Castles of Steel (54 page)

It was time to end it. Sturdee brought his ships in and pounded
Gneisenau
from 4,000 yards. The vessel was a place of carnage. Her bridge and foremast were shot away, her upper deck a mass of twisted steel, half her crew dead or wounded. One of
Carnarvon
’s shots had buckled
Gneisenau
’s armored deck, jamming it against the steering gear and forcing the ship into a slow, involuntary turn to starboard. Yet despite this devastation, the armored cruiser’s port guns and fore turret continued to fire spasmodically. At 4:47 p.m., she ceased firing and no colors were seen, but it was uncertain whether she had struck—several times her colors had been shot away, and each time they had been hoisted again. At 5:08 p.m., her forward funnel crashed over the side. By 5:15 p.m.,
Gneisenau
had been silent long enough for Sturdee to order “Cease Fire,” but before the signal could be hoisted, a jammed ammunition hoist on
Gneisenau
came free, shells again reached the cruiser’s fore turret, and a final, solitary shot was fired at
Invincible.
Grimly, the battle cruisers returned to work. A last British salvo was fired and she halted, rocking in the swell, water flooding in through the lower starboard gun ports. At 5:50, Sturdee repeated his signal to “Cease Fire.” Still, the German cruiser’s flag remained flying.

At 5:40 p.m., Maerker had given orders to scuttle the ship. The stern torpedoes were fired and the submerged tubes left open to the sea while explosive charges were fired in the main and starboard engine rooms. With thick smoke clinging to her decks and water gurgling and gushing through the hull, the ship rolled slowly over onto her starboard side.
Gneisenau
went down differently from
Scharnhorst,
submerging so slowly that men on deck were able to muster and climb down the ship’s sides as she heeled over. Survivors estimated that about 300 men were still alive at that time. Emerging on deck, the men, coal blackened from the bunkers and the engine rooms, carried the wounded with them and began putting on life belts. As the ship slowly heeled over, Captain Maerker ordered three cheers for the kaiser and there was a thin chorus of
“Deutschland, Deutschland über alles.”
When the order “All men overboard” came, the men slid down the side and jumped into the water. At 6:00 p.m.,
Gneisenau
sank and British seamen, watching from
Inflexible,
began to cheer until the captain ordered silence and commanded his men to stand at silent attention as their enemy went down.

When their ship went down, between 200 and 300 survivors were left struggling in the water. A misty, drizzling rain was falling, the sea was beginning to roughen, there was a biting wind, and the temperature of the water was 39 degrees Fahrenheit. The British battle cruisers, 4,000 yards away, carefully closed in on the survivors, attempting to repair and launch their own damaged boats, steaming slowly, lowering boats, and throwing ropes. All around the ships, rising and falling on the swell, men floated, some on hammocks, some on spars, some dead, some still alive and struggling, then drowning before a boat could reach them. A few German sailors were able by their own efforts to swim to the high steel sides of a British ship and be pulled in by ropes. Some were so numbed by the shock of cold water that they could not hold on to anything and drowned within sight of the rescuing boats and ships. Some were alive but too weak and, before they could be brought in, drifted helplessly away into the dark. The wind brought awful cries from the men in the water. “We cast overboard every rope end we had . . . ,” said a young English midshipman, “trying to throw to some poor wretch feebly struggling within a few yards of the ship’s side. If we missed him, the swell would carry him out of reach. We could do nothing but try for another man. . . . Some of the Germans floated away, calling for help. It was shocking to see the look on their faces as they drifted away and we could do nothing to save them.” Every effort was made; when
Carnarvon
with Stoddart on board reacted slowly in joining the rescue work, Sturdee dropped his mask of imperturbability. “Lower all your boats at once,” he signaled imperatively, and
Carnarvon
lowered three boats, which picked up twenty Germans. By 7:30 p.m., the rescue work was completed. Of
Gneisenau
’s complement of 850 men,
Invincible
had brought aboard 108, fourteen of whom were found to be dead after being lifted on deck.
Inflexible
picked up sixty-two, and
Carnarvon
twenty. Heinrich von Spee, the admiral’s son, did not survive.

