Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby

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Map of operations against Yarmouth (November 3rd) and Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby (December 16th)
Sea War in the North Sea 1914–1918

The Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby on December 16, 1914 as part of the war at sea in the North Sea during the First World War instead. German cruisers shelled the northeastern English coastal towns of Scarborough , Hartlepool and Whitby with around 1,500 shells and laid mines near the coast. They caused the loss of 127 people dead and several hundred injured, mostly civilians, as well as moderate destruction in the three cities. The Grand Fleet , which had been warned by Room 40, had expired, but did not intervene to stop the bombardment.

prehistory

After the British decision of 1914 to commit to a distance blockade against Germany in the North Sea, a battle between the battle fleets on both sides initially seemed unlikely. The German side shifted to small war operations with mines, submarines and other light forces in order to weaken the numerically superior Royal Navy before such a fight would be sought. This did not rule out major actions against the English coast with the backing of the deep-sea fleet . So it came to the bombardment of Yarmouth on November 3, 1914 , in which the Germans lost the armored cruiser Yorck in a minefield of their own. This raid demonstrated the endangerment of the English coast and led to the temporary emergence of a certain fear of invasion in Great Britain. The British naval command responded by detaching a squadron of predreadnoughts from the Grand Fleet lying in Scapa Flow and stationing it in Rosyth .

German planning

The German naval command continued to hope to be able to use their ships actively against the British and, among other things, devised a plan to use several of their modern battlecruisers in the trade war . This plan, specifically represented by Admiral Franz von Hipper , the commander of the reconnaissance forces, was initially put aside by his superiors. The fleet chief Friedrich von Ingenohl, on the other hand, favored a new raid against the English east coast, combined with the hope of luring the Grand Fleet or part of it into a recently laid minefield or within range of the German submarines. This plan was approved in November by Kaiser Wilhelm II, who was euphoric by the sea victory of the East Asia Squadron at Coronel . However, it seemed necessary to wait for repairs to be completed on the battle cruiser Von der Tann, which was suffering from machine problems , before undertaking such a dangerous undertaking.

On December 8, the news of the devastating defeat of the East Asia Squadron in the Falkland Islands came to Germany . It became apparent that at least two battle cruisers of the Grand Fleet were currently not available in the North Sea, which should be exploited. Ingenohl also hoped to counteract the psychological effect of the British naval victory with a successful undertaking against the English coast. In contrast to the last undertaking against Yarmouth, this time the deep-sea fleet would run out to support as far as the Dogger Bank, but Ingenohl did not inform the Kaiser of this so as not to endanger the company.

British reconnaissance knowledge and dispositions

Warned by Room 40 of the impending attack, the British Admiralty was able to take precautions. It was decided to intercept the German attacking forces on the way back with superior forces. For this purpose, the 1st battle cruiser squadron under David Beatty with four battle cruisers, the 1st light cruiser squadron under William Edmund Goodenough with four light cruisers and the 2nd battle squadron under George Warrender with six of the most modern dreadnoughts were provided. The Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Fleet, Admiral John Jellicoe , had intended to sail with the entire Grand Fleet, but the Admiralty forbade him to do so as not being necessary. The rendezvous place of the British squadrons was determined by Jellicoe at a point southeast of the Dogger Bank. The trap was to be closed from the south by the light forces of the Harwich Force under Reginald Tyrwhitt and the destroyers and submarines of Roger Keyes .

However, the British intelligence missed the important fact that the German deep-sea fleet left to support the company. On the morning of December 16, she was only 30 nautical miles from the British rendezvous point on Dogger Bank and with 14: 6 battleships outnumbered Warrender's squadrons.

course

Around 3 a.m. on December 15th, Hipper and his attack group left the Jade Bay . On the way, the torpedo boat S 33 , which had gone off course in the dark, radioed according to course instructions, which the British noticed. It turned around and was sighted by a group of British destroyers, who in turn relayed their observations by radio. Hipper intercepted enemy radio communications and was warned that the British might have information about the raid and were at sea. On the morning of December 16, Hipper sent most of his destroyers and three of the four light cruisers on their way home. The Kolberg , which had about 100 mines on board, accompanied the battle cruisers on. The German ships then split up to attack: Seydlitz , Moltke and the hybrid armored cruiser Blücher were to shoot Hartlepool, Derfflinger , Von der Tann and Kolberg were to take action against Scarborough.

Damaged house in Scarborough where several members of a family were killed

At 8 o'clock Derfflinger and Von der Tann began bombarding Scarborough. The Kolberg meanwhile laid out a minefield in front of Flamborough Head . The local Grand Hotel, three churches and several private houses were hit by the two ships next to Scarborough Castle . The population crowded the train station and the arteries to escape the shelling. At around 9:30 a.m., the bombardment stopped and the two battlecruisers continued to bombard Whitby. In addition to the coastal guard station to be met, Whitby Abbey was also hit here.

