite charges in the casemate. A tongue of flame had leaped down the hoist and into the ammunition passage, endangering the magazine. Without an instant's pause, and although severely burned, Sergeant Mayes picked up a cordite charge and threw it away, afterward flooding the compartment and putting out a fire that had started in some neighbouring empty shell bags. No wonder that Captain Allen, writing afterward to the Association of Men at Kent, should have said that "though the enemy fought bravely to the very end, against such men as I have the honour to command, they never could have had a chance."
By half-past six, the Nürnberg was on fire forward, all her guns being apparently silenced, and the Kent ceased shelling her, and drew up within two miles. Her flag was still flying, however, and the Kent opened fire again, but only for a few minutes longer, when the Nürnberg hauled her flag down and made signs of surrender. She was now blazing furiously, and listing heavily to starboard; and the Kent began to take measures to save life. Unfortunately all her boats had been holed by the Nürnberg's fire, and, before she could launch them, they had to be repaired. Two were quickly patched up, but the crews were only successful in saving a dozen men, five of whom afterward died on board from the effects of wounds and exposure.
To complete the victory of this single-ship action everyone on board had contributed his utmost, but it seems probable that in history the larger share of the credit will be given unstintingly to the engineers and stokers. It was certainly bestowed on them by their comrades in the Kent. "The captain," we are told, "nearly fell on the engineer-commander's neck and kissed him when he 'blew up' after the action to see him and to advise as to the best speed to go back to harbour. He nearly shouted at him for some time: 'My dear fellow, my dear engineer-commander! You won the action, you did it splendid! Without your speed we should have lost everything.'"
Meanwhile, at Port Stanley, now in wireless communication with all the rest of Admiral Sturdee's squadron, the silence of the Kent, owing to her broken wireless, had begun to give rise to some alarm. "Kent, Kent, Kent" rang the invisible call, but there was no reply, and it was feared that she had been lost. It was perhaps characteristic that, in spite of this, she was the first of them all to reach port the next day. Of von Spee's squadron only the Dresden remained, to be run to earth three months later. The Bristol and Macedonia, after capturing their crews, had sunk the Santa Isabel and the Baden; and the total British casualties in killed and wounded amounted to less than thirty.
"Our trawlers mined the fairway.
Our cruisers spread the bait,
We shelled the Briton's seaside towns
To lure him to his fate,
We set the trap twice over.
We left him with his dead—"
"But now we'll play another game,"
The British sailor said.
With the destruction of von Spee's squadron nothing of Germany's navy was left at large in the outer seas save one or two cruisers and armed merchantmen, whose days of freedom were already numbered. Of these the survivor of the Falkland Islands' Battle, the Dresden, was destroyed in the following March at Juan Fernandez; the Königsberg, bottled up in the Rufiji River in Africa, was finally disposed of a few months later; while the Kronprinz Wilhelm, the Prinz Eitel Friedrick, and the Karlsrühe met with various fates during the same summer. That in spite of the enormous calls upon the navy in the way of convoying transports they were joined by no others from their home waters is the best tribute to the efficiency of our floating cordon in the North Sea. And yet its very success in this respect was largely responsible, perhaps, for a somewhat distorted picture of the actual position—that of a sulky and immobilized German Fleet confronted with an impenetrable British barrier.
That would have been hardly true even of each side's surface ships; but it was as far as possible from the complete reality. For what had in fact begun with the outbreak of war—what had never ceased day or night—was a desperate and unceasing battle, none the less crucial because it was so often silent. Some hint of its real nature might have been gathered from the laconic Admiralty announcement, a day or two after war had been declared, that the German passenger steamer, Königin Luise, had been sunk, while mine-laying, by one of our destroyer patrols; and this vessel had been at work, fortunately with very little result, upon a subtle and long-prepared scheme of action. It is true that after she had been sunk, the cruiser Amphion—the leader of the Harwich Patrol that sank her—herself went down on one of the Königin Luise's mines; but the larger end aimed at remained unachieved.
This was no less than the mining in of Harwich, and was part of a deliberate and extensive plan, not only to cripple the northward progress of our larger squadrons to their war-stations, but to block the entrances of as many as possible of our chief naval bases. That some such policy would be attempted had, of course, long been foreseen. Germany's recalcitrant attitude at the Hague Conference toward the question of mine-laying had pointedly suggested this; and it was known that, prior to the outbreak of war, she had accumulated a store of at least ten thousand mines. To counter such measures steps had already been taken in the formation, a few years previously, of a trawler section of the Royal Naval Reserve, whose business it would be to keep the channels clear; while a group of old gun-boats had been assembled for the same purpose to act in conjunction with the Grand Fleet.
It had become instantly clear, however, that the original provision of eighty-two trawlers would be insufficient; and, by the end of August, this had been increased to 250—to be yet further and immensely added to as the busy months went by. Nothing in our naval record, indeed, was more dramatic or so signal an evidence of the national sense of admiralty than the gathering together of that vast auxiliary service of fishermen, pilots, and amateur yachtsmen, and the enormous responsibilities thrust into their hands to be so efficiently and light-heartedly carried. Time after time, by the resource of our fishermen, of sea-loving undergraduates, of amateurs of all sorts, what might have been disasters of the first magnitude were averted or overcome. Between the navy proper, with its thousands of other problems, and these new and insidious dangers—the laying of minefields by apparently innocent neutrals, the ever-present activities of enemy submarines—the courage, the cunning, the native sea-instinct of these otherwise untrained forces was the buffer. The fishermen of Galilee became fishers of men. The fishermen of Britain became fishers of mines. And the debt of human freedom to the latter is not immeasurably less, perhaps, than to their predecessors.
