Gotland bout 19 June 1915 g. Part of 2
So, at a meeting with the commander in chief V.A. Canina after a five-hour debate on June 17, 1915, a decision was made in principle on a raid on Memel. Now it was necessary to prepare a plan of operation and do it very quickly, because, according to intelligence, the imperial review in Kiel was to take place the next day, that is, June 18, after which German warships would return to their posts. In order to have time to carry out the operation, the ships had to go to sea already on the night of June 17-18, and it was necessary to prepare for the exit. All this together meant that the headquarters of the imperial Baltic fleet literally a few hours remained to prepare the plan of operation.
Strangely enough, a very original plan of a military operation was born over such an insignificant time. It envisaged the engagement of disparate forces over a considerable area. The plan envisaged the formation of three units of ships:
1) shock group;
2) covering forces;
3) group demonstration action.
Shock group consisted of a special purpose unit, which included:
1) armored cruiser "Rurik";
2) Oleg and Bogatyr armored cruisers;
3) Novik squadron;
4) The 6 division of destroyers, including “Kazan”, “Ukraine”, “Military”, “Terrible”, “Steregushchy”, “Zabaykalets”, “Turkmenets-Stavropol”.
Without a doubt, everyone who reads this article remembers perfectly the TTX of the cruisers and Novik, as for the 6 Division, it was composed of “post-Susim” destroyers of the “Ukraine” type, which had 730 tonnes of speed and armament, consisting of two 25-mm guns, one 102-mm, four machine guns and two one-tube 37-mm torpedo tubes.
The special purpose detachment was led by Rear Admiral Mikhail Koronatovich Bakhirev, who in 1914 r took command of the 1 cruisers brigade, and before that was the commander of the armored cruiser Rurik.
Cover forces included:
1) battleships "Glory" and "Tsesarevich";
2) armored cruisers “Bayan” and “Admiral Makarov”;
3) submarines "Cayman", "Dragon", "Crocodile", "Mackrel", "Perch" and E-9.
The first three boats were Caiman type ships of the same type that had 409 / 480 tons of surface / submarine displacement, surface gasoline engines and electric submersible engines on which the boats developed 9 and 5 nodes, respectively. The boats of one 47-mm and one 37-mm cannons were armed, as well as four 450-mm torpedo tubes. These ships were the brainchild of the "gloomy American genius" of engineer S. Lack, who envisioned many unique features in his project, such as wooden superstructures, a camera for divers and retractable wheels (!) To move along the bottom, although they were finally abandoned. Unfortunately, the submarines of the Cayman type were also distinguished by an almost complete lack of combat capability, which made their use in the First World War extremely difficult. As for the "Mekreli" and "Perch", it was small (151 / 181 tons) and very outdated ships, managed to take part in the Russian-Japanese war. In essence, of all six submarines that were part of the Covering Force, only the magnificent British E-9 that had 672 / 820 tons, the submarine / surface displacement, 16 / 10 units speed, and torpedo armament, which included 2 nasal, 2 traverse and one aft 450-mm torpedo tubes.
The group of demonstrative actions included 7-I destroyer division, which included “Combat”, “Vigorous”, “Stormy”, “Attentive”, “Mechanical Engineer Zverev” and “Mechanical Engineer Dmitriev”. The normal displacement is 450 tons, speed in 27 units, 2 75-mm guns, 6 machine guns and three single-tube 450-mm torpedo tubes. These ships would have looked good in the Port Arthur squadron, for which they were built, but they were late for the Russian-Japanese war. After it, only two out of ten destroyers built under this project went to the Far East, and the remaining eight were included in the Baltic Fleet.
The overall design of the operation was as follows. The ships of the special purpose detachment (strike group) were to leave their bases and concentrate on the Vinkova bank in 05.00. Then, moving along the deep water between the coast and the eastern coast of Gotland Island, they should approach Memel on early morning 19 June, make an attack, planned in the form of a short fire attack, and then leave for the Abo-Aland skerry position.
The surface ships of the covering forces remained in the Abo-Aland skerry position in full readiness to sail at the request of the commander of the special detachment. The submarines of the covering forces were to turn around in the area of Libau and Steinort Lighthouse and patrol 18 and 19 on June. The meaning of this action, apparently, was that if any large German ships were in Libava, they could take the shortest route along the coast to the Gulf of Finland in order to try to intercept a special unit from his throat. In this case, they just would have flown into the positions of Russian submarines.
