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Submarine Campaigns
1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
or "SUBMARINE CAMPAIGNS. - At the beginning of the World War the submarine was a comparatively new weapon of untried possibilities, whose ultimate place in naval warfare it was hard to foresee; and there ensued a period of tentative effort, confined at first to the North Sea, which lasted from Aug. 1914 to Feb. 1915. Germany started the war with 28 submarines, but the unreliable nature of the Korting engines fitted in ' the first 18 boats (U1-U18) had given her a low opinion of their merits. This was accentuated by the result of the first operation of the war consisting of a sortie by io boats up the North Sea, in which U15 was rammed by the light cruiser " Birmingham " on Aug. 9 1914 and U13 disappeared. On the British side some 56 submarines were available, the newest boats of the D and E class being attached to the 8th Flotilla (18 boats) employed under Commodore Roger Keyes in guarding the approach to Dover Straits with a couple (E6 and E8) reconnoitring in the Bight.
Early Days of the War. - Submarines did not play a decisive part in the Heligoland Bight action on Aug. 28. The six British submarines present were disconcerted by the unexpected appearance of British light cruisers, and the German submarines Were retained off Heligoland guarding the approach to the rivers. The first British warship to be sunk by submarines was the " Pathfinder," a small cruiser torpedoed by U21 (Otto Hersing), off the Forth on Sept. 5, an incident which aroused little comment beyond emphasizing the danger of old ships patrolling on regular beats. The sinking of the " Cressy," " Hogue " and "Aboukir" off the Dutch coast on Sept. 22 1914 was a much heavier blow. They had been sent to patrol on the Broad Fourteens, between England and Holland, and were steaming slowly in line abreast two miles apart at 6:30 A.M. when the " Aboukir," " Hogue " and " Cressy " were torpedoed in quick succession. This was the work of Otto Weddingen in U9, and the wholesale disappearance of Cruiser Force C within an hour with a loss of over 1,400 men came as an unpleasant shock, and definitely established the power of the new weapon. By the end of Sept. submarines were pushing past Dover Straits into the Channel, and on Oct. 16 1914 the fear of the new weapon reached a climax, when on a false alarm of one in Scapa Flow the British Grand fleet hastily put to sea at night and proceeded to Lough Swilly where by a freak of misfortune the "Audacious" ran on a mine and was lost. Oct. 20 1914 had seen the sinking of the first merchant ship, the ss. " Glitra," off Norway by U17, but it was not until Nov. 23 that U18 actually attempted to enter the Flow. The Grand fleet were at sea at the time and Ur8 was rammed by a minesweeper, the" Dorothy Gray," close to the Hoxa entrance. She went down to 11 fathoms with her hydroplanes damaged, and coming to the surface later was rammed by
the destroyer " Garry " and forced to surrender, the first and (with the exception of UB
116 in 1918) the last attempt to enter Scapa Flow.
Defensive Methods
The war found the British navy almost destitute of defensive methods against the submarine. A committee had sat on the subject but had evolved nothing but the modified sweep - a somewhat clumsy contrivance consisting of a line of explosive charges towed astern, regulated in depth by a water-kite and fired from inboard. The defence of Scapa had been mooted as early as 1912, and Adml. Jellicoe, then at the Admiralty, had taken an important part in discussions on the subject, but nothing had been done beyond allocating a small sum for the purpose in 1913, which was diverted to Dover to build a wall on the breakwater, in pursuance of the pre-war tendency to try and fit prospective wars into the existing naval ports. By the end of 1914 Cromarty had been supplied with Capt. Donald Monro's boom, but Scapa with all its entrances was not secure till Feb. 1915. Counter measures at this stage of the war were confined to an extensive development of the Auxiliary Patrol organization, the tentative supply of defensive armament to merchant shipping, and the equipment of a comparatively small number of vessels with the modified sweep. The trawlers of the Auxiliary Patrol played an important part in minesweeping and in escort work, but were too slow and too poorly armed to be really effective in offensive operations against the submarine. By the end of 1914 the submarine was generally recognized as a new and powerful weapon in naval warfare, though its tremendous potency as an instrument of the guerre de course had not been fully realized. Germany had lost 7 and with the addition of it had 30 now available, with 42 U boats and 127 UB and UC under construction and on order. Von Tirpitz, fully alive to theft-possibilities, was already building great hopes on them'.
The early morning of New Year's Day 1915 sawthe old battleship " Formidable " (Capt. A. N. Loxley) fall a victim to U24 off Start Point while patrolling up and down with the Channel fleet at io knots. The captain went down with the ship. Only 141 were saved out of a crew of over Boo, and the incident demolished once and for all the opinion of a certain school of naval thought that the submarine could be ignored.
They were now going farther afield. Otto Hersing in U21 made his first cruise to the Irish Sea in Jan. 1915, and this month too saw the first instances of a ship being torpedoed without warning in the case of the British s.s. " Tokemaru" and s.s. " Ikaria " off Havre on Jan. 30 by U20 (Schwieger, -who was to earn an unenviable reputation for ruthless warfare).
Campaigns of 19r5
Feb. 4 1915 saw the close of what may be termed the preliminary phase of submarine warfare. The German naval staff now decided to conduct a general campaign against merchant shipping, and on this date the German Government issued a declaration constituting all waters round Great Britain and Ireland a war zone ( Kriegsgebiet), in which from Feb. 4 all enemy merchant ships would be destroyed without it being always possible to avoid danger to passengers or crew, and where even neutral vessels would be exposed to danger of attack. This evoked on Feb. 11 a strong protest from the United States denouncing it as an indefensible violation of neutral rights. The date was postponed to Feb. 18 and the order modified to the extent that neutral ships were to be spared, though in adjudging their neutrality all circumstances and not the flag only were to be taken into account. March 18 1915 saw the end of Otto Weddingen in U29 which was on her way home round Great Britain, about half-way between Kinnaird Head and Norway, when she was rammed by the battleship " Dreadnought " after attacking the battleship " Marlborough." The inauguration of the new campaign was followed in March by the establishment of the Flanders flotilla, which at first consisted of small UB and UC boats working chiefly round the Thames and east coast. By Oct. 1915 it had grown to 16 boats, and was contributing a fair proportion of the ships sunk.
