# 90th anniversary of Jutland.



## syscom3 (Jun 1, 2006)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...d01.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/06/01/ixuknews.html

Jutland survivor recalls horror of sea battle
By Sally Pook
(Filed: 01/06/2006)

Ninety years ago, Henry Allingham was on board a ship bound for the greatest sea battle of the First World War.

The Battle of Jutland, of which he is thought to be the last surviving British witness, cost the lives of nearly 9,000 men in a single day. The losses secured the British command of the seas and the blockade of Germany, but were soon overshadowed by the tragedy of the Western Front.

Mr Allingham was not yet 20. Ninety years afterwards to the day, he boarded HMS Belfast, on the Thames, to commemorate those who were lost.

They were memories he would rather forget, he said when asked about the horrors of the night of May 31, 1916.

"You didn't have much time to think about it. You had a job to do and you just got on with it. You made sure you played your part and did the very best you were able to do.

"People asked if I was frightened. Well I didn't have time to be frightened. We were lucky. There were a lot of dud shells. That saved us from harm."

Mr Allingham, who celebrates his 110th birthday next week, joined the Royal Naval Air Service in 1915 as an aircraft mechanic and acted as an observer and gunner searching for U-boats, Zeppelins and mines in the North Sea.

In May 1916 he was ordered aboard Kingfisher as it set out to join the British Battle Fleet in the North Sea.

In the battle that followed more than 8,600 lives were lost as 250 British and German ships fought for supremacy of the seas.

"I was a very young man," said Mr Allingham. "I stuck my neck out a bit, which was stupid. I soon learned that was not the way to go on. A lot of the ships went straight, but there were mines which were lethal. We went round them. That was a good move."

Asked about the terrible loss of life, Mr Allingham said: "You don't think about how it feels.

"It is later on in life that it comes to you to think about it, and you want to forget. I didn't want to remember the war.

"Those men gave all they had to give, not only in the First World War but in the Second World War. What they did for me..."

The Duchess of Gloucester was in attendance on board HMS Belfast yesterday to open an exhibition, The Ghosts of Jutland, which will run for a year. She said the battle - unprecedented and ferocious - had been heard by farmers 30 miles inland in her native Denmark. Three battle cruisers, Invincible, Indefatigable and Queen Mary, were sunk. After the battle the bodies of British and German sailors washed up on the shores.

"Many lessons were learned that day in May that are still relevant today," she said. "Most acutely that the Royal Naval ships and sailors were not as invincible and indefatigable as those names implied, and the effect of high explosives on the human body was beyond imagining."

Mr Allingham is believed to be the oldest surviving First World War veteran. As well as Jutland, he saw service at the Somme and Passchendaele. Last August he led the nation in the Lord's Prayer at the Cenotaph to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War. He joked: "I have become quite sophisticated now."

Asked about the attention he has received, he added: "All this is unbelievable to me. There are lots of men who deserve to be made a fuss of far more than I do."


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jun 1, 2006)

the BBC news over here said he was the only survivor of the battle on either side? he's turning 110 next week, either way, it cirtainly deserves reconition..........


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## Gnomey (Jun 1, 2006)

Yep. Caused the British Admiral to say "There is something wrong with our bloody ships today" as three of the same type exploded one after the other...

The problem, they removed the blast doors from the magazines to speed up reload times


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jun 3, 2006)

that was one of the Royal Navy's biggest problems during WWI and i think II, they concentrate more on rate of fire than accuracy, and rarely practiced actually firing the guns, they just practiced loading, why? well a large part of it was actually so they wouldn't have to clean the guns, that's annother big royal naval past time, cleaning.......


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## Dac (Jun 4, 2006)

There's also some conjecture that the British ships were dangerously overloaded with ammunition going into the battle. It was stored wherever possible and proved deadly when German shells penetrated the lighter armored Battlecruisers. No British Battleship blew up as the three BCs did.


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## timshatz (Jun 5, 2006)

There is a very good book about the War at Sea in WW1. It is called "Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea". Best book I've read on the subject. You can get it used from Amazon for a reasonable price. Definite staple for any book shelf. 

