Raid on Yarmouth

Coordinates: 52°34′N 1°45′E / 52.57°N 1.75°E / 52.57; 1.75
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Raid on Yarmouth
Part of the
First World War

North Sea
Date3 November 1914
Location
Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, England.
52°34′N 1°45′E / 52.57°N 1.75°E / 52.57; 1.75
Result British Victory
Belligerents
 United Kingdom  German Empire
Commanders and leaders
United Kingdom David Beatty German Empire Franz von Hipper
Strength
3 destroyers
1 minesweeper
3 submarines		 3 battlecruisers
1 armoured cruiser
4 light cruisers
Casualties and losses
21 killed
3 wounded
1 submarine sunk		 235 killed
1 armoured cruiser sunk
Three British fishing trawlers were sunk during the raid
Raid on Yarmouth is located in North Sea
Raid on Yarmouth
class=notpageimage|
Location of Great Yarmouth

The Raid on Yarmouth, on 3 November 1914, was an attack by the

armoured cruiser
was sunk after striking two German mines outside its home port.

Background

In October 1914, the Imperial German Navy (

Kaiser had ordered that no fleet action was to take place but small groups of ships might still take part in raids. The German raids were to mine British waters, to pick off solitary ships or to entice larger groups into pursuing and being ambushed by the German High Seas Fleet, in relatively safe waters near Germany.[1]

Raiding British coastal towns might force the Royal Navy to alter the disposition of its ships to protect them. The British kept the greater part of the Grand Fleet together, so it would have superiority if it engaged the German Navy. The Germans hoped to encourage the British to detach more ships from the Grand Fleet for coastal defence, increasing the likelihood that the German Navy could attack isolated ships before the Grand Fleet could intervene.[2]

Prelude

The Yarmouth raid was carried out by the German

armoured cruiser Blücher and the light cruisers SMS Strassburg, Graudenz, Kolberg and Stralsund. Mines were to be laid off Yarmouth and Lowestoft and the ships were to bombard Yarmouth with their guns.[3]

Raid

At 16:30 on 2 November 1914, the battlecruiser squadron left its base on the Jade River. Two squadrons of German battleships followed slightly later, to lie in wait for ships that the battlecruisers might have lured. By midnight, the squadron was sufficiently north to be passing fishing trawlers from various countries. By 06:30 on 3 November, the patrol sighted a marker buoy at "Smith's Knoll Watch", allowing them to determine their exact position and close in to Yarmouth.[4] The Yarmouth coast was patrolled by the minesweeper HMS Halcyon and the old destroyers HMS Lively and Leopard. Halcyon spotted two cruisers, which she challenged. The response came in the form of shellfire from small and then larger guns. Arthur Pollen wrote that

Private letters speak of salvoes falling short and over in the most disconcerting manner, and of the ship being so drenched with water as to be in danger of foundering. One man was lost through a fragment of a shell.

— Pollen[5]
Outline map; bombardment of Yarmouth by German naval forces on 3 November 1914

Lively—some 2 

fall of shot and correct their aim. At 07:40, Hipper ceased firing at Lively and directed some shells toward Yarmouth, which hit the beach. Once Stralsund had finished laying mines, the ships departed.[6]

Halcyon—out of immediate danger—radioed a warning of the presence of German ships. The destroyer HMS Success moved to join them, while three more destroyers in harbour began raising steam. The submarines HMS E10, D5 and D3—inside the harbour—moved out to join the chase, but D5 struck a mine and sank. At 08:30, Halcyon returned to harbour and provided a report of what had happened.[7]

At 09:55, Admiral

Jade Bay to Wilhelmshaven—went off course and hit two mines. A number of the crew survived by sitting on the wreck of the ship, which had sunk in shallow water but at least 235 men were killed (reports vary).[8]

Aftermath

The German flagship, SMS Seydlitz

Admiral Hipper was awarded an Iron Cross but refused to wear it, feeling little had been accomplished. Although the results were not spectacular, German commanders were heartened by the ease with which Hipper had arrived and departed and were encouraged to try again. The lack of reaction from the British had been due partly to news that morning of a much more serious loss at the Battle of Coronel and because Admiral John Jellicoe, commander of the Grand Fleet, was on a train returning to his ships at the time of the raid.[9] According to Winston Churchill, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the British could not believe there was nothing more to the raid than briefly shelling Yarmouth and were waiting for something else to happen.[10]

Orders of battle

Royal Navy

Imperial German Navy

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Massie, 2004, p. 310
  2. ^ Massie, 2004, p. 310
  3. ^ Corbett, 2009 p. 250
  4. ^ Massie, 2004, pp. 310–311
  5. ^ Pollen, 1919, p. 241
  6. ^ Massie, 2004, pp. 309, 311
  7. ^ Corbett, 2009, pp. 251–252
  8. ^ Massie, 2004, pp. 312–313
  9. ^ Massie, 2004, pp. 312–313
  10. ^ Churchill, 1923, pp. 440–442

References

  • OCLC 769844622
    .
  • ISBN 978-1-84342-489-5
    . Retrieved 4 September 2016.
  • OCLC 865180297
    .
  • ISBN 0-224-04092-8
    .
  • Pollen, A. J. H. (1919). The British Navy in Battle. Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
    OCLC 710122
    . Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  • Ward, J. M. (1992) [1989]. Dawn Raid. The Bombardment of The Hartlepools, Wednesday, December 16th, 1914 (2nd ed.). Bishop Auckland: Printability.
    ISBN 1-872239-01-3
    .
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