An
interesting, well-researched documentary was shown about the Battle of Jutland
by Channel 4 on Saturday 21st May 2016. New technology enabled divers to have a close
look at the wrecks lying on the bed of the North Sea. It is hard for us these days to imagine what
life was like in WW1 when ordinary folk did not have telephones at home and
there was no television or radio (wireless).
During the First World War, Cecil
Roberts was a young journalist working for the “Liverpool Echo”. In early May 1916 Roberts went with a party
of other journalists on a “special naval mission” to “see the Navy in its
various activities”. They visited ships,
arsenals and building yards around the coast of Britain. After meeting Vice-Admiral Sir David Beatty
on HMS. Lion at Rosyth, they went to
Scapa Flow in the Orkney Islands, which Admiral Sir John Jellicoe had decided
was the safest harbour for the main British Fleet. Although Scapa Flow was too far north to
protect the east coast from the German bombardments (Scarborough, Whitby and
Hartlepool, December 1914), it meant that the German fleet were “bottled up…
save for the odd hit-and-run exploit.”
Roberts
interviewed Sir John Jellicoe aboard HMS Iron
Duke. As an amateur pianist himself,
he asked the Admiral if he played the baby grand piano that was in the
Admiral’s cabin. ”Very badly,” replied the Admiral. With regard to the war, Sir John Jellicoe
warned: “The main danger which we have to guard against is that of the Fleet being
forced to make false strategic moves owing to some outcry being caused by
people who think that unless guns are being fired, or the Fleet is constantly
in the vicinity of the enemy coast, the Navy is not doing its work to win the
war.”
The
British Navy had not seen significant action since the Battle of Trafalgar on
21st October 1805 but warfare had been very different back then when
there were no submarines or mines. Sir
John Jellicoe knew that, compared to British ships, the German ships were
faster and better equipped with thicker armour plating. German ships had better range-finders and
optical instruments for gunnery. However,
Jellicoe’s warning to the Admiralty of July 1914 about the inferiority of
British ships, went unheeded.
According
to Roberts, ‘Our shells were inferior… the magazine chambers had dangerous
defects, ship design was faulty and our cordite was defective, being unstable
at high temperatures’. Writing in
1968, Roberts added a note with regard to those
defects which were the possible cause of the sudden explosions that destroyed Vanguard, Bulwark, Natal, Princess Irene and Glatton.
This
would indeed seem to have been the case, for the documentary showed a German ship
that, in spite of having been hit 24 times by British shells, was afloat
and had to be scuttled with most of her crew still on board to avoid her
falling into British hands.
After
the Battle, Roberts went to a lot of trouble to try to find out the truth and
came to the conclusion that, while the Germans could claim a ‘tactical success’,
they “never again dared to challenge the British Fleet”. Their ships “rotted in the harbours with
deteriorating crews” and they were “forced to resort to unrestricted submarine
warfare which in turn failed and brought in the U.S.A.” Roberts felt that Jellicoe was right to urge caution and had
the British Fleet engaged the German ships at Jutland, there would have been a
far greater loss of life and shipping on both sides.
Cecil
Roberts “The Years of Promise” (Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1968), Chapter
Three “Beatty, Jellicoe and Jutland”, pp. 89 – 133.
Illustration: A painting by Charles Dixon, RI entitled "Windy Corner, Battle of Jutland" - depicting HMS "Bellerephon", a Dreadnought.
