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THE KÖNIGSBERG INCIDENT
AND THE GREAT WAR IN EAST AFRICA |
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Königsberg
Summary - Continued
Captain Looff took Königsberg back
out to sea on the afternoon tide. By evening, the German cruiser was steaming
for Zanzibar at her safe cruising speed of 10 knots. At five o'clock in the
morning she fired on and disabled the channel pilot boat and approached the
harbor mouth from the south. Soon Pegasus was clearly in view and
Königsberg opened fire at 9,000 yards range. Within twenty minutes,
the British cruiser was giving off heavy smoke and going down slowly by the
bows. Königsberg swung around and headed out of the harbor, firing
three rounds at the British radio station which was sending frantic requests
for help. As the German cruiser left the harbor several zinc cordite casings
were thrown into the water to give the effect of minelaying.
Unfortunately for Königsberg, one of her main engines
had broken a piston-rod crosshead and Looff's plans for a raid along the South
African coast were shelved. Only the machine shops at Dar-es-Salaam could
manufacture the spare parts needed. So twenty-four hours after her departure
Königsberg was back in the Rufiji delta, the only safe place on the
coast for her to moor. The delta was separated into numerous channels, and the
Germans were the only ones who knew that several of these were navigable by
medium draft ships. In case of an emergency, Königsberg would have
several escape routes. Both Königsberg and Somali were
camouflaged and many of Königsberg's light weapons were moved
ashore to keep out curious British landing parties. Soon, they were joined by
forces from the land army who garrisoned the local islands and dug
entrenchments and spotting posts throughout the seaward edge of the
delta.
| HMS Pegasus sinking |
 |
Captain Looff was unaware of several
events going on around him at this point. Two days after his attack at
Zanzibar, the German cruiser Emden steamed into the British harbor at
Madras, India, and bombarded it. This double blow to British interests was not
to be stood for, not to mention the strangling effect the German attacks had on
shipping. The 5,400 ton cruisers HMS Chatham, HMS Weymouth and
HMS Dartmouth were all dispatched to find and destroy
Königsberg. The first breakthrough for the British occurred when
Chatham searched the German liner Präsident and discovered
an order for shipments of coal to be delivered to the Rufiji delta. By the
afternoon of October 20, Chatham anchored near a clear area of the delta
and sent a landing party ashore. Soon, a British sailor had climbed a tree and
could see the disguised masts of the Königsberg and Somali
rising above the vivid green canopy of the river delta's forests. By the next
morning, the British cruisers Dartmouth and Weymouth arrived
offshore and the blockade had begun.
| Königsberg at low tide in the Rufiji |
 |
On November 2, the three British
cruisers zeroed in on what they now knew to be the German ship's masts and
fired throughout the day. No targets were hit but Looff moved his flotilla two
miles further upstream as a precaution. Several days later Chatham
scored several hits on Somali during the course of a general attack.
Somali soon began to burn and eventually became a total loss. On
November 9 the mouth of the Ssuninga Channel was blocked when the British sank
the freighter Newbridge there in a daring raid. In reality this last
action had little effect on events, as Königsberg never acquired
adequate quantities of coal to make a run for the sea.
There now began an eight month long impasse, during which
Königsberg was unable to escape from the Rufiji delta, and the
British were unable to get close enough to bombard her. Her topmasts were
removed, preventing the British from using their rangefinders, and more
entrenchments were dug throughout the delta, creating a fortified zone which no
British force could hope to secure. On the British side, there were several
attempts to bring aircraft in for reconnaissance. This sometimes worked,
causing alarm when the spotters inevitably reported Königsberg with
steam up and ready to run for the open ocean. After a few encounters with the
increasing numbers of British aircraft, Captain Looff arrayed a series of light
cannon and machine gun positions as an anti-aircraft defense. These were very
effective and brought down at least one of the British planes.
The White
Flag
Soon after the short battle at Zanzibar, a story reached the
press that the naval ensign for Pegasus had been shot away during the
firing but was then held aloft by Royal Marines who heroically ran out into the
rain of shell fire to keep their flag flying. In reality Captain Ingles of
Pegasus had ordered the ensign struck and a white flag raised in order
to prevent further loss to his crew. The unpleasant fact that a British man of
war had struck her colors was never endorsed during the war and the story of
the brave marines continued to inspire accounts and paintings for years
afterward. |
In April of 1915, a blockade
running ship named Rubens bearing supplies for Königsberg
and the land army arrived in the Indian Ocean after a long voyage from Germany.