But the most interesting thing in the initial version of the plan is the presence of a demonstration action group, which consisted of a division of old destroyers and was supposed to go to the Libava area by June 10.00 19. Thus, it was assumed that first there would be a raid on Memel, and almost immediately the Germans would see the Russian ships at Libau. All this could have led the enemy astray and made him assume that Memel’s shelling was only an attempt to divert attention and that the main operation would be carried out by Libau, and to send reinforcements specifically to Libau, and not to intercept the forces retreating from shelling.
In general, the original plan was distinguished by obvious positive qualities with two negative ones. First, the floated 1 brigade of cruisers (“Bayan”, “Admiral Makarov”, “Bogatyr” and “Oleg”) was divided into half-brigades between the two units, and it was not good. And secondly, the main danger for Russian ships did not come from Libava, but from the mouth of the Vistula, Danzig-Neifarvasser, where enemy large ships could be located, and where they turned out to be in fact, so it was there that the submarines should be deployed.
Despite the fact that the fleet headquarters had only a few hours to draw up the plan of the operation (you still need to write orders, transmit them with the special ship commanders, and so it takes time to prepare for the exit, etc.), the quickly drawn up plan immediately began be subject to various innovations. First, common sense still prevailed and "Bayan" and "Admiral Makarov" were removed from the covering forces and transferred to the special purpose detachment M.K. Bakhirev. Thus, in the upcoming operation, the amalgamated compound, which was the 1st brigade of cruisers, acted together. I must say that otherwise, the Gotland battle could not have taken place at all, but we will talk about this later.
Secondly, the shelling of Memel was postponed from the morning of June 19 to the evening of June 18, so that it was possible to retreat to the night when the Germans had practically no chance to intercept the special forces detachment. Accordingly, there was no need for Libava’s demonstration actions, which released the destroyers 7 division, but there was no point in sending them with a special unit, due to the extremely low combat qualities of these already outdated destroyers. Therefore, it was decided to use them to ensure the deployment of combat ships participating in the operation - they accompanied the 1 Brigade and Rurik cruisers to the collection point at the Vinkov Bank and, if necessary, accompany the covering forces represented by the “Tsarevich” and “Glory” battleships in the case of their release to the sea.
But the submarine deployment plan had as many as three iterations - we already indicated the first version above, but then, sensibly assessing the technical condition of the boats, it was decided to use two other submarines, the Shark and the Minogue, sending them to the north and south tips of the island of Öland, and the British E-9 sent to Libau. But alas, the Shark and the Lamprey were also not ready for the march, so the final disposition of the submarines was determined this way:
1) “Caiman”, “Dragon”, “Crocodile” were deployed at the entrance to the Gulf of Finland;
2) “Mackrel” and “Perch” are sent to Lüzerort (it is marked on the map with a question mark, because the author of this article is not sure that he has correctly determined his location);
3) British E-9 sent to the mouth of the Vistula.
In other words, no matter how regrettable it may sound, Russian submarines patrolled where they could, and English ones where it was necessary.
What else could be said about the Russian plan? Throughout the operation, the ships were instructed to observe the radio silence, using radio stations for transmission only in case of emergency. When confronted with the ships of the enemy, on the contrary, it was required to “jam” their radio programs. And the order also contained very interesting instructions: in the event that an enemy was found on the transition to Memel, and if this “unit was in a favorable position,” cruisers were ordered to engage in a decisive battle. Nevertheless, it was not worth forgetting about the main goal:
In the end, the plan was drawn up and brought to the direct perpetrators. It's time to get down to business.
At one time, the German field marshal Helmut von Moltke uttered the catch phrase: “No plan survives a meeting with the enemy,” although there is a suspicion that Sun Tzu expressed the same idea long before him. Alas, the Russian plan of operation began to “pour in” long before the enemy appeared on the horizon.
