"The Good Hope and Monmouth returned the enemy's fire, and soon the action became general. We were very close to each other on the British side, but the Germans were much farther apart. The enemy soon got the range of our ships and were hitting the Good Hope and the Monmouth very often, and it was not long before the Good Hope was on fire. Soon after the Monmouth took fire, but this was kept under.
"After about forty minutes the Good Hope seemed to break out of the line and close towards the enemy, and she was not seen again (although some state that she was still firing her after-turret)." According to the official report made by the captain of the Glasgow: "At 7.50 p.m. an immense explosion occurred on board Good Hope amidships, flames reaching 200 feet high. Total destruction must have followed. It was now quite dark."
The Monmouth and Glasgow still fought on gamely, both sides firing at the flashes, the Germans firing salvoes. "The Monmouth was very badly damaged by this time", continues the account we have already quoted, "and she hauled off to starboard, followed by the Glasgow, as the big ships had now commenced to fire on us as well as the small ones. It was very dark now, but owing to the fire on the Monmouth no doubt the enemy had a good mark to aim at. The enemy's fire ceased as soon as we turned away to starboard. It could easily be seen as we passed the Monmouth that she had suffered heavily, and it appeared to me that she was still on fire. She also had a list to port and was down by the head.
"Our captain made a signal to her, asking if she was all right, and was told that she was making water badly forward and was trying to get her stern to the sea. He then asked him if he could steer north-west, but received no reply. The enemy were now coming towards us, and we thought that we might have drawn them away from the Monmouth, but in a few minutes we could see search-lights and gun-flashes, and we knew that it was the Monmouth they were firing on." Under the growing light of a full moon, which was now rising slowly in the stormy heavens, the practically undamaged German squadron was seen bearing down directly on the little Glasgow, which, as she could by no possibility be of any assistance to the Monmouth, made off at full speed to avoid annihilation, and by 8.50 had run the enemy out of sight. About half an hour later a number of flashes were seen afar off, which, without doubt, marked the death throes of the gallant Monmouth. The Glasgow was badly knocked about. She had an enormous gash in her side 9 feet long and 3 feet wide, besides minor injuries. But she lived not only to fight another day, but to take signal revenge on her opponents.
"Nothing could have been more admirable than the conduct of the officers and men throughout. Though it was most trying to receive a great volume of fire without chance of returning it adequately, all kept perfectly cool, there was no wild firing, and discipline was the same as at battle-practice. When target ceased to be visible, gunlayers spontaneously ceased fire."[95]
It must be borne in mind that the only guns in the British squadron equal in power to the sixteen 8·2-inch much more modern weapons of the two big German armoured cruisers were the two 9·2-inch guns carried by the Good Hope, one of which was knocked out ten minutes after the battle began.
The Glasgow, on the second day after her escape, had a curious experience, if we are to believe the story of one of her men, as she ran plump into a sleeping whale! "That was another shock for us. The ship trembled and we all rushed up on deck to find out what had happened." The Glasgow picked up the pre-Dreadnought battleship Canopus, which at the time of the fight was unfortunately 200 miles away to the southward, and both ships proceeded in company to Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands. The German ships do not appear to have followed them, but went to Valparaiso, presumably to send home news of their victory. The news of the disaster to Sir Christopher Cradock's squadron naturally created great enthusiasm in Germany and corresponding grief in this country. But the naval authorities, in dead secrecy, at once prepared to settle accounts with Von Spee and his ships. On the 8th December, just over a month after the catastrophe off Coronel, their efforts bore the fullest fruit. On the previous day a squadron consisting of the battle-cruisers Invincible and Inflexible and the cruisers Carnarvon, Cornwall, Bristol, and Kent, under the command of Sir F. C. Doveton Sturdee, had arrived at Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands, their crews greeting the Glasgow, which was lying there in company with the Canopus, with round after round of cheering.
The inhabitants of these remote islands were unfeignedly glad to see the new arrivals, since they had received warning that they might expect a German raid. At 8 a.m. the look-outs on Sapper Hill to the south-west of Port Stanley reported columns of smoke coming up over the south-west horizon. Soon afterwards a two-funnelled ship and a four-funneller were made out, and the Kent was ordered out to the harbour mouth and orders given for all ships to raise steam for full speed. The Kent, it is interesting to note, went into action this day flying the silken ensign and jack which had been presented by the ladies of Kent on her first commission. To conceal the presence of the two big battle-cruisers, which might be spotted by their tripod masts, these two ships were ordered to stoke up with oil fuel, and the thick black greasy smoke billowing from their funnels soon shrouded the harbour with a dusky veil. Twenty minutes later other smoke columns were reported more to the southward.
The two ships first observed, which proved to be the Gneisenau and Nürnberg, continued to advance steadily towards the island, training their guns on the wireless station, and about an hour and a half after they had first been sighted came within 11,000 yards of the Canopus, which let fly at them with her big guns, firing over the low-lying land between the south side of the harbour and the open sea. The Germans at once hoisted their colours and turned away. Then, seeing the Kent at the harbour mouth, they turned towards her, but very shortly afterwards turned away again and went off at full speed towards their consorts, who were now coming up. It is thought that they must have got a glimpse of the "surprise packet", in the shape of the Invincible and Inflexible, that was awaiting their advent.
At a quarter to ten the Carnarvon, Inflexible, Invincible, and Cornwall weighed and stood out to sea in the order named, and overtook the Kent and the Glasgow, which had gone out and joined her a few minutes earlier. The German ships were now in full sight to the south-east—hull down, and doing the "Goeben glide" for all they were worth. In the British ships the stokers were working furiously, the smoke belching in thick volumes from the funnels; and, with every man at his post, their decks flooded with water as a preventive against fire, and hoses ready, the vessels gradually gathered way.