The British fleet that set off from Cork to the waters off Skar included the Minotaur-class armored cruiser "Defense", which pursued the German armored cruiser here, the Monmoth-class armored cruiser "Donegal" which belonged to the home defense fleet, the old protective cruisers "Blenheim", "Creskent", and "Newtown", and the destroyers "Osprey", "Lewen", "Alert", "Cheerful", and "Horse Race", a total of 10 large and small combat ships. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 The French armored cruiser "Edgar" followed, but was not incorporated into the sailing formations of the British fleet.

After an hour and twenty minutes of sailing westward at full speed, a gray water reconnaissance plane suddenly appeared over the British fleet, which immediately cast a shadow over the mind of the commander of the British fleet, Rear Admiral Abbasnot. There had never been any intelligence that the German Scharnhorst-class armored cruisers were equipped with water reconnaissance aircraft, and while this simple modification was technically and spatially feasible, there may be something else behind it.

Naval aviation should have been the British Navy's superior arms ahead of European countries, they began to use airships for naval gun firing in 1909, began to equip aircraft in 1911, and converted an old cruiser into the world's first seaplane carrier the following year, but just when the British steadily developed naval aviation at their own pace, the German Navy on the other side of the North Sea sprung up, and they put the aircraft catapult technology invented by the Americans into practical use, and secretly built the world's first aircraft carrier, and ordered a zeppelin unit capable of long-range reconnaissance. By the outbreak of the war, the German Navy had far more aircraft and airships than the British Navy, and its technical and tactical superiority was fully demonstrated in the Battle of London during the First Battle of Flanders. The British, aware of the consequences of this disparity, were unable to push the country to the brink of danger by a series of defeats, with large-scale ship repairs and rush construction depleting their own stockpiles at an alarming rate, while the losses of the British merchant fleet were increasing day by day. In the case of material shortage, from September to October, 240 aircraft were manufactured in British factories, and the monthly output was more than 6 times that of the pre-war period, but it was far from meeting the needs of the battlefield, and most of the old models of aircraft could not match the German combat attack aircraft.

"Sir, we just intercepted the Germans' radio communications, and the plane was informing its mothership about us. The German fleet should have been 40 nautical miles northwest of us, based on the bearings described by the German pilots, but no further information could be obtained from the German communications. ”

The staff officer's report made Rear Admiral Abbasnot, who was in command of the fleet of the "Donegal", even more grim. In order to ascertain the position of the German fleet, two Schott seaplanes were sent to search the waters near Skar at the same time that the British fleet set sail from Cork Harbour.

About a quarter of an hour after adjusting its course to the northwest, the watchpost on the ship saw the two British troop transports fleeing in disarray in the sea ahead, but the British destroyers escorting it were nowhere to be seen, and the plume of smoke from the ship's sailing could be faintly seen in the distant sea.

Rear Admiral Abbasnot ordered the battle alarm to be sounded and the formation of the fleet to be deployed in pre-battle formation: two armored cruisers and three protective cruisers formed battle columns, and five destroyers spread out in front of them, like a straight T-shaped sweeping in the direction of the enemy ships.

All the British ships were quickly put into position, and Abbas Noth set his sights on the French armored cruiser that was following the British fleet. He is not sure what the quality and fighting spirit of the French naval officers and men are today, but the Edgar-Günet-class is the last class of armored cruisers built by France, although the caliber of the main guns is not as good as the British Warrior, the Minotaur and the German Scharnhorst, but the single ship is equipped with 14 main guns, has a strong firepower density, and the defense data on paper is also on par with the top pole patrol of the British and German Navy.

Of the British fleet commanded by Abbasnot, only the "Defense" had the strength to match the German Scharnhorst-class, and his flagship "Donegal" was only a lightweight armored cruiser with a displacement of nearly 10,000 tons and equipped with 6-inch naval guns.

Since Britain and France were allies, the French armored cruiser had no concerns about whether to enter the war or not, and Abbas knew that the French were concerned about accepting the command of the British in battle, and that he himself had no authority to deal with the matter, so he had to ask the British Admiralty for instructions and invite the French warships to move closer to his fleet.

Ten minutes later, two dark shadows appeared in the distant sea. The Germans had already learned of the arrival of the British fleet through their water reconnaissance aircraft, so they did not continue to chase the two British troop carriers at full speed, or to carry out ultra-long-range artillery bombardment on them. Their two armored cruisers were perfectly capable of avoiding this British fleet as long as the Germans wanted to, but they did not turn around and slip away.

"Twenty-four thousand yards from the enemy!"

As the loud voice of the firing commander came from the firing control command room on the bridge, the atmosphere on the bridge of the "Donegal" suddenly became tense. In sight, the two German battleships were gradually revealing their slender sides. Abbasnot and the officers on the bridge watched with telescopes in stride, their hulls painted in gray and white, making it difficult for their opponents to judge its speed from the waves, while their three chimneys were all exhausting smoke, and the plumes of smoke were not thick, so it could be inferred that they were not going fast......

