Allen L. Churchill

DEATH OF LORD KITCHENER—OTHER EVENTS OF THE SECOND YEAR

The night of June 7, 1916, a storm raged along the Scottish shore. There was wind, rain, and high seas. Toward dusk a British cruiser approached a point on the extreme northerly end of the coast and took aboard Earl Kitchener, Secretary of State for War, and his staff. Among those with him were Lieutenant Colonel Oswald Arthur Fitzgerald, his military secretary; Brigadier General Arthur Ellershaw, one of the war secretary's advisers; Sir Hay Frederick Donaldson, munitions expert, and Hugh James O'Beirne, former counselor at the British embassy in Petrograd and for some time secretary of the embassy in Washington.

The cruiser, which was the Hampshire, of an old class, put to sea and headed for Archangel, whence Lord Kitchener was to travel to Petrograd for a war council with the czar and his generals. About eight o'clock, only an hour after the party embarked, a mine or torpedo struck the Hampshire when she was two miles from land between Merwick Head and Borough Brisay, west of the Orkney Islands. It is supposed that the cruiser's magazine blew up. Persons on shore saw a fire break out amidships, and many craft went to her assistance, although a northwest gale was blowing and the sea was rough.

Four boats got away from the Hampshire, all of which were swamped. According to one report Lord Kitchener and his staff were lost after leaving the cruiser, but a survivor said that he was last seen on the bridge with Captain Herbert J. Savill, her commander. According to this man Kitchener had on a raincoat and held a walking stick in his hand. He said that the two men calmly watched preparations for departure and saw at least two lifeboats smashed against the ship's side.

Twenty minutes after being torpedoed the Hampshire sank, with a loss of 300 lives.

On July 9, 1916, two days after the Hampshire went down, eleven men of the cruiser reached the Orkneys, after forty-eight hours buffeting by the waves upon a raft. The body of Colonel Fitzgerald was washed ashore the same day of the sinking, but the sea did not give up Kitchener or any of the other members of his staff.

The Italian admiralty made known June 9, 1916, that the transport Principe Umberto had fallen victim to a submarine in the Adriatic with a large loss of life. Estimates of the dead ran from 400 to 500.

King George and Queen Mary attended a memorial service at St. Paul's in honor of Kitchener on June 13, 1916, when many of the most prominent officials and citizens of the realm were present. They had a large military escort to and from the cathedral in respect to the dead war minister. Other services were held at Canterbury and in many cities through the kingdom.

On the night of June 18, 1916, a squadron of Russian submarines, destroyers and torpedo boats surprised a German convoy of merchant vessels at a point southeast of Stockholm and not far from Swedish waters. Owing to the heavy losses of German shipping in the Baltic practically all Teuton ships in that sea traveled under escort only, and there was a dozen or more vessels in the convoy. An engagement took place lasting forty-five minutes, during which the Russians sank the auxiliary cruiser Herzmann, capturing her crew and two other craft, one of which was believed to have been a destroyer. In the confusion all of the merchant ships reached the Swedish coast and other destroyers and armed trawlers accompanying them made good their escape. Berlin admitted the loss, adding that the Herzmann's commander and most of her crew were saved.

During the night of June 16, 1916, the British destroyer Eden collided with the transport France in the English Channel and sank. Thirty-one men and officers escaped. The German submarine U-35, commanded by Lieutenant von Arnauld, put into Cartagena, Spain, June 21, 1916, after a 1,500 mile run from Pola with a personal letter to King Alfonso, signed by Kaiser Wilhelm. The missive bore thanks for the treatment of German refugees from the Kameruns who had been interned in Spain, and the submarine also brought hospital supplies for the fugitives. Its arrival made a strong impression on the Spanish public and was taken as a new sign of Germany's power. No such trip ever had been made before for such a purpose. It was a precedent in the communication of kings.

The British steamship Brussels, carrying freight and a number of passengers, most of whom were Belgian refugees bound from Rotterdam to Tillbury, a London suburb, was captured in the channel by German destroyers and taken to Zeebrugge, Belgium on the night of June 23, 1916. The incident proved that German warcraft were again far afield. It was said that the capture had been made by means of previous information as to the time of the Brussels's sailing and with the aid of a spy. Her course lay about forty miles north of Zeebrugge, and a suspected passenger was seen to wave a lantern several times before the destroyers came up.