The Flanders flotilla had hardly started its career when it met with a formidable obstacle in Dover Straits. Experiments had been proceeding for some months in the use of steel wire nets to indicate and obstruct the passage of submarines, and the admiral at Dover (Rear-Adml. Hon. Horace Hood) now succeeded in closing the Straits by this means for over four months. The nets used were in lengths of 100 yds. and 60 or 3 o ft. deep, shot by drifters, and by Feb. 13 1915 he had some 30 drifters riding to their nets in the Straits. Bad weather took a heavy toll of the equipment, but the results were surprisingly successful to an extent hardly appreciated at the time. U8 fouled one of these nets on March 8 1915 off the Varne and was forced to come up by the destroyer " Ghurka," which exploded a modified sweep over her. U37 went down the Channel later in the month and never returned. Early in April U32 got caught in a net, and had so much difficulty in getting clear that she went home northabout. She drew a formidable picture of the obstruction, and on the strength of her report the Bight flotillas received instructions to go northabout, and the Flanders boats following their example also eschewed the Straits for over four months. It was thought at first that in the net a permanent antidote to the submarine had been found, and net bases were established at several ports, particularly at Larne for the North Channel, but technical difficulties (clips and indicator buoys) supervened, and the Germans overcame the lighter form of net by net cutters.
The sinking of the liners " Falaba," " Lusitania " and " Arabic " constituted three beacons in the 1915 campaign. The former, an Elder Dempster liner of 4,806 tons on the way to sierra Leone, was torpedoed with five minutes' warning on March 27 by U28 off the south of Ireland, and sank in eight minutes with the loss of over 100 lives. The indignation arising from this incident had hardly subsided when it was fanned to fever heat by one of the most momentous incidents of the war. On May 7 1915 Schwieger in U20 was off the Old Head of Kinsale (south of Ireland) when he sighted a great liner homeward bound. This was the " Lusitania " going only 18 knots, her decks crowded with women and children. At 2:15 P.M. he sent two torpedoes into her without warning and she went down in 20 minutes with the loss of 1,198 lives, while Schwieger " moved with mixed feelings " watched the terrific scene. A chorus of applause arose in Germany, but the deed can be seen now as an error of the first magnitude, which set on foot the whole train of circumstances which brought America into the war. The controversy between the German naval staff and the Chancellor immediately reached a crisis. The latter refused to be responsible for such acts, and on June 5 1915 an imperial order was issued forbidding the sinking of large passenger vessels. Von Tirpitz, the Secretary of State, was furious, and he and Bachmann, the chief of the naval staff, both sent in their resignations, but were commanded bluntly to remain at their posts.
Meanwhile Otto Hersing, the pioneer in distant fields, had sailed on April 25 in U21 for the Mediterranean. Arrangements had been made to provide him with oil on the way, probably in the vicinity of Tangiers, but they broke down, and he arrived at Cattaro on May 13 with only half a ton of oil fuel left. He reached the Dardanelles on May 25 and instantly made his presence felt. The " Vengeance" was missed by a torpedo that day; the old battleship " Triumph " supporting the Anzacs off Gaba Tepe was hit by two torpedoes at 12:30 P.M. and turned turtle in nine minutes with a loss of over 200 lives. Two days later (May 27) the " Majestic," supporting the troops inside the Straits, was hit and capsized with the loss of 49 men. The whole system of naval bombardment received a severe shock, though it was not till Aug. 13, when the " Royal Edward " was sunk near Kos by UB r4, that the transports began to suffer.
By this time another counter to the submarine had been found in the decoy ship, whose early type consisted of trawlers or vessels with submarines in tow. Three submarines were sunk in this way during the summer of 1915 (U40 on June 23 by C24, U23 on July 20 by C27, and U36 on July 24 by the " Prince Charles "). Aug. 19 1915 saw the destruction in the approach to St. George's Channel by the decoy ship " Baralong " of U27, while she was attacking the " Nicosian." Several German sailors had boarded the latter vessel, and the American cattlemen in her, when they saw the submarine disappear, fell on them and threw them overboard. Germany gave vent to a roar of indignation, undisturbed by the fact that the very day U27 was sunk U24 (Schneider) met the White Star liner " Arabic " outward bound off the south of Ireland and sank her without warning with the loss of 44 lives. Indignation in America flamed up anew. Again at great headquarters von Tirpitz wrestled with the Chancellor and again the Chancellor won the day. The use of decoy ships and defensively armed merchantmen, by increasing the danger of coming to the surface, provided the German naval staff with a strong argument for unrestricted warfare, but the imperial decision went in favour of the Chancellor, and orders were issued on Aug. 30 that no liners were to be sunk without warning and due regard for the safety of passengers. This was a bitter blow to the partisans of submarine warfare, and Adml. Bachmann, the chief of the naval staff, who had not been consulted on the issue, resigned and was succeeded by Adml. von Holtzendorff. The commander-in-chief of the High Sea fleet, Adml. von Pohl, also asked to be relieved, but to no purpose. He was told he did not understand the political situation. On Sept. 20 1915 further orders were issued to suspend submarine warfare on the west coast and in the Channel. The campaign now languished in British waters. From Sept. 1915 to Feb. 1916 activity against merchant shipping practically ceased in the Bight and was transferred to the Mediterranean.
During the year Feb. 1915 to Jan. 1916 a total of 394 Allied and neutral ships had been sunk by submarines with a gross tonnage of 1,059,141 tons; of these 225 (760, 44 0 tons) were British, J4 of which had been sunk in the Mediterranean. Some 60 merchant ships had been sunk without warning during the year and 17 submarines had been destroyed, an average of one submarine for 23.1 ships.