17 June 1915 “Slava”, “Tsesarevich” and 1-th brigade of cruisers were in the Abo-Aland skerry position, “Rurik” - in Revel (Tallinn), and “Novik” and 6-th battalion of destroyers - in Moonzund. All of them, by virtue of wartime, were in high readiness to leave, they only needed to load coal a little. On the cruisers of the 1 Brigade, the loading was completed by the same day 17.20 and immediately moved to the Pipscher raid where they were to the 21.30. There, they met with part of the destroyers battalion 7, and, accompanied by the “Battle”, “The Hardy,” and “Stormy” cruisers on 02.00, the nights of July 18 left the raid and moved to the collection point at Vinkov banks. The remaining three destroyers of the 7 Battalion were accompanied by the armored cruiser Rurik, which was heading for the Vinkov bank from Revel. The cruisers met without incident, after which the 7 division was released "to the winter apartments".
But if the 1 brigade of cruisers and Rurik had no problems at the stage of concentration, then the Novik out of Moonsund and the destroyers 6 division got into dense fog and were forced to anchor at Worms Island, so Vinkova Bank they came out more than three hours late. By this time, the cruiser Rear Admiral M.K. Bakhirev had already left, but he ordered the destroyers to follow him to Dagerort, where, due to the higher speed of the destroyers, the detachments would have to unite. Alas, in 06.00 am 18 Jun and M.K. Bakhirev landed in the fog and the chance that the destroyers will be able to join him is almost gone. Then Mikhail Koronatovich, not wanting the relatively low-speed ships of the 6 Division to continue to wander in the fog, canceled their participation in the operation and ordered them to return. As for “Novik”, according to the order of M.K. Bakhirev, had to abandon attempts to find the cruisers of the 1 th brigade and Rurik, and go independently to Memel, guided by the general plan of the operation. But the commander of the "Novika" MA Berens acted easier and asked for radio coordinates, course and speed of the cruisers of the commander of the special purpose detachment, and after receiving all this, I was able to join them.
So, the special purpose detachment "lost" the division of the destroyers, but the rest of the ships were still able to gather together. Ahead of them in the wake column were the 1 Brigade cruisers, followed by the Rurik, and closed the Novik column. However, the fog jokes were just beginning on this point, because at about 18.00 18 in June, the Russian squad landed in a near-zero visibility zone. And so, after turning on the course that brings M.K. Bakhirev to Memel, "Rurik" and the next "Novik" were lost - despite the fact that the 1 Brigade of cruisers turned on wake lights and threw special rattles into the water (orienting on the sound of which you could choose the right course), reunite with "Novik "And" Rurik "they failed.
Here, a huge role was played by the fact that, unlike the ships of the 1 brigade, neither Rurik nor Novik were included in any brigade, division, or other unit of the Baltic Fleet, but were listed as individual units. To a certain extent, this was understandable, because both Rurik and Novik were fundamentally different in their characteristics from the other ships of the Russian fleet of the same class. To include "Novik" in the division of coal-bearing destroyers meant to cut back its capabilities, but there was also a downside. The fact is that the 18 June cruisers of the 1 th brigade also lost sight of each other, but, being a floated compound, could “find themselves” guided by the barely noticeable wake left behind by the ship ahead. But the commanders of "Rurik" and "Novik", who had no such experience, failed to unite with the 1-th brigade.
18 evening came on June, when the ships of the special purpose squad, according to the order, were to fire at Memel. But M.K. Bakhirev, of course, could not do this - not only did he not understand where (the detachment went according to reckoning from two o'clock in the morning) and there was nothing to be seen around, he also lost almost half of his combat strength, “having lost "Rurik", "Novik" and 6-th division of destroyers on the way! But the main reason that prompted M.K. Bakhireva refuse to fire, there was a terrible appearance, or rather, its complete absence.
However, at that moment the Russian commander had not yet fully abandoned the idea of firing on Memel - he simply decided to postpone the raid until the morning. In 19.00 18 June, he turned to 180 degrees and, instead of Memel, went to the Gotland Peninsula in order to determine the place where his squad is located. As a result, the 1 cruiser brigade reached the southern tip of Gotland, where the fog was not as thick as east and could be determined by the Faludden beacon. Now M.K. Bakhirev, at least, knew the whereabouts of his cruisers. In 23.35, he turned around again and again went to Memel - but only in order to again land in the band of the strongest fog.
