War at Sea (1914-1918)
The Battle of Heligoland Bight
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28th august 1914=Opening of battle
First naval war
Designed by British to attack German patrols in north-west German Coast
Heligoland= German base
British Commander Tyrwhitt in charge of operation
Aided from Vice Admiral Beatty
28th August 7a.m. = Tyrwhitt sinks two German torpedo boats
Germans not unprepared; deployed two ships, The Frauenlob and The Stettin, shortly after
four light cruisers joined, incl. Rear Admiral Mass’s flagship Köln
Tyrwhitt had come to be in a tight spot, called assitance of Beatty at 11:45a.m
 Arrived at 12:40p.m
 Sunk Mainz, Köln and Ariadne, damaging three other crusiers
Germans lost 1,200 men wheras britsh only suffered 35 deaths
Battle of Coronel
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Battle opened 1st November 1914
Coronel = Central Coast of Chile
British became aware of it after the arrival of the news that Admiral Sir Christopher
Cradock’s squadron was completely destroyed
Cradock’s fleet= not modern, not strong = no Chance against Admiral Spee’s five vessels – all
modern and efficient
Outnumbered Cradock sends for reinforcements; these don’t arrive in time: battle
unexpectedly started on 1st November
Humiliated by the defeat, British swiftly assembled a large naval force to destroy Spee’s
force
 Lead by Sir Frederick Sturdee
The Battle of the Falkland Islands
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-Admiral von Spee doesn’t expect a British counterattack
British, however have been sent to avenge the British defeat at the battle of Coronel
Germans : Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and Cruisers
British : Invincible and Inflexible were accompanied at Port Stanley by six other cruisers, all under the
command of Vice Admiral Sturdee ; armored cruisers Canarvon, Cornwall and Kent; two light cruisers, Bristol
and Glasgow; and an old vessel, Canopus, (presently grounded at Port Stanley and used as a form of makeshift fortress.)
Wanting to refuel, Spee began attack on 8th Dec. 1918
- Aware of Port Stanley having shipping, Spee mistakenly Thought that the ships were Japanese
Germans = Tired and exhausted, British = Opposite
Germans = Outgunned, realized the danger far to late , tried to evade British by hurriedly evacuating into
open sea , At 10 am pursued by British Fleet, at ca. 13.20 pm Spee see’s no other way than fighting,
Germans success in striking Invincible, 40 mins later Sturdee brings his ships in firing range, Four German
cruisers were sunk, with Spee's flagship Scharnhorst sinking rapidly first, followed by Gneisenau, Nurnberg
and Leipzig.
10 British sailors killed, no ship badly damaged , Germans lost 2,200 men (drowned or killed), only German
ship to survive = Dresden = 3 months later surrendered off the Juan Fernandez Islands (14th March)
The Battle of the Falkland Islands ended German Raids on Sea and became a tremendous morale booster of
the British
The Raid on Scarborough and
Hartelpool
 Approx. 8:10 am, 16th September 1914 Admiral Franz von Hipper
bombards Northsea English Seaports Hartlepool, Scarborough
and Whitby
 Ended approx at 9:30 causing 137 deaths and 592 injured
 Royal navy dispatch with a fleet of 6 battleships, 4 battle
cruisers, 4 heavy cruisers, 6 light cruisers and 8 submarines due
to warning of Naval Intelligence crew
 Germans raided with 5 battle cruisers, (?) light cruisers and (?)
destroyers
 Raid almost failed, Von Hipper only managed to survive due to
British signaling mistakes, British became large clamour
The Battle of Dogger Bank
 24 January 1915
 Result of the Raids on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby
 Admiral Von Hipper wanted to “re-live” the raids but
British interception stopped him
 British used a stolen German code-book to decode an
interception of German radio traffic
 British first sunk Bucher, killed 782 and captured the act on
film
 Sunk the flagship Seydlitz, killed 192
 Not a battle of importance, was another morale booster
for British navy
The Battle of Jutland
 Opened 31 may 1916
 Greatest naval battle of the WWI
 Commander of German High seas fleet, Reinhard
Scheer (recently appointed), confident of codes being
secure and decided to return to raids on the British
coast
 Battle split into 5 main phases
 No aircraft or submarines used, although planned
The Battle of Otranto Straits
 Austro-Hungarian Navy attack
 Launched in the night of 14/15 May 1917
 Austro-Hungarian initiative began with an attack against an Italian
munitions ship and its accompanying destroyer, sinking both.
 The three cruisers proceeded to sail along the Otranto Barrage at
3.30am sinking fourteen Allied patrol craft in the space of two hours
 Allies try to stop Austro-Hungarian attack; fail and A-H Navy able to
flee
 A-H supported by Germans; including the Submarine U-25 which
severely damages Dartmouth along with its accompanying
destroyer
 Consequence : Italians left the Otranto Barrages with the reasoning
that they were indefensible
The Battle of Zeebrugge
 Launched 23 April 1918
 Plan to neutralize Belgian ports of Zeebrugge and Ostend;
both used by Germans as a base for submarines and light
shipping
 Planned in secret
 Main force was to be at Zeebrugge, smaller force at
Ostend
 Began badly, because the diversion of smoke was
interrupted by unexpected winds, and therefore failed
 Raid on Zeebrugge produced unclear results; almost none
whereas the smaller force in Ostend failed totally
Bibliography
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