Hartlepool, unlike Scarborough and Whitby, was a significant military target with port facilities and factories defended by three BL 6-inch coastal guns. The gun crews, a total of around 165 men, had been warned and had received live ammunition in good time. The bombardment began around 8:10 a.m. Four British destroyers were at sea nearby, but all but one did not dare to approach the much larger combat ships. The HMS Doon fired a torpedo at a range of 5000 yards before retreating. The city was bombarded with direct fire from very close range, so that most of the shells were not armed and ricochetted wildly through the streets . The coastal guns could do little against the armor of the large ships, so that the operating crews concentrated on the superstructures. The weakest armored Blücher was damaged so that it retreated out of range. The reconnaissance cruiser Patrol , lying in the harbor, tried to sail, but was hit by several 21 cm shells from the Blücher and ran aground. Another cruiser, the Forward , had no steam on the boilers and had to stall. A submarine, HMS C9 , followed the patrol but was forced to dive when shells began to fall and did not come out of port until the German ships had already moved away. The bombardment stopped at around 8:50 a.m.

The Hartlepool bombardment resulted in the most casualties: 86 civilians died and 424 were injured. In addition, there were losses among the gun crews. 1,150 shells were fired, hitting the steel mill, gas works and railroad, next to seven churches and over 300 private houses. As in Scarborough, the population tried to escape the shelling by train or road. The losses on the German side amounted to eight dead and a dozen injured.

British naval movements and encounters with the high seas

Warrender was leaked to 05:30 on 15 December from Scapa Flow and had around 11 am with the out of the Cromarty Firth coming Beatty at the Moray Firth made. With Warrender in command, the unit ran to the agreed interception point at Dogger Bank. Before dawn on December 16, a skirmish between the accompanying destroyers and the destroyers and light cruisers of the deep-sea fleet developed. Ingenohl felt the news of a torpedo attack forced him to turn away. As a result, a meeting of the two main fleets was just avoided, they were less than 20 nautical miles apart. Ingenohl had already put himself in a difficult position with his information policy vis-à-vis the Kaiser and, ignorant of the enemy's strength, could not possibly put his fleet at risk.

In fact, Jellicoe had finally been given permission to sail with the Grand Fleet, but he was not in the vicinity and could have intervened on behalf of Warrenders and Beattys. Goodenough fought briefly in Southampton with the light cruiser Stralsund and some destroyers, but they turned away. He didn't mention to Beatty that there were other German cruisers nearby. Overall, communication between the squadrons involved on the British side was very poor that day, which, together with the bad weather, prevented Hipper from being intercepted. Last but not least, Warrender received a message from Room 40 during the day that the deep-sea fleet was at sea, which is why it did not dare to run further east. He did not know that it had turned off and returned to its ports before midnight. Even the units Tyrwhitt and Keyes, which were light from the south, were no longer able to attack Hipper's retreating group. A possible torpedo hit by the E11 submarine ordered into the German Bight on the Dreadnought Posen, which was laying from the Elbe to the Jade, on the day after the raid was prevented by a mistake.

Effects

“Remember Scarborough - Enlist Now!”
British propaganda poster from 1915

The raid had a huge impact on UK public opinion. On the one hand, the attack on civilian targets and the number of victims served as food for the government's recruitment campaign. Not least, in the course of the attack, the first military casualty from combat operations in Great Britain since the attack on the Medway - almost 250 years earlier. On the other hand, the Royal Navy came under fire for apparently doing nothing to counter the attack. Jellicoe then pushed through that in similar future situations, the Grand Fleet would sail on time and in full strength to provide assistance. Beatty's battlecruisers were also permanently stationed further south, in Rosyth, so that they could intervene more quickly. The Christmas attack on Cuxhaven can, at least in part, be seen as a British attempt to quickly restore the damaged reputation of the Royal Navy.

literature

  • Tim Benbow: Naval Warfare 1914-1918: The History of World War I: From Coronel to the Atlantic and Zeebrugge. Amber Books, 2008.
  • Mark Bostridge: The Fateful Year: England 1914. Penguin, 2014.
  • Bob Clarke: Remember Scarborough: A Result of the First Arms Race of the Twentieth Century. Amberley Publishing, Stroud 2010.
  • William Langford (Ed.): They Were There! - Memories of the Great War 1914-1918 by those who experienced it. Pen & Sword, 2014.
  • Tobias R. Philbin: Admiral von Hipper: The inconvenient Hero. BR Grüner, Amsterdam 1982.
  • Daniel George Ridley-Kitts: The Grand Fleet 1914-19: The Royal Navy in the First World War. The History Press, 2013.
  • Jann M. Witt , Robin McDermott: Scarborough Bombardment: The attack of the German ocean-going fleet on Scarborough, Whitby and Hartlepool on December 16, 1914. Palm Verlag, Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-944594-50-7 .

Web links

Commons : Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files