One of those saved was Commander Pochhammer, second in command of
Gneisenau.
After the war, he recalled:

The ship inclined more and more. I had to hold tight to the wall of the bridge to avoid sliding . . . then
Gneisenau
pitched violently and the process of capsizing began. . . . I felt the ship giving way under me. I heard the roaring and surging of the water come nearer. . . . The sea invaded a corner of the bridge and caught me. . . . I was caught in a whirlpool and dragged into an abyss. The water eddied and murmured around me and droned in my ears. . . . I opened my eyes and noticed it was brighter. . . . I came to the surface. The sea was heaving. . . . I saw . . . [our ship] a hundred yards away, her keel in the air[;] the red paint on her bottom glistened in the sunset. In the water around me were men who gradually formed large and small groups. . . . Albatrosses with three to four yards wingspan surveyed the field of the dead and avidly sought prey. . . . It was a consoling though mournful sight to see the first of the English ships approaching . . . to see her brought to a standstill as near to us as appeared possible, her silent crew ranged along the side, throwing spars to help support us and making ready to launch boats. One boat was put in the water, then re-hoisted because obviously it was damaged and leaked. . . . The wind and the swell were slowly driving the English away from us. Eventually, two boats were launched . . . a smaller one . . . [came] in our direction, a sort of dinghy, four men were rowing . . . a young midshipman in the bow. A long life line was thrown to me . . . [but] I lacked strength to climb into the boat. The boat was half full of water. Eventually, the little boat bobbed alongside the giant, whose flanks had a dirty, yellow color. . . . I was quite unable to climb the rope ladder offered to me. A slip knot was passed under my arms . . . and then, all dripping, I found myself on a ship of His Britannic Majesty. From the hat bands I saw it was the
Inflexible.

Wrapped in blankets, given a hot-water bottle and brandy, and placed in a bunk in the admiral’s quarters, Pochhammer was treated as a guest of honor. Even in the cabin, the German officer was cold; British warships, he discovered, were not heated by steam but by small electric stoves. Captain Phillimore came to see him and invited him to dinner in the officers’ wardroom. There, Pochhammer, who spoke English, was offered ham, eggs, sherry, and port. Gradually, other rescued German officers appeared. That evening, as the senior surviving officer of the East Asia Squadron, he was handed a message from Admiral Sturdee: “Flag to
Inflexible.
Please convey to Commander of
Gneisenau:
The Commander-in-Chief is very gratified that your life has been spared and we all feel that the
Gneisenau
fought in a most plucky manner to the end. We much admire the good gunnery of both ships. We sympathize with you in the loss of your admiral and so many officers and men. Unfortunately the two countries are at war. The officers of both navies who can count friends in the other have to carry out their country’s duty, which your admiral, captain and officers worthily maintained to the end.” Commander Pochhammer replied to Sturdee: “In the name of all our officers and men I thank Your Excellency very much for your kind words. We regret, as you, the course of the fight as we have learned to know during peacetime the English Navy and her officers. We are all most thankful for our good reception.” That night, falling asleep, Pochhammer felt the vibrations as
Inflexible
moved at high speed through the South Atlantic.

The pursuit of the German light cruisers continued through the afternoon into darkness. For over two hours, from 1:25 p.m. to 3:45 p.m., in a straightforward stern chase,
Glasgow, Kent,
and
Cornwall
raced south after
Leipzig, Dresden,
and
Nürnberg.
The pursuing British ships—two armored cruisers and a light cruiser—were overwhelmingly superior in armament:
Kent
and
Cornwall
each carried fourteen 6-inch guns and
Glasgow
had two 6-inch and ten 4-inch; if the British could catch the Germans, the outcome was certain. In this situation, however, success depended more on speed than on guns and, except in the case of
Glasgow,
the margin of speed was narrow.

When the three German light cruisers broke away to the south, they were ten to twelve miles ahead of their pursuers. Had their design speed still been applicable—
Nürnberg
’s and
Dresden
’s were over 24 knots,
Leipzig
’s 23—their chance of escape would have been excellent. Nominally,
Glasgow,
designed to reach 26½ knots, could catch them, but one ship could not possibly have overtaken and overwhelmed three. Here, however, design speeds did not apply. The German ships had been at sea for four months with no opportunity to clean their hulls, boilers, and condensers. Beyond decreased efficiency and slower speeds, any attempt to force these propulsion systems to generate sustained high speeds could actually pose a threat. Under the extreme pressures reached in a high-speed run, boilers and condenser tubes contaminated by the processing of millions of gallons of salt water might leak, rupture, even explode.