Disguised as a Danish freighter, she was bearing 1600 tons of high grade
Westphalian coal for the Königsberg, as well as thousands of rounds
of ammunition, machine tools, cutting torches, clothing, fresh and canned
provisions and a universe of other supplies. She also carried millions of
rounds of ammunition, rifles and machine guns for the land army. The British
however, knew of her arrival in the area and when Rubens finally reached
Manza Bay the British cruiser Hyacinth appeared from the south, kicking
up a bow wave at flank speed. Captain Carl Christiansen, a reserve officer
assigned to Rubens was mortified that he should experience such luck at
the end of his long voyage. He brought his ship into the bay and grounded it in
shallow water before sending an emergency radio message, evacuating the crew
and ordering fires to be set. Little did he know that Hyacinth had
suffered a major engine failure and was now only approaching at half speed. Had
Rubens dashed to the open sea, the British vessel could not have
followed him. Hyacinth hove to outside the bay and shelled the
Rubens. Christiansen had also scuttled the ship before abandoning her,
and little damage was done by the shelling. By the time the British returned a
few weeks later, they discovered that the Germans had salvaged everything which
had been on Rubens, except for the coal and some of the
ammunition.
The loss of Rubens meant that
Königsberg was indefinitely confined to the Rufiji Delta. What the
Captain did not know was that the British had begun systematically charting the
location of the Königsberg and her complex web of defenses. The
Admiralty dispatched two shallow-draft river monitors, Mersey and
Severn, to the East African coast, where they arrived in June, 1915
after a long and difficult journey. The Royal Navy remained concerned that a
supply ship would somehow reach Königsberg. If that were to happen,
the embarrassment would be intolerable and so plans to destroy the German
raider continued apace.
On July 6, 1915, the British finally
executed the plan which they had worked toward for months. Severn and
Mersey headed up the Kikunja branch of the river delta against light
small arms fire. As they closed within firing range one of the two operational
planes in the Rufiji area dropped several bombs near Königsberg,
mostly to act as a diversion. At 0645 the monitors opened fire at a range of
10,600 yards, and at 0700 Königsberg opened fire on the monitors.
By 0740 Mersey had been hit twice, one of which nearly destroyed the
ship. She retired a short distance, leaving Severn to continue the
bombardment. Eventually both ships opened the range to over 11,000 yards before
retiring. Immediately after Severn moved off, five shells from
Königsberg landed exactly where she had been moored. The British
counted their luck; they had fired 635 rounds from their six inch guns and
scored three hits on Königsberg. Mersey had lost one of her
two main guns and Severn missed being blown out of the water by what her
captain called sheer good luck.
| Salvaging the Rubens |
 |
For four days all was quiet, but early on Sunday,
July 11, British aircraft began circling Königsberg, announcing the
renewal of some sort of British effort. By 1145 the monitors were in the
entrance to the river and at 1215 Königsberg began firing with four
of her main guns. The monitor's carefully rehearsed system for aerial
observation and fire control worked perfectly the second time.
Königsberg was so low on ammunition that she was unable to maintain
the same rate of fire as the two monitors and soon numerous direct hits
impacted along the length of the German cruiser. One of the first hits landed
next to the conning tower, followed by others which brought down the middle
funnel and started a fire near the forward magazine which cause the ship's
hollow mast to smoke like a chimney. The land line to the Pemba Hill
observation post was cut and by 1300 all was lost. Königsberg was
firing blind, burning and under continuous accurate shell fire. The order was
sent out to abandon ship and the remaining crew scrambled down the side of the
ship, bringing with them what wounded they could.
As six inch shells
continued to rain down, First Officer Koch placed torpedo heads to blow out the
cruiser's keel, and at 1400 on the afternoon of July 11, 1915, SMS
Königsberg heaved slightly as the torpedoes detonated. A roar and a
blast tore open the cruiser's hull plating and she heeled to port, sinking into
the mud of the Rufiji River. By 1500 the two British monitors had ceased firing
and retired back down the river to Mafia Island, which was the British base
during the Rufiji operations.
The Germans immediately salvaged the ten
main guns from Königsberg, all of which were used during the course
of the East African land campaign. The Dar-es-Salaam machine shops manufactured
carriages for the big guns and for a long time they were the heaviest artillery
present in the bitterly contested land battles which followed. Of the
Königsberg's original crew of 350 men, only 15, including Captain
Looff, survived the war and returned to Germany.  |
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