This was the true picture then of the North Sea—an area nearly three times the size of Great Britain—a Grand Fleet holding the exits and entrances against every possible sortie in force, but itself so threatened by submarines and minefields that at one time its war-stations were actually changed, and so nearly paralyzed that there were not a few hours when considerable units of it were practically embayed. Thus, definite minefields were laid by the enemy at Southwold, the mouth of the Tyne, and near Flamborough Head, and not only there but off the north of Ireland, where it was hoped to destroy or disorganize the Canadian transports. Nor were our most vital waters, such as those of the Firth of Forth, free from the repeated visits of those early submarines; and it is primarily as trapping expeditions, leading us into prepared minefields, and only secondarily as baby-killing bombardments, that such raids as those on Lowestoft, Gorleston, and Yarmouth must in reality be considered.
The first of these took place on November 3, 1914, the day following the Admiralty proclamation in which it had been announced that from November 5th the North Sea was to be considered a closed area. This had become necessary, as was then publicly indicated, owing to the persistent and indiscriminate sowing of mines; because peaceful merchant-ships had already been destroyed by these on the main trade-route between Liverpool and America; because these mines had been laid by vessels flying neutral flags; and because exceptional measures had in consequence now become imperative. For these reasons it was announced, therefore, that all vessels passing, from the fifth of November onward, a line drawn from the northernmost point of the Hebrides through the Faroe Islands to Iceland would do so at their own peril. Traders to and from Norway, the Baltic, Denmark, and Holland, were advised to use the English Channel and the Straits of Dover, and were then assured that they would receive full sailing directions, and, as far as Great Britain could secure it, a safe passage.
Meanwhile, in every dockyard, work was being pushed forward upon all sorts of naval construction, and each new problem, as it arose, was being considered and vigorously dealt with. To guarantee, however, in all circumstances and at any given moment, the integrity of our whole coast-line was plainly impossible, though every month saw its increase of patrols and personnel; and, on December 16th, the enemy again bombarded three of our seaside towns.
These were Hartlepool, Whitby, and Scarborough, casualties being inflicted in every case. It was a foggy winter morning when three hostile cruisers were sighted off Hartlepool about 8 o'clock; and, a quarter of an hour later, the bombardment began, lasting till ten minutes to nine. The enemy agents in this case seem to have been two battle-cruisers and one armoured cruiser; and, though Hartlepool itself was an open town, land batteries in the neighbourhood endeavoured to reply. Their fire was ineffective, however; several soldiers attached to the Durham Light Infantry and Royal Engineers were killed and wounded; the gasworks were set on fire; and the civilian casualties amounted to nearly a hundred. Almost at the same time, a battle-cruiser and armoured cruiser approached and shelled Scarborough, firing about sixty shots, while two battle-cruisers attacked Whitby, civilians in both towns being killed and wounded.
Owing to the objectives chosen, the conditions of the weather, the brevity of their visit, and their power and speed, the enemy squadrons made port intact again, though a patrol of destroyers very pluckily attacked them. In all nearly one hundred civilians were killed in these three towns, about five hundred being wounded; the military casualties amounted to thirty-four, and those on the three destroyers to twenty-eight. The German battle-cruisers, employed in this expedition were identified as the Derfflinger, Seydlitz, Moltke, von der Tann, and Blücher, the three latter, it was believed, having been also engaged in the previous raid upon the Norfolk coast.
Though, as we have said, it was quite impossible to give an absolute guarantee against such incidents as these, they were certainly not soothing to the feelings of the Grand Fleet and least of all to those of its cruiser squadrons. In spite of the elaborate justifications voiced in the German Press by such writers as Count Reventlow, they had outraged every canon not only of international law but of decent seaman-like feeling, and were an early indication of the horrible license that German sea-policy was prepared to allow itself. That had not yet staggered the world, as the sinking of the Lusitania was to stagger it, or such incredible atrocities as that to be associated with the Belgian Prince; but it had opened up a vista to every clean-hearted sailor sufficiently dark as to have changed the character of the war. It was now plain, for example, that such naval leaders as Admiral von Spee and the captain of the Emden were no longer to be regarded as typical of the directing minds of Germany's navy. How completely they were in the end to be disregarded was not yet manifest; but it was already clear that the old and peculiar amenities, the traditional chivalry of sea-warfare, were but poorly respected, even if they were understood, by this latest aspirant to sea-power. It was with a special satisfaction, therefore, that early on January 24, 1915, a strong patrolling fleet, under Sir David Beatty, received news of a powerful enemy squadron not far away to the south-south-east.
This consisted, as soon became clear, of the Derfflinger, Seydlitz, Moltke, and Blücher, with six light cruisers and a strong force of destroyers; and there was little doubt that they were once more en route for a bombardment of some part of our coast. With Admiral Beatty, who was flying his flag on the Lion, were the Princess Royal, the Tiger, the New Zealand, and Indomitable, all powerful vessels, the three former each carrying eight 13.5-inch guns, while the New Zealand and Indomitable carried the same number of 12-inch guns. In company with these, disposed on their port beam, were the light cruisers Southampton, Nottingham, Birmingham, and Lowestoft, and, scouting ahead—the two squadrons having met at sea—were Commodore Tyrwhitt in the Arethusa, commanding three flotillas of destroyers, and the two light cruisers Aurora and Undaunted.