Jutland is covered in detail. One of the things it does talk about is the loss of the the three BCs. Covers them very well. The amazing thing about it is when the third one blew up and sank (I think it was the Invincible), hardly anbody on the British side noticed. Everyone was so busy shooting at the Germans that somebody finally figured it out only when they turned around and it wasn't there anymore. Just a cloud of smoke. Some people didn't even know it was gone until they got back to port. 

That's pretty wild. A 20,000 ton BC blows up and everyone is too busy to notice.


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## Dac (Jun 5, 2006)

I guess everbody would have been busy keeping their heads down. Can you imagine how much metal must have been flying around with about 250 ships involved.


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## timshatz (Jun 6, 2006)

Dac said:


> Can you imagine how much metal must have been flying around with about 250 ships involved.



Yeah, and the size of the stuff. No .303 rounds to bother about (although they were doubtless there), we're talking 11 through 15 inch shells wizzing around. 

Also notes in the book that while the British were flinging the stuff as fast as possible, the Germans tended to be deliberate and methodical in their shooting. Usually got a straddle within the first 3-4 salvos. The Brits opening shots were sometimes 2+ miles over the Germans and found the range only slowly. Talking the BattleCrusiers here. Of the 6 ships in Beatty's BC squadron, 50% end up at the bottom of the North Sea with HMS Lion a hair away from joining them and the Tiger with serious battle damage. Only the HMS New Zealand came out of it with little battle damage. Germans BCs were hit, but not destroyed. German BC design sacrificed gun size and speed to survivability. Looks like it paid off.


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## plan_D (Jun 6, 2006)

Had the Royal Navy gunners kept to regulations the battle would have not been as bad for the Royal Navy on that day. Removing the blast doors, and packing the turrets full of cordite for a faster rate of fire sealed the fates of those ships. In the end, the German High Seas Fleet was defeated and the Royal Navy held the sea though. 

Much bravery on both sides, and a well deserved salute.


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## timshatz (Jun 7, 2006)

True. After all, that's why they have the blast doors in the first place. As the old saw goes, "Ordinance instructions are written in blood". Too true. 

One thing about the BCs, they were more "Cruisers" than "Battleships". Unfortunately, the powers that be frequently forgot that point and sent them into situations where they got in slugging matches with Battleships and lost. Not so much in WW1, but in WW2, every BC that went at it hammer and tongs with a Battleship ended up on the losing side:

Hood V Bismark
Kirishima V Washington
Scharnhorst V Duke of York

All of them ended up with the BCs on the bottom of the ocean and the BB usually sailing away with little damage (points for the Kirishima putting a major league hurting on the South Dakota before getting clobbered).


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## plan_D (Jun 7, 2006)

I am more shocked by the British misuse of the Battlecruiser. Britain invented the Battlecruiser and the doctrine for the type, yet time and time again it is Britain that misuses it.


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## delcyros (Jun 7, 2006)

In my little view, the problems of the RN can be summarized as following:

1.) -most important- :
Shell deficiancies. All in all, the RN managed to get an equal number of hits compared to the HSF (BC and BB). They had advantages in firecontroll (FC directors, plotting table), hence HMS QUEEN MARY was reputated for beeing the most accurate RN vessel at Jutland) but:
The shell designs were absolutely crap. Very brittle shellbody combined with instantious fuze delay and insufficiant means of soft AP caps (if even). Hitting a german KC-type face hardened plate, these shells regularly broke into pieces, even at distances, at which they should achieve full penetration, several shells failed to detonate. Low armour piercing capabilities, esspeccially at range compared to the lighter, and more reliable fuze delayed german shells.
It wasn´t well after ww1 that the RN generally introduced a proper APCBC design (1918 Greenboy) for BB and BC shells, but even they were inferior (altough only slightly) compared to the german APCBC design since 1913

2.) low temp igniting (unstable) cordite in silk bags:
As the main propellant for guns, these bags were responsible for blowing up the 3 BC. SEYDLITZ got all her 5 turrets knocked out by 13.5 and 15"ers (12"ers didn´t made it through the barbettes) but the use of a more stable propellant in metall brass cases prevented that any HSF ship blew up (possible exception: the predreadnought POMMERN rapidly disappaered after torpedohits, but no explosion is reported). 
Regarding RoF: Only the british BC had ammo stroed up in the barbettes and turrets, the BB were adaequately secured. I cannot see how this improved the RoF either. 

3) communication:
...what if...(...Jellicoe would have been informed properly by his subcommanders?)