Captain Fryatt attempted to ram the nearest vessel and escape, but the effort failed and he was arrested and charged with piracy. Germany had announced early in the war that she would consider any merchant captain who made a hostile move, even in defense of his vessel, as a franc-tireur.

Loss of the Italian auxiliary cruiser Citta di Messina, 3,495 tons, and the French destroyer Fourche was announced by Paris June 25, 1916. The Messina was carrying troops across the Strait of Otranto when a submarine torpedoed her. The Fourche, serving as a convoy, gave pursuit without result, then turned back to save such survivors as she could. Within a few minutes she was struck by a second torpedo and sunk. All on board the two vessels, probably 300 men, were drowned.

Earl Kitchener.

The Austrians lost two transports in the harbor of Durazzo, June 26, 1916, when Italian submarines succeeded in passing the forts and inflicting a heavy blow. Both ships had troops, arms and ammunition aboard, according to a Rome report. The casualties were unknown.

Petrograd announced that Russian torpedo craft intercepted a large convoy of Turkish sailing vessels in the Black Sea on June 29, 1916, and destroyed fifty-four ships. The attack took place off the Anatolian coast, and several hundred men were believed to have been drowned. If the number of ships sunk was correct it established a record for the war.

The former German warship Goeben, renamed the Sultan Selim, shelled Tournose, a Russian Black Sea port, on July 3, 1916, and did considerable damage. One steamship in the harbor went down as a result of shell fire and large oil works near the city broke into flames. The Breslau, called the Midullu by the Turks, bombarded Scotchy, a near-by port, about the same time. Several fires started in the latter city and there were some casualties at both points.

A second Russian hospital ship, the Vperiode, was torpedoed in the Black Sea, July 9, 1916, with a loss of seven lives. She was a ship of 850 tons, having accommodations for about 120 wounded. Like the Portugal, sunk by a submarine some weeks before the Vperiode was plainly marked with the usual Red Cross emblem. The attack came in daylight and was accepted by the Russians as having been deliberately made, which once more aroused the indignation of the Russian people.

Berlin announced July 7, 1916, that the British steamer Lestris, outward bound from Liverpool had been captured near the British East Coast and taken to a German port. This second capture in the channel within a few days caused considerable criticism in England.

As dawn was breaking on July 10, 1916, a submarine came alongside a tug in Hampton Roads and asked for a pilot. The pilot went aboard and found himself on the subsea freighter Deutschland, first merchant submarine to be built and the first to make a voyage. She came from Bremerhaven, a distance of 4,000 miles, in sixteen days. Reports had been current since the U-35 made her trip to Cartagena that the kaiser would send a message to President Wilson by an undersea boat. The American public scouted the idea as being impossible of accomplishment, but the report persisted, and cities along the Atlantic Coast line had been on the watch for several days. The Deutschland eventually turned into Hampton Roads, piloted by a waiting tug, and tied up at a Baltimore dock.

The submarine, which was the largest ever seen in American waters, became a seven days' wonder. Captain Paul Koenig and his twenty-nine men and officers told some interesting stories of their trip across the ocean. It was said that the Deutschland could remain submerged for four days. When they got into the English Channel there was a cordon of warships barring exit to the Atlantic that made them extremely cautious. So Captain Koenig let his vessel lay on the bottom of the channel for a day and a night while the men enjoyed themselves with a phonograph and rousing German songs. When their enemies thinned out to some extent the submarine started again on her way and headed directly for Baltimore, which she reached without special incident.

The Deutschland immediately received the name of supersubmarine. Some thousand tons of dyes and other valuable products filled her hold. They were reported to be worth $1,000,000. The vessel was able to make twelve knots an hour on the surface and about seven knots when submerged. She traveled most of the way across on the surface, being under water about one-third of the time. In addition to her valuable cargo, she brought a special message from Kaiser Wilhelm to the president.