It was Sunday morning; the day had broken clear at about a quarter to seven, and it was a few minutes after this hour that the Aurora, then travelling at twenty knots, sighted a two-masted, four-funnelled cruiser accompanied by some destroyers. Half concealed by her smoke, in the uncertain light, and at about four miles distance, the Aurora, for a few moments, had been unable to determine her nationality; and it was for these reasons that the enemy cruiser—afterward known to be the Kolberg—was the first to open fire. No appreciable damage was caused to the Aurora, however, who replied immediately and with such good effect that, five minutes later, the Kolberg changed course and retired upon the stronger enemy forces that had now become visible. The presence of these had at once been signalled to Admiral Beatty and his cruisers, and the whole squadron at once worked up to its full speed of 28-½ knots. When first sighted, the enemy vessels had been steering northwest, but they immediately changed their course to the southeast, the distance separating the two squadrons being then about fourteen miles, and their position, at half-past seven, being about thirty miles from the English coast.
From the outset it had been evident that the enemy did not mean to engage, and that, if he were to be brought to action, it would only be after a chase; and, although as a squadron we had the advantage in speed, our superiority was not very great. Nor was Admiral Beatty's problem in any other respect so simple as had been Sir Doveton Sturdee's. Not only had Admiral Beatty always to bear in mind that he might be being led into some recently laid minefield, but he knew that with every hour he would be nearly forty miles nearer to the heavily guarded waters on the other side. Moreover, he had at all times to be prepared for a torpedo-attack from the accompanying fleet of enemy destroyers, while it was practically certain that, before the action ended, he would find himself in the presence of hostile submarines. He was further at a disadvantage in that, though he was stronger in gun power, he was forced to rely upon bow fire only, and this while travelling at full speed. That meant that, for the greater part of the action, his leading battle-cruisers, the Lion, Tiger, and Princess Royal could only bring to bear four of their 13.5-inch guns, while the Seydlitz and Moltke, firing astern, could each use eight of their 11-inch guns, the Derfflinger four of her 12-inch guns, and the Blücher six of her 8.2's. It became a matter of margins, therefore—and not very extensive ones—both in speed and range, and of the British capacity to use these in the limited time before the German cruisers could reach their own waters.
Some idea of what this meant can best be gathered, perhaps, from the fact that, though travelling at thirty knots, it was almost an hour and a half—during which time more than fifty miles of sea had been covered—before the fourteen miles that separated the two squadrons had been reduced to ten. This was just before nine o'clock, the enemy being still on Admiral Beatty's port bow, his light cruisers ahead, followed by the Derfflinger, Moltke, Seydlitz, and Blücher in single line, with a large number of destroyers on their starboard beam. Leading in the Lion, Sir David Beatty was followed by the Tiger, the Princess Royal, and the New Zealand, the latter and the Indomitable—both slower vessels—having broken all records, thanks to their engine-room staffs.
Already a shot or two had been fired from the Lion's forward guns, taking the Blücher as her target, and, a few minutes after nine, she made her first hit on this cruiser, carrying away her bridge, according to the prisoners afterward taken. At this range, with her 13.5's tilted at an angle of some sixteen degrees and her big shells dropping steeply, the fire of the Lion seems, under the circumstances, to have been remarkably accurate. About ten minutes later, the Tiger came into range and took up the attack on the Blücher, the Lion transferring her attentions to the Seydlitz, the next ahead. Meanwhile the enemy had begun to respond but without inflicting any damage, and, a quarter of an hour later, the Princess Royal was able to join in the chorus, also taking the Blücher for her first target.
The Blücher, slower than her consorts, and already heavily damaged, was now dropping astern and came under the guns of the New Zealand, the Princess Royal transferring her fire to the Seydlitz with immediate and visible results. The enemy's destroyers were now throwing up dense columns of smoke to screen his wounded battle-cruisers; but, by a quarter to ten, not only the Blücher, but the Derfflinger and Seydlitz were on fire. Our own light cruisers and destroyer flotillas had fallen back to port a little so as not to obscure the range; and the position just before ten exhibited the Lion confining her attentions to the Derfflinger, the Tiger attacking the Derfflinger, and, when this was hidden from her by smoke, the doomed and swiftly-flagging Blücher, the Princess Royal shelling the Seydlitz, and the New Zealand engaging the Blücher—the Indomitable, in spite of her efforts, not having yet drawn within effective range.
The condition of the Blücher, as was afterward learned from prisoners, though it was to become worse, was already terrible enough. Early in the action her electric plant had been destroyed, and her men down below crept in darkness. Still too far to be raked, her decks were being excavated by half-ton shells dropping from the sky. In the narrow spaces below, apart from the shattering shell fragments, the enormous air-displacement wrought destruction and death. Iron plates were moulded by it as if they had been wax, and men tossed like apples and crushed to pulp against them. Later, as the range narrowed, the Blücher became more helpless, and, as she came under the full force of the British broadside fire, she staggered at each salvo, scarcely recovering before another hurled her again on her side.
But the main battle had now swept on; and the fact that the Blücher was left to her fate is the best indication, perhaps, of the injuries already sustained by her speedier and stronger consorts. It was not until a quarter to eleven, however, that the Blücher, then far astern, definitely turned north out of the line; and, before this had happened, the German light cruisers and destroyers had closed in from the starboard and were threatening a torpedo attack. The British light forces were accordingly ordered up to prevent this, the Lion and Tiger also opening upon the enemy destroyers. The attack never materialized, however; was possibly only a feint; and would in any case have been checkmated by the admirable handling of the M division of destroyers under Captain the Hon H. Meade, and particularly, perhaps, of the destroyer Meteor under Lieutenant Frederick Peters.