4.) BC/BB Design:
The RN put emphasis on a steady gunplatform with reduced metacentric height. A tradeoff lies in poor stability once flooding occured. This directly 
led to rapid sinking of the AC. Tell this survivors of CL WIESBADEN, which survived the whole battleline of the QE´s (after beeing crippled by 15"ers) and the whole battleline of the GF. Ship sunk during the night.


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## timshatz (Jun 8, 2006)

Good post delcyros. All the pertinent points. Good job. 

Was unaware of the metacentric height details. Could you explain further?


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## timshatz (Jun 8, 2006)

plan_D said:


> I am more shocked by the British misuse of the Battlecruiser. Britain invented the Battlecruiser and the doctrine for the type, yet time and time again it is Britain that misuses it.



Think the Admirals had a problem of "It looks like a Battleship, it's armed like a Battleship, is displaces like a Battleship so... it drifts into the job of the Battleship" with lousy results.

Looks so much like a Battleship that it's hard to think of it like a Cruiser. But that is essentially what it was. A Cruiser with honkin' big guns on it.


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## delcyros (Jun 8, 2006)

For a general explenation of how metacentric stability works look at Stuart Slades article at the naval techn. board:

http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-009.htm

The metacentric concept was understood quite well in the late 90´s of the 19th century but design philosophys drifted away in Britain and Germany early in the 20th. century. The "Q"´s were the last british BB to have an adaequate metacentric height, the following "R", NELSON and KGV classes all had greatly reduced metacentric height (check out Friedmann´s or Breyer´s book for details) in order to achieve a steady gun platform. 
However, each flooding reduces the metacentric height (counterflooding also always reduce the metacentric height), the roll of the ship will be longer and longer and once no metacentric height is left (whether or not buoyancy reserve is left doesn´t matter), the ship will not be able to recover from a list and/or yaw, thus even slight beauforts will cause the ship to capsize.
The HSF designs put emphasis on a very "stiff" design with a metacentric height generally beeing nearly twice of what was typical for RN ships and three-four times as large as later RN ships ("R" and later). Higher metacentric height= more stability= better. This made them unpleasent lively at worse seastate (altough they didn´t took on that much list), reducing their gunnery effectiveness but it also made them really hard to sink. Lutzow had +6000 t. seawater in the ship and waves washed up to Barbette B but she still was afloat for 25 min. Two torpedoes finished her off. The higher metacentric height directly contributed to the survive of SEYDLITZ with 5000 t. water in the ship.
-It should be noted that no buoyancy reserve left rarely caused a ship to sink (it would sink with even keel). Most ship capsized, indicating that the metacentric reserve was depleted.


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## timshatz (Jun 8, 2006)

Thanks Delcyros, good read, good link.


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## delcyros (Jun 9, 2006)

Thank You.


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## delcyros (Jun 10, 2006)

I had always my problems to understand why Britain sticked to their shelldesign when Germany, Austro-Hungary and even Russia already shifted to the hardcapped and delay fuzed shells. They knew the specifications for them but it wasn´t until very late 1918, in other words after end of ww1, that Britain began to introduce a decent APCBC design.
With what happened at Jutland, Scheer could be statisfied. Other circumstances would see a decisive british victory...


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## timshatz (Jun 16, 2006)

delcyros said:


> I had always my problems to understand why Britain sticked to their shelldesign when Germany, Austro-Hungary and even Russia already shifted to the hardcapped and delay fuzed shells.



I think part of it is the natural, cautious approach that Fleets (across the world) take towards changing anything. While "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" may not quite cover it, a perspective of "It works ok and we know that while the new jobby has flaws we don't know about" might be closer to it. Admirals rarely change a perspective until the object is proven to be a loser. They may think the product is less than effective but it works to a certain extent. So get on with the job using what you have. 

The point at which you realize the product is a loser is a relative one. Lack of use is generally the most common reason why nobody finds our a weapon doesn't work well (aka, American Torpedoes in the begining of the Pacific War) while other nations may've taken a more interested, costly and time intensive approach to developing the weapon. 

Similarly, and again I am just putting out my .02 on this thing, the Japanese at Tsushima (only 11 years earlier) did not have rounds that penetrated while the Russian rounds did, for the most part. At least that was what I have heard. The British Admirals may've heard the same thing. Hence, bursting wasn't as big a deal versus the penetration. As long as the round hit, that might've been more important.