Meanwhile, the communications service of the Baltic Fleet continued to carry on its combat watch: this is how the captain of the 2 rank, KG, described it. Love
The thing is that simultaneously with the raid of the Russian light forces on Memel, and despite the imperial review in Kiel, the Germans carried out “task VII” (under this designation it appeared in German documents), namely, the setting of a minefield in the area of the lighthouse Bogscher . To this end, in the evening of June 17, an Albatross minelayer was launched from the mouth of the Vistula River, accompanied by the armored cruiser Roon and five destroyers. On the morning of June 18, Commodore Karf came out of Libau to connect with them on the Augsburg light cruiser, accompanied by the Luebeck light cruiser and a pair of destroyers. It must be said that the strongest fog interfered with the Germans no less than the Russians, because these two detachments could not connect at the rendezvous point and went to the area of the operation (mine barrage) separately. Interestingly, the cruiser M.K. Bakhireva and the German troops dispersed at noon on June 18 about 10-12 miles from each other, but, of course, they could not detect the enemy.
So, the radio intelligence of the Russian fleet was able to find out about the imperial parade in Kiel, as well as that the bulk of the German warships in the Baltic were withdrawn to Kiel for the period of the parade. It was an unqualified success, which predetermined the operation of the shooting at Memel. Unfortunately, the communications service was not able to identify in advance the mining operation, which was carried out by the Kaiserlmarine just at the time of the inspection in Kiel, and this should be considered as a failure of our intelligence. But then she managed to detect the negotiations of the German ships at sea, promptly decipher them and thereby reveal the approximate composition of the German forces, as well as their location.
Interestingly, the Germans also discovered the Russian negotiations, because, as we saw above, the special-purpose squad did not observe the prescribed radio silence. But, without being able to decipher the Russian messages, Commodore Karf decided that his radio operators could hear the Russian sentinel talks from the Gulf of Finland, who, of course, could not have alerted him. But Russian intelligence officers literally "took the arm" of Rear Admiral M.K. Bakhirev and brought him straight to the enemy, which should be regarded as the brilliant success of the service Nepenin and Rengarten.
As we said above, in the evening of June 18 in the 23.35, the 1 th brigade of cruisers turned back to Memel. And after a little more than two hours, on 01.45 19 June, on Admiral Makarov, two radiograms were received:
и
Having received this information, Mikhail Koronatovich, without regret, abandoned attempts to reach Memel in a thick fog — there was an excellent “prize” in front of him, for which it was worth giving up the main goal of the operation. However, M.K. Bakhirev did not immediately rush to intercept - until 03.00 morning 19 June, he continued to search for "Rurik" and "Novik", and just making sure that he did not find the lost ships, he turned his crew of cruisers towards the Germans. Then another radiogram came from Rengarten:
It is light. The thick fog that confused 18 on June and the Russian and German sailors broke up a bit and the cruisers of the 1 th brigade saw each other: “Bayan”, “Oleg” and “Bogatyr” turned out to be three miles from “Admiral Makarov”. Restoring the wake column ships M.K. Bakhirev went to the 303 course at 06.15, and an hour later they turned the course to 10 degrees, leading to the point where Augsburg was supposed to be. Then Mikhail Koronatovich ordered to increase the speed to 19 nodes and report a semaphore to the brigade cruisers:
The officers of "Admiral Makarov" were perplexed. “Nepenin with the Rengarten was infuriated by the Germans ... Our connection can be trusted,” said M.K. Bakhirev.
To be continued ...
Strangely enough, a very original plan of a military operation was born over such an insignificant time. It envisaged the engagement of disparate forces over a considerable area. The plan envisaged the formation of three units of ships:
1) shock group;
2) covering forces;
3) group demonstration action.
Shock group consisted of a special purpose unit, which included:
1) armored cruiser "Rurik";
2) Oleg and Bogatyr armored cruisers;
3) Novik squadron;
4) The 6 division of destroyers, including “Kazan”, “Ukraine”, “Military”, “Terrible”, “Steregushchy”, “Zabaykalets”, “Turkmenets-Stavropol”.
Without a doubt, everyone who reads this article remembers perfectly the TTX of the cruisers and Novik, as for the 6 Division, it was composed of “post-Susim” destroyers of the “Ukraine” type, which had 730 tonnes of speed and armament, consisting of two 25-mm guns, one 102-mm, four machine guns and two one-tube 37-mm torpedo tubes.
