Battle of Heligoland Bight
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| First Battle of Heligoland Bight | |||||||
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| Part of the First World War | |||||||
 SMS Ariadne in action at Heligoland Bight |
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| Belligerents | |||||||
 British Empire |
 German Empire |
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| Commanders | |||||||
| David Beatty Reginald Tyrwhitt |
Leberecht Maass† | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| 5 battlecruisers 8 light cruisers 33 destroyers 3 submarines |
6 light cruisers 19 torpedo boats 12 minesweepers |
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| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 35 killed 55 wounded |
712 killed 149 wounded 336 captured 3 light cruisers sunk 1 light cruiser badly damaged 2 light cruisers damaged 2 torpedo boats 1 destroyer sunk |
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The First Battle of Heligoland Bight was the first naval battle of the First World War, fought on 28 August 1914, after the British planned to attack German patrols off the north-west German coast.
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[edit] British forces
The Harwich Force of two light cruisers, Arethusa and Fearless, and 31 destroyers, under the command of Commodore Reginald Tyrwhitt, made a raid upon the German navy patrols west of the German naval base at Heligoland. Its actions were to be coordinated with a submarine force commanded by Commodore Roger Keyes. Providing cover for the Harwich Force were "Cruiser Force C" with five old armoured cruisers and "Cruiser Force K" under Rear Admiral Moore with the battlecruisers Invincible and New Zealand. The Admiralty did not consider more support necessary, but Admiral John Jellicoe, Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Fleet, subsequently sent the First Battlecruiser Squadron under Vice Admiral David Beatty and the First Light Cruiser Squadron under Commodore William Goodenough to provide cover and support. The Admiralty's failure to inform Tyrwhitt and Keyes of this change in plans later caused considerable confusion on the battlefield.
On top of these, British submarines were deployed. E class submarines E4, E5 and E9 were ordered to attack reinforcing or retreating German vessels. E6, E7 and E8 were positioned 40 miles further out to draw the German destroyers out to sea. D2 and D8 were stationed off Ems to attack reinforcements should they come from that direction.
[edit] Opening action
.jpg/180px-SMS_Mainz_sinking_(photo).jpg)
In the early hours on 28 August, the Harwich Force encountered the first German torpedo boats west of Heligoland. Not entirely surprised by the attack, the Germans hastily deployed the light cruisers Frauenlob and Stettin, joined shortly afterwards by four more light cruisers, including Rear Admiral Leberecht Maass' flagship, Köln.
Finding his force outgunned and under heavy fire, with Arethusa badly damaged by Frauenlob, Tyrwhitt received initial assistance from Commodore Goodenough's squadron of six modern Town class light cruisers: Southampton, Birmingham, Falmouth, Liverpool, Lowestoft and Nottingham. Frauenlob suffered severe damage herself and retreated to Heligoland, but Mainz, arriving on the battlefield from Emden, found herself between Tyrwhitt's and Goodenough's forces and was sunk after a long and valiant battle.
[edit] Battlecruisers
With more German cruisers careening about in the fog and smoke and much confusion on both sides, Tyrwhitt requested assistance from Beatty's battlecruisers at 11:25 am. Beatty, with the battlecruisers Lion, Queen Mary and Princess Royal, had by then linked up with Rear Admiral Moore's Force K and was some 25 miles to the north. The five battlecruisers arrived at about 12:40pm and sank Köln and Ariadne, leaving the scene before the Germans, impeded by low tide, could get their own battlecruisers out of Wilhelmshaven.
[edit] Aftermath
The battle was a clear British victory. Germany had lost the three light cruisers Mainz, Köln and Ariadne and the destroyer V 187 sunk, and the light cruiser Frauenlob had been severely damaged. The light cruisers Strassburg and Stettin had also been damaged. German casualties were 1,242 with 712 men killed, including Rear Admiral Maass, and 336 prisoners of war. The Royal Navy had lost no ships and only 35 men killed, with 40 wounded.
The most significant result of the battle was the effect on the attitude of the Kaiser. To preserve his ships the Kaiser determined that the fleet should, "hold itself back and avoid actions which can lead to greater losses." Admiral Pohl, Chief of the German Naval Staff, wired Ingenohl that, "in his anxiety to preserve the fleet [William] ... wished you to wire for his consent before entering a decisive action."
Tirpitz was outraged by this decision. He wrote after the war, "The Emperor did not wish for losses of this sort ... Orders [were] issued by the Emperor ... after an audience with Pohl, to which I as usual was not summoned, to restrict the initiative of the Commander-in-Chief of the North Sea Fleet. The loss of ships was to be avoided; fleet sallies and any greater undertakings must be approved by His Majesty in advance. I took the first opportunity to explain to the Emperor the fundamental error of such a muzzling policy. This step had no success, but on the contrary there sprang up from that day forth an estrangement between the Emperor and myself which steadily increased."[1]
Churchill after the war observed:
All they saw was that the British did not hestitate to hazard their greatest vessels as well as their light craft in the most daring offensive action and had escaped apparently unscathed. They felt as we should have felt had German destroyers broken into the Solent and their battle cruisers penetrated as far as the Nab. The results of this action were far-reaching. Henceforward, the weight of British Naval prestige lay heavy across all German sea enterprise ... The German Navy was indeed "muzzled". Except for furtive movements by individual submarines and minelayers, not a dog stirred from August till November.[2]
