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As the battle raged in the south, the Grand
Fleet thumped on down to the scene of the action. The 24 dreadnought
battleships were drawn up in six columns abreast of each other.
Ahead of them were the widely spread heavy cruisers who acted
as a screen to prevent surprise and scout out the way forward.
Finally as an advance guard there was the 3rd Battlecruiser Squadron,
some 25 miles ahead of the main body of the Grand Fleet.
As the
fleets drew together a series of actions began as the screens
collided. Beatty, approaching the Grand Fleet, adjusted his
course to north-north-east, bending across the area from which
it was presumed Jellicoe would emerge, thus screening Jellicoe
from view and at the same time closing in once again on Hipper.
As he stood aboard the Iron Duke, every passing moment rushing
him towards the battle that would decide the future of the British
Empire, Jellicoe was faced with an intractable problem – his
subordinates had failed to inform him of the location of either the Battlecruiser Fleet
or the High Seas Fleet.
At 18.14 Beatty at last signalled the location of the High Seas
Fleet. Jellicoe could have
waited no longer, and he deployed on to the port column to gain
the best light for gunnery and 'cross the 'T' of the German line.
This may have been much criticised since, but no-one has been
able to substantiate such criticisms other than by vague generalisation.
As the Grand Fleet deployment commenced, the heavy cruiser screen
found themselves in an extremely awkward and downright dangerous
situation between the fleets. The Defence was quickly blown up
and the Warrior was next in the German sights. Below
decks, in the aft engine rooms, Engineer Commander Henry Kitching
was thrown into a hell at sea as the shells crashed down.
I heard a tremendous explosion at the after end, a heavy
jar went through the whole fabric and most of the lights went
out. Immediately afterwards there was a heavy roar of water and
steam and my impression was that we had been torpedoed. Several
men came running forward from that end, one of them with blood
streaming down his face. In that moment I realised fully what
cold drawn funk is like. But I had to make a decision and advancing
towards the after end, I tried to gauge the extent of the damage.
The engines still went on running, which seemed to show that the
cylinders had not been hit, but in the dim uncertain light perceived
what appeared to be Niagara at the after end of the engine room
though whether the sheet of water was rising up from below or
pouring down form above I couldn't be sure at the time. Anyhow,
a blast of steam on my face warned me that I hadn't long to think
about it and I soon made up my mind that no pumps could deal with
the quantity of water that was coming in, and that the only thing
to do was to get the men out as quickly as possible. At first
the men didn't know what to do, as the ladders at the after end
were inaccessible, but I shouted to them to go up the midship
ladder and hustled all towards it in front of me. As soon as it
appeared that they had all gone up, I followed them myself, but
by that time all the lights had gone out and it was pitch dark.
When I got to the top, knowing it was hopeless to go aft, I turned
forward and felt my way by the handrails along the platform at
the tops of the cylinders towards the door at the fore end, which
communicated with the port engine room and with the mess deck.
When I got there, however, a stoker told me that we could not
get through there, as the mess deck was on fire, and when I tried
to do so I was met with a rush of thick smoke and blinding fumes
that drove me back. At this moment with this in front and the
roar of steam behind me I felt like a trapped rat, for there seemed
to be no possibility of lifting the heavy armoured hatches overhead,
and a spasm of sheer terror came over me; but just then I realised
that the man was calling my attention to a glimmer of light above,
and the next minute I found myself climbing out though a torn
rent in the deck. Engineer Commander Henry Kitching, HMS
Warrior
The crippled Warrior lurched back
towards the British lines under heavy fire, augmented with a will
by the leading dreadnoughts of the High Seas Fleet. Here the Warrior
was rescued by an amazing conjunction of events.
As the 5th Battle Squadron turned in order
to tag on to the end of the battle line Warspite suddenly,
and without warning, veered out of line and headed directly
for the German ships. She began executing a huge circle that took her
dangerously near the German line, but to the intense relief of
the beleaguered crew of the Warrior, she acted like a
magnet, attracting German shellfire from close range. The German dreadnoughts
blasted away at her with both main and secondary armaments
at varying ranges from between 9,500 to 13,500 yards. The Warspite
then gave a fantastic demonstration of all the
powers and investment that went into that ultimate weapon of war – the
super-dreadnought. The men aboard her were
totally reliant on
the strength and resilience of her armour protection for their survival. It was
designed to keep shells out of the ships vitals and, for the most part, that was
exactly what it did. But multiple hits from German shells of all
calibres smashed much of her unarmoured superstructure. The whole
incident had lasted about ten minutes. As they emerged they found
that they could only safely make about 16 knots, and they made
their own way back to Blighty.
