14th – 17th December 1939 (South Atlantic – the surface raiders)
In Post 183 we left the damaged Graf Spee heading toward the Uruguayan capital Montevideo, doggedly shadowed by the light cruisers Ajax and Achilles. Although damaged also, the two small cruisers were still in varying degrees of fighting condition, which was more than could be said for HMS Exeter which, with no main guns serviceable, had been ordered to Port Stanley for emergency repair.
HMS Exeter at Port Stanley evidencing her impromptu re-design courtesy of the Graf Spee’s 11-inch guns. In a well-rehearsed plan, Harwood had split his force into two. As the greater threat to Graf Spee Exeter had been the focus of the German ship’s attention.
Kapitan Langsdorff, himself wounded in the head and arm during the battle, had decided that damage to his ship had been too great to continue the fight and that the best course of action would be to seek refuge in a neutral country where he could effect emergency repairs before confronting whatever would be waiting for him later. Langsdorff’s decision to head for UK-friendly Uruguay rather than the more pro-German Argentina seems strange, and even more so was the fact that none of his fellow officers questioned the decision. The only likely explanation was that a) Langsdorff was unaware of the political situation in the two countries and b) the journey to the Argentine ports was longer – thus putting Graf Spee at risk of night time torpedo strikes from the British cruisers.
As Graf Spee made her way toward Montevideo, from time to time her shadowers strayed into range of the her guns and had to withdraw under smokescreen, but they ensured that they remained sufficiently close to Graf Spee so as not to lose her. At one point that afternoon, the British thought they saw a Hipper-class ship approaching from seaward, but this proved to be a case of mistaken identity and they were able to keep the Graf Spee in visual contact for the rest of the day.
So as the German raider headed into the River Plate estuary, what was the state of the ship?
Graf Spee had received around twenty-three hits; three 8-inch shells from Exeter and the remainder 6-inch shells from Achilles and Ajax. On the face of it, as far as the British could see, she was seaworthy and still able to fight, but things were not quite as they seemed.
- The forward 11-inch gun was behaving erratically (as it had for most of the battle)
- To compound this problem, the main rangefinder was broken
- 11-inch shell supply was enough for a further 40 minutes of action
- The port ammunition hoists for the 5.9-inch guns were out of action
- The forward Anti-Aircraft director was no longer working
- Starboard 4.1-inch gun out of action
- One barrel of the port 4.1-inch gun out of action
- Starboard chain hoist for the 4.1-inch shells no longer operable
- She no longer had the ability to fire torpedoes
- A large hole in the bows made sea-keeping in rough waters hazardous if not impossible
- Her engines were limited to a top speed of 17 knots
- Key auxiliary boiler that supplied steam to the distilling plant for fresh water was broken
- Fuel and lubricating oil purifier was broken
- The level of useable fuel was limited to 16 hours [this I have not been able to confirm]
- Main galley and baking facilities out of action
- Flour store contaminated with sea water
So what about the British ships? Both Achilles and Ajax had been on the receiving end of hits and near misses during the battle. The biggest problem was a shortage of ammunition for the Achilles (30% remaining). Ajax was better off for shells (50%) but that was because she had lost half her main armament. Fuel was a concern too, but Harwood would be able arrange refuelling at sea for his two ships while they watched and waited.
With the news that Exeter was no longer in the fight, Commodore Harwood had ordered the Cumberland to break-off her self-refit in the Falklands and sail for the River Plate as quickly as possible – she arrived late on the 14th. Reinforcement by the big guns: the carrier Ark Royal, the battlecruiser Renown plus the cruisers Dorsetshire, Shropshire and Neptune would not arrive until the 20th at the earliest….
At just before midnight on the 13th December, the Graf Spee entered Montevideo harbour. The shooting war had ended – politics and deception would now take over. Uruguay, whilst essentially friendly toward the UK (there were strong economic ties between the two countries) was keen to ensure that she did nothing to jeopardise her neutrality and so sought to be as even handed as possible in handling this rather unwanted situation she found herself in. Nonetheless, the fact that the British Minister to Uruguay, Sir Eugen Millington-Drake, was on warm personal terms with the Uruguayan Foreign Minister Dr Alberto Guani and the Defence Minister General Alfredo Campos, did not hurt the British cause.