The special purpose detachment was led by Rear Admiral Mikhail Koronatovich Bakhirev, who in 1914 r took command of the 1 cruisers brigade, and before that was the commander of the armored cruiser Rurik.
Cover forces included:
1) battleships "Glory" and "Tsesarevich";
2) armored cruisers “Bayan” and “Admiral Makarov”;
3) submarines "Cayman", "Dragon", "Crocodile", "Mackrel", "Perch" and E-9.
The first three boats were Caiman type ships of the same type that had 409 / 480 tons of surface / submarine displacement, surface gasoline engines and electric submersible engines on which the boats developed 9 and 5 nodes, respectively. The boats of one 47-mm and one 37-mm cannons were armed, as well as four 450-mm torpedo tubes. These ships were the brainchild of the "gloomy American genius" of engineer S. Lack, who envisioned many unique features in his project, such as wooden superstructures, a camera for divers and retractable wheels (!) To move along the bottom, although they were finally abandoned. Unfortunately, the submarines of the Cayman type were also distinguished by an almost complete lack of combat capability, which made their use in the First World War extremely difficult. As for the "Mekreli" and "Perch", it was small (151 / 181 tons) and very outdated ships, managed to take part in the Russian-Japanese war. In essence, of all six submarines that were part of the Covering Force, only the magnificent British E-9 that had 672 / 820 tons, the submarine / surface displacement, 16 / 10 units speed, and torpedo armament, which included 2 nasal, 2 traverse and one aft 450-mm torpedo tubes.
The group of demonstrative actions included 7-I destroyer division, which included “Combat”, “Vigorous”, “Stormy”, “Attentive”, “Mechanical Engineer Zverev” and “Mechanical Engineer Dmitriev”. The normal displacement is 450 tons, speed in 27 units, 2 75-mm guns, 6 machine guns and three single-tube 450-mm torpedo tubes. These ships would have looked good in the Port Arthur squadron, for which they were built, but they were late for the Russian-Japanese war. After it, only two out of ten destroyers built under this project went to the Far East, and the remaining eight were included in the Baltic Fleet.
The overall design of the operation was as follows. The ships of the special purpose detachment (strike group) were to leave their bases and concentrate on the Vinkova bank in 05.00. Then, moving along the deep water between the coast and the eastern coast of Gotland Island, they should approach Memel on early morning 19 June, make an attack, planned in the form of a short fire attack, and then leave for the Abo-Aland skerry position.
The surface ships of the covering forces remained in the Abo-Aland skerry position in full readiness to sail at the request of the commander of the special detachment. The submarines of the covering forces were to turn around in the area of Libau and Steinort Lighthouse and patrol 18 and 19 on June. The meaning of this action, apparently, was that if any large German ships were in Libava, they could take the shortest route along the coast to the Gulf of Finland in order to try to intercept a special unit from his throat. In this case, they just would have flown into the positions of Russian submarines.
But the most interesting thing in the initial version of the plan is the presence of a demonstration action group, which consisted of a division of old destroyers and was supposed to go to the Libava area by June 10.00 19. Thus, it was assumed that first there would be a raid on Memel, and almost immediately the Germans would see the Russian ships at Libau. All this could have led the enemy astray and made him assume that Memel’s shelling was only an attempt to divert attention and that the main operation would be carried out by Libau, and to send reinforcements specifically to Libau, and not to intercept the forces retreating from shelling.
In general, the original plan was distinguished by obvious positive qualities with two negative ones. First, the floated 1 brigade of cruisers (“Bayan”, “Admiral Makarov”, “Bogatyr” and “Oleg”) was divided into half-brigades between the two units, and it was not good. And secondly, the main danger for Russian ships did not come from Libava, but from the mouth of the Vistula, Danzig-Neifarvasser, where enemy large ships could be located, and where they turned out to be in fact, so it was there that the submarines should be deployed.
Despite the fact that the fleet headquarters had only a few hours to draw up the plan of the operation (you still need to write orders, transmit them with the special ship commanders, and so it takes time to prepare for the exit, etc.), the quickly drawn up plan immediately began be subject to various innovations. First, common sense still prevailed and "Bayan" and "Admiral Makarov" were removed from the covering forces and transferred to the special purpose detachment M.K. Bakhirev. Thus, in the upcoming operation, the amalgamated compound, which was the 1st brigade of cruisers, acted together. I must say that otherwise, the Gotland battle could not have taken place at all, but we will talk about this later.
