Q-Ships and Their Story

by E. Keble Chatterton

Having received orders to proceed, Lieutenant Muhlhauser then began to take the Dusseldorf across the North Sea. I am indebted to him for having allowed me to see his private diary of this voyage, and I think it well illustrates the unexpected and surprising difficulties with which Q-ship officers so frequently found themselves confronted. Having parted company with the Tay and Tyne, Dusseldorf’s new captain proceeded to look for navigational facilities, but in this respect she was amazingly ill-found. The only chart available showed just a small portion of the North Sea, and there was no sextant in the ship. This was a delightful predicament, for with all her magnetic ore it could be taken for certain that the compass would have serious deviation, and, having regard to the number of minefields in the North Sea and the physical dangers of the east coast of Scotland, it was a gloomy prelude to crossing from one side to the other.

Having been round the ship, it was now possible to ascertain her character. She was not a thing of beauty, there was no electric light, the engine-room was in a neglected condition, and round it were the engineers’ cabins, the skipper and mate being berthed in a deckhouse under the bridge. However, as the prize dipped to the North Sea swell it was a joy to realize that all the hundreds of tons of ore would not reach Germany. At this late stage of the war she was very short of this commodity, and the loss to her would be felt. The Tay and Tyne had certainly made a most useful capture. Fortunately there was found plenty of food in Dusseldorf, and enough coal for about three weeks, so if only a few days’ fine, clear weather could be ensured, the ship would soon be across and anchored in a British harbour. That, of course, was always supposing there was no encountering of mines or torpedoes.

By dusk of the first day the Halten Lighthouse (Lat. 64.10 N., Long. 9.25 E.) was made out, and then the night set in. For some time the glass had been falling, and before the morning it was blowing a gale of wind with a heavy sea. Loaded with such a cargo Dusseldorf made very heavy weather, and was like a half-tide rock most of the time, and during the next day made only 30 miles in twenty-four hours! Strictly speaking, this is not the North Sea but the Atlantic Ocean, and February is as bad a month as you could choose to be off this Norwegian coast in a ship that could make good only a mile an hour. By the afternoon of the twenty-fourth the Romsdal Islands had been sighted, and then, fearing lest the enemy might have received news of the capture and sent out some of his light forces, the ship was kept well out from the shore. The Germans should never get this ore, and arrangements were made to sink her rather than give her up.

With no chart, a doubtful compass, and so few appliances, was there ever an Atlantic voyage made under more casual circumstances? Bearings were taken of the Pole Star and Sirius in order to get a check on the compass, and the ship proceeded roughly on a W.S.W. course. During the twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth it blew a westerly gale, and the seas crashed over her without mercy. Owing to the cargo being heavy and stowed low, the Dusseldorf displayed a quick, lively roll, and already had broken down twice, when for a third time on the evening of the twenty-sixth she again stopped. She was now four days out, and the captain was a little anxious as to his position, but it was impossible to ascertain it. A cast of the lead was taken and bottom was found at thirty fathoms. From this it was assumed that they were now somewhere near the Outer Skerries (East of the Shetlands); and inasmuch as it was believed there was a German minefield, laid this year, not far away, anxiety was in nowise lessened. As soon as the repairs had been effected, course was altered to south-east for 16 miles, then south for the same distance, and north-west in the hope of making the land. This was done, but no land appeared, and it was blowing a gale from the north-west. Whether the ship was now in the North Sea or whether she had overshot the Shetlands and got the other side of Scotland, who could say? Neither the error of the compass nor the error of the log could be known. It was now the twenty-seventh, and they might be north, south, east, or west of the Shetlands, but, on the whole, Lieutenant Muhlhauser believed he was in the North Sea, so decided to run south until well clear of the Moray Firth minefields, and then south-west until the land was picked up.

The twenty-eighth of February passed without land being sighted, and there was always the horrible possibility that suddenly the ship might strike the shore in the darkness. It was a long-drawn-out period of suspense, aggravated by bad weather and the presence of mines and submarines. But as spring follows winter and dawn comes after night, so at length there came relief. At six in the morning of the first of March a light was picked up on the starboard bow, which, on consulting a nautical almanack, was identified as the Bell Rock (east of the Tay). Continuing further south, two trawlers and an armed yacht were sighted off May Island, so a signal was sent through the yacht to Admiral Startin at Granton reporting the arrival of a prize captured by Tay and Tyne, and, in due course, having steamed up the Firth of Forth, Dusseldorf at last came to anchor and reported herself. It had been a plucky voyage made under the worst conditions, and many an officer has been decorated for an achievement less than this.

As for Tay and Tyne, she, too, had passed through a trying period. After landing the Norwegian pilots and Customs House officials in Sves Fjord she had steamed out to sea and made bad weather of the gale, water even pouring into the engine-room; but she had been saved from foundering by taking shelter in a Norwegian fjord, and next day cruised about the coast looking for more ore ships, but had no further luck, so on February 25 shaped a course for Lerwick, where she duly arrived, and the German prisoners were taken out of the fo’c’sle and handed over to the naval authorities.