The Baltic. - Meanwhile British submarines had been active in the Baltic and the Dardanelles, where a great field had opened to British heroism. In the Baltic E9 (Comdr. Max Horton) and E1 (Comdr. N. F. Laurence) were the first to penetrate early in 1915, and proved a valuable addition to the Russian (Adml. Essen's) force. On July 2 1915, when the Russians sank the minelayer " Albatross," E9 sent two torpedoes into the old cruiser " Prinz Adalbert " and drove her back to port. On Aug. 4 1915 E13 ran ashore on the Danish island of Saltholm while passing the Sound. Before the 24 hours given her by the Danes to get off had elapsed two German destroyers appeared and, opening fire on her, killed half the crew, an act which did not pass unavenged. The Germans at the time were making a determined attempt to force the Gulf of Riga with a view to operating on the Russian flank, and the battle-cruisers of the 1st Scouting Group with the 1st Battle Squadron and a number of light cruisers had been lent for this purpose by the High Sea fleet. E1 now appeared on the scene, and the very day that E13 received its deadly hail of fire sent a torpedo into the battle-cruiser " Moltke" off the Gulf of Riga, driving her back to port.
Winter did not stop the activity of the British submarines. In the latter part of 1915 E8, E 9 and Erg (Comdr. F. A. N. Cromie) attacked the important iron ore - trade from Lulua (Sweden) to Germany, and between Oct. r 1 and 23 sank 14 large German steamers engaged in it. The " Prinz Adalbert " too was sunk by E8 on Nov. 8, and on Dec. 12 the light cruiser " Bremen " and destroyer V191 were sent to the bottom. The Germans now set to work vigorously to devise counter measures. Minefields were laid in the Sound off Drogden, in the Flint-Rinne at the southern end of the passage on the Swedish side and at Falsterbo; an old battleship was stationed to defend them; torpedo flotillas were despatched to patrol the entrance to the Baltic, and convoy flotillas were organized for the Swedish trade with the result that British submarine activity suffered a severe check and the difficulty of entering the Baltic was greatly increased. The work of submarines there was also seriously hampered by the inability of the Russian dockyards to cope with their demands, an unmistakable indication of the probable failure of any attempt to conduct a big campaign in that sea.
The Mediterranean
In the Mediterranean the ability of submarines to assist the Dardanelles campaign by interfering with Turkish transport in the Sea of Marmora was fully realized, but the passage of the Dardanelles was not an easy proposition. Twenty-seven miles long with a width of only a mile in the famous Narrows (the 31m. stretch between Chanak and Nagara) lent itself easily to defence, and could be transformed into a veritable trap for submarines. It is impossible to give the details of every passage where every passage was an heroic venture. Lt.-Comdr. Norman Holbrook had made the passage on Dec. l r 1914 in B 1 r and torpedoed an old battleship, the " Messidiyeh." E 15 (Lt.-Comdr. T. S. Brodie) was now the first to go up on April 15, but grounded in Kefez Bay (on the Asiatic side some ro m. up) and was lost, his ship being torpedoed later by a picket boat under Lt.-Comdr. Eric Robinson, to prevent it falling into the hands of the Turks. E14 (Lt.-Comdr. E. C. Boyle) followed, passing Chanak on the surface and running submerged for fortyfour hours. She sank three ships, including the transport " Gul Gemel " with 6,000 troops, bringing her commander a V.C. AE2 (Lt.-Comdr. H. H. G. Stoker) made the passage on April 25, diving under the minefields, but on the 30th broke surface suddenly, and coming under fire was forced to the surface and sunk. On May 1 the French submarine " Joule " attempted the passage and succumbed to a mine. Err (Lt.-Comdr. M. E. Nasmith) passed safely at the end of May, sank to ships, penetrated into the Bosporus and torpedoed the transport " Stamboul " and an ammunition ship there. Passing Kilid Bahr on his way back, her commander found a large mine perched in the bows which he dropped neatly by dipping and going astern, and won a V.C. in its place. E12 (Lt.-Comdr. Kenneth M. Bruce), E7 (Lt.-Comdr. A. D. Cochrane), E2 (Comdr. David Stocks), E20 (Lt.-Comdr. C. H. Warren) and Hi (Lt. Wilfred Pixie) followed, doing the same heroic work in difficult and dangerous waters. E 14 was up again in July and sank 22 ships, great and small, including a 5,000-ton steamer on Aug. 7, and clearing the Sea of Marmora. He was assisted in this task by Err, who sank the old battleship " Hairredin Barbarossa " the same day and the transports " Chios " and " Samsoun " with the ammunition ships " Espahan " and " Tenedos " a week or so later. By this time a powerful barrage had been laid at Nagara, greatly increasing the risk of the passage. The French submarine " Marriotte " encountered an enemy submarine and was sunk (July 26) and E2 on her way in got badly entangled in the Nagara obstruction, but managed after ro minutes' plunging about to get clear. E7 was not so fortunate. Going up on Aug. 4 she got enmeshed in the nets, and after the explosion of three mines in her vicinity was forced to the surface and sunk. E12, who followed in Sept., remained up 40 days with E20 and Hi in her company for a time and sank 37 ships. On the way down she fouled a net in the Narrows and went down to 245 ft., with the hydroplanes jambed and the conning tower flooded; finally she struck the chain moorings at Kilid Bahr which swept away the entanglement, and though she broke surface and came under fire managed to win through. The French submarine " Turquoise " was sunk by gunfire on Oct. 30 1915, and a final toll of British boats was taken in E g o (Lt.-Comdr. C. H. Warren) which fell a victim to stratagem after passing through the Narrows. With the help of an Allied code probably taken from a captured submarine she was inveigled to a rendezvous and torpedoed by UBr4 on Nov. 6. Err remained up a record period of 48 days in Nov. and Dec., sinking 46 ships of different sizes. The last submarine to make the hazardous passage was E2, which was recalled on Jan. 2, a week before the final evacuation, and got safely through.