Secondly, the shelling of Memel was postponed from the morning of June 19 to the evening of June 18, so that it was possible to retreat to the night when the Germans had practically no chance to intercept the special forces detachment. Accordingly, there was no need for Libava’s demonstration actions, which released the destroyers 7 division, but there was no point in sending them with a special unit, due to the extremely low combat qualities of these already outdated destroyers. Therefore, it was decided to use them to ensure the deployment of combat ships participating in the operation - they accompanied the 1 Brigade and Rurik cruisers to the collection point at the Vinkov Bank and, if necessary, accompany the covering forces represented by the “Tsarevich” and “Glory” battleships in the case of their release to the sea.
But the submarine deployment plan had as many as three iterations - we already indicated the first version above, but then, sensibly assessing the technical condition of the boats, it was decided to use two other submarines, the Shark and the Minogue, sending them to the north and south tips of the island of Öland, and the British E-9 sent to Libau. But alas, the Shark and the Lamprey were also not ready for the march, so the final disposition of the submarines was determined this way:
1) “Caiman”, “Dragon”, “Crocodile” were deployed at the entrance to the Gulf of Finland;
2) “Mackrel” and “Perch” are sent to Lüzerort (it is marked on the map with a question mark, because the author of this article is not sure that he has correctly determined his location);
3) British E-9 sent to the mouth of the Vistula.
In other words, no matter how regrettable it may sound, Russian submarines patrolled where they could, and English ones where it was necessary.
What else could be said about the Russian plan? Throughout the operation, the ships were instructed to observe the radio silence, using radio stations for transmission only in case of emergency. When confronted with the ships of the enemy, on the contrary, it was required to “jam” their radio programs. And the order also contained very interesting instructions: in the event that an enemy was found on the transition to Memel, and if this “unit was in a favorable position,” cruisers were ordered to engage in a decisive battle. Nevertheless, it was not worth forgetting about the main goal:
"If the object of attack is insignificant, or if during the battle it turns out that a weakened enemy can be destroyed by part of our forces, then, leaving part of our ships for this purpose, the rest will continue to perform the intended operation."
In the end, the plan was drawn up and brought to the direct perpetrators. It's time to get down to business.
At one time, the German field marshal Helmut von Moltke uttered the catch phrase: “No plan survives a meeting with the enemy,” although there is a suspicion that Sun Tzu expressed the same idea long before him. Alas, the Russian plan of operation began to “pour in” long before the enemy appeared on the horizon.
17 June 1915 “Slava”, “Tsesarevich” and 1-th brigade of cruisers were in the Abo-Aland skerry position, “Rurik” - in Revel (Tallinn), and “Novik” and 6-th battalion of destroyers - in Moonzund. All of them, by virtue of wartime, were in high readiness to leave, they only needed to load coal a little. On the cruisers of the 1 Brigade, the loading was completed by the same day 17.20 and immediately moved to the Pipscher raid where they were to the 21.30. There, they met with part of the destroyers battalion 7, and, accompanied by the “Battle”, “The Hardy,” and “Stormy” cruisers on 02.00, the nights of July 18 left the raid and moved to the collection point at Vinkov banks. The remaining three destroyers of the 7 Battalion were accompanied by the armored cruiser Rurik, which was heading for the Vinkov bank from Revel. The cruisers met without incident, after which the 7 division was released "to the winter apartments".
But if the 1 brigade of cruisers and Rurik had no problems at the stage of concentration, then the Novik out of Moonsund and the destroyers 6 division got into dense fog and were forced to anchor at Worms Island, so Vinkova Bank they came out more than three hours late. By this time, the cruiser Rear Admiral M.K. Bakhirev had already left, but he ordered the destroyers to follow him to Dagerort, where, due to the higher speed of the destroyers, the detachments would have to unite. Alas, in 06.00 am 18 Jun and M.K. Bakhirev landed in the fog and the chance that the destroyers will be able to join him is almost gone. Then Mikhail Koronatovich, not wanting the relatively low-speed ships of the 6 Division to continue to wander in the fog, canceled their participation in the operation and ordered them to return. As for “Novik”, according to the order of M.K. Bakhirev, had to abandon attempts to find the cruisers of the 1 th brigade and Rurik, and go independently to Memel, guided by the general plan of the operation. But the commander of the "Novika" MA Berens acted easier and asked for radio coordinates, course and speed of the cruisers of the commander of the special purpose detachment, and after receiving all this, I was able to join them.