This destroyer, with the Lion and Tiger, was the only British vessel to suffer material damage; and her position at one time, in the full field of bombardment, was one that her crew are never likely to forget. This was soon after eleven, when the Lion, who had drawn more than her namesake's share of the German fire, had been struck by a chance shot that reduced her speed to ten knots an hour. The rest of the destroyers and light cruisers had by this time dropped astern again, the majority on the starboard or disengaged side, while others, on the port side, had turned northward after the Blücher. After the Lion had been hit, however, the Meteor was ordered up to cover her, thereby steaming under the salvos from both sides; and it is possible to glean an idea or two of what this meant from the account of it afterward written by one of her officers.
"We were absolutely in the line of fire," he said, "shells whistling over and all around us, and now and again an enemy's broadside aimed directly at us. Try and imagine a frail destroyer steaming thirty knots, with four battle-cruisers on either side belching forth flame and smoke continually, the screech of the projectiles flying overhead seeming to tear the very air into ribbons, 12-inch shells dropping perilously near, and raising columns of water a hundred feet into the air, a few yards away, the spray washing our decks and drenching all hands. Picture the awful crashing noise, the explosions and flashes, as shots took effect, the massive tongues of fire shooting up, and the dense clouds of yellow and black smoke which obliterated the whole ship from view as the shells burst on striking. And this, if you can imagine it, will give you some idea of the Meteor's position in a glorious action. Its terrible imposing grandeur made one forget personal danger. Of course, something had to happen. It was simply inevitable. About eleven o'clock, the Lion drew out of the line temporarily, the Princess Royal taking the lead, and it was not till then that the Indomitable opened fire and took her part in the engagement. We had already been hit a couple of times, but without doing any material damage, and half of us missed death by inches; but it seemed as if we possessed a charmed life; it is truly miraculous, nothing less, that we continued so long without being disabled; but Providence must have been with us that day. Just about this time, the Blücher was in a terrible state; one funnel gone, the other two like scrap-iron and tottering, both fore and main topmasts shot away, fore turret carried clean over the side, and only part of her mainmast and fore tripod mast left standing, and even these in a very shaky condition. So she fell out of the line—a raging furnace amidships, helpless, unable to steam; and her sister ships left her to her fate. The battering she had undergone was something incredible, and she was in her death agony now, so we began to close her, and found she was settling down, though still on an even keel. Now was our chance. We approached her, circling around, but even then she was not dead, for, at precisely 12.5 p.m., with the very last round she ever fired, she sent an 8.2-inch shell into us, which killed four men and wounded another. But what a sweet revenge was to come! Two minutes later, we discharged our torpedo. It hit her nearly amidships. There was a tremendously violent shock. She heeled completely over and sank in eight and a half minutes, hundreds of men clambering over her sides and standing there, just as if it were the upper deck, waiting for the final plunge."
Not to be outdone, and consistent with her reputation, the Arethusa was also in at the death, and had in her turn loosed a couple of torpedoes at the Blücher with terrific effect—one striking her aft and one forward, reaching her magazine and causing a violent explosion. It was the Arethusa, too, who subsequently embarked and brought home to port the majority of the Blücher's survivors, the rescuers and rescued being alike bombed from the air by a German aeroplane that had appeared on the scene.
Meanwhile the Lion, having pulled out of the line, not vitally injured, but unfit for further action, the Tiger, Princess Royal, and New Zealand had continued the chase of the flying enemy, the Indomitable having been detailed to attend to the Blücher. Round the wounded Lion, to protect her from submarine attack—submarines had already been sighted a few minutes before—had closed one of our light cruisers and six destroyers, and, at half-past eleven, Admiral Beatty called the destroyer Attack alongside, boarded her, and raced at full speed after his other three battle-cruisers.
So fast was the pace at which the action was being fought that not only were these out of sight, but the Blücher, now in her death throes, was also below the horizon. With her guns tilted, as she listed there to port, and the "Engage the enemy more closely" signal still flying from her mast, the Lion had been suddenly wiped off the slate, as it were, with what chagrin to those on board can be readily imagined. But for that unlucky shot, the Battle of the Dogger Bank might have been as complete a victory of its kind as that of the Falkland Islands, and it was only by a hair's breadth that the other three German battle-cruisers, lame and heavily damaged, contrived to reach harbour.
Headlong as he was travelling, it was not till noon that Sir David Beatty met his returning cruisers, and, twenty minutes later, having shifted his flag from the Attack to the Princess Royal, he heard from Captain Osmond de B. Brock of what had subsequently happened; that the Blücher had been sunk near Borkum Reef, a Zeppelin and aeroplane bombing the vessels rescuing survivors; and that the other cruisers had made their escape in an eastward direction. It was owing to the increasing danger from mines thrown out of the fleeing vessels, and the growing proximity of the German minefields, that the action had in the end been broken off; and whether it should, under those circumstances, have been pressed further must remain an open question. That quite apart, however, from its material advantages in the sinking of the Blücher and the disabling of her consorts, the victory of the Dogger Bank had important moral results there is not a shadow of doubt. It had once more re-affirmed the value of the battle-cruiser for which the navy was chiefly indebted to Lord Fisher, and it proved to be the grave of the big-scale raids upon our open east coast towns. More than all that, however, it was a triumphant example of an instantly seized opportunity; it demonstrated to the enemy that, in spite of his mines and submarines, we maintained our full tactical liberty; and it was further evidence that in Admiral Beatty we had found a naval leader of the highest class.
Those were the recognitions behind the "Well done, David" of the Princess Royal's coal-blackened stokers as the Admiral climbed in mid-sea from the little Attack into the famous cruiser; and they spoke again, on the following Tuesday morning, when the Lion limped up the Firth to her anchorage. Three miles away, in the Fifeshire valleys, ploughman and farmboy heard those welcoming syrens.
At the outbreak of war, Germany was represented in the Mediterranean by two vessels, the Goeben and Breslau, more likely, perhaps, to become historical than any two that she will ever build. Both were modern vessels, the Goeben, a first-class battle-cruiser, carrying ten 11-inch guns and capable of 28 knots, and the Breslau, a light cruiser of about the same speed and with twelve 4.1-inch guns. Outside the Adriatic, these were the only hostile men-of-war with which the Allies in the Mediterranean had to reckon; and, though full allowance must be made for the responsibilities entailed in preventing a sortie of the Austrian Navy, in convoying troops from Algeria to France, and in avoiding the least infringement of neutral waters, the escape of the Goeben and Breslau must still be regarded as a disaster to our arms.
On August 4th, before the declaration of war between Germany and Great Britain, but after France and Germany had already begun hostilities, the Goeben and Breslau had shelled Phillippeville and Bona, two Algerian ports belonging to France, and had returned to Messina in Sicily on August 5th. Here they obtained coal from vessels in the harbour, the Italian authorities refusing, under the laws of neutrality, to allow them facilities for coaling ashore, and, by the same rule, they had to leave territorial waters within twenty-four hours. Their movements and whereabouts had, of course, been known throughout to Admiral Sir Berkeley Milne in command of the British Mediterranean Fleet; and now, being free to attack them, he was awaiting their departure, together with a subsidiary squadron under Rear-Admiral E. C. T. Troubridge. The German admiral and his officers had no illusions as to the destiny that awaited them when they put to sea; made their wills; and steamed out of harbour on the evening of August 6th. Their design, it was believed, was to rush the Straits of Otranto and join up with the Austrian Fleet in the Adriatic. The paramount importance of not affording Italy the least pretext of complaint seems to have weighed heavily on the British admirals. The Goeben and Breslau, heading apparently for the Straits, suddenly changed course for the southeast; and, though the light cruiser Gloucester, which had kept in touch with them, immediately notified this and went gallantly in pursuit, the superior power and speed of the two German cruisers enabled them to fight her off and make good their escape.
They passed through the Dardanelles on August 10th, and, three days later, were said to have been bought by the Turkish Government, by whose officers and crews they were in future to be manned. Sir Berkeley Milne was recalled for an inquiry, the senior French officer, Admiral Boué de Lapeyrère, taking his place as Commander of the combined British and French forces, on August 30th; and, on September 20th, Rear-Admiral Troubridge also returned home. At his own request, he was court-martialled on November 5th, Admirals Sir Hedworth Meux and Sir George Callaghan conducting the inquiry, and, on November 12th, it was announced that he had been acquitted of all blame. Sir Berkeley Milne was also exonerated as the result of an Admiralty investigation.
So ended an episode in which, from the strictly naval standpoint, and though our leaders in the Mediterranean were held free from blame, it must be admitted that the honours rested with the German admiral and the perspicacity of his advisers in Berlin. Whether or no the arrival at Constantinople of the Goeben and Breslau was the determining factor in the Turkish Government's policy; how, if they had been sunk by us, that Government might have acted; and the effect on the situation that they had created of a prompter and more drastic action on our own part—these matters can never probably be accurately determined. On the other hand, it is clear that, both in material and moral effect, their presence was an enormous asset to German diplomacy; and that, indirectly at any rate, our campaign in Gallipoli, with all its consequences, derived from them. On September 27th, Turkey closed the Dardanelles; on October 31st, she declared war; and, three days later, on instructions from the Admiralty, but without reference to the War Council, certain units of the Mediterranean Fleet shelled the outer forts of the Dardanelles. In the light of after events, this was undoubtedly an error, but it was undertaken at the time with the purpose of ascertaining the effective range of the protecting Turkish guns.
Now to obtain a fair picture of the operations at Gallipoli that were afterward undertaken—operations in the first place wholly naval, but finally predominantly military—it is necessary to return for a moment to London and to study the general background against which they must be viewed. Here, after all, were the two or three brains upon which, as a whole, our strategy depended; and it is interesting to note how the mechanism through which they acted had become moulded and modified by the stress of war. For it must be remembered that, after those admirable dispositions, long considered and provided for by the Committee of Imperial Defence, had been undertaken—after not only the navy and army, but every affected department had gone, as it were, to its war-stations—an era followed that is best to be described as the era of improvisation.
No such war had been fought upon the earth's surface, and each succeeding day opened a new prospect. With every branch of both services discovering strange and imperative needs; with no section of our national life that was failing to experience some fresh dislocation—it was little wonder that, in the various higher executives, changes and experiments in change should have been found necessary. Many, perhaps most of these, were proved to be inadequate, and replaced by others as the war went on. Others were doomed from the first and should never have been embarked upon. It had been so arranged, for example, at the War Office, that most of the General Staff officers should take commands in the field; and, when Lord Kitchener became Secretary for War, the General Staff practically ceased to exist.
Accustomed to self-reliance, to centralization even in the minutest details, Lord Kitchener assumed powers so various and important, as it was impossible for any one man to wield; and, to some extent, though not to such an extreme, a similar process had set in at the Admiralty. Instead of the Board of Admiralty, consisting of the First Lord, the four Sea Lords, the two Civil Lords, the Parliamentary and Permanent Secretaries, there had come into being a War Staff Group, including the First Lord and the First Sea Lordd (but none of the other Sea Lords), the Chief of Staff, the Permanent Secretary, a Naval Secretary, and Sir Arthur Wilson—the latter, "Tug" Wilson, as he was called, although retired, being regarded as one of our greatest naval strategists. That was the composition in November, 1914, of the real directorate of the navy, Lord Fisher, who succeeded Prince Louis of Battenburg, on October 30th, being First Sea Lord.
