2nd Battle Cruiser Squadron:
Australia (Flag), Indomitable, Inflexible.
Cruiser Squadrons
2nd Cruiser Squadron:
Minotaur (Flag), Duke of Edinburgh, Cochrane, Shannon, Achilles, Donegal.
3rd Cruiser Squadron:
Antrim, Roxburgh, Devonshire.
On June 5th Field Marshal Lord Kitchener arrived at Scapa en route to Archangel. In the morning he crossed from Thurso in the Oak, and came on board the Iron Duke on arrival at Scapa. He lunched with me, and the Flag officers present were invited to meet him. Before lunch we went round the ship. The officers and men naturally greeted him with much respect, and he can have had no doubt of the admiration in which he was held. During lunch he discussed with me his forthcoming trip, and said once or twice that he was looking forward to it as a real holiday. The strain of the last two years, he confessed, had been very great, adding that he had felt that he could not have gone on without this break, which he welcomed very much. He was not, however, very sanguine that he could achieve much in Russia. He mentioned the difficulty which he experienced in dealing with questions discussed in the Cabinet, a difficulty felt by most soldiers and sailors, whose training does not fit them to state or to argue a case, and who frequently find great difficulty in doing so. They are, as a rule, accustomed to carry out their ideas without having first to bring conviction to the minds of men who, although possessing great general knowledge and administrative experience, have naturally but little acquaintance with naval and military affairs which in themselves form a lifelong study.
After lunch conversation turned to the Jutland action, and Lord Kitchener evinced much interest in the tactics and the general story of the action.
Lord Kitchener impressed me strongly with the idea that he was working to a time-table, and that he felt that he had not a day to lose. He mentioned three weeks as the limit of his absence, and I expressed astonishment at the programme which he had planned to carry out in the restricted period. He was most anxious not to lose a moment on the sea trip and asked me more than once what I thought was the shortest time in which the passage could be made.
During the day the weather at Scapa, which had been bad in the morning, gradually became worse, and by the afternoon it was blowing a gale from the north-eastward. It had been originally intended that the Hampshire should take the route which passed up the eastern side of the Orkneys, following the channel ordinarily searched by mine-sweeping vessels as a routine measure; but as the north-easterly gale was causing a heavy sea on that side, mine-sweeping was out of the question, and it was also obvious that the escorting destroyers could not face the sea at high speed. I discussed with my Staff which route on the west, or lee, side would be the safest, and finally decided that the Hampshire should pass close in shore, and not take the alternative route passing farther to the westward near Sule Skerry Lighthouse. The reasons which influenced this decision were:—
(a) With a north-easterly wind there would be less sea and, therefore, more chance of the destroyers being able to keep up with the Hampshire.
(b) It was practically impossible that this route could have been mined by any surface mine-layer owing to the dark period in Northern latitudes being confined to a couple of hours, during which no ship could expect to approach the shore for mine-laying without having first been sighted.