No other submarine, so far as known, had made a trip of such distance as the Deutschland up to that time. Longer voyages have been accredited to several British submarines, but they were either made with a convoy or broken by stops enroute. Soon after the beginning of the war, several Australian submarines journeyed from their far-away home ports to the Dardanelles, traveling 13,000 miles. They called at various points in the two Americas. Submarines built in America and assembled in Canada proceeded from Newfoundland to Liverpool before the Deutschland crossed the Atlantic, but they had another ship as convoy. The Sultan Selim and the Midullu clashed with Russian ships in the Black Sea, July 11, 1916, sinking four merchant vessels. They also bombarded harbor works on the Caucasian Coast near Puab. Both attacking vessels made their escape without injury.

Vienna reported on the same day the sinking of five British patrol boats in the Otranto Road, between Italy and Albania, by the cruiser Novara. Only nine men were saved.

Seaham Harbor, a small coal port near Sunderland, on the British Channel coast, was shelled by a submarine the night of July 11, 1916. Thirty rounds of shrapnel started several fires and caused the death of one woman. Berlin also claimed the sinking of a British auxiliary cruiser of 7,000 tons and three patrol vessels on the night of that day. The statement was never denied in London, and no details were made public as to the fate of the crews.

The Italian destroyer Impetuoso was torpedoed in the Adriatic, July 16, 1916, with a loss of 125 lives.

In retaliation for Turkish attacks upon her hospital ships, Russia announced July 21, 1916, that she would no longer respect hospital ships of the Ottomans. It was pointed out that hitherto all vessels bearing the markings of the Red Crescent Society, which is the Turkish equivalent of the Red Cross, had been uniformly respected. This declaration by Russia implied a depth of resentment that had swept through all of the allied countries because of deeds said to have been committed by the Teutons and their Turkish cohorts. Some few reprisals were taken by France in the way of air raids in retaliation for the bombardment of open cities. But this was the first recorded step of Russia in that direction and foretold a war in which all quarter would disappear.

Two years of fighting had cost both sides heavily upon the sea. Up to August 1, 1915, according to the best available figures, the allied navies lost seventy-one warships, with a tonnage of 326,855. Great Britain was a sufferer to the extent of forty-two ships in that first year, aggregating 254,494 tons, represented by eight battleships, three armored cruisers, four protected cruisers, four light cruisers, and twenty-three smaller craft. In the same period France lost twelve ships of 28,027 tons; Russia six ships of 21,775 tons; Japan seven ships of 4,801, and Italy four ships of 17,758 tons.

The losses of Germany, Austria and Turkey in 1915 were placed at eighty-nine ships, with a gross tonnage of 262,791. Of these Germany lost sixty-nine vessels, aggregating 238,904 tons, and consisting of one battle cruiser, five armored cruisers, ten protected cruisers and fifty smaller craft. Austria lost seven ships of 7,397 tons, and Turkey thirteen ships of 16,490 tons.

Curiously enough the second year's figures show smaller losses for both sides. The Allies are accredited with forty-one ships having a tonnage of 202,600, and the Teutonic allies with thirty-three ships, having a tonnage of 125,120. Thirty-four British ships were sunk, including two battleships, three battle cruisers, seven protected cruisers, two light cruisers, and seventeen smaller craft. The other losses were distributed between her partners in arms.

Germany's loss in 1916 was twenty-six ships—four battleships, one battle cruiser, six protected cruisers, and fifteen smaller craft, approximating 114,620 tons. The remaining casualties on the German side were divided between Austria and Turkey.

These figures do not take into account several vessels claimed to have been sunk by both sides but are predicated upon known sea casualties. During the two years Germany sustained a reduction of 18.5 of her strength in battleships and battle cruisers of the dreadnought era, which means ships built since 1904, and these are the units that really count in modern warfare. Britain is believed to have lost 6.6 of similar vessels. In light cruisers her loss was only 5.2 per cent, while Germany was weakened nearly 45 per cent in that class of vessel. The figures shift for vessels of an older type, showing a ratio of about two to one against Great Britain. This is due largely to the Dardanelles enterprise and because in some instances older craft were assigned to many dangerous undertakings where the newer ships were held in reserve. In every engagement of any consequence that took place during the first two years of war, with the single exception of the fight off Chile, Britain won and Germany lost. But Germany inflicted greater injury upon her opponent than any other nation in all the years of Britain's maritime supremacy. The actual material loss to her enemies was larger than her own. Despite this and the fact of Germany's strongest efforts Britain still ruled the waves.[Back to Contents]