Battle of Jutland 6 - The night: fight and flight

HMS Iron Duke. Jellicoe endured hours of 
uncertainty aboard his flagship as a result
of abysmal communications.

     

Once action had been broken off, both fleets were heading due south out of sight of each other as the night approached. The final action of daylight matched the first. Beatty, somewhat to the south west of Jellicoe, encountered Hipper’s battered fleet and immediately engaged them, inflicting further damage before Mauve’s 6 pre-Dreadnought battleships made their only intervention of the battle, drawing enough of Beatty’s attention and firepower to allow Hipper’s ships to escape into the gloom. Jellicoe rapidly decided that he would not pursue further action in the darkness. Rather he would keep between Scheer and safety in order to roll him up in the likely renewal of action in the morning. He knew the Germans were far better equipped, in men, machinery and tactics, to fight actions at night.

Final Stages. The maelstrom at the top of the
represents the actions to after midnight, when
Scheer's desperate gamble paid off, taking him
from the west of the BGF to its NE, and close 
to the safety of Horn Reef.

21.00  As darkness fell on 31/5, Jellicoe had good reason to be pleased with his situation. His own battle fleet was undamaged, and he had 143 warships placed between Scheer’s GHSF of 93 ships and their options for escape. Amazingly he was not yet aware of the loss of Indefatigible and Queen Mary from Beatty’s force, although he had observed directly the fate of Hood’s Invincible. He was confident that the morning would bring the opportunity to re-engage with Scheer. He calculated that a southerly course would keep him between Scheer’s escape routes to Wilhelmshaven or the river Ems further south. He knew that Scheer’s fleet was better equipped and trained for night manoeuvres, but he thought it unlikely the German, having twice turned 180 degrees to avoid the BGF would try to break across his line and head east to the alternative escape of Horns Reef. His reasoning was logical, but in fact it was precisely what Scheer intended to do. Scheer felt he had very little time (daylight in June breaks before 3am in northern waters) and virtually no chance of outrunning Jellicoe to reach his southern escapes. He concluded that his superior night capabilities and his destroyers gave him a fighting chance of getting his Dreadnoughts home. If he was very lucky, he might even pass behind Jellicoe’s rearguard and avoid contact altogether (and as it turned out he was lucky, with Jellicoe being further south than him). At 21.10 he ordered his fleet to steer SE towards Horns Reef (an order intercepted by Room 40, see below). Of Hipper's five battle cruisers, only Moltke could still operate effectively: Derfflinger had one functioning gun turret, and the other three were unable to fire. Scheer placed Hipper’s invalids and six of his own damaged Dreadnoughts in the rear; his best and least damaged battleships in the van of his line, and then pushed his cruiser and destroyer screens ahead.

As the Jellicoe (heading S) and Scheer (heading SE) battle fleets converged unknowingly in the dark, they formed a V shape, which by chance became an X, almost like a formation dancing move, and they missed each other. However, the smaller ships did not, and some fierce close range fighting ensued between opposing light cruisers. The Southampton was badly damaged, and the German cruiser Frauenlob was blown in half by an almost point blank range torpedo salvo. Jellicoe was aware of this action, but not of its importance. The incompetence of the Admiralty in London in transmitting (or not) both true and false information left Jellicoe unwilling to rely on any intelligence received, and dependent on direct reports from his own ships (patchy at best). Thus the Admiralty decided to pass on Room 40’s interception of Scheer’s 9.10 order to turn SE, but - crucially - did not pass on Scheer’s request for aerial surveillance reports on weather at Horns Reef. Jellicoe did not believe the first, but might have done in conjunction with the second. He was understandably bitter about this after the war, when all was revealed and it transpired that seven other relevant signals were intercepted by Room 40 that night and not passed on. Massie, in his history "Castles of Steel" is withering in his condemnation of Admiralty incompetence "Personal responsibility for this gross Admiralty failure..was never officially assigned. ..... Admiral Oliver, the Chief of Staff, charged with approving Admiralty messages sent to the Commander-in-Chief "had left the room for some much needed rest and had left in charge an officer who had no experience of German operational signals". The said officer simply filed the messages without action - you couldn't make it up.