For the latter part of the year 1915 two submarines had usually been working in the Sea of Marmora at a time. Altogether some 32 passages had been made or attempted by submarines, and though they had incurred the loss of 7 of their number (E15, AE2, E7, E20, " Joule," " Mariotte " and " Turquoise," their efforts had met with a large degree of success. The Sea of Marmora had been made unsafe, the Turks had been forced to send their troops by a roundabout route - by rail to Rodosti and then a three days' march to Gallipoli. Their tale of losses included two old battleships, one destroyer, 12 sloops and small craft, 7 transports, and no less than 197 vessels of all sorts and sizes, steam and sail, of which 36 were over r,000 tons. This was the end of the Dardanelles submarine campaign, whose record fills a golden page in the annals of the navy.
In the autumn of 1915, when activity in British waters diminished, five more German submarines were sent to the Mediterranean. With them went Max Valentiner in 1738 and Arnauld de la Periere in U35, two of the most distinguished German submarine commanders. The result was immediately evident. Valentiner, on his way from Gibraltar to Cattaro alone sank a round dozen of ships, including the Italian liner " Ancona " with a loss of over 200 lives, and the sinkings in the Mediterranean in Nov. went up to 23 chiefly off Crete, Malta and Tunis. They were nearly all merchant ships. No more men of war fell to them, and out of 242 transports only three were lost, the " Royal Edward " (Aug. 13, loss of life 955), " Ramazan " (Sept. 19) and the " Marquette " on Oct. 23. On Dec. 30 1915 Valentiner sank the P. & O. liner " Persia " (7974 tons) off Crete without warning with a loss of 334 lives, but Germany refused to admit that it was one of her submarines and tried to transfer the responsibility to Austria. This brought the year 1915 to an end, a year fertile in hope and speculation, begetting vast promises of further success. To all Germany the future of her navy lay beneath the waters, though few could read the riddle as far as the bottom of Scapa Flow.
Types of German Submarines
A short digression may be inserted here on the general types and characteristics of German submarines. They comprised four main classes - converted mercantiles (Deutschland class), U boats, UB and UC. The converted mercantile numbered a bare half-dozen (U151-U155) and were used chiefly off the Azores and in 1918 off the coast of America. They were about 213 ft. long, large, slow and clumsy, going about nine knots only on the surface, but capable of remaining out for three to five months. They had a good armament of two 5.9-in. guns, six torpedo tubes (4 bow, 2 beam) and 30 torpedoes. The U boats were the principal type, and were large boats which did most of their work in the Atlantic approaches. They were 210-225 ft. long, could go 141-17 knots on the surface, and 8-9 knots submerged. They could only maintain this speed submerged for an hour or so, but could continue at a speed of about two knots for as much as 48 hours; then, like all submarines, they had to come to the surface and recharge their batteries with the help of their Diesel motors. They carried two guns (usually one 4.1 in. and one 22-pounder), with 4 to 6 torpedo tubes and 8 to 12 torpedoes, and remained out generally from 25-30 days. There was also a special class of U minelayers, which originally numbered 10, viz. U71-U80, carrying 36 mines and 2 torpedoes. They had only a single hull and were slow boats, rarely cruising at more than 5 knots. Though the work on the west coast of Scotland and off the Dutch coast in 1918 was done by these boats they were not as a class very successful, and by 1918 there were only 5 of them left. The UB boats were originally built for coastal work, and the first 17 were small boats capable of being sent in sections overland. The earlier boats could remain out from 7-14 days, the later boats from 14-24 days. They carried one gun forward (a 4.1 in. or 22-pounder) and the earlier boats 2 to 6 torpedoes, which were increased to 5 tubes (4 bow, 1 stern) and 10 torpedoes in the later type. The UC boats were essentially minelayers, carrying one 22-pounder forward, 3 tubes with 4 to 6 torpedoes, and 18 mines. They remained out from 10-20 days in the North Sea, but when working in the Channel from Flanders rarely more than twelve. Submarines cruised normally on the surface. When attacking they usually proceeded at periscope depth (about 45 ft. for U boats), cruising at 65-85 ft., and going to 150 ft. if attacked. The fact that a periscope was rarely visible, even with glasses, at over a mile, emphasizes the difficulty of counter-attack.
German Submarine Flotillas
The flotillas were distributed in four principal commands - the North Sea (or High Sea fleet) flotillas working from the Bight and usually termed the North Sea flotillas; the Flanders flotillas working from Zeebrugge; the Mediterranean based on Pola, Cattaro and Constantinople, and the Baltic (or Kurland) flotilla working from Baltic ports. The Flanders flotilla consisted wholly of UB and UC boats and was allotted a definite area of operations, which extended on the east coast of Great Britain as far as Flamborough Head (Yorks), and in the Channel as far as 7° W. (about as far as Waterford) and down to the Gironde. At the beginning of the year 1916 the strength of the various flotillas was approximately North Sea 16, Baltic 6, Flanders 18, Mediterranean 12. There were 16 boats approaching completion, and 161 boats building and being delivered at the rate of 8 to 10 a month.
Campaign of Ig16
The year 1916 was marked by another long-drawn-out controversy between the German Chancellor and the naval staff. The Chancellor stood out against unrestricted naval warfare (that is sinking at sight); the naval staff fought for it. Nor were their arguments lacking in force. If a submarine came to the surface at a distance a ship could run away, if it rose close at hand it was exposed to fire from an armed merchantman or decoy ship. In Jan. 1916 the German naval staff presented a memorandum claiming that unrestricted warfare would force England to make peace in six months. It stated that from Feb. to Oct. 1915 one or two steamers, averaging 4,085 tons, had been sunk daily by each submarine. This was an exaggerated estimate, for the figures for British ships in 1915 were more nearly one-third of a ship per submarine per day, but on this basis they calculated a loss of 631,000 tons a month, at which rate it was estimated that England would be reduced to her knees in six months. A definitive audience took place at Great Headquarters on March 6 1916, when it was decided to postpone its execution till April 1 in order to bring all possible means of persuasion to bear on the United States in the attempt to reconcile them to the idea.