As in the War Office and Admiralty, a similar kind of change had become observable in the Cabinet. Theoretically the direction of the war rested, of course, in the hands of this body, assisted in their deliberations by the Committee of Imperial Defense. Practically both the Cabinet and the Committee of Imperial Defense fell more and more into abeyance, the conduct of the war passing into the hands of a new and smaller body, known as the War Council. This consisted of the Prime Minister, then Mr. Asquith, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Lloyd George, the Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, the Secretary of State for India, the Marquis of Crewe, the Secretary for War, Lord Kitchener, and the First Lord of the Admiralty, Mr. Winston Churchill. Of these, however, the main responsibility rested upon Mr. Asquith, Mr. Churchill, and Lord Kitchener. This was in practice the triumvirate then conducting the war, as far as the British Empire was concerned, and each of the three was a man of strong and outstanding personality. In Mr. Asquith the country was being served by a statesman of very typical English qualities, imperturbable, perhaps a little slow-moving, magnanimous, shrewd, and of great intellectual capacity. In Mr. Churchill the Admiralty had at its head a man of brilliant and impulsive mentality, complete physical and moral fearlessness, and a somewhat headstrong initiative. In Lord Kitchener there had come to the War Office the foremost soldier of the Empire, the man who had been recalled by an irresistible popular appeal from the governorship of Egypt, in whose name the new armies, voluntarily recruited from every social rank, had outrun equipment, ammunition, even places to be lodged in—a man who already, in his sixty-fourth year, had become an almost legendary figure, the liberator of the Sudan, Roberts' successor in South Africa, the administrator of India and Egypt, omnivorous of work, relentless, silent, and the public's beau-ideal of personal efficiency.
But, while of these three, it was little wonder that, politics apart, Lord Kitchener predominated, another figure, scarcely less powerful, and hardly second as a national idol, stood, as it were, at the elbow of this inner triumvirate in the person of Lord Fisher. The maker of the modern navy, and, in an even more vital sphere, as authoritative an influence as Lord Kitchener, at the age of seventy he had returned to the Admiralty with an almost equal popular approval. He had not, however, as had Lord Kitchener, an actual place in the War Council; and he was not, of course, present at many of its meetings.
This was the position at home, then, when, at a gathering of the War Council, held on November 25th, it was suggested by Mr. Churchill that the best way to defend Egypt was to attack some part of Turkey's Asiatic coast, and that an occupation of the Gallipoli Peninsula would give us the control of the Dardanelles and put Constantinople at our mercy—the idea in Mr. Churchill's mind being evidently that of a combined naval and military movement on a big scale. That some such attack on the Turkish lines of communication might eventually become desirable Lord Kitchener agreed. He did not consider, however, that the time had arrived for it; and when, a few days later, Mr. Churchill suggested to the War Office the advisability of collecting enough transport for 40,000 men—such transport to be assembled in Egypt—Lord Kitchener again replied that he did not think this was yet necessary, and that he would give the Admiralty full notice. The precaution was taken, however, in spite of this, to send horse-boats to Egypt whenever convenient, in view of the possible occasion of some such expedition as had already now become adumbrated.
Meanwhile the navy was playing its part in various operations already necessitated by the war with Turkey. Thus, on November 2nd, the Minerva, a sixteen-year-old protected cruiser, had shelled the forts and barracks of Akaba in the Red Sea; and, on November 8th, the town of Fao, at the head of the Persian Gulf, had been bombarded to cover the landing of troops from India, whence they captured Basra on November 21st. Simultaneously, of course, between Russia and Turkey, the struggle for the mastery of the Black Sea had been progressing. On November 10th, the Russians had sunk four Turkish transports; and, on November 18th, the Goeben, had been materially damaged in an engagement off Sebastopol. Two days later, the Turkish Hamidieh had bombarded Tuapse. On December 10th, the Goeben having been repaired, with the Berk-i-Satvet, shelled Batum; and, on December 12th, the Hamidieh was damaged by a mine in the Bosphorus. The first notable Turkish loss, however, was in the torpedoing of the battleship Messudiyeh in the Dardanelles, on December 13th, by the British submarine B11, under circumstances that will be referred to later. On December 17th, the Russian cruiser Askold sank a couple of Turkish steamers off Beyrout, and, on December 26th, the Goeben was again damaged, this time, like the Hamidieh, by a mine in the Bosphorus. Later, having been once more repaired, she was again to figure in desultory raiding actions on Black Sea ports; but, by the end of the year, it may be said that the Russian Navy was practically in unchallenged command of the Black Sea.
Russia's position in the land campaign against Turkey was not, however, quite so satisfactory, and it was on January 2nd that there was received in London a telegram from Sir George Buchanan, our ambassador in Petrograd, destined to have a profound effect upon our Near East policy. In this it was stated that the Russian armies were being rather severely pressed in the Caucasus, and that the Russian Government hoped it might be found possible for a demonstration to be made against Turkey elsewhere. On this same day, Lord Kitchener wrote to Mr. Churchill that he did not think we could do anything that would seriously help the Russians in the Caucasus; that we had no troops to land anywhere; that the only place where a demonstration might check the sending eastward of Turkey's reinforcements was the Dardanelles; but that we should not be ready for anything big for some months. A telegram was, however, sent to Russia the next day that some demonstration would be made, although it was unlikely, it was feared, that it would have any great effect in withdrawing enemy troops from the Caucasus. To an ally in a strait that was the only reply possible. But to the British Government it meant this—that by January 3d it had definitely pledged itself to make a demonstration against the Turks, and that the Dardanelles had again been mentioned as a possible arena of attack.
Let us consider for a moment, from the geographical standpoint, the sort of problem that was presented. A little under fifty miles in length, the channel of the Dardanelles—the Hellespont of the ancients—united the Sea of Marmora on the east with the Ægean Sea and Mediterranean on the west. Its general course was from northeast to southwest, but, at the point known as the Narrows, about fourteen miles from the Ægean entrance, there was a kink in it, lying north and south, a little over four miles long. In no part of its course between the Ægean Sea and the town of Gallipoli, where it began to broaden, was it more than 7,000 yards wide, and at the Narrows it was little more than three-quarters of a mile across. Its depth in mid-channel varied from 25 to 55 fathoms, and down it set a current from the Sea of Marmora of an average speed of 1-½ knots, frequently increasing, and especially in the Narrows, after a northerly wind, to as much as 5 knots. In addition to this, cross-currents were continually met with, owing to the shallow bays on each side of the channel.
The boundaries of this channel were, on the north side, the Peninsula of Gallipoli which separated it from the Gulf of Saros, and, on the southern, the coast of Asia Minor, upon the westernmost portion of which had stood the old town of Troy. The Peninsula of Gallipoli was a narrow tongue of land, not more than three miles wide where it sprouted from the mainland, swelling to twelve just above the Narrows, but only five miles across at the Narrows themselves. It was almost wholly arid or brush-covered, with a central and irregular spine of hills, rising, in the plateau of Kilid Bahr and the heights of Krithia and Achi Baba, to 970, 700, and 600 feet respectively, and, except for a few small beaches and descending stream-beds, facing both north and south in low, precipitous cliffs.
The southern or Asiatic shores of the Dardanelles were somewhat lower and more broken, the hills inland rising to 3,000 feet, many of them being plentifully wooded. Of these the most famous was Kag Dagh, the Mount Ida of the Gods, whence, in the Homeric poems, they had looked down upon the twenty years' siege of Troy. Every yard of these shores, indeed, as of the waters between them, was instinct with real or legendary history. Across the Dardanelles, Leander had swum to Hero. Over the Narrows, Xerxes had built his bridge of boats. By the same road, a hundred and fifty years later, Alexander of Macedon had marched to the conquest of Asia; and it had been across the Narrows, in the middle of the fourteenth century, that the Turks from Asia had swarmed into Europe. Constantinople and all but a few miles around it had soon been encircled by their advance, and had been finally occupied by Sultan Mohamed II about a hundred years afterward.
That had been in 1453, and, nine years later, recognizing the vital importance of the Dardanelles, Mohamed II had built the first two forts of the many that were afterward designed to protect them. These were the Old Castles, the Castles of Europe and Asia, on either side of the Narrows; and it had not been till two hundred years later that the two New Castles had been built lower down, at the Ægean entrance. From that time onward, till 1864, the fortifications of the Dardanelles may be said to have remained mediæval; but, upon the advice of Great Britain, then Turkey's protector, new works had been undertaken, and, after the Peace of San Stefano in 1878, there had been a further strengthening of both coasts, the later fortifications having been German and the artillery provided by Krupps.
Since that date, the Dardanelles had never been forced against armed resistance, and only once before, in modern times, when the British admiral Duckworth in 1807 had made a plucky but not very long-lived demonstration before Constantinople—having had to retire, not without damage, owing to the precarious nature of his communications.
Such was the geographical aspect of the problem that the Admiralty was called upon to consider; and the fortifications protecting the Straits were arranged somewhat as follows. Commanding the entrance, on the European side, were forts at Cape Helles and Sedd-el-Bahr with two others on the Asiatic side, Fort Orkanieh and Kum Kale. These contained, between them, ten 10.2-inch guns, four 9.2-inch, and two 6-inch guns. A few miles higher up, about four below the Narrows, and just south of Point Kephez on the Asiatic coast, was Fort Dardanos, mounting five 6-inch guns in rectangular turrets, at a height of about 350 feet. Opposite this, on the European side, was Fort Soghandere. The mouth of the Narrows themselves was very strongly guarded both at Chanak in Asia and Kilid Bahr on the Peninsula; and a fleet approaching the Narrows would find itself confronted—apart from an unknown number of field-guns and howitzers—with ten 14-inch, eighteen 10.2-inch, eight 9.2-inch, and thirty-seven 6-inch guns, as well as twenty-one 8.3-inch howitzers. When it is remembered that, in addition, there were the channel minefields and land torpedo-stations to be reckoned with, and an area of manoeuvre less than four miles at the widest, it will be seen that the prospect, on paper at any rate, was a sufficiently formidable one from every standpoint. Could it reasonably be faced by the navy alone? Was an accompanying army absolutely essential? And, if so, of what numbers must the latter consist to ensure success?
These were the questions that now inevitably arose; and if, from a technical standpoint, the first could be answered satisfactorily, there would be many obvious advantages in the purely naval attack. If the navy, that was to say, could force itself unaided into the Sea of Marmora and shell Constantinople, troops that would be very valuable elsewhere need not be diverted to a new theatre of war; a great deal of tonnage would be saved at a time when the pressure on our mercantile marine was everywhere immense, while, if it were unsuccessful, such an attack could be abandoned, it was thought, without much damage to our prestige.