SMS Pommern. One of the Pre-Dreadnoughts
mistakenly taken to Jutland by Scheer. They slowed the 
fleet and were in action only once. Pommern 
was sunk by torpedoes

24.00 Scheer’s fleet found itself in action with the rear-covering British destroyer flotilla just before midnight. Although these disrupted the German Dreadnoughts course for Horns Reef with their torpedo attacks, they were no match for the searchlights and night fire of the Germans. Of the 12 in the flotilla, 4 were sunk and 3 badly damaged. 

The final acts of the night were devastating explosions that destroyed two medium sized ships. The first was the British armoured cruiser Black Prince. Originally part of Arbuthnot's 1st Cruiser Squadron (see previous post) she had been detached and lost since that group had been broken up about 6 hours earlier. Heading south, looking for the BGF, she blundered into Scheer's Dreadnoughts just before midnight. She was massacred in a hail of floodlight and shells - sinking with all 900 crew lost. 

Less than two hours later, as Scheer's (by now) motley fleet completed their high risk transit across the stern of the British Fleet, and were less than thirty miles from Horn Reef, they ran into a final flotilla of destroyers guarding the NE aspect of the BGF. The destroyers, led by Stirling, captain of the Faulkner launched a torpedo attack. His tubes missed the leading Konig Dreadnoughts, but sunk the pre-Dreadnought Pommern (pictured above), which went down rapidly with the loss of 800 lives. On this occasion, Stirling had the presence of mind to signal Jellicoe directly regarding the whereabouts of the GHSF, but agonisingly his messages did not get through. Scheer had lost a few small ships, but it was a price worth paying for the now (almost) secured safety of his Dreadnoughts.

02.00 But why did no-one else signal to Jellicoe to alert him to the importance of the action astern his main fleet? A combination of mixed messages from the incompetents at the Admiralty, and silence from his own Fleet commanders left him completely to his own devices and, frankly, to guesswork. Admittedly, officers were reluctant to signal too frequently for the risk of giving away positions, but for this cause that reason should surely have been disregarded.  Jellicoe was content to steam south, believing he was cutting off Scheer’s escape while putting distance between himself and what he took to be German destroyers in his rear – it was after all the torpedo threat that concerned him the most. He would face unrelenting criticism for this after the war, and yet he had at least two senior commanders much closer to the action than he, who chose not to react. As first light broke around 02.00 on 1st June, Scheer was completing his fleet’s passage across Jellicoe’s stern, and was almost in sight of Horn Reef.

Not all their damaged ships got there. German destroyers torpedoed the stricken Lutzow after her crew had been taken off. Wiesbaden sank in the North Sea. Seydlitz, struggling badly, narrowly avoided the rear of the British fleet, but ran aground on the sands of Horn Reef. Moltke, with Hipper on board, was the only one of his squadron to avoid severe damage, but was detached from the GHSF. She was the last to make her escape, eluding the BGF by a southerly route.

04.00  At dawn, Jellicoe’s fleet had been widely dispersed. He expected that he was still to the SE of Scheer, and ordered a turn to the NW, both to get closer to his stragglers and to search for Scheer. Beatty was further to the south searching for Scheer. At 04.00 Jellicoe received belated but unequivocal news from the Admiralty that Scheer was almost at Horn Reef. Ironically, this was just as Beatty was seeking permission (brashly, in view of his previous errors and misjudgements) from Jellicoe to join him to the SW, the opposite direction, in looking for Hipper.
Jellicoe immediately realised the implication of the Admiralty message. The Battle of Jutland was over. there was nothing to do but sweep up and go home. At 04.15 Jellicoe set his fleet to cruising order, to sweep back northwards to base.