Battle of River Plate: A Grand Delusion by Richard Woodman

Author:Richard Woodman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Military / World War II
ISBN: 9781844682454
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Published: 2008-03-19T16:00:00+00:00

He kept the scrap of signal paper, afterwards even - as Eric Grove amusingly and touchingly records, given the outcome - ‘having several copies of it made by an expert forger, hence the number of apparent “originals”.’

But there were other details. In addition to this crucial assessment Harwood also considered the matter of logistics: first, the fuel oil available to him if compelled to linger off the Rio de la Plata then held in two chartered tankers, the Eagle Oil Company’s San Castro and the Capulet, owned by a subsidiary of the Bowring Steamship Company, the Bear Creek Oil and Shipping Company; and second, the time and distance involved if a recall of the Cumberland became necessary.

Later that day, at 13.15 ship’s time, having made his decision, Harwood signalled his squadron. On the face of it they were routine movements: Achilles was to leave Rio de Janeiro and proceed to Montevideo, where she was to refuel on the 8th; on completion of bunkering she was to steam to a rendezvous with Harwood in Ajax in Latitude 35° 00’ South, Longitude 050° 00’ West on the afternoon of the 10th; meanwhile Cumberland was to head south and proceed to the Falklands to commence her boiler-clean; on the 9th Exeter was to leave Port Stanley, steaming north to be off the Medanos lighthouse at 07.00 on the 12th. Having cast his net, thereafter the Commodore would issue further orders and until that time strict radio silence would be maintained by the squadron. This might have triggered alarm to any enemy interceptors if it had not been anything more than the prudent precautions taken by an experienced cruiser commander. The same might be said of the especial orders to the captain of HMS Cumberland. While undergoing her required boiler-clean and self-refit no more than half of her propulsion should be out of commission for anything other than a short period. In other words not all her boilers would be blown-down at the same time, an instruction in which it was implicit that she might be recalled at short notice.

As Cumberland steamed south and Ajax north, the two cruisers came in sight of each other and received an unexpected bonus. On 5 December they intercepted the German blockade runner Ussukuma, a 7,834-ton freighter belonging to the Hamburg-based Deutsche Ost-Afrika Linie, a company having interests associated with the Woermann Linie AG, which had already lost several ships to British cruisers. The Ussukuma’s crew scuttled her. (Elsewhere, on the 9th, the Shropshire intercepted the blockade runner Adolf Leonhardt. She too was scuttled.) With Cumberland in the Falklands Commodore Harwood’s ‘available forces’ made their rendezvous about 150 miles off the estuary of the Rio de la Plata as planned at about 06.00 on the forenoon of 12 December. Forming line-ahead they moved off to the south-eastwards, heading for a new position of Latitude 32° 00’ South, Longitude 047° 00’ West. At noon Harwood sent a signal by Aldis lamp to the Exeter and Achilles from Ajax, which made his intentions plain.

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