Glasgow
quickly developed 27 knots and drew ahead of
Cornwall
and
Kent.
By 2:45 p.m., Luce, who was the senior officer on the three British cruisers, found himself nearly four miles ahead of his own two armored cruisers and within 12,000 yards of
Leipzig.
He opened fire with his bow 6-inch gun. One shell hit
Leipzig,
provoking her to turn sharply to port to reply with a 4.1-inch broadside. The first German salvo straddled
Glasgow
and when the next salvo scored two hits, Luce pulled back out of range. This reciprocal maneuver was repeated several times, but each time
Leipzig
turned to fire, she lost ground, giving the two slower British armored cruisers opportunity to creep up.

At 3:45 p.m., the German light cruiser force divided.
Dresden,
in the lead, turned to the southwest,
Nürnberg
turned east, and
Leipzig
continued south. Luce had to make a choice. For over an hour, his
Glasgow,
in front of
Kent
and
Cornwall,
had been firing at
Leipzig,
the rearmost of the German ships. The leading German ship,
Dresden,
already had a start on him of sixteen miles. The sky was clouding over; rain squalls were in the offing; at the earliest, if he pursued the distant
Dresden,
Luce could not come up within range until 5:30 p.m. He therefore decided to make sure of the two nearer, slower German ships and to let
Dresden
go. As the sky became overcast, then turned to mist and drizzle,
Dresden
grew fainter in the distance and eventually faded from sight.

The three pursuing British ships now followed two Germans:
Glasgow
and
Cornwall
pursued
Leipzig
to the south, while
Kent
went after
Nürnberg
to the east.
Cornwall
began hitting
Leipzig
with her fourteen 6-inch guns, while
Leipzig
gamely hit back at
Cornwall
with her ten 4.1-inch guns.
Cornwall,
shielded by her armor, thrust on without hesitation to give and take punishment. Using Sturdee’s tactics, she closed the enemy at full speed, firing her forward guns, then, as soon as
Leipzig
began to hit back, turned sharply to starboard to bring her broadside to bear. And while
Cornwall
was drawing
Leipzig
’s fire,
Glasgow
closed in from a different direction to hammer the enemy with her own 6-inch and 4-inch batteries. For nearly an hour, these tactics continued.
Leipzig,
hit time after time, was doomed, but her gunfire remained expert. She fired rapidly, hitting
Glasgow
three times and
Cornwall
ten.

At 6:00 p.m., with the range down to 7,000 yards,
Cornwall
began firing special high-explosive shells. The effect was immediate. A large fire broke out forward on
Leipzig
and her gunfire became sporadic. Nevertheless, the German light cruiser continued to fire back until 7:05 p.m., by which point her mainmast and two of her funnels were gone and she had become an inferno of flashes and dark smoke. At this point,
Cornwall
ceased fire, expecting the enemy to strike her colors.
Leipzig
did not strike. Accordingly,
Cornwall
closed to 5,000 yards and fired more salvos. When the two British cruisers drew in to see whether she had struck, she was seen to be a wreck, but her flag was still flying on the remains of her foremast. Luce waited. He was about to signal, “Am anxious to save life. Do you surrender?” when
Leipzig
fired another—and as it turned out, final—shot.

What happened next was the result of a grim misunderstanding.
Leipzig
had fired her last shot. Captain Haun was ready to abandon and scuttle his ship; her seacocks had been opened and Haun had ordered all hands on deck with their lifesaving gear. A hundred and fifty men gathered amidships, hoping to be saved. But the German ensign was flying. Luce, for his part, was ready to accept
Leipzig
’s surrender, but with the flag still flying she was considered an active enemy. The difficulty was that the fires burning around the base of the mast where the flag was flying prevented anyone from lowering it. Haun already had told his men, “If anyone can reach the ensign, they can haul it down, for we shall sink now”; one sailor had made a dash through the inferno and collapsed, burning, before he reached the mast. The British waited for a reply that did not come, and at 7:25 p.m., Luce ordered both
Glasgow
and
Cornwall
to resume firing. The effect on the groups of men gathered on
Leipzig
’s open deck was appalling. The shells burst in the middle of the groups; a few minutes earlier, when the light cruiser had fired its last shot, there had been 150 men left. Now fifty remained.