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## delcyros (Feb 8, 2007)

Renrich said:


> It was my understanding that the Crews in Indefatigable, Queen Mary and Invincible may not have been following the latest procedures regarding flash proof doors between the handling rooms and magazines. I don't know how anyone could know for sure under the circumstances.



That, as far as I can see, is a directed opinion. It was not without reason. While beeing attrective as an explenation, it also implies that no german shell penetrated into any british BC vitalia. I personally believe, that´s why these thesis are so widespread, You may trace them down to the early 20´s.
I am not going to say that this hadn´t happened nor that these relaxed procedures didn´t played a role (I firmly believe they did) but records are giving another image:

In all cases the explosion followed beeing hit, in no case the explosion was without a recorded hit at turret/barbette or close to them on the hullstructure.

I will now look how probable penetrations are:
The germans fired in all cases either 11"/50 (Von der Tann: 11"/45), 305 Kg APC or 12"/50, 405 Kg HE projectiles. The distances of the fatal hits are given with:

A) Indefategable 
At 16:04 Von der Tann achieved successive hits (using 11"/45), one beeing close to or at X-barbette below the upper deck, the following violent explosion destroyed the ship. The distance according to Campbell was ~15.500-16.000 yards.
The target angle according to the battle charts was in between 15 and 20 deg (I assume 20 deg for Target angle).
B) Queen Mary 
At 16:26 Queen Mary was hit by several impacts from either Seydlitz (using 11"/50) or Derfflinger (using 12"/50) or both. The sources give either A or B barbette /turret and a hit on Q turret with a subsequent explosion of the forward magazines and a cordite fire in Q handling rooms (which did not reached the magazine) When Queen Mary blew up, Seydlitz gunnery report gives a range of 14.750 yards, Derfflinger, which also fired at Queen Mary (with 12"/50), logged a range of 14.400 yards. The target angle was probably the same, something in between 15 and 20 degrees (I use 20 degrees).
C) Invincible
At 18:32, one or more 12" shells from either Lützow or Derfflinger or both hit the Q turret or in it´s vicinity at only 9.800-9.600 yards. Several hits are believed to have occured earlier in between 10.400-9.600 yards. The target angle was quite low according to most battle charts (I use 10 deg. TA).

As You may see, the diffculty to achieve penetration is in reversed order. The most difficult one belongs to Indefatigable, it was at longest distance and with the less powerful gun.

Indefatigables main belt had a thickness of 6" (laminated over 4" wood and 0.5" non armour grade construction steel) over the magazines + an additional shielding of 2.5" behind the main belt (the torpedo bulkhead), sufficiant to stop even heaviest fragmentation.
At the given distance the ballistics for Von der Tann´s 666lbs main projectiles reveal a striking velocity of ~1300 fps (taken into account an average gunwear) and an angle of fall of 17.2 deg. The netto impact obliquity therefore is 26.15 deg. Our computations show that under such circumstances, 6" of armour are piercable with the given APC-round. The projectile remains 309 fps velocity behind the plate, the windscreen and AP-cap will be stripped off and there is some probability that the lower body of the projectile undergoes damage (defusing the projectiles), altough the estimated probability is ~33%. However, even an intact projectile usually would fail to defeat the 2.5" torpedo bulkhead behind (433 fps are needed to do so). A simple belt penetration into magazines therefore seems to me unconvincing.
Another possibility is a deck penetration of the 1" weather deck followed by the 2" armour deck:
The weather deck get´s penetrated with a remaining velocity of 1180 fps, the projectile looses windscreen (but not AP-cap), get´s deflected downwards by some1.5 degrees and remains otherwise intact. The fuze will be set (35.4ft. to go at 0.03 s. normal fuze delay).
Even the lower 2" main armour deck get´s defeated with 762 fps remaining velocity. The projectile therefore will have enough time to move deep into the magazines before exploding.

So I conclude, yes- a direct magazine penetration (by deck), even at those comparably long distances, has a convincing probability. In this case any precautious measures couldn´t have helped.


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## timshatz (Feb 8, 2007)

Great post.


