The Great War at Sea: A Naval History of the First World War by Lawrence Sondhaus

Author:Lawrence Sondhaus
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub, mobi
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2014-07-31T07:00:00+00:00

Figure 7.2 German dreadnought Friedrich der Grosse

Scheer’s second fleet sortie, on April 24–25, retraced the route of the first, but with Hipper’s battle cruisers steaming all the way to the southeastern coast of England to bombard the towns of Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft, in the hope of provoking a response by the Grand Fleet. Great Yarmouth, undamaged in the German navy’s first attempt at coastal bombardment (November 3, 1914), was home to a British submarine base, while Lowestoft, on the Suffolk coast, 9 miles (14 km) to the south, hosted a detachment of minesweepers. Once again, Scheer coordinated his sortie with an air attack, this time by eight zeppelins departing with (rather than ahead of) the fleet. The German battle cruisers – now five in number, with the addition of the newly commissioned Lützow – were accompanied by six light cruisers and two flotillas of destroyers, as before with additional support from the U-boats stationed in Flanders. Scheer followed this more robust striking force with the rest of the High Sea Fleet, including the six pre-dreadnoughts of the II Squadron. The operation began at 12:00 on April 24, with the goal of having the battle cruisers off Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft at dawn on the 25th. Just four hours out of Wilhelmshaven, the battle cruiser force was reduced to four when the lead ship in the German column, Hipper’s flagship Seydlitz, struck a mine off the Dutch coast, took on water at the bow, and had to return home, escorted by a zeppelin and two destroyers. Hipper transferred his flag to the Lützow, and the sortie proceeded as planned. In the immediate predawn hours of April 25, six of the zeppelins bombed Harwich, Norwich, Lincoln, and Ipswich; Hipper’s battle cruisers followed with their bombardments, starting at Lowestoft at 05:00 (04:00 GMT) and finishing at Great Yarmouth at 06:00. The raiders were challenged off Lowestoft by Tyrwhitt with a detachment of four light cruisers and a dozen destroyers from the Harwich force, which fled back to the south as soon as they recognized that the attacking force included battle cruisers. One of the cruisers, HMS Conquest, survived a direct hit from one of Hipper’s ships. After shelling the two ports, Hipper’s squadron rejoined the main body of the High Sea Fleet nearer the Dutch coast, west of Terschelling, but when no British surface forces challenged them, and submarines appeared to shadow his movements, Scheer took his ships home.8

The attack, indeed, provoked a British response, but too late to bring about a battle. Jellicoe had just taken the Grand Fleet out on a sortie of his own from April 21 to April 24, steaming across the North Sea all the way to Horns Reef on the Jutland coast before heavy fog (in which the battle cruisers New Zealand and Australia collided, badly damaging the latter) forced him back to his bases. As soon as he had returned home, intelligence that Scheer had left Wilhelmshaven in force at midday on April 24 prompted Jellicoe to put to sea again later that afternoon, as soon as his ships had refueled.

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