"It's not right...... They...... Not the Scharnhorst class! ”

The words of the staff officer beside him pierced the doubts in Abbasnot's heart. Thinking of the cunning tactics that the Germans had used, a chill ran behind him, and fine beads of sweat appeared on his sideburns.

A moment later, another officer on the bridge exclaimed: "Battle cruisers! Damn it! That's two German battlecruisers! ”

There was a dead silence on the bridge.

Abbasnot stared at the two shadows in the telescope, their silhouettes were not very clear, the three chimneys were undoubted, the towering column masts and the thick box bridge were also typical of the German large warships of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, at first glance it would indeed make people think that they were German Scharnhorst-class armored cruisers, but if you look closely, it is not difficult for insiders to find that their size is by no means more than 13,000 tons of displacement, and these are not two sister ships of the same type, There are certain differences in the lines of the hull and the layout of the deck building. If you can observe them up close, you will be able to find out more clues and even see their true identity at a glance, but this is the sea, a suffocatingly tense and cruel territory, and the down-and-out side simply doesn't have that much bother to catch these clues.

"Twenty-two thousand yards!"

The sound from the firing command room clearly reached the ears of every British officer on the bridge, if the two really German battle cruisers in front of them, with the performance of the German Navy in the battles of Jutland and Flanders, the 10 British ships here plus 1 French armored cruiser would have no chance of winning!

The British used yards as the unit of distance, 22,000 yards was just over 20,000 meters, which was already within the effective range of the German battle cruisers, but the two battleships on the sea in the distance remained silent. However, in the eyes of a professional officer like Abbasnot, who specializes in ship command and has extensive seafaring experience, the Germans have adjusted to the ideal shooting position and can fire at any time. The reason why there was no shooting may have been just to get the ignorant and fearless British fleet to take the initiative to get closer.

Abbasnot knew that he could not hesitate any longer, and he ordered in a loud voice: "Pass my order, the fleet will turn right 2 compass points to cover the withdrawal of the troop carriers!" ”

At the moment, the non-commissioned officer in charge of the signal and the sailors who were in charge of the flag signal were unknown, but every officer on the bridge spontaneously performed his duties in accordance with this order, so that the warship, which carried more than 600 officers and men, and the entire fleet, could carry out Abbasnot's orders in place.

The British fleet turned to avoid the battle, and the German commander on the opposite bridge naturally saw it, and the two battleships painted with "fashionable" camouflage paint adjusted their course slightly, so that the distance between the two fleets continued to decrease, and when the firing commander of the "Donegal" reported a reading of 17,500 yards, that is, a distance of 16,000 meters, the two German battleships opened fire one after another. The shells screeched at the British fleet, and then fell with a bang, stirring up columns of water that rushed to the surface of the sea, and the rumbling explosions resounded across the sea......

Looking at the rising waves, Abbas not, on the contrary, calmed down, and said to his colleagues on the bridge: "That's a German battle cruiser with 12-inch naval guns, no doubt!" ”

The Moltke-class was armed with 11-inch guns, and according to Abbasnot's judgment, the two German cruisers that attacked them were "De Fllinger" and "Seydlitz".

Because of its similar silhouette and configuration, the "De Fllinger" was considered an improved version of the Sedlitz by the outside world. The difference in standard displacement between the two is 1500 tons, and the overall size of the "De Fllinger" is slightly larger, but such a gap is not easy to gap at a long distance and there is a visual dislocation, and more importantly, the crew erected a fake chimney in the middle of the deck, and all the battle cruisers of the German Navy are in a double chimney configuration, only the Scharnhorst-class (with a change in design from the historical original) and the Adalbert-class armored cruisers are three-chimneys, which is obviously the primary reason for the miscalculation of the British crew.

On the other hand, the battle between two German battle cruisers against the British convoy took place in the early morning, and the view on the sea was not ideal. In order to achieve a quick victory, the German ships launched an attack on the two most striking protective cruisers in the British fleet with a fast rate of fire, sinking one on the spot and severely damaging the other, and this frequency of main gun fire also made the British think that they were armored cruisers equipped with 8 or 9-inch calibers, and as a result, both the battered British protective cruisers and the troop carriers that fled in panic sent distress telegrams claiming that they had been attacked by two German armored cruisers.

The combination of the Germans' elaborate camouflage and the British careless miscalculation created a precarious situation for the Abbas nott fleet and the French armored cruiser Edgar. In terms of firepower, all the British and French warships here together are less than one of the other side; In terms of speed, except for destroyers, none of the British and French warships here could outrun the German battle cruisers, not to mention that the two troop carriers were still in this terrible sea.

(End of chapter)