So, the special purpose detachment "lost" the division of the destroyers, but the rest of the ships were still able to gather together. Ahead of them in the wake column were the 1 Brigade cruisers, followed by the Rurik, and closed the Novik column. However, the fog jokes were just beginning on this point, because at about 18.00 18 in June, the Russian squad landed in a near-zero visibility zone. And so, after turning on the course that brings M.K. Bakhirev to Memel, "Rurik" and the next "Novik" were lost - despite the fact that the 1 Brigade of cruisers turned on wake lights and threw special rattles into the water (orienting on the sound of which you could choose the right course), reunite with "Novik "And" Rurik "they failed.
Here, a huge role was played by the fact that, unlike the ships of the 1 brigade, neither Rurik nor Novik were included in any brigade, division, or other unit of the Baltic Fleet, but were listed as individual units. To a certain extent, this was understandable, because both Rurik and Novik were fundamentally different in their characteristics from the other ships of the Russian fleet of the same class. To include "Novik" in the division of coal-bearing destroyers meant to cut back its capabilities, but there was also a downside. The fact is that the 18 June cruisers of the 1 th brigade also lost sight of each other, but, being a floated compound, could “find themselves” guided by the barely noticeable wake left behind by the ship ahead. But the commanders of "Rurik" and "Novik", who had no such experience, failed to unite with the 1-th brigade.
18 evening came on June, when the ships of the special purpose squad, according to the order, were to fire at Memel. But M.K. Bakhirev, of course, could not do this - not only did he not understand where (the detachment went according to reckoning from two o'clock in the morning) and there was nothing to be seen around, he also lost almost half of his combat strength, “having lost "Rurik", "Novik" and 6-th division of destroyers on the way! But the main reason that prompted M.K. Bakhireva refuse to fire, there was a terrible appearance, or rather, its complete absence.
However, at that moment the Russian commander had not yet fully abandoned the idea of firing on Memel - he simply decided to postpone the raid until the morning. In 19.00 18 June, he turned to 180 degrees and, instead of Memel, went to the Gotland Peninsula in order to determine the place where his squad is located. As a result, the 1 cruiser brigade reached the southern tip of Gotland, where the fog was not as thick as east and could be determined by the Faludden beacon. Now M.K. Bakhirev, at least, knew the whereabouts of his cruisers. In 23.35, he turned around again and again went to Memel - but only in order to again land in the band of the strongest fog.
Meanwhile, the communications service of the Baltic Fleet continued to carry on its combat watch: this is how the captain of the 2 rank, KG, described it. Love
"Midnight. A new radio log page has been launched. Above, “Friday, 19 June from midnight” is clearly displayed. Further empty, clean bluish lines of lines waiting for records. Now there is nothing remarkable. There are silent long and short crackles in the ears, dashes, points that cause different emotions in the listeners on the Kilconde. The tone of the settings, the speed of transmission, the power of sound - everything matters, everything is so familiar among the unfamiliar sounds of "alien", that is, Swedish, radio stations. Since the enemy, the German - it is a kind of "their friends."
Suddenly, all at once suddenly bent over the table, as if on cue. One quickly began to write down the numbers on paper, the other to rotate some kind of round, shiny black handles, and the third to move some pointer up and down on the scale.
“So, so,” says Rengarten in a low voice, “the darlings were in the rear.” Thumbs up. We listened to your voice, and now we read what you write there. And, quickly turning over the copied edition of the German code, our valiant radio-telegraph officer began to decipher the Commodore Carf radio message. Letters, syllables, phrases appeared on a sheet of paper.
“Now give me our code: I have to telegraph the chief of the first cruiser brigade.” It will interest him. Will rub his hands Koronatovich.
Suddenly, all at once suddenly bent over the table, as if on cue. One quickly began to write down the numbers on paper, the other to rotate some kind of round, shiny black handles, and the third to move some pointer up and down on the scale.
“So, so,” says Rengarten in a low voice, “the darlings were in the rear.” Thumbs up. We listened to your voice, and now we read what you write there. And, quickly turning over the copied edition of the German code, our valiant radio-telegraph officer began to decipher the Commodore Carf radio message. Letters, syllables, phrases appeared on a sheet of paper.
“Now give me our code: I have to telegraph the chief of the first cruiser brigade.” It will interest him. Will rub his hands Koronatovich.
The thing is that simultaneously with the raid of the Russian light forces on Memel, and despite the imperial review in Kiel, the Germans carried out “task VII” (under this designation it appeared in German documents), namely, the setting of a minefield in the area of the lighthouse Bogscher . To this end, in the evening of June 17, an Albatross minelayer was launched from the mouth of the Vistula River, accompanied by the armored cruiser Roon and five destroyers. On the morning of June 18, Commodore Karf came out of Libau to connect with them on the Augsburg light cruiser, accompanied by the Luebeck light cruiser and a pair of destroyers. It must be said that the strongest fog interfered with the Germans no less than the Russians, because these two detachments could not connect at the rendezvous point and went to the area of the operation (mine barrage) separately. Interestingly, the cruiser M.K. Bakhireva and the German troops dispersed at noon on June 18 about 10-12 miles from each other, but, of course, they could not detect the enemy.
So, the radio intelligence of the Russian fleet was able to find out about the imperial parade in Kiel, as well as that the bulk of the German warships in the Baltic were withdrawn to Kiel for the period of the parade. It was an unqualified success, which predetermined the operation of the shooting at Memel. Unfortunately, the communications service was not able to identify in advance the mining operation, which was carried out by the Kaiserlmarine just at the time of the inspection in Kiel, and this should be considered as a failure of our intelligence. But then she managed to detect the negotiations of the German ships at sea, promptly decipher them and thereby reveal the approximate composition of the German forces, as well as their location.
Interestingly, the Germans also discovered the Russian negotiations, because, as we saw above, the special-purpose squad did not observe the prescribed radio silence. But, without being able to decipher the Russian messages, Commodore Karf decided that his radio operators could hear the Russian sentinel talks from the Gulf of Finland, who, of course, could not have alerted him. But Russian intelligence officers literally "took the arm" of Rear Admiral M.K. Bakhirev and brought him straight to the enemy, which should be regarded as the brilliant success of the service Nepenin and Rengarten.
As we said above, in the evening of June 18 in the 23.35, the 1 th brigade of cruisers turned back to Memel. And after a little more than two hours, on 01.45 19 June, on Admiral Makarov, two radiograms were received:
"19.06" Augsburg "appointed a rendezvous probably light cruiser in the square 377"
и
"9.45 is the place of the enemy cruiser, who was appointed a rendezvous, 339 square."
Having received this information, Mikhail Koronatovich, without regret, abandoned attempts to reach Memel in a thick fog — there was an excellent “prize” in front of him, for which it was worth giving up the main goal of the operation. However, M.K. Bakhirev did not immediately rush to intercept - until 03.00 morning 19 June, he continued to search for "Rurik" and "Novik", and just making sure that he did not find the lost ships, he turned his crew of cruisers towards the Germans. Then another radiogram came from Rengarten:
"The 2.00" Augsburg "was in the fourth quarter of the 357 square, its course 190 degrees, the speed of 17 nodes"
It is light. The thick fog that confused 18 on June and the Russian and German sailors broke up a bit and the cruisers of the 1 th brigade saw each other: “Bayan”, “Oleg” and “Bogatyr” turned out to be three miles from “Admiral Makarov”. Restoring the wake column ships M.K. Bakhirev went to the 303 course at 06.15, and an hour later they turned the course to 10 degrees, leading to the point where Augsburg was supposed to be. Then Mikhail Koronatovich ordered to increase the speed to 19 nodes and report a semaphore to the brigade cruisers:
“Prepare for battle. An adversary is expected straight ahead. ”
The officers of "Admiral Makarov" were perplexed. “Nepenin with the Rengarten was infuriated by the Germans ... Our connection can be trusted,” said M.K. Bakhirev.
To be continued ...
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