The coldness of the reception the Germans would receive in Uruguay soon became apparent. The German request for assistance from the largest Uruguayan repair yard was met with a resounding no and help had to be sought from Argentinian sources and Germans in the country.
A kind of weird situation thus developed in which the Germans wanted to extend their stay in port for as long as possible in order to effect maximum repairs, but the longer the stay, the more chance the British had of concentrating force (at this time the heavy units of the Royal Navy were 1,000 miles away off Brazil). The British meantime wanted the German ship to sail as quickly as possible as an initial external inspection suggested that the ship was not too badly damaged and that she only fled to port due to ammunition shortage and damage to her fire control system.
The Uruguayans carried out their own assessment and decided that the Graf Spee would be given three days to complete the necessary works to make the ship sea-worthy and to carry out essential repairs and that she would have to leave Uruguayan waters by 2000hrs on 17th December.
It was only on the morning of the 15th that Harwood told Millington-Drake that he should make every attempt to keep the Graf Spee in port as long as possible to allow time for reinforcements to arrive. The only way of doing this would be to ensure that a British merchant vessel leave Montevideo at certain times. Under the terms of the Hague convention it would then be impossible for Graf Spee to leave less than 24 hours after the merchant. The Uruguayans were unmoved by this tactic however – Graf Spee would have to leave by the allotted hour.
Three things convinced Langsdorff that heavy units were waiting for him and his men outside the harbour. The first of these was Langsdorff’s own reading of the situation. In conversation with his ex-prisoners, Langsdorff appears to have believed that the British cruisers would not have behaved the way they did unless there were heavy units close by that they were trying to lure the Graf Spee toward. This mind set appears at odds with what he must have known about the Royal Navy.
The second piece of ‘evidence’ came from his own look-outs who appeared to be convinced that a Renown-class battlecruiser and the Ark Royal were on the horizon. But it was the deception operation employed on the 16th that would have removed any remaining doubt in Langsdorff’s mind. The British, aware that communications between Montevideo and Buenos Aires were tapped, sent out signals requesting fuel and a berth for the Renown and Ark Royal. News that the two large warships would be entering port shortly then appeared in Argentine newspapers.
Langsdorff appears to have ruled out sailing for Argentina as she could not reach a port there without having to sail into open water – and thus engaging with the overwhelming British forces he believed to be waiting for him. Although some repairs were effected – the majority were simply not repairable in the timeframe provided. It was now the Germans turn to press the Uruguayans for a longer stay for the ship – but once again the answer was a firm no.
Meanwhile a conference between Grand Admiral Raeder and Adolf Hitler on the 16th presented Langsdorff with two options; sail to Argentina or scuttle the ship in the River Plate. Quite understandably internment by the Uruguayans was to be avoided at all costs. As stated above, the journey to Argentina was impossible due to the shallowness of the waters and was ruled out. Further attempts were made of the Uruguayans to get an extension agreed, but these came to nought. The decision was made – the ship would be scuttled.
In the early hours of the 17th the crew were ordered to destroy all sensitive equipment in order that it would be of no use to the enemy. Then, with this done and the decision to scuttle no longer possible to reverse, the Germans got word that the heavy British units were at Rio – nowhere near the River Plate.
At just after 1800hrs on the evening of the 17th, the Graf Spee, with demolition charges set, sailed from Montevideo harbour with a skeleton crew. When she was four miles out she stopped. Her skeleton crew disembarked and she soon became engulfed in fire. Graf Spee blew up just before 2000hrs.
With the decision made, the scuttling of the panzerschiff went according to plan.
The crew of the Graf Spee travelled to Argentina but the reception there was not as may have been expected – and the officers and men of the panzershiff were interned for the remainder of the war. Not so Hans Langsdorff. He took full responsibility for the loss of the Graf Spee and, having been persuaded by his fellow officers not to go down with the ship, he shot himself on the 19th December.
Hans Langsdorff seen here at the funeral for Graf Spee's dead held in Uruguay. The German captain engaged the British cruisers against orders and he was to pay for this with the loss of his ship and his life. What should not be forgotten is the humane way in which this officer went about conducting warfare and his treatment of the officers and men whose ships he sank and whom he took prisoner.
Sources:
The Price of Disobedience (Grove)