CORONEL, 1914

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 32, 1 November 1932, Page 9

CORONEL, 1914

Gallant Fight Against Great Odds HOW CRADOGK’S MEN DIED To-day marks the eighteenth anniversary of the Battle of Coronel—the naval action fought off the coast of Chile on November 1,1914, between the British cruiser squadron commanded by Rear-Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock and the greatly superior German force under Admiral Count von Spee. The armoured cruisers Good Hope and Monmouth were sunk, and with them perished some 1400 officers and men—there was not a single survivor. The story of the events that led up to the action is one of the darkest chapters of the war at sea. As early as September 14 the Admiralty, by their cabled orders to Sir Christopher Cradock, had realised clearly that there was “a strong probability of the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau arriving in the Magellan Straits or on the West Coast of South America." They ordered Cradock, “as soon as you have superior force," to “search north as far as Valparaiso, break up the German trade, and destroy the German cruisers.” From that time onward Cradock acted in obedience to those very definite orders. But he never was able to gather under his flag that “superior force,” which bold action on the part of the Admiralty could easily have given him. Cradock’s order to the superior armoured cruiser Defence to join Him was countermanded by the Admiralty, which divided its available forces and kept an armoured squadron in the Atlantic “to leave sufficient force on each side [of South America] in case the hostile cruisers appear there [on the east coast] on the trade routes.” It is true he was given the old battleship Canopus, but Cradock’s protest that he considered it “impracticable, on account of Canopus’s slow speed, to find and destroy enemy squadron” was disregarded. Nevertheless, he carried on. Off the Coast of Chile.

Meanwhile the Germans had concentrated away off the Chilean coast a squadron comprising the Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, Dresden, Nurnberg, and Leipzig, all modern, fast, well-armed and notably efficient ships. The Good Hope and Monmouth, manned largely by reservists, were obsolescent and under-gunned ships of a type much criticised for their design when built. Cradock also had the modern light cruiser Glasgow and the auxiliary cruiser Otranto, which, with the slow and ancient Canopus, made up a very inassorted force. When Lord Fisher went to the Admiralty on October 29 as First Sea Lord, his first act was to improve the precarious position of Admiral Cradock. The Defence was sent to join him and he was ordered not to act without the Canopus but to keep his squadron concentrated on her and to make every effort to junction with the Defence. Prompt as was the action taken, it was too late—the cabled orders never reached Cradock, who was at sea 50 miles west of Coronel on the afternoon of November L At 5 p.m. that day Cradock righted the German squadron steaming to the southward in the teeth of a strong gale and a heavy sea. At 6.18 p.m. he called up the Canones, which, with the squadron’s colliers, was over 250 miles away, and signalled: “I am now S°ing to attack the enemy.” That was his last recorded message. The German ships manoeuvred for position Inshore of Cradock’s squadron and, at 7 o’clock, when the sun had just set and the British ships were sharply silhouetted against the western sky, von Spee opened fire. The German ships were almost invisible, except for the flashes of their guns, and the Good Hope and Monmouth were soon badly damaged. The British flagship blew up with an Immense explosion shortly before 8 o’clock. The Monmouth fell out of the line partly disabled, and, found about an hour later, was sunk with her colours flying. The Glasgow, also damaged, and the Otranto escaped in the darkness. The disaster was avenged five weeks later in the Battle of the Falkland Islands, when four of.the five German ships were sunk, the fifth being destroyed subsequently. “Never Was a Nobler Act.”

Possibly no better tribute to Cradock and his gallant men will ever be paid than that pronounced by Mr. Balfour, when, as First Lord of the Admiralty, he unveiled, in 1916, a memorial to Sir Christopher Cradock in York Minster. "What, then, was his design in attacking a force obviously greatly superior to his own; a force which, except by some extraordinary accident, some stroke of unexpected fortune, he could not expect successfully to cope with? Was it that he refused to count the risks? Such deeds of uncalculating daring make our blood tingle within us. Yet there is, after all, a higher wisdom than such calculation, and a higher courage than such daring, and that higher courage, I believe. Admiral Cradock to have possessed. Why, then, did he attack —deliberately, designedly, intentionally—a force which he could not have reasonably hoped either to destrov or put to flight? “The German Admiral in the Pacific was far from any port where he could have refitted. No friendly bases were open to hipi. If, therefore, he suffered damage, even though in suffering damage he apparently inflicted greater damage than he received, yet his power, great for evil while he remained untouched, might suddenly be utterly destroyed. . . . Admiral Cradock couid only judge by the circumstances that were before him. and If he judged that his squadron, he himself and those under him. were well sacrificed if they destroyed the power of this hostile fleet, then I say that there is no man, be he sailor or civilian, but would say that such a judgment showed not only the highest courage, but the greatest courage of unselfishness: and that Admiral Cradock, by absolute neglect of personal interests and ambitions, had shown a wise judgment in the interests of his country. .... If I am right in regard to the motives which animated him, there never was a nobler act. unsuccessful though it was, than that which he performed off the coast of South America. “His body is-separated from us by half the world, and he and his gallant comrades He far from the pleasant homes of England. Yet they have their reward, and we, looking at what they attempted, and judging what they did in the light of what they attempted, are surely right in saying that theirs is an immortal place in the great roil of naval heroes.”