In the following month Tay and Tyne, accompanied by another Q-ship named the Glendale, was again off the Norwegian coast on the look-out for ore ships, just as in Elizabethan days our ancestral seamen were in a western sea looking out for the Spanish ships with their rich cargoes. Glendale (alias Speedwell II. and Q 23) was a disguised trawler of 273 tons belonging to Granton, and armed with a couple of 12-pounders, a 6-pounder, and two torpedoes. On the twenty-first of March, Glendale was off the Oxnaes Lighthouse when she captured the German S.S. Valeria with 2,200 tons of ore. In vile weather these three ships then started to cross to Lerwick, but, after they had got part of the way across, Valeria’s small supply of coal gave out, so on the twenty-third she had to be abandoned and then sunk by the shelling from the two Q-ships, the crew having been previously taken off by boats, while both Q-ships poured oil on to the sea. Although Valeria never reached a British port this was most useful work; for not only was the ore prevented from reaching Germany, but they were deprived of a brand-new 1,000-ton ship. Her captain, who, together with the rest of the crew, was brought into Lerwick, had only just left the German Navy, and this was his first trip. Incidents such as these show what excellent service can be rendered in naval warfare irrespective of the size of ships and of adverse circumstances, provided only that the officers have zeal and determination. The risks run by these two small ships were very great when we consider the manner in which our Scandinavian convoys had been cut up in spite of destroyer protection. Conversely, seeing how necessary for the prosecution of the war these supplies of ore were to Germany, is it not a little surprising that she did not station a submarine off the Norwegian coast to act as escort, submerged, and then torpedo the Tay and Tyne as soon as she began to close the ore ship? One of her smaller submarines could surely have been spared for such an undertaking, and it would have been, from their point of view, more than worth while.

Finally, we have to relate the fight of another small coasting steamer transformed into a Q-ship. This was the Stockforce (alias Charyce), which had been requisitioned at Cardiff at the beginning of 1918, and then armed with a couple of 4-inch guns, a 12-pounder, and a 3-pounder. Her captain was Lieutenant Harold Auten, D.S.C., R.N.R., who had had a great deal of experience in Q-ships under Admiral Bayly, and had recently commanded the Q-ship Heather. On the thirtieth of July, 1918, Stockforce was about 25 miles south-west of the Start, steaming along a westerly course at 7½ knots, the time being just before five in the afternoon, when the track of a torpedo was seen on the starboard beam coming straight on for the ship. The crew were sent to their stations, the helm was put hard aport and engines full speed astern, in the hope of avoiding the torpedo; but it was too late. The ship was struck on the starboard side abreast of No. 1. hatch, putting the forward gun out of action, entirely wrecking the fore part of the ship, including the bridge, and wounding three ratings and an officer.

As soon as the torpedo had exploded there came a tremendous shower of timber, which had been packed in the hold for flotation purposes, and besides these 12-pounder shells, hatches, and other debris came falling on to the bridge and fore part of the ship, wounding the first lieutenant, the navigating officer, two ratings, and adding to the injuries of the forward gun. All this had happened as the result of one torpedo. The enemy, perhaps, being homeward bound with a spare torpedo in his tube, had not hesitated to use such a weapon on a small coaster instead of employing his guns. Stockforce had been fairly caught and was settling down by the head. The ‘abandon ship’ party then cleared away their boat and went through their usual make-believe, whilst the ship’s surgeon had the wounded taken down to the ’tween deck, where their injuries could be attended to. Here it was none too safe, for the bulkheads had been weakened by the explosion so that the water flowed aft, flooding the magazine and ’tween decks to a depth of three feet, and thereby rendering the work of the surgeon not merely difficult but hazardous.

Whilst the ‘panic’ party were rowing ahead of the ship, the rest lay at their stations on board, behaving with the greatest equanimity and coolness, while Lieutenant Auten, as the fore-control and bridge were out of action, exercised his command from the after gunhouse. Five minutes later the submarine rose to the surface half a mile distant, and, being very shy, remained there for a quarter of an hour carefully watching Stockforce for any suspicious move. In accordance with the training, the ‘panic’ party then began to row down the port side towards the port quarter so as to draw the enemy on, and this manœuvre succeeded in fooling the German, who now came down the port side as required, being only about three hundred yards away. As soon as the enemy was full on the beam of Stockforce, the latter handed him the surprise packet. It was now 5.40 p.m. as both 4-inch guns opened fire from the Q-ship. The first round from the after gun passed over the conning-tower, carrying away the wireless and one of the periscopes, the second shell hitting the conning-tower in the centre and blowing it away, sending high into the air a man who was in the conning-tower.