Georg von Hase had made himself comfortable. Cozy sofa, cup of coffee. The drink should, however, cool. A little later, the alarm sounded "Clear ship to battle" on the German warship "Derfflinger".
The capital ship plowed through the North Sea with four other battle cruisers, artillery officer Hase stormed from the fair to his station. "Suddenly, I spot big ships in my periscope - dark colossi, six tall and broad, giant ships," he noted later.
Hase observed how the British battlecruisers formed into a battle line: "Like a herd of giant animals of the primeval world, they jumbled together, with slow movements, shadowy, irresistible." At 15:48, the Germans opened the fire. A hellish slugfest over a distance of about 15 kilometers with grenades, up to half a ton. In the turrets: load, aim, fire, load, aim, fire.
Archive footage of the Imperial Fleet
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MIRROR TV
Stunned, British Vice Admiral David Beatty watched his ships being shot down. 16:06: The "Indefatigable" exploded in a fireball. Over 1000 dead. 16:26: A detonation tore the "Queen Mary". Out of 1274 men, only nine survived.
"Something seems to be wrong with our damned ships," Beatty swore. What the Briton did not know: from the south steamed the entire German deep-sea fleet. What the Germans did not suspect: 50 nautical miles northwest waited the British Grand Fleet, ready to destroy their opponent.
Steel column
A little later Beatty should lure the Germans with full steam to the north. Both fleets met in the North Sea off the coast of Jutland to the biggest naval battle in history. A fight that neither side had planned.
"Finally," said German sailor Richard Stumpf in his diary, "finally the big event has come." Since the outbreak of the First World War, the German High Seas Fleet had mostly lain idle in the harbor, for almost two years only drill and boredom, while comrades fought on land in the trenches. Neither could the German admirals decisively disturb British overseas trade nor break the naval blockade that isolated Germany from international trade.
Early in the morning of May 31, 1916, the German High Seas Fleet, under Commander Reinhard Scheer, cleared the anchor in Wilhelmshaven. On the open sea, the ships formed into a kilometer-long column of steel. 16 modern battleships, six battleships, plus small cruisers and dozens of torpedo boats with over 45,000 men on board.
Five German battlecruisers had preceded the High Seas Fleet, with Georg von Hase on board. They were to lure parts of the British fleet out of the harbors - to destroy them with concentrated firepower. When the Germans ran out, however, the Grand Fleet under Commander John Jellicoe was already at sea, because the British were able to decode the German radio traffic.
Deadly maneuver
28 battleships, nine battlecruisers and eight battleships, flanked by over 100 small cruisers and destroyers - about 60,000 men had the British on board. However, they did not know that the entire German High Seas Fleet was on the way.
Like the blind, 99 German and 150 British warships came together on the afternoon of May 31st. Without adequate air reconnaissance no side knew how strong the opponent was. And what ever happened on the North Sea. "I wish someone would tell me who's shooting and what's being shot," Jellicoe said as he heard gunfire beyond the horizon.
Abridged animation of the battle process
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Nicholas Jellicoe / Stiftung Deutsches Marinemuseum
The full version can be seen since 29 May 2016 in the German Maritime Museum Wilhelmshaven.
At around 6:15 pm, the Admiral fortunately formed his fleet to a battle line, ship by ship, to take the enemy under fire. Jellicoe could hardly believe his luck - at a 90-degree angle, the Germans headed for the British line. So his ships could cover the leading Germans with a bullet hail. Only the German top could effectively reciprocate the fire.
"Heavy hits hit our ship with tremendous force and exploded with a tremendous bang," Georg von Hase reported on the "Derfflinger". Shortly before he had observed the explosion of the British armored cruiser "Defense": "The ship was destroyed in atoms, every living being on board was already killed in the explosion," wrote Hase in his book "The Two White Peoples!". None of the nearly 900 men on board survived.
Nocturnal exchange
Powder smoke and intoxication billowed over the hazy sea, and muzzle flashes flashed from the guns over and over. Battleship fought battleship, smaller cruisers, destroyers and torpedo boats attacked.
The inside of the warships turned into slaughterhouses. "The fallen, as far as they were up, were burned beyond recognition," wrote Johannes Karl Groth on the conditions in a turret of the battle cruiser "Lutzow". The gunner tried to rescue a man from a pile of rubble. "A sad picture: both legs were torn off at the level of the knee joint, also the left arm at the level of the elbow."
In view of the threat of destruction Admiral Scheer had his fleet turn 180 degrees. Almost to safety, he changed his mind, ordered his ships back to the British bullet, changed his mind again.
Video footage of wrecks of the Skagerrak battle
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Innes McCartney / JD Contractor A / S
"Battle action into the enemy! Ran!", He had the battlecruisers and torpedo boats signaling to finally allow the rest of the fleet to flee. "We were actually in the absolute sausage kettle", described Georg von Hase the continuous shot, which descended on the "Derfflinger".
A miracle happened. Jellicoe had his ships turned off in the face of the torpedo shot. At barely ten nautical miles away, both fleets soon slid through the darkness. The Germans hurried south, the British followed suit, the fighting continued. Shortly after midnight, the British "Black Prince" exploded with 857 men, two hours later the German "Pommern". 844 dead. Almost she would have been safe - at dawn the High Seas Fleet passed the German minefields.
In the end, the Germans signed the victory. The Royal Navy lamented 14 submerged ships with 6094 dead, the German fleet 11 with 2551 dead. The balance of power in the North Sea remained as they were: the sea routes still blocked Royal Navy, far superior. The navy resumed the submarine warfare. The result: 1917 joined the US as another opponent in the war. The British had lost more ships, but achieved their goal.
"There are no good guys in the war"
"Almost 9,000 dead - and nothing has changed for Germany," said Nicholas Jellicoe the Skagerrak battle. For him it is a piece of family history; as a grandson of John Jellicoe he has written a book about it and created a website with an informative battle animation.
Why all this, a century later? "We live in an uncertain political time," explains Jellicoe. "We need to understand what it means to go to war, people have entered the First World War like sleepwalkers, and we too must be very careful today."
"It was complete madness to kill each other on such an industrial scale," Innes McCartney agrees. For years, the British underwater archaeologist has been exploring the wrecks of the battle. "I hope the people who read my book understand how pointless such a struggle is, never to repeat the mistakes of the past."
Also in Denmark, the memory of the largest of all conventional naval battles is still present today. "My grandfather could hear the battle noise," says Gert Normann Andersen. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary, the Danish diver and founder of an underwater services company opened the Sea War Museum in Thyborøn on the west coast of Jutland: "We want to show the consequences of war in our museum, there are no good boys in the war, you kill or you will killed. "
Better, you never face this decision.
Exhibition: "Skagerrak Naval Battle without Winner" - Opening on May 29, 2016, Stiftung Deutsches Marinemuseum, Wilhelmshaven.
Exhibition: Sea War Museum Jutland , Thyborøn, Denmark.
On the occasion of the 100th anniversary, the "Memorial to the Dead of the Battle of the Skagerrak" will open there.