Von Spee’S Pacific Raiders
pp. 59-60 · Read in the full issue
Where the "Scharnhorst" and "Gneisenau"
Prowled in 1914
7^ HE “ PIM” article in July recounting how Sir Bickham Sweet-Escott , then Governor of Fiji , saved Suva from the German cruisers “Scharnhorst” and “ Gneisenau” in 1914, by a faked cable message to HMAS “Australia”, has prompted an Islands reader to send us the following details of the raiding squaaron’s movements in the Pacific. They are taken from an article by “Foretop", published in a Sydney newspaper a short time ago.
THE story of Vice-Admiral Count Maximilian von Spee and his squad ron in the Pacific is the story of Germany’s methods of using warships, aided by merchant ships and secret agents in neutral ports as raiders against the British Empire in wartime. For the Imperial German Navy, the merchant shipping services. Consular Corps, es pionage units, even individual German business firms and nationals in neutral countries were efficiently organised for sea-raiding activities against the Empire at least six years before the 1914-18 war began.
Conforming to a pre-determined scheme, Von Spee put to sea from his peace-time station—Tsingtao in Ger many’s then Chinese Concession—towards the end of June, 1914. He had under his direct leadership, two armoured cruisers “Scharnhorst” and “Gneisenau” (each of 11,400 tons), together with the supply ship “Titania”. Two light cruisers, “Em den” and “Nurnberg”, awaited their admiral at sea; while another light cruiser of Von Spec’s squadron, “Leipzig”, was in Mexican waters. Thus war, on August 4, 1914, found all the German admiral’s ships conveniently at sea “some where in the Pacific”, with all the factors of concealment and the possibility of surprise action in their favour.
The actual state of war occurred con siderably later than the Kaiser’s naval leaders expected, so that the first days of hostilities found Von Spec’s vessels m need of coal and supplies. Here the cun ningly organised German supply system came into operation. Several merchant men, loaded with coal and provisions, answered Von Spec’s coded summons and secretly effected a meeting with his war ships on August 11 and 12 off Pagan Island in the Marianas (Ladrone Islands), then a German possession, located about halfway between New Guinea and Japan.
COALING at the Ladrones occupied Von Spee for three days, during which time a plan of operations was developed in consultation with Berlin.
Concealment was maintained by restrict ing the use of wireless except for receiving coded instructions. Messages to Germany were sent through long-range trans mitters located in Germany’s various Pacific colonies or by cable through neu tral territory.
The “Emden”, after coaling, was sent from the Ladrones into the Bay of Bengal to commence one of the most notorious raiding cruises in naval annals.
The Marshall Islands, then a German colony about 1,500 miles east-south-east of the Ladrones, received a visit from the German raiders on August 26 to 30.
From here Von Spee occupied a position adjacent to the Australia-Japan trade route, and within striking distance of the shipping lanes to Canada and USA.
His whereabouts remained well concealed.
The future for raiding appeared bright.
But on August 23, 1914, the Anglo- Japanese alliance brought Nippon’s
declaration of war against the Central Powers. Then the siege of Tsingtao and general activity by the Anglo-Japanese naval forces made the North-west Pacific no longer healthy for German warships; so the squadron moved south-eastwards with a raiding objective in view.
Fanning Island in Central Pacific, al most on the Equator and half-way point on the important Sydney-Vancouver undersea cable, was the first British terri tory to be directly attacked by Von Spec’s raiders. September 7, 1914, saw the “Nurnberg” send a landing party to raid the cable station, break up the in struments, cut the undersea cables, and
depart with £720 in cash taken from the Following the disclosure of their where abouts by the Fanning Island raid and safe-breaking expedition, the Germans needed to create a diversion to confuse the general situation in the Pacific and obscure their next move. Accordingly, instructions were sent through agents in California and Mexico to the “Leipzig” to attack British shipping out of Mexican ports. This resulted in the sinking of the “Elsimore” on September 11, and “Bank fields” on September 25.
BOMBARDMENT of important Aus tralian coastal cities, such as Sydney or Brisbane, with the side issue of an attack on Australian-New Zealand overseas shipping, was an attractive pros pect to Von Spee at this stage; but once more the long arm of the Empire’s Senior Service, assisted by the French,
intervened. , .