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## renrich (Feb 9, 2007)

delcyros seems to have a lot of data on naval matters which makes his posts always interesting. The British BCs gunnery seemed to have been deficient compared to their battleships. Another factor about the effectiveness of the British gunfire that has been pointed out is that their bursting charges in the AP shells was lyddite which proved to be unstable and caused the charge to explode prematurely. The German shells used another explosive I believe called trotyl which was more stable and more effective.


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## renrich (Feb 9, 2007)

I believe it was Beatty who was supposed to have said to Lion's captain after he thought(mistakenly) that Princess Royal had blown up " something seems to be the matter with our bloody ships today, steer two points closer to the enemy" probably a myth but this was before the third BC the Invincible had blown up.


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## renrich (Feb 9, 2007)

The reason given for the charmed life of New Zealand during the battle(I believe she received not a single hit) was that her captain was wearing a Maori skirt which had been given him by those tribesmen and the skirt bestowed it's luck on the ship. To me the decisions, conduct and actions of Hipper and his battle cruisers deserve all of the praise possible for meritorious and effective behavior during the battle. I can only compare their fortitude and bravery to the actions of the small boys and jeep carriers at Leyte Gulf.


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## timshatz (Feb 9, 2007)

renrich said:


> The reason given for the charmed life of New Zealand during the battle(I believe she received not a single hit) was that her captain was wearing a Maori skirt which had been given him by those tribesmen and the skirt bestowed it's luck on the ship. To me the decisions, conduct and actions of Hipper and his battle cruisers deserve all of the praise possible for meritorious and effective behavior during the battle. I can only compare their fortitude and bravery to the actions of the small boys and jeep carriers at Leyte Gulf.



Very true about Del's postings. A treasure trove of facts and information. Very good to read.

Heard the same thing about the New Zealand. Of the 6 BCs in that line, she was the only one to get away without any casualties. 

Think Hipper's BC squadron was thrown away. Scheer could've done a better job of handling them. The "Death Ride" was a panic move. Probably could've gotten them home (for the most part) in one piece. And the turn back towards the Brits the second time, what was he thinking? Read plenty of it but still have no clue. 

On the other hand, Jellicoe made sound decisions throughout the battle. Ended up getting the short end of the stick from the Admiralty while the guy who screwed up most of his decisions (Beatty) ended up being promoted. 

Go figure. Probably a lesson in making sure you make friends in high places when getting promoted.


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## Henk (Feb 9, 2007)

German Navy could have won taht they if they just cept on fighting. No one actualy won the battle, but if you take losses the Germans won the battle that they lost the least men. The German Navy were never used again in a major Naval battle again. I wish I could see some of those German and British Battleships. Oh, and were the Baden class there it would have been great.


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## trackend (Feb 9, 2007)

Good Post Del



Henk said:


> German Navy could have won taht they if they just cept on fighting. No one actualy won the battle, but if you take losses the Germans won the battle that they lost the least men. .



In my opinion the German Fleet would of lost had they not withdrawn.
My take is that although the German fleet inflicted heavier casualties they failed to acheive the original objectives in fact all it proved was that they could not take on the British and hope to take command of the sea 
It was the German fleet that withdrew to port so I say they lost as they no longer commanded the ground.


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## timshatz (Feb 10, 2007)

Agree with Trackend on this one. The High Seas fleet was only under the guns of the Grand Fleet for a relatively short time. In terms of numbers, that is where they were most vulnerable. The British Battleships could and did stand the shelling very well. An example of this is the damage done to the Warspite. She survived in spite of being targeted by almost every gun on the German Battleline (for a short time). The Brits had a larger number of larger guns. Brits built their battleships to shoot then survive. The Germans built theirs battleships to survive then shoot. 

I think the Germans did ok, as did the British. True, it was not a total victory for either side. But, if I had to make a decision on it, I would give it to the Brits on Points. The Germans did come out of port again later in the war, but they did not have any great affect as a fleet. They were not a threat to British trade. 

The German High Seas Fleet was a failed weapon (IMHO). Tirpitz idea of being a threat but not being able to destroy the opposition was a failed strategy. The results of his theory was the creation of a fleet that made an enemy of the British (who were not one before). The fleet never paid for itself strategically and, in fact, was one of the causes of the eventual German defeat.


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## delcyros (Feb 10, 2007)

As to whom won, Jutland was inconlusive, something unexpected by the admirality of both navies. The concept of battlefