CHAPTER VII
IN THE SOUTH SEAS: THE DISASTER OFF CORONEL
Sunset and evening star
* * * *
And after that the dark.
During the years 1912 and 1913 the Captain of the British cruiser Monmouth, the senior English Naval Officer on the China Station, and Admiral Count von Spee, commanding the German Far-Eastern Squadron, were close and intimate friends.
The intimacy of the chiefs extended to the officers and men of the two squadrons. The English and Germans discussed with one another the chances of war between their nations, and wished one another the best of luck when the scrap came. The German Squadron, which has since been destroyed, was like no other in the Kaiser’s Navy. It was commanded by professional officers and manned by long-service ratings. It had taken for its model the English Navy, and it had absorbed much of the English naval spirit. Count von Spee, though a Prussian Junker, was a gentleman, and with Captain von Müller, who afterwards made the name of the Emden immortal, was worthy to serve under the White Ensign. Let us always be just to those of our foes who, though they fight with us terribly, yet remain our chivalrous friends. I will tell a pretty story which will illustrate the spirit of comradeship which existed between the English and German squadrons during those two years before the war.
In December 1912 the Monmouth was cruising in the Gulf of Pechili, which resembles a long flask with a narrow bottle neck. Admiral von Spee, who was lying with his powerful squadron off Chifu, in the neck of the bottle, received word from a correspondent that the second Balkan War had brought England and Germany within a short distance of “Der Tag.” Von Spee and his officers did not clink glasses to “The Day”; they were professionals who knew the English Navy and its incomparable power; they left silly boastings to civilians and to their colleagues of Kiel who had not eaten of English salt. Count von Spee thought first of his English friend who, in his elderly cruiser, was away up in the Gulf at the mercy of the German Squadron, which was as a cork in its neck. He at once dispatched a destroyer to find the Monmouth’s captain and to warn him that though there might be nothing in the news it were better for him to get clear of the Gulf. “There may be nothing in the yarn,” he wrote, “I have had many scares before. But it would be well if you got out of the Gulf. I should be most sorry to have to sink you.” When the destroyer came up with the Monmouth she had returned to Wei-hai-wei, and the message was delivered. Her skipper laughed, and sent an answer somewhat as follows: “My dear von Spee, thank you very much. I am here. J’y suis, J’y reste. I shall expect you and your guns at breakfast to-morrow morning.” War did not come then; when von Spee did meet and sink the Monmouth she had another captain in command, but the story remains as evidence of the chivalrous naval spirit of the gallant and skilful von Spee.
In November 1913 the Monmouth left the China Station, and before she went, upon November 6th, her crew were entertained sumptuously by von Spee and von Müller. She was paid off in January 1914, after reaching home, but was recommissioned in the following July for the test mobilisation, which at the moment meant so much, and which a few weeks later was to mean so much more. When the war broke out, the Monmouth, with her new officers and men, half of whom were naval reservists, was sent back to the Pacific. The armoured cruiser Good Hope, also commissioned in July, was sent with her, and the old battleship Canopus was despatched a little later. Details of the movements of these and of other of our warships in the South Atlantic and Pacific are given in the chapters entitled “The Cruise of the Glasgow.” The Glasgow had been in the South Atlantic at the outbreak of war, and was joined there by the Good Hope and Monmouth.
Meanwhile war had broken out, and we will for a few moments consider what resulted. The Emden, Captain von Müller, was at the German base of Tsing-tau, but Admiral von Spee, with the armoured cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, was among the German Caroline Islands far to the south of the China Sea. The Dresden was in the West Indies and the Leipzig and Nürnberg on the West Coast of Mexico (the Pacific side). The Japanese Fleet undertook to keep von Spee out of China waters to the north, and the Australian Unit—which then was at full strength and included the battle cruiser Australia with her eight 12-inch guns and the light cruisers Melbourne and Sydney, each armed with eight sixes—made themselves responsible for the Australian end of the big sea area. The Emden, disguised as an English cruiser, with four funnels—the dummy one made of canvas—got out of Tsing-tau under the noses of the Japanese watchers, made off towards the Indian Ocean, and pursued that lively and solitary career which came to its appointed end at the Cocos-Keeling Islands, as will be described fully later on in this book. The Australian Unit, burning with zeal to fire its maiden guns at a substantial enemy, sought diligently for von Spee and requisitioned the assistance of the French armoured cruiser Montcalm, an old slow and not very useful vessel which happened to be available for the hunt. Von Spee was discovered in his island retreat and pursued as far as Fiji, but the long arm of the English Admiralty then interposed and upset the merry game. We were short of battle cruisers where we wanted them most—in the North Sea—so the Australia was summoned home and the remaining ships of the Unit, no longer by themselves a match for von Spee, were ordered back to Sydney in deep disgust. “A little more,” declared the bold Australians, who under their English professional officers had been hammered into a real Naval Unit, “and we would have done the work which the Invincible and Inflexible had to do later. If we had been left alone there would not have been any disaster off Coronel.” While one can sympathise with complaints such as this from eager fire-eaters, one has to accept their assertions with due caution. The German High Seas Fleet was at that time a more important objective than even von Spee. So the Australia sailed for England to join up with the Grand Fleet, and von Spee had rest for several weeks. He was not very enterprising. Commerce hunting did not much appeal to him, though his light cruisers, the Dresden and Leipzig, did some little work in that line when on their way to join their Chief at Easter Island where the squadron ultimately concentrated. On the way across, von Spee visited Samoa, from which we had torn down the German flag, but did no damage there. On September 22nd, he bombarded Tahiti, in the Society Islands, a foolish proceeding of which he repented later on when the Coronel action left him short of shell with no means of replenishment. For eight days he stayed in the Marquesas Islands taking in provisions, thence he went to Easter Island and Masafuera, and so to Valparaiso, where the Chilean Government, though neutral, was not unbenevolent. He was for three weeks at Easter Island (Chilean territory), coaling from German ships there, and in this remote spot—a sort of Chilean St. Kilda—remained hidden both from the Chilean authorities and from our South Atlantic Squadron.
We must now return to the British Squadron which had been sent out to deal with von Spee as best it might. Cradock with such a squadron, all, except the light cruiser Glasgow, old and slow, had no means of bringing von Spee to action under conditions favourable to himself, or of refusing action when conditions were adverse. Von Spee, with his concentrated homogeneous squadron, all comparatively new and well-armed cruisers, all of about the same speed of twenty-one or twenty-two knots, all trained to a hair by constant work during a three years’ commission, had under his hand an engine of war perfect of its kind. He could be sure of getting the utmost out of co-operative efforts. The most powerful in guns of the English vessels was the battleship Canopus, which, when the action off Coronel was fought, was 200 miles away to the south. She bore four 12-inch guns in barbettes—in addition to twelve sixes—but she was fourteen years old and could not raise more than about thirteen to fourteen knots except for an occasional burst. Any one of von Spee’s ships, with 50 per cent. more speed, could have made rings round her. Had Cradock waited for the Canopus,—as he was implored to do by her captain, Grant,—and set the speed of his squadron by hers, von Spee could have fought him or evaded him exactly as he pleased. “If the English had kept their forces together,” wrote von Spee after Coronel, “then we should certainly have got the worst of it.” This was the modest judgment of a brave man, but it is scarcely true. If the English had kept their forces together von Spee need never have fought; they would have had not the smallest chance of getting near him except by his own wish. Admiral Cradock flew his flag in the armoured cruiser Good Hope, which, though of 14,000 tons and 520 feet long, had only two guns of bigger calibre than 6-inch. These were of 9.2 inches, throwing a shell of 380 lb., but the guns, like the ship, were twelve years old. Her speed was about seventeen knots, four or five knots less than that of the German cruisers she had come to chase! The Monmouth, of the “County Class,” was as obsolete as the Good Hope. Eleven years old, of nearly 10,000 tons, she carried nothing better than fourteen 6-inch guns of bygone pattern. She may have been good for a knot or two more than the Good Hope, but her cruising and fighting speed was, of course, that of the flagship.
The one effective ship of the whole squadron was the Glasgow, which curiously enough is the sole survivor now of the Coronel action, either German or English. Out of the eight warships which fought there off the Chilean coast on November 1st, 1914, five German and three English, the Glasgow alone remains afloat. She is a modern light cruiser, first commissioned in 1911. The Glasgow is light, long and lean. She showed that she could steam fully twenty-five knots and could fight her two 6-inch and ten 4-inch guns most effectively. She was a match for any one of von Spee’s light cruisers, though unable to stand up to the Scharnhorst or Gneisenau. The modern English navy has been built under the modern doctrine of speed and gun-power—the Good Hope, Monmouth, and Canopus, the products of a bad, stupid era in naval shipbuilding, had neither speed nor gun-power. The result, the inevitable result, was the disaster of Coronel in which the English ships were completely defeated and the Germans barely scratched. The Germans had learned the lesson which we ourselves had taught them.
When one considers the two squadrons which met and fought off Coronel, in the light of experience cast by war, one feels no surprise that the action was over in fifty-two minutes. Cradock and his men, 1,600 of them, fought and died.
Sunset and evening star
* * * * *
And after that the dark.
The Glasgow would also have been lost had she not been a new ship with speed and commanded by a man with the moral courage to use it in order to preserve his vessel and her crew for the further service of their country. Von Spee, who had the mastery of manœuvre, brought Cradock to action when and how he pleased, and emphasised for the hundredth time in naval warfare that speed and striking power and squadron training will win victory certainly, inevitably, and almost without hurt to the victors. Like the Falkland Islands action of five weeks afterwards, that off Coronel was a gun action. No torpedoes were used on either side. Probably it was one of the last purely gun actions which will be fought in our time.
At the end of October the British and German squadrons were near to one another, though until they actually met off Coronel the British commanders did not know that the concentrated German Squadron was off the Chilean coast. Von Spee knew that an old pre-Dreadnought battleship had come out from England, though he was not sure of her class. He judged her speed to be higher than that of the Canopus, which, though powerfully armed, was so lame a duck that she would have been more of a hindrance than a help had Cradock joined up with her. Von Spee had an immense advantage in the greater handiness and cohesiveness of his ships. The Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were sisters, completed in 1907, and alike in all respects. Their shooting records were first-class; they were indeed the crack gunnery ships under the German ensign. Their sixteen 8.2-inch guns—eight each—fired shells of 275 lb. weight, nearly three times the weight of the 100-lb. shells fired from the 6-inch guns which formed the chief batteries of their opponents the Good Hope and Monmouth. They were three months out of dock but they could still steam, as they showed at Coronel, at over twenty knots in a heavy sea. The light cruisers Dresden, Leipzig and Nürnberg were not identical though very nearly alike. Their armament was the same—ten 4.1-inch guns apiece—and their speed nearly the same. The Dresden was the fastest as she was the newest, a sister of the famous Emden. None of the German light cruisers was so fast or so powerful as the Glasgow, but together they were much more than a match for her, just as the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau together were more than a match for the Good Hope and Monmouth. When, therefore, von Spee found himself opposed to the British armoured cruisers he was under no anxiety; he had the heels of them and the guns of them; they could neither fight successfully with him nor escape from him. The speedy Glasgow might escape—as in fact she did—but the Good Hope and the Monmouth were doomed from the moment when the action was joined.
I have dwelt upon the characteristics of the rival squadrons at the risk of being wearisome since an understanding of their qualities is essential to an understanding of the action.
On October 31st, the Glasgow put into Coronel, a small coaling port near Concepcion and to the south of Valparaiso, which had become von Spee’s unofficial base. He did not remain in territorial waters for more than twenty-four hours at a time, but he got what he liked from German ships in the harbour. The Glasgow kept in wireless touch with the Good Hope and Monmouth, which were some fifty miles out at sea to the west, and von Spee picked up enough from the English wireless to know that one of our cruisers was at Coronel. At once he despatched the Nürnberg to shadow the Glasgow, to stroll as it were unostentatiously past the little harbour, while he with the rest of the squadron stayed out of sight to the north. In the morning of November 1st out came the Glasgow and made for the rendezvous where she was to join the other cruisers and the Otranto, an armed liner by which they were accompanied. The wireless signals passing between the watching Nürnberg and von Spee were in their turn picked up by the Good Hope, so that each squadron then knew that an enemy was not far off. Cradock, an English seaman of the fighting type, determined to seek out the Germans, though he must have suspected their superiority of force. Neither side actually knew the strength of the other. Cradock spread out his vessels fan-wise in the early afternoon and ordered them to steam in this fashion at fifteen knots to the north-east.
THE SOUTH SEAS.
At twenty minutes past four the nearest ships on either side began to sight one another, and until they did so Cradock had no knowledge that he had knocked up against the whole of the German Pacific Squadron. The German concentration had been effected secretly and most successfully. When the Scharnhorst, von Spee’s flagship, first saw the Glasgow and Monmouth they were far off to the west-south-west and had to wait for more than half an hour until the Good Hope, which was still farther out to the west, could join hands with them. Meanwhile the German ships, which were also spread out, had concentrated on the Scharnhorst. They were the Gneisenau, Dresden, and Leipzig, for the Nürnberg had not returned from her watching duties. Cradock, who saw at once that the Germans were getting between his ships and the Chilean coast, and that he would be at a grave disadvantage by being silhouetted against the western sky, tried to work in towards the land. But von Spee, grasping his enemy’s purpose, set the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau going at twenty knots due south against a heavy sea and forced himself between Cradock and the coast. When the two light cruisers drew up, the four German ships fell into line parallel with the English cruisers and between them and the land. All these preliminary manœuvres were put through while the two squadrons were still twelve miles apart, and they determined the issue of the subsequent action. For von Spee, having thrust the English against the background of the declining sun and being able, with his greater speed, to hold them in this position and to decide absolutely the moment when the firing should begin, had effectively won the action before a shot had been fired. So long as the sun was above the horizon the German ships were lighted up and would have made admirable marks could Cradock have got within range. But von Spee had no intention of letting him get within range until the sun had actually set and had ceased to give light to Cradock’s gunners. His own men for an hour afterwards could see the English ships standing out as clearly as black paper outlines stuck upon a yellow canvas screen. “I had manœuvred,” wrote von Spee to a friend, on the day following the action, “so that the sun in the west could not disturb me. . . . When we were about five miles off I ordered the firing to commence. The battle had begun, and with a few changes, of course, I led the line quite calmly.” He might well be calm. The greater speed of his squadron had enabled him to outmanœuvre the English ships, and to wait until the sunset gave him a perfect mark and the English no mark at all. He might well be calm. Darkness everywhere, except in the western sky behind Cradock’s ships, came down very quickly, the nearly full moon was not yet up, the night was fine except for scuds of rain at intervals. Between seven and eight o’clock—between sunset and moonrise—von Spee had a full hour in which to do his work, and he made the fullest use of the time. At three minutes past seven he began to fire, when the range was between five and six miles, and he hit the Good Hope at the second salvo. His consort the Gneisenau did the same with the Monmouth. It was fine shooting, but not extraordinary, for the German cruisers were crack ships and the marks were perfect. At the third salvo both the Good Hope and Monmouth burst into flames forrard, and remained on fire, for German shell rained on them continually. They could rarely see to reply and never replied effectively. The Good Hope’s lower deck guns were smothered by the sea and were, for all practical purposes, out of action. Yet they fought as best they could. Von Spee slowly closed in and the torrent of heavy shell became more and more bitter. We have no record of the action from the Good Hope and Monmouth, for not a man was saved from either ship. The Glasgow, which, after the Otranto had properly made off early in the action—she was not built for hot naval work—had both the Dresden and the Leipzig to look after, could tell only of her own experiences. Captain Luce in quiet sea service fashion has brought home to us what they were. “Though it was most trying to receive a great volume of fire without a chance of returning it adequately, all kept perfectly cool, there was no wild firing, and discipline was the same as at battle practice. When a target ceased to be visible gun-layers simultaneously ceased fire.” Yet the crews of active ratings and reservists struggled gamely to the end. It came swiftly and mercifully.
We have detailed accounts of the action from the German side, of which the best was written by von Spee himself on the following day. There is nothing of boasting or vainglory about his simple story: though the man was German he seems to have been white all through. I have heard much of him from those who knew him intimately, and willingly accept his narrative as a plain statement of fact. Given the conditions, the speed and powers of the opposing squadrons, the skilful preliminary manœuvres of von Spee before a shot was fired, and the veil of darkness which hid the German ships from the luckless English gunners, the result, as von Spee reveals it, was inevitable. He held his fire until after sunset, and then closing in to about 10,000 yards—a little over five miles—gave the order to begin. He himself led the line in the Scharnhorst and engaged the Good Hope, the Gneisenau following him took the Monmouth as her opposite number. The Leipzig engaged the Glasgow, and the Dresden the Otranto. The shell from the 8.2-inch batteries of the German armoured cruisers—each could use six guns on a broadside—got home at the second salvo and the range was kept without apparent difficulty. The fires which almost immediately broke out in the Good Hope and Monmouth gave much aid to the German gunners, who, when the quick darkness of the southern night came down, were spared the use of their searchlights. “As the two big enemy ships were in flames,” writes one careful German observer, “we were able to economise our searchlights.” Then, closing in to about 5,000 yards, von Spee poured in a terrific fire so rapid and sustained that he shot away nearly half his ammunition. After fifty-two minutes from the firing of the first shell the Good Hope blew up. “She looked,” wrote von Spee, “like a splendid firework display against a dark sky. The glowing white flames, mingled with bright green stars, shot up to a great height.” Cradock’s flagship then sank, though von Spee thought for long afterwards that she was still afloat. The Otranto had made her escape, but the Monmouth, which could not get away, and the Glasgow—which at any moment could have shown the enemy her heels—still continued the unequal fight. The night had become quite dark, the flames in the Monmouth had burned out or been extinguished, and the Germans had lost sight of their prey. The Scharnhorst and Gneisenau worked round to the south, and the Leipzig and Dresden were sent curving to the north and west, in order to keep the English ships away from the shelter of the land. Just then the light cruiser Nürnberg, which had been sent upon the scouting expedition of which I have told, arrived upon the scene of action and encountered the crippled Monmouth. Had the English cruiser been undamaged, she could soon have disposed of this new combatant, but she was listing heavily and unable to use her guns. Running up close the Nürnberg poured in a broadside which sent the Monmouth to the bottom. The Glasgow, badly damaged above water, but still full of speed and mettle, could do no more. The big German cruisers were coming up. Her captain took the only possible course. Shortly before the stricken Monmouth disappeared under the waves he made off at full speed.
No one was picked up, either from the Good Hope or the Monmouth. Von Spee, who was not the man to neglect the rescue of his drowning enemies, gives an explanation. He was far from the Good Hope when she blew up, but the Nürnberg was quite close to the foundering Monmouth; why was no attempt made at rescue in her case at least? It was dark and there was a heavy sea running, but the risks of a rescue are not sufficient to excuse the absence of any attempt. The Nürnberg had not been in the main action, she was flying up, knowing nothing of what had occurred, when she met and sank the Monmouth. Her captain saw other big ships approaching and thought that one of them was the Good Hope. This is von Spee’s excuse for the omission of his subordinate to put out boats—or even life lines—but one suspects that the captain of the Nürnberg had a bad quarter of an hour when next he met his chief.
The German squadron was undamaged, scarcely touched. Three men were wounded by splinters in the Gneisenau. That is the whole casualty list. One 6-inch shell went through the deck of the Scharnhorst but did not explode—the “creature just lay down” and went to sleep. “It lay there,” writes von Spee, “as a kind of greeting.” The light German cruisers were not touched at all. But though the German squadron had come through the fight unharmed, it had ceased to be of much account in a future battle. The silly bombardment of Tahiti, and the action off Coronel, had so depleted the once overflowing magazines that not half the proper number of rounds were left for the heavy guns. No fresh supplies could be obtained. Von Spee could fight again, but he could not have won again had he been opposed to much lighter metal than that which overwhelmed him a few weeks later off the Falkland Islands.
On the second day after the action von Spee returned to Valparaiso. Though his own ship had fought with the Good Hope and he had seen her blow up he did not know for certain what had become of her. This well illustrates the small value of observers’ estimates of damage done to opponents during the confusion of even the simplest of naval fights. Distances are so great and light is so variable. The destruction of the Monmouth was known, but not that of the Good Hope. So von Spee made for Valparaiso to find out if the English flagship had sought shelter there. Incidentally he took with him the first news of his victory, and the large German colony in the Chilean city burned to celebrate the occasion in characteristic fashion. But von Spee gave little encouragement. He was under no illusions. He fully realized the power of the English Navy and that his own existence and that of his squadron would speedily be determined. He “absolutely refused” to be celebrated as national hero, and at the German club, where he spent an hour and a half, declined to drink a toast directed in offensive terms against his English enemies. In his conduct of the fights with our ships, in his orders, in his private letters, Admiral von Spee stands out as a simple honest gentleman.
He was a man not very energetic. Though forcible in action and a most skilful naval tactician, he does not seem to have had any plans for the general handling of his squadron. If an enemy turned up he fought him, but he did not go out of his way to seek after him. He dawdled about among the Pacific Islands during September and at Easter Island during most of October; after Coronel he lingered in and out of Valparaiso doing nothing. He must have known that England would not sit down in idle lamentation, but he did nothing to anticipate and defeat her plans for his destruction. His shortage of coal and ammunition caused him to forbid the commerce raiding which appealed to the officers of his light cruisers, and probably the same weakness made him reluctant to seek any other adventures. For five weeks he made no attempt even to raid the Falkland Islands, which lay helplessly expecting his stroke, and when at last he started out by the long safe southern route round the Horn, it was to walk into the mouth of the avenging English squadron which had been gathered there to receive him. One thing is quite certain: he heard no whisper of the English plans and expected to meet nothing at the Falkland Islands more formidable than the Canopus, the Glasgow, and perhaps one or two “County Class” cruisers, such as the Cornwall or Kent. He never expected to be crunched in the savage jaws of two battle cruisers!
While this kindly, rather indolent German Admiral was marking time off the Chilean coast, the squadron which was to avenge the blunder of Coronel was assembling from the ends of the earth towards the appointed rendezvous off the Brazilian coast. The Bristol, a sister of the Glasgow, had come in from a long cruise in the West Indies, during which she had met and exchanged harmless shots with another German wanderer, the Karlsruhe. The Invincible and Inflexible were racing down from the north. The Cornwall and Kent, burning to show that even “County” cruisers were not wholly useless in battle, and the armoured cruiser Carnarvon were already in the South Atlantic. The poor old Canopus and the Glasgow had foregathered at Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands on November 8th, but were immediately ordered north to Montevideo to meet the other cruisers on the passage south. They left in accordance with these orders, but the Canopus was turned back by wireless, so that Port Stanley might have some naval protection against the expected von Spee raid. Here the Canopus was put aground in the mud, painted in futurist colours, and converted into a land fort. With her four 12-inch guns she could at least have made the inner harbour impassable to the Germans. The Glasgow docked for repairs at Rio, and then joined the avenging squadron which had concentrated off Brazil, and with them swept down to the Falkland Islands which were reached upon the evening of December 7th. All the English ships, to which had been committed the destruction of von Spee, had then arrived. The stage was set and the curtain about to go up upon the second and final act of the Pacific drama. Upon the early morning of the following day, as if in response to a call by Fate, von Spee and his squadron arrived. After five weeks of delay he had at last made up his mind to strike.