It was quite clear, of course, that, unless the Straits could be secured behind it, the Fleet would not remain there for very long. But, from evidence at the Government's disposal, it was believed that its arrival would have immediate and far-reaching results—that a revolution in Constantinople against the pro-German Young Turk Party would almost certainly ensue; and that Bulgaria, then neutral and undecided, might definitely ally herself with the Entente Powers. Further, the opening of the Dardanelles would at once facilitate the admission into Russia of much-needed munitions, and would release, for the benefit of the world at large, considerable supplies of cereals.
Moreover, there was another factor that forbade the question being summarily dismissed as technically impossible. For, while it was true that hitherto the bulk of naval opinion had been adverse to the use of ships in a duel with forts, and while the results of purely naval action against such defenses as those, for example, as Port Arthur, had not been encouraging, it was realized that in the present war—as regarded the land, at any rate—the value of fortresses had fallen very considerably. Hammered by modern artillery, the world had seen such strongholds as those of Liège, Namur, and Antwerp, crumbling to pieces in a few hours, and theories were once more in the melting-pot. Since the outbreak of war, too, there had been added to the navy, in the 15-inch guns of the Queen Elizabeth, the most powerful marine artillery that the world had yet seen. Could the navy then tackle the problem alone?
With all this in his mind, on January 3d, the day that we had pledged ourselves to do our best, Mr. Churchill telegraphed to Vice-Admiral Carden, then our senior officer in the Mediterranean, asking him if he thought it practicable to force the Dardanelles by the use of ships alone, assuming that only our older battleships would be employed, with a suitable escort of mine-sweepers and bumpers, and suggesting that the importance of a successful result would justify severe loss. Two days later, Vice-Admiral Carden replied that he did not think the Dardanelles could be rushed, but that they might be forced by extended operations with a large number of ships. On January 6th, Mr. Churchill invited Admiral Carden to forward detailed particulars as to the force required, the manner of its employment, and the results to be expected from it. Five days afterward, Admiral Carden replied that five operations were possible, namely, the destruction of the defenses at the entrance to the Dardanelles; action inside the Straits so as to clear the defenses up to and including Point Kephez Battery; the destruction of the defenses of the Narrows; the sweeping of a clear channel through the minefields and advance through the Narrows, followed by a reduction of the forts farther up, and an entrance into the Sea of Marmora. What Admiral Carden suggested, in fact, was a methodical invasion with a systematic demolition of the fortifications—an operation estimated to require at least a month for its performance.
This was Admiral Carden's plan, and it was of course discussed by the Admiralty War Group, though never officially by the Board of Admiralty; and it is interesting to discover the general attitude of its naval members toward the scheme. Of these by far the most influential was Lord Fisher, who seems from the first instinctively to have distrusted it, to have been occupied with preparing for other operations elsewhere, and to have left it, so long as it seemed to him likely to remain subsidiary and additional to these, in the admittedly capable hands of Admiral Sir Henry Jackson—not a regular member of the War Group, but frequently consulted—and the then Chief of the Staff, Admiral Henry Oliver. Sir Arthur Wilson seems on the whole to have taken up much the same attitude as that of Lord Fisher. Admiral Oliver believed in its possibilities, though these would largely depend, of course, upon factors, whose importance could only be determined by experiment. At the same time, he would apparently have preferred to wait until the army could coöperate on a big scale. Commodore Bartolomé, while agreeing in the preferability of a combined naval and military operation, believed that, at a push, in a purely naval attack, about half the forces could get through, though what they would do then was a matter upon which he felt himself in the dark. None of these sailors believed, since it could always be broken off, that the proposed naval attack could lead to disaster. All assumed the necessity, as seen by the War Council, from a political point of view, of immediate action; and all assumed it to be the case, on the authority of Lord Kitchener, that no troops were at the moment available.
Thus we come to the 13th of January, the very critical date when, at a meeting of the War Council, Mr. Churchill, with additional details, submitted Admiral Carden's plans. The outer forts having been destroyed, as could be done, it was believed, without the bombarding ships coming into range of their guns, the inner would be attacked both from the Straits and by indirect fire across the Gallipoli Peninsula. Three modern vessels and about a dozen old battleships would, it was thought, suffice for the operation; and these could be spared without sensibly depleting our naval strength elsewhere. Further, the Queen Elizabeth, now ready for her trials and about to carry these out at Gibraltar, could instead fledge her virgin guns upon the forts of the Dardanelles.
Such was the proposition laid before the War Council, and it was quite clear, of course, to every member of it that, with a minimum of effort, it opened a vista of very dazzling political possibilities. It was also obvious that Mr. Churchill himself believed whole-heartedly that the attempt should be made. What was the attitude of his colleagues on this most important occasion? Now, while in the end it was Mr. Asquith who would have to be responsible for any decision, it was undoubtedly Lord Kitchener, in such a matter as this, whose opinion would carry the greatest weight; but Lord Fisher and Sir Arthur Wilson were also present, though not as executive members. Lord Kitchener, after consideration, pronounced himself in favour of the plan, pointing out that, if it were to prove unsuccessful, the attack could be discontinued. Lord Fisher and Sir Arthur Wilson remained silent, and their silence was accepted as giving technical consent. Nor would it have been true to have interpreted it otherwise, although the minds of both of them were occupied with other plans. It was therefore decided to instruct the Admiralty to prepare for a naval expedition in February to bombard and take the Gallipoli Peninsula with Constantinople as its objective—a decision that was unhappily variously understood by the different members of the Council, the majority being under the impression that all they had done was to sanction the tentative preliminaries of a promising line of action.