At 21:30 on the night of 11th August 1914 three Australian destroyers snuck into the harbour of Simpsonhafen in German Neu Guinea torpedoes and guns primed to sink the German vessels at anchor there. With one swift blow the three small vessels were going to quash German naval plans for the Pacific region.
The War’s evolution from a dispute between Austro-Hungary and Serbia into a global conflict led to the two sides having to look to their colonies and secure the sea lanes. In Berlin the situation was quite simple with only two fleets being abroad as well as a couple of lone cruisers whose Captains already carried sealed orders for what to do as and when war began (in case you haven’t got around to reading my Karlsruhe article).
For Winston Churchill, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the situation was exponentially more difficult and the rolling blue abyss became a giant chess board with German and Allied pieces moving continually. The race was on to try and clear the board of the Germans as quickly as possible to secure trade routes, troop transports and colonies. There were two ways to do this, the first was to remove Germany’s ability to fight a naval campaign in the colonies by taking her colonies and destroying the wireless stations or destroying the German warships at sea.
Taking the Colonies was, in these early days, very problematic as that would entail robbing the Western Front of troops at a vital juncture as well as a massive amount of logistics though at the same time trying to find a handful of enemy cruisers scattered around the world and be able to destroy them was just as difficult a concept. Instead a median was found in attempts to close off their main ports and where possible wireless transmitters were to be destroyed by naval or local forces.
Churchill lorded over the world map moving his ships and squadrons about whilst trying to conceive of what the German commanders would try to do and where they would go before using wireless to move his pieces.
Through the fog of war one vital German piece was moving and it held the potential to cause severe trouble for the Allies. Vizeadmiral von Spee’s Ostasiengeschwader, though not the most powerful vessels in the region, were formidable enough if controlled by a wise officer who not only had the measure of his vessels but also his men, the region and his logistics. Sadly for Chuchill, Maximilian Graf von Spee was such a man. The German colonial empire was made up of countless islands sprinkled across the Pacific where warships or their auxiliaries could hide, there were also plenty of civilian ships that von Spee might offload guns and crew on to to create a force of raiders that could ravage merchant ships and tying down all of the vessels at his disposal in the region.
The region also had large amounts of British colonies and interests including India, Australia and New Zealand. Von Spee could turn up anywhere and fire off a bombardment or with his mere presence close a shipping lane to traffic harming the British war effort. The Royal Navy had to be everywhere at once until the German showed his hand.
For Admiral Jerram in Hong Kong and Patey in Australia, having Churchill watching over their shoulders and dictating directions was more than a bit frustrating. In previous centuries Admirals had had the freedom to command their fleets as they wished when they were thousands of miles away from London with no way to receive commands. For Patey it was doubly so as he answered to the Australian parliament as the commander of the Royal Australian Navy but he had an idea where the Germans would be and if he struck quickly he could knock von Spee’s fleet out of the war before the politicians in Canberra could overrule him.
The question on everyone’s lips was where would von Spee go? Intelligence of where the German vessels were at the start of the war was pretty sketchy. No one seemed to know where the armoured cruiser Scharnhorst was, her sister, Gneisenau was reported in Shanghai and simultaneously at Nagasaki (probably with her sister), Emden was at Tsingtau and Nurnberg could be anywhere having left Honolulu at the end of July.
Patey was pretty sure he knew where von Spee would go though and it was right on his doorstep. Neu Guinea had not only a wireless station but two deep water ports at Friedrich Wilhelm Harbour and Simpsonhafen at Rabaul on the island of Neu Pommern near the capital of Herbertshohe. It made perfect sense as von Spee would have access to supplies, coal, the wireless station and knowledge the main British fleet under Jerram would be heading to blockade their Chinese concession port at Tsingtau. In a letter dated 10th August Patey wrote;
“As far as I can judge the whole of the German Eastern fleet is concentrating off German New Guinea and I am going there after them.”
The Australian fleet had started the conflict at Sydney less HMAS Sydney and the destroyers Yarra, Parramatta and Warrego which were instead at Moreton Bay, Brisbane. The Melbourne was to redeploy to Freemantle but Patey would take the rest of the fleet as quickly as he could to waters off Port Moresby where he expected to find von Spee. Time was of the essence as the parliaments of New Zealand and Australia were already discussing offensive operations in Samoa and Neu Guinea (respectively) and any landing would require his fleet as an escort.
News reached him on the 6th August that the Scharnhorst was heard signalling near Malaita east of the Solomons and she was heading South East. The Melbourne was returned to his flag with the older Pioneer of the New Zealand force taking her position.At the same time Patey was attempting to signal the China Station’s CO, Martyn Jerram, to come down from the North and together they could trap von Spee but the other Commander was operating under a wireless blackout and following Churchill’s orders to isolate Tsingtau with his own vessels.