Von Tirpitz, in despair at the continual frustration of his plans, resigned, and his place was taken by Adml. von Capelle. Five days before the prescribed date UB18 (Steinbrinck) torpedoed the " Sussex " on March 24 1916 on her way from Folkestone to Dieppe with 25 American citizens on board; and though she remained afloat, the forepart of the vessel was blown up and some 80 passengers were killed and injured. America's patience now came to an end, and on April 18 President Wilson threatened to break off diplomatic relations. The German Government gave way, and abandoning the idea of ruthless warfare issued an order on April 25 precluding submarines from sinking any merchant ship at sight, and requiring them in their war against trade to act in strict accordance with the methods prescribed by prize law, which entailed stopping a ship, examining her papers and giving all the crew and passengers an opportunity to leave her before proceeding to any act of destruction.
Meanwhile the chief of the naval staff at Berlin had issued an order, which came into force on Feb. 29 1916, that armed merchantmen were to be regarded as warships, and the attention of German submarine commanders was called to a clause in the prize regulations under which all merchantmen which might attack a German or neutral ship were to be regarded as pirates. This found its sequel on March 28, when Capt. Fryatt in his ship the " Brussels " attacked U33 on her way to Holland, and, being captured with his ship by a German destroyer on June 23, was tried and shot (July 27 1916).
The decision against unrestricted warfare came as a bitter disappointment to Adml. Scheer, who received the order on his way to carry out the Lowestoft raid on April 25 1916. He immediately recalled all the High Sea fleet submarines and ordered them to cease operations against merchant shipping. He refused to have anything to do with what he called the blunt edge of the weapon, and had decided that if they were not to be used in un restricted warfare he would use them only in fleet operations.
The Flanders command followed suit with most of its boats, and the Mediterranean flotillas were left to continue the campaign against commerce alone. Just as Adml. Scheer's order went out an extensive barrage was being laid off the Belgian coast (April 24) by the Dover Patrol (Vice-Adml. Sir Reginald Bacon);. This was an effort on a large scale to cope with the submarine by a combination of mines and mine-nets. It consisted of some 18 m.' of moored nets fitted with net mines, supported by lines of mines, running parallel to and about 12 m. off the Belgian coast. It was completed by May 7 1916 and a patrol was maintained on it by day from May to October. It is difficult to estimate its precise value, for the diminished activity ascribed to it at Dover was. undoubtedly due to the cessation of submarine operations on political grounds from May to Sept. 1916. No doubt it made work more difficult for Flanders submarines, but the mines were poor and notoriously ineffective. A single boat (UB3) was destroyed in its vicinity the day it was laid by a lance bomb thrown from a drifter, the " Gleaner of the Sea." Another (UB 10) ran into it and took eight hours to clear with net mines exploding all round her, and though the work entailed in the barrage deserves a generous meed of praise no submarine was actually destroyed by it in 1916, and it certainly never prevented the entry and exit of the Flanders boats.
Steinbrinck, of the Flanders flotilla, was now sent to cruise in' the Channel to report on the feasibility of warfare on the lines of prize law, which involved the stoppage and due warning of ships before destruction. His report was unfavourable, and during the summer the Flanders boats worked only on the E. coast. Scheer meanwhile used his Bight flotillas (reinforced with Flanders boats) in fleet operations, of which the most important were those of Jutland and Aug. 19, when the " Nottingham and " Falmouth " were sunk by U52 and U66. It was on this latter occasion that E23 (Lt.-Comdr. Robert Turner) torpedoed. the German battleship " Westfalen " on its way out of the Bight. This was at 5 :30 A.M., and on rising to the surface later at .10:10 A.M. he reported the German fleet to the C.-in-C., then. some 180 m. off, an incident which first brought into prominence the: possibilities of the submarine in fleet reconnaissance work. During the summer the chief of the German naval staff was trying to persuade Scheer to modify his " harsh professional conception "of submarine warfare, and resume restricted war against commerce in accordance with prize law. The Mediterraneansubmarines had continued working on these lines with good results; the Flanders flotilla had recommenced on a small scale in Sept. 1916, and the operations in concert with the fleet had only resulted in the sinking of two light cruisers. The " Deutschland," under Capt. Paul Kdnig, tried a trading venture across the Atlantic during the summer, reaching America on July 9 1916 and returning on Aug. 23 with a cargo of rubber, nickel, and tin, but the " Bremen " which followed her in Sept. was lost. UJ3: under Lt.-Comdr. Hans Rose, a skilful and chivalrous commander, crossed the Atlantic (leaving on Sept. 17 and arriving on Oct. 7) and sunk five merchantmen off Newport News. The " Deutschland " made a second trip across, arriving in New. London on Nov. 1 and reaching Germany safely on Dec. 10 1916. There her mercantile career ended, and she was fitted out as a submarine-of-war and went off to work in the Azores. Archangel too became a sphere of activity for a time, and seven ships were sunk there in Oct., but the initial success did not continue, and in Nov. U56 was sunk by Russian patrols. The German naval staff now decided that all flotillas were to resume the campaign against commerce in accordance with prize law, and orders to this. effect were issued on Oct. 6 1916. Scheer had underestimated the power of legitimate warfare. The monthly average of all Allied and neutral merchant ships sunk by submarines had been 76 ships and 153,521 tons (gross) from Feb. to Sept. 1916. From Oct. 1916 to Jan. 1917 the average rose to 173 ships and 346,405 tons, and the campaign was extended with success to the Azores, Canaries and Madeira, where Funchal was bombarded on Dec. 3 by a converted mercantile.
"Unrestricted " Warfare, 1917. - But during the autumn Scheer and the naval staff found powerful allies for the policy of unrestricted warfare in Hindenburg and Ludendorff. The topic was again discussed on Sept. 3 1916 at Great Headquarters at Pless in the presence of the Chancellor, Hindenburg, Ludendorff and Adml. von Holtzendorff, and it was finally decided to postpone it till an effort had been made to come to terms. Then followed the note of Dec. 12 1916 calling on the Allies to avoid further bloodshed, and on Dec. 22 the naval staff presented another memorandum in which it was hoped to reduce British shipping by 39% in five months, on a basis of 600,000 tons monthly, an estimate which turned out to be excessive, for by June 1917 British shipping had been reduced only from 18.2 to 16.6 million tons, a reduction of only 9.1%. The offer to negotiate was rejected by the Allies, and it was decided on Jan. 9 to commence unrestricted warfare on Feb. 11917. All Germany was waiting for the decision. The Reichstag listened to the Chancellor's announcement in breathless silence, and on Feb. 3 the American ambassador left Berlin. Germany now had 148 submarines, of which 28 were in the Mediterranean and some 20 in Flanders. She had commenced with 28 and had lost 51. The repairs incurred at Jutland, the provision of patrol vessels and the vacillations of policy had reacted on submarine building, and von Capelle had only laid down 90 boats to Tirpitz's 186, but during 1917 269 more were ordered and it was hoped to keep pace with the demand. The barred zone announced by Germany on Jan. 31 1917 in which all shipping was liable to be sunk extended roughly from Terschelling (Holland) to Udsire (Norway), thence to the Faroe Is. and passing down the meridian of long. 20° W., 350 m. from the coast of Ireland, went oti to Finisterre. It also included the Mediterranean with the exception of its western portion round Majorca and a narrow track 20 m. wide as far as Greece. The area round Archangel was added to it in March 1917, and on Jan. II 1918 it was extended to the meridian of long. 30° W., 720 m. from the coast of Ireland, and two large areas were added round the Azores and C. Verde Is.
The effects of the new campaign were quickly felt. The system under which traffic approached Great Britain on routes patrolled by ships and trawlers with a sprinkling of destroyers proved incapable of meeting the emergency. Losses of Allied merchant ships rose from 171 in Jan. to 234 in Feb., 281 in March and 373 in April. This was the black month of the war. At this rate one ship in every four that left British shores did not XXXII.-20
return, and by Nov. 1917 the irreducible margin of shipping would probably have been reached. The effects were most severely felt in the Channel, Mediterranean and the routes south of Ireland (called the Fastnet and Scilly approaches), which were strewn with the hulls of sunken ships. The outlook was dark and perplexing to those who saw the Grand Fleet remaining mistress of a sea which was becoming a cemetery for British shipping, and had not realized the fact that the battle fleets were becoming subsidiary factors in a new form of the guerre de course. The efforts to deal with the situation took a threefold form. Firstly, a convoy system ( see CoNvoY) was introduced involving the escort of merchant shipping at sea and the control of all shipping movements; secondly, the naval staff was reorganized so as to insure a due status for the convoy system, and a planning section and anti-submarine division were added to it ( see Admiralty Administration); thirdly, invention and research were speeded up in the technical fields of mines, depth charges and hydrophones. These efforts were successful. Gradually the losses of ships went down and the losses of submarines crept up.
The enemy's operations can only be broadly described; his principal areas were the approaches to the Channel and Irish Sea, the North Sea (particularly off the Yorks. coast), the Channel and Mediterranean. The number of submarines operating varied. As a rule there might be two or three (converted mercantile) operating in the Azores and on the Dakar (W. Africa) coast, 8 or 9 U boats in the Atlantic approach (from longitude 7° to 12° W.) and on their way there and back, 4 or 5 (including a couple of Flanders UC) in the Channel and its approach, with 5 UB (Flanders) and 2 UC (Flanders) in the North Sea. In the Mediterranean there were usually 4 to 6 submarines at work, including r or 2 011 the N. African coast, i or 2 round Italy, I perhaps off Salonika, 2 off Egypt, Syria and Crete. This gives a total of some 25-30 submarines at work. The tonnage sunk per submarine varied. Curiously enough the average bag was considerably more in the time of restricted warfare than it was in 1917-8. In the former period it was probably something like 16,000 tons a trip. U49 on her first trip in Nov. 1916 in the Channel and Bay of Biscay sank 40,000 tons, and Forstmann, Arnauld de la Periere and Max Valentiner in the Mediterranean thought little of 20,000 tons a trip in 1916. But in 1917 the average bag was probably not much more than 8,000 tons for a U boat and 3,000 for a UB or UC. In the North Sea in Jan. 1918 a U boat was fairly fortunate to get 4,000 tons, and in the Channel 6,000 tons had become a fair bag.
Progress of Counter Measures
In the anti-submarine campaign great progress was made in technical devices, and larger depth charges were supplied in greater quantities. Type D charge (300 lb. T.N.T.) entirely superseded type D X (120 lb.), and the output was increased. Destroyers carried five or six instead of one or two; some were equipped with as many as 20 or 30, and the number of submarines sunk by depth charges rose from 8 in 1917 to 15 in 1918. Decoys (generally designated Q ships) continued effective in 1917, and five submarines were sunk by them during the year. These were merchant ships manned with a trained crew and armed with guns carefully concealed by special devices. On a submarine opening fire the ship would stop and a portion of the crew called the " panic party " took to the boats, lowering them carelessly and hurriedly in the hope that the submarine would approach and board the vessel. If she did the bulwarks fell and a deadly fire was poured into her at close quarters. Capt. Gordon Campbell was the most successful exponent of this stratagem. U38 fell to his ship, the " Pargust," on Feb. 17 1917 off the southwest of Ireland, and UC29 was sunk by her on June 7 in the same area, bringing him a V.C. His last ship, the " Dunraven," sank on Aug. Io after a heroic action with U61, in which the after gun's crew remained steady at their post with the poop blazing under them and were blown up with the gun rather than betray the nature-of their ship. The " Prize," (Lt. Wm. Sanders) and the " Stonecrop " (Comdr. Morris Blackwood) were also gallant ships, the former sinking U88 out in the Atlantic on Sept. 17 and both being sunk by submarines. By Sept. 1917 the decoy had lost its efficacy, though four were Naval Submarine Campaigns still in use in the early part of 1918. From first to last it achieved the destruction of 13 submarines with the loss of some 20 decoy ships, great and small, some like the " Prize " and " Vala " with all hands. Its place was now taken by the seaplane and P boat. The latter were low boats not easily seen in mist or at dawn and were responsible for no less than four submarines in 1917. Aircraft now began to be really effective, and in 1917 six submarines succumbed to the Soo-lb. bombs of large HandleyPages in the southern portion of the North Sea. British submarines too were constantly on patrol, and were able to count six submarines to their credit by the end of the year (G13 sank UC43 off the Shetlands March io; E54 U81 in the Atlantic May 1; D7 U45 north of Ireland Sept. 12; E45 UC79, Oct. 19; Ej2 UC63 Nov. 1, in the North Sea, and C15 UC65 Nov. 3, in the Channel). The hydrophone, an instrument designed to detect submarines by sound waves under water, also developed greatly, but was more useful as a detector and in controlled minefields than in actual pursuit.
The whole system of staff work was overhauled. Direction of convoys became one of the principal functions of the naval staff and the machinery of Intelligence was adjusted in this light. Intelligence of first-rate importance derived from wireless directionals had hitherto been shrouded in secrecy and locked away in drawers for the edification of the very few. The director of Naval Intelligence (Rear-Adml. Sir W. R. Hall) at last obtained control of it, and spread it abroad and circulated it to every command. The movements of all enemy submarines hitherto veiled in secrecy were displayed on a great chart in the Convoy room, and subjected to careful analysis by the new Plans Section. In Oct. 1917 this division prepared a large mine-net operation based on careful observation of submarine tracks in September. In spite of bad weather and unfavourable circumstances three large submarines (U50, U66 and U1 06) found their way into the minefield and were sunk, causing a scare in the Bight which sent submarines round by the Kattegat for the first time.
Plans were prepared too for mining the Bight, but it was not till Sept. 1917 that the new mines were ready in sufficient quantity. Gradually the whole strength of the High Sea fleet had to be concentrated on getting submarines in and out. An armada of minesweepers, barrier breakers, escort forces and outpost forces were constantly at work trying to keep a passage open for them along ways which extended as far as 150 m. from Heligoland. Dover still remained a thorn in the flesh. The cessation of submarine activity in April 1916 had been erroneously attributed there to the Belgian coast barrage, and a similar barrage had accordingly been laid across the Straits in the latter part of 1916. It was composed of mine-nets 60 ft. deep with a minefield in support. But the mines were of the old defective design. They dragged into the nets, sank British ships, and had to be swept up in June and July 1917. The barrage entailed enormous labour but did not close the Straits, and from Feb. to Nov. 1917 enemy submarines passed at the rate of at least 24 passages a month. This was a serious matter, for the Dover passage saved a Flanders boat eight days on the double journey to the Channel approach out of its trip of 14 days, and a Bight boat six days out of its trip of 25 days. In Oct. the whole question became acute, for Flanders boats were responsible for some 22 ships a month in the Channel. The proper antidote was a strong. minefield, and the vice-admiral at Dover had suggested in July 1917 laying a deep minefield from the Varne to Gris Nez, but the new mines were not ready and could not be supplied to Dover till Nov. It was partly laid on Nov. 21, but it was not constantly and intensively patrolled so as to make the submarines dive, with the result that between Nov. 21 and Dec. 8 21 submarines made the passage in safety. This was a severe disappointment, and instructions were sent to establish a strong patrol equipped with flares and searchlights to force the submarines down. This was done to a limited extent, and on the 19th the new minefield took its first toll in UB56. But difficulties arose in the execution of the plans and the urgency was so acute that before the end of the month RearAdml. Sir Roger Keyes, Director of Plans, was sent to Dover to assume the command, and the next four months saw nine sub marines destroyed in the Dover area. By Feb. 1918 the Bight boats had ceased to use the Straits, and by May the activity of the Flanders boats in the Channel had been enormously reduced; the blocking of Zeebrugge contributed to this result, and the losses in the Channel were reduced to six a month, the minefields laid by the Flanders boats falling from 404 in 1917 to 64 in 1918.
The year 1918 saw the commencement of a much more ambitious scheme - the Northern Barrage - which aimed at nothing less than mining with 120,000 mines the huge stretch of 240 m. between the Orkneys and Norway. (See Minesweeping And Minelaying.) This was really an immense task, complicated by a deep gut some 60 m. wide on the Norwegian side where the depths ran to 150 fathoms. The credit for its conception and execution lies largely with Adml. Sims and the U.S. navy. It was an American enterprise performed by American sailors in American minelayers. As it was only commenced in April and was barely completed in Oct. its value is difficult to appraise, but the loss of some half-a-dozen boats can be attributed to it in Sept. and Oct. 1918. United States destroyers too were doing invaluable work in escorting convoys, and had been doing it ever since May 1917, during the dark months of 1917 when destroyers were more valuable than battleships.
The losses in the Mediterranean had given rise to serious concern, and the First Lord (Sir Eric Geddes) and the director of Naval Intelligence proceeded there in person to arrange for an extensive reorganization of the commander-in-chief's staff. Its clear waters, too deep for mines, and its regular tracks had been an ideal hunting ground for submarines. During 1917 only two German submarines had been lost there, and in the black month of April 1917 the Mediterranean had supplied one-fifth of the tonnage sunk. The arrival of some 14 Japanese destroyers in the summer brought the losses down about io°/ 0, but in Dec. 1917, when vigorous action had greatly reduced the losses at home, the Mediterranean was still contributing 147,000 tons a month or, over one-third of the whole. The convoy system was now introduced in the Mediterranean, the Otranto barrage was established and reinforced, and in May 1918 no fewer than four submarines were destroyed there. The effect of these measures was soon felt. Our losses in that sea were reduced from 9 5 ships a month in the last quarter of 1917 to an average of 43 in July, Aug. and Sept. 1918.
The U-boat zone had been extended to the Azores in Nov. 1917, and one or two boats had been working regularly there with fair results and comparative immunity till May 1918 when U15 4 was torpedoed by E35 about 150 m. west of Cape St. Vincent, an exploit directly due to improved intelligence.
Adml. von Capelle had been confident that his submarines would be able to prevent the U.S.A. troops reaching Europe, but actually not a single transport was lost up to Feb. 5 1918, when the " Tuscania " was torpedoed with a loss of only 44 lives out of 2,404. To stop the ceaseless flow of troops four large submarines were sent across the Atlantic, but though they destroyed over 60 ships they did not get a single loaded transport, and U156 was lost in the Northern Barrage on her way home. On July 19 1918 the great liner " Justicia," 32,234 tons, was hit by a torpedo from UB64 at 2:30 P.I. off the Skerryvore (Scotland, W. coast), and attacked again by US4 and UB 124 the next morning.
A whole armoury of depth charges was dropped round 1313124 by the " Marne " and other destroyers, forcing her to the surface to surrender. All this time the mining of the Heligoland Bight went steadily on with the help of the gallant 10th Destroyer Flotilla (Capt. Berwick Curtis), and its exits were occasionally entirely closed. The Flanders flotilla felt the full force of the increased activity at Dover and suffered heavily. In Jan. 1918 it numbered 29 boats; it lost no less than 24 during the year and its strength dropped to 13. By the middle of 1918 it had earned the dread name of the " Drowning Flotilla," and its boats could reckon on a life of only three or four trips.
The Kattegat still remained open. In April 1918 a deep minefield was laid there, and had it been possible to keep it patrolled the submarines would have had to face another serious danger. How far this was practicable is a moot point.
The reports of destruction in 1918 gradually began to fall into four categories. Either a mine demolished the boat wholesale, or an aeroplane swooped down on it with Soo-lb. bombs, or a volley of depth charges forced it to the surface, or a torpedo from a British submarine brought its career to a sudden end. Depth charges competed with mines as the principal instrument of destruction (destroyers and patrols 39%, mines 30%); then came the submarine 8%, with aircraft a bad last.
It is impossible to narrate the long story of destruction. UB81 may be mentioned as an example of the unenviable career of a German submarine. On her way down Channel on Dec. 2 1917 she struck a mine off the Owers (near Portsmouth) and water began to enter by the stern. An attempt was made to bring her to the surface, but the after-tanks would not blow and her stern sank to the bottom in 90 feet. The gauges showed the bows to be out of water, and with the boat lying at an angle of about 60° a torpedo was lowered from the bow tube, and a man rammed up its narrow length. The sea cap was opened cautiously and it was found that the mouth of the tube was a couple of feet above water. Men were rammed carefully up and seven men had dragged themselves painfully out, only to find the cold so bitter and the strain so great that most of them elected to go back and join those who were seeking oblivion and death in the oxygen flasks. P32 patrolling in the vicinity saw the bows above water, but in the endeavour to get alongside the wind and waves bumped her against the submarine, which went to the bottom, leaving only a solitary survivor. Two little drifters contributed their quota to the tale. On April 17 1918 a little drifter, the " Pilot Me," whose jolly name was in itself an omen of success, working in the North Channel, suddenly sighted the periscope of UB82, 150 ft. off, and turning quickly dropped four depth charges on it. The submarine came up at an angle of 45°, and three other drifters, the " Young Fred," " Look Sharp " and " Light," all opened fire on her. She went down and the " Young Fred " dropped four depth charges on her, bringing her to a final end.
Statistics of Submarine Warfare
The dreary dreadful tale of ships sunk and attacked is too long to give (for dates and names see Admiralty Return of British Merchant and Fishing Vessels Captured or Destroyed, Aug. 1919, H.C. 199). It includes the names of nine hospital ships, all, with one exception, large ships whose character was unmistakable (" Asturias " March 20 1917, Channel, beached, 44 lives lost; " Gloucester Castle " March 30 1917, Channel, towed in; " Donegal " April 17 1917, Channel, sunk, 41 lost; " Guildford Castle" April to 1917, Bristol Channel, hit by dud torpedo; " Lanfranc " April 17 1917, off Havre, with 167 wounded Germans, sunk, 34 lost; " Dover Castle " May 26 1917, Mediterranean, sunk, 7 lost; " Rewa " Jan. 4 1918, Bristol Channel, sunk, 4 lost; " Glenart Castle " Feb. 26 1918, Bristol Channel, sunk, 95 lost; "Llandovery Castle " June 27 1918, Atlantic). Of these the attack on the " Llandovery Castle " by U86 (Patrig) was probably the most flagrant breach of the principles of humanity. She was homeward bound from Canada 116 m. from the Fastnets (S.W. point of Ireland). The enormous red cross of a hospital ship was lit on her side, glowing in the twilight like a lustrous jewel, when she was attacked and sunk; of the 258 persons on board, including 14 nurses, all except a boatload of 20 perished.
| f | 1914 (5 mths.) | 1915 | 1916 | 1917 | 1918 (Io mths.) | By Surface Craft . | 55 | 23 | 32 | 64 | 3 | " Submarines . | 3 | 396 | 964 | 2 ,439 | 1,035 | " Mines.. . | 42 | 97 | 161 | 170 | 27 | Total.. . | Ioo | 516 | 1,157 | 2,673 1 | 1,0652 | Total Tonnage (in 000's). . | 303 | 1,277 | 2,348 | 6,184 | 2,627 | German Submarines sunk . | 5 | 25 | 66 | 743 Allied and Neutral Merchant SI ips Sunk, 1914-8. 1 Also three by aircraft. 2 Also one b y aircraft. Not including 14 blown up on evacuating Flanders and the Adriatic. Allied and Neutral Merchant Ships Sunk, 1917-8. AAllied and neutral merchant ships sunk by submarine. BGross tonnage of merchant shipping sunk by submarines, in 000's. CSubmarines sunk.
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