During all this excitement, to the east
of the orchestrated tangle of ships that marked the Grand Fleet
deployment, the 3rd Battlecruiser Squadron under Rear-Admiral
Horace Hood swung right round in succession, neatly placing himself
in front of the whole emerging battle line some two miles ahead
of the oncoming Lion. The 3rd Battlecruiser Squadron
made excellent shooting at firing at the German battlecruisers, who found
themselves almost helpless in front of their enemies and unable to
make any effective response. As the Grand Fleet completed its
fraught deployment into line, one by one the mighty dreadnoughts,
their very names reflecting two centuries of British naval hegemony
around the globe, opened a thunderous fire. For those in the Battlecruiser
Fleet there was a huge sense of mission accomplished. Midshipman
Ouvry was now fully awake aboard the Tiger.
That I suggest to you was a tremendous moment in anybody's
life. At last the two main fleets were in action. I remember thinking
to myself, "Well, we've lost a lot and we're going to lose more.
But we don't mind losing this and that as long as the two fleets
meet. This moment had arrived and there was a feeling of extraordinary
relief – rather patriotic relief perhaps. It was absolutely wonderful
to see the battleships opening fire. I thought, "Well, this is
the end!" Midshipman John Ouvry, HMS Tiger
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Then the situation changed. At about
18.30, without warning, the mists seemed to open up and the Germans
saw their tormentors, the 3rd Battlecruiser Squadron, right in
front of them. Once again it did not take the German gunners long
to react. Commander Paschen aboard the Seydlitz.
Meanwhile we had turned to the South
and suddenly there appeared, plainly and comparatively near, an
English Battlecruiser of the Invincible class, four points aft.
I cannot express the delight I felt at having one of these tormentors
clearly in sight and like lightening the orders are given.
Commander Günter Paschen, Seydlitz
The worst of the shelling was concentrated
on the leading ship, the Invincible, the progenitor of
all battlecruisers. It was not a situation that she had been designed
to face. Her speed was meant to be her protection but here she
was facing two heavily armed, better armoured and altogether more
modern German battlecruisers. At such short range it was a
question only of where the shells hit that would determine her
fate. Her armour could not hope to withstand this kind of punishment.
Only luck could be her salvation in these circumstances. Midshipman
J C Croome had a unique view from the Indomitable:
There was a terrific flash from the
Invincible, then in sight as we turned towards the enemy a point
or so, and she went up in a column of smoke several hundred feet
high decorated at the edges by bits and pieces of what a second
before had been a battlecruiser and the flagship of our squadron.
Of this astonishing spectacle I took a photograph, which I expect
was probably unique. I must have got the explosion almost at its
height since the column of smoke and debris took certainly three
seconds to get to its full height. So utterly unexpected and sudden
was this calamity that I don't think it made much impression on
me until quite a time afterwards. I remember some small bits of
falling debris bouncing on top of the turret drove me back to
the shelter of my 4" gun shield. One of these pieces, which happened
to stay on top of the turret, I picked up as a souvenir two or
three minutes later. I burned my hand quite nicely doing so to
my surprise and disgust as it looked cold enough. Midshipman
J C Croome, HMS Indomitable
The Invincible blew up at 18.34.
Yet again, the thin armour of a British battlecruiser had been
found wanting under the random probing of heavy calibre shells.
The moment a shell penetrated her midships turret she was doomed,
as the flash raced down into the magazines below. Of the Invincible's
crew of 1,032 men, just six survived. The Invincible split
in two, and as the middle section disappeared in the titanic explosion,
the wreck took up a bizarre configuration as bow and stern stood
out erect from the water. Macabre monuments to the failure of
British battlecruiser design, now to be passed by almost all of the
ships of the Grand Fleet in the succeeding minutes.
The sinking of the Invincible was
a triumph, but it did not change the basic tactical morass in which the High Seas Fleet was
now sinking. Shells were crashing down
on the battlecruisers and the leading dreadnoughts. The escape
manoeuvre selected by Scheer was the splendidly named 'Gefechtwendung
nach Steuerbord' or battle turn to starboard - the naval
equivalent of a hand-brake turn. Each ship would turn
individually - the ship bringing up the rear would put its helm over first,
followed by each ship in turn moving towards the van.
From the British perspective the High Seas Fleet simply disappeared
into the confusion of the misty conditions. No-one in the Grand Fleet realised for
a while what had happened. At most they had only been able to
see a few of the German ships and it was presumed that they had
merely been swallowed up by the mists, and would shortly re-appear.
Aboard the Iron Duke, Jellicoe
was once more faced with a considerable quandary. The guns were
falling silent as their targets 'disappeared' and it became apparent
that the Germans were not going to engage on parallel courses
if they could possibly avoid it. Jellicoe turned south to place
himself across the line of the German retreat home and at the
same time secured the best available light as the sun set in the
west.
As the Grand Fleet settled on to a southerly
course, Scheer took a decision that has variously been regarded
as bold, reckless or downright stupid, depending on the perspective
of the commentator. At 18.55, he ordered a second 'Gefechstwendung'
which brought his ships onto an easterly course – heading directly
towards the centre of Jellicoe's line.
Thus at around 19.10, the Grand Fleet were suddenly
granted a second bite at the cherry as the German destroyers,
battlecruisers and leading dreadnoughts emerged from the mottled
mixture of mist, smoke and sunset haze. The British fire doubled
and redoubled, yet the Germans could see next to nothing except
flashes ahead of them. Scheer realised that, whatever his intentions
may have been, he had made a disastrous mistake. Yet he could
see little from his position in the middle of the line as to what
was actually happening up ahead of him. A man of quick decisions,
at 19.13 he issued an amazing order by signal flag, perhaps
best translated as, "Battlecruisers at the enemy, attack, give
it everything!"
Scheer intended to buy time to cover another
'Gefechtswendung' back on to a westerly course in order
to allow
the main dreadnought fleet to escape. A torpedo attack launched
by the destroyers would not be enough in these desperate circumstances,
and the battlecruisers being the only feasible option remaining,
as they would dilute the British fire and allow the destroyers
to approach to a decisive torpedo range. He ordered the battle
turn to starboard at around 19.18, as soon as the battlecruisers
and destroyers had commenced their attack. This time things did
not go as smoothly as the conditions were extremely unfavourable
to any complicated manoeuvre. The battlecruisers did not hesitate
but suffered dreadfully as they acted as a target for British
fire, drawing fire away from the turning battle line behind them.
Shell after shell plunged down onto the German battlecruisers. No British
battlecruiser could have survived such punishment.
At the same time the German destroyers
launched a desperate charge which triggered the standard naval
response from Jellicoe. At 19.22 he ordered the light cruisers
into the attack to counter the German thrust. At the same time
he issued orders for his dreadnoughts to turn away - this would greatly
reduce the chance of torpedoes hitting his precious but vulnerable
giants. This order left them sailing directly away from the High Seas
Fleet. As far as he was concerned, torpedo attacks on any large
scale meant that there was a mathematical certainty that ships
in close order line ahead would be hit. Jellicoe was not prepared
to risk anything with the fleet that held, and guaranteed, the naval
supremacy of the British Empire. Once the danger was over he
again turned
back to close with the High Seas Fleet, which had by then disappeared
off to the west. Once again, senior officers cheerfully assumed that anything
they could see
was visible to all. For the moment at least, the High Seas Fleet
has escaped.
Shortly afterwards Beatty sighted
the German battlecruisers and once again the old enemies opened
up on each other, just at the official sunset time of 20.19. By
a strange coincidence the twist and turns of the battle had brought
them almost back to where they had started many hours before.
The German battlecruisers were not really in a fit state to resume
the battle. They had suffered much in the last three hours,
many of their guns were out of action, fires still blazed below
decks and they were listing drunkenly from the effect of hits
below the waterline. In contrast, the Lion, Princess
Royal and Tiger had suffered damage which only partially
restricted their fighting potential, and the New Zealand,
Indomitable and Inflexible were almost untouched.
The Germans disengaged in the gathering gloom and Beatty did not
follow, unsure what was happening and not willing to go too far
out on a limb. Overall, the situation remained the same, as the
Grand Fleet stood squarely across the German route home.
Jellicoe was once again left in literal
and metaphorical darkness. Reports that came in were confusing,
often lacking in the necessary detail, bearings and positions.
At 20.28, Jellicoe altered course to form a single line once again,
determined to stay across the German line of retreat heading south.
He still had the whip hand. Could he convert his undoubted positional
advantage into a convincing victory?
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