On 9th August Patey gathered his Captains and outlined his plan of attack. The battle-cruiser Australia would hang back whilst the Sydney and three destroyers would advance into Friedrich Wilhelm Harbour at night before the moon rose. The destroyers would enter the harbour and sink any German warships found there before proceeding to Simsonhafen and repeating the same move. If no ships were found then in the morning they would land sailors at Herbertshohe to find and destroy the wireless station.They hoped that not only would they catch Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Nurnberg but also the armed survey ship Planet and Governor’s launch Komet, a fact that Lieutenant-Commander Hill of the Parramatta noted in his diary.
The weight of the attack was starting to play on Patey’s mind, especially with news reaching him that the Scharnhort’s signals were getting fainter as she moved further away and he wrote of logistical issues too.
“It is a most difficult problem as the distances are so very great out hee, the problem of keeping the ships supplied with coal and oil is a most difficult one. Iam now nearly 2000 miles from Sydney our principal base and 500 from Simpson Haven… I am doubtful if any German men of war will be there as there may be some colliers, and there is a wireless station that I want to destroy. After that I shall be very hard up for coal and oil”
At 17:30 the three destroyers, in company with the Sydney departed for Simpsonhafen and over the following hour cleared for action and went to quarters. Hill would also remark in his diary that they were proceeding with “nothing being known of defences or fortifications” such as minefields or shore batteries around the harbour and that they were basically relying on luck to see them through.
Leaving the Sydney at Pried Point at 21:00 the destroyers crept into the harbour at a slow speed to using the land as cover and the dark moonless night Unsighted they made a systematic search of the harbour, torpedoes primed and ready. Hill noted in his diary that they found;
“Nothing afloat in Harbour. Only thing sighted was a hundred or so natives dancing tango round fire on beach (Huge disappointment). Enemy given us the slip.”
A further search of Wilhelm harbour was just as fruitless and the destroyers returned to the Sydney to make their report and the decision was made to wait for first light before returning and shelling the wireless station and completing one of their objectives. However on their return they could see no Wireless tower to shell.
Orders were given aboard the Sydney and at 10:30 and Hill sailed the ten miles to Herbertshohe where he led an armed shore party from the Parramatta to search for the elusive station but as they approached they saw the inhabitants fleeing into the jungle to escape them. Hill’s men searched the town for evidence and two captives were brought before him.
“One German missionary & one half cast who spoke English. Could get no information out of them even with revolver down their necks, very loyal”
With the threat of execution not swaying the prisoners Hill’s men followed telegraph wires along the beach and found the abandoned Post Office where cables were cut, the telephone exchange smashed up and left “laden with cigars, postcards & coconuts (loot)” before releasing the prisoners. With coal running low the force withdrew to meet with Patey who was growing more anxious about the vulnerability of his unescorted colliers.
On the 12th August the old protected cruiser HMAS Encounter was cruising slowly through the St George’s passage off Neu-Mecklenburg island when a column of smoke was seen approaching. Lookouts reported it was a German cruiser and the decks had to be quickly cleared for action of wood, sacks of food and stores as well as the ship’s chicken coop. Sailors rushed to action stations, guns were loaded and they collectively held their breath.
As they closed on the vessel they must have been very relieved to see the tramp steamer Zambesi approaching. They pulled over the German flagged vessel and found she was carrying parts for the wireless station and an engineer who was due to finish its commissioning. The engineer revealed that the elusive station was far in land and that a proper landing force would be necessary to take it.
As Patey coalled he was of the opinion that the Germans had withdrawn to Narau via Samoa and that he should try their next but on the night of the 12/13 August he received a message from the Governor of New Zealand regarding the sea lanes to Samoa. Believing that the Germans were still near Patey responded that they were not safe enough for New Zealand’s elderly three P class cruisers and would at once depart to meet them near Fiji.
But now this had all been achieved where was von Spee?
At the time of the raid on Herbertshohe von Spee was at Pagan Island in the Northern Marianas some 1500 miles to the north with the Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Nurnberg waiting for more supply ships to join his flotilla. On the 13th August he held a meeting with his commanders including the freshly arrived von Muller of the Emden and Thierrichens of Prinz Eitel Friedrich to discuss his plans and noted his concern about the location of the Australia observing that she alone could decimate his squadron.
The Australian fleet would never get to engage von Spee’s whole squadron though von Muller was destined to run in to the Sydney at the Cocos Islands - a story for another time.