The battle cruiser “Australia”, the
cruisers “Sydney”, “Melbourne”, and “En counter”, with three destroyers and two submarines, were on the Australian sta tion at that time, under command of Rear-Admiral Sir George E. Patey. The then flagship of the Royal Australian Navy possessed a fire power superior to the “Scharnhorst” or “Gneisenau”, while the Australian cruisers could deal with the “Nurnberg”. Also available was the French armoured cruiser “Montcalm”.
Faced by such a force, the German ad miral showed tactical judgment in leaving Australian and NZ waters unmolested.
New Zealand and Australian land forces now co-operated with naval units to increase the pressure on Von Spee.
Samoa was captured by an NZ force on August 29, and a similar fate befell Ger man New Guinea at the hands of an Australian expedition on September 11, Thus, Germany’s only two “contact points in the South Seas, with their valuable high-power wireless stations, were eliminated. The German position in the Pacific had literally fallen to pieces in only six weeks of war, and Berlin had to make new plans for the Kaiser’s “admiral at large”.
The primary requisite in the new Ger man plan was that Von Spee should mislead the British as to his intentions to operate in the South Atlantic; and he
set about this task in a thoroughly work manllke manner. He showed his squadron ?o n « amoa on September 14, then steamed 1,200 miles eastwards to the French Society Islands (Tahiti), and struck a blow for the Kaiser by bombarding Papeete and sinking the French ship "Zeiee” on September 22. Two more landing-party raids were made between September 26 and October 2 in the French Marquesas Group, about 600 miles north east of Tahiti.
The German warships left the Mar quesas on a false course westwards to give observers the impression they were going back to counter-attack Samoa. i-.ater they worked around to their true course, towards Easter Island, about 2,000 miles to the east-south-east, where Von Spee had ordered the cruiser “Leipzig” with several merchant ship tenders to meet him for coaling and provisioning.
Another cruiser, “Dresden”, had mean time made the Peat around the Horn from the South Atlantic and was to reinforce the Pacific squadron at the Easter Island rendezvous.
EASTER Island is a small volcanic out crop of some 45 square miles area, located in the Eastern Pacific, about 2,000 miles from South America. It is a Chilean possession, and, in 1914, was leased to a farming and ranching syn dicate, whose resident manager was a Britisher named Percy Edmunds. The island is world fanupus for its great stone idols of disputed origin, which have been the subject of much scientific research, as was the case in 1914—Mr. and Mrs Scoresby Routledge being there on a research expedition when the Germans arrived. The only other inhabitants were a German planter and some 250 natives.
When Von Spee arrived there on October 12 news of war had not reached the settlement.
Mrs. Routledge relates interesting de tails of Von Spec’s visit in her book, “The Mystery of Easter Island”. She tells how the Germans explained their arrival by saying that they were on a training cruise from China to Valparaiso—and also how that loyal Britisher, Mr. Edmunds, sold them over £l,OOO worth of foodstuffs, not knowing he was dealing with his coun try’s enemies. Later, however, a German officer let drop the inevitable, arrogant remark that “Germany would be in com mand by Christmas”; and, finally, when the German planter went on board for the usual “cultural visit”, the news that Germany was about to conquer the world was more than he could keep to himself after tasting generously of the Father land’s Rhenish wines.
It was indeed tragic that those isolated Britishers lacked any means of commu nicating to the British Admiralty the one piece of naval intelligence which could have altered the whole course of the war at sea and saved thousands of British lives.
With his ships fully coaled and pro visioned, Von Spee sailed confidently away from Easter Island during the even ing of October 18, 1914, leading the “Scharnhorst” (flagship), “Gneisenau”, “Nurnberg”, “Leipzig”, and “Dresden”, the two latter ships having joined him as ordered. A call was made at Mas-a-feura Island, 550 miles from the Chilean coast, on October 26. More coal was taken on from merchant ships, and the squadron pushed on eastwards, anxious to hurry the great enterprise of breaking through into the South Atlantic.
The rest belongs to history. On Novem ber 1, the German squadron defeated Rear-Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock’s British force in the Battle of Coronel. A month later Vice-Admiral Sturdee smashed Von Spec’s flotilla off Falkland Islands, on the Atlantic side of South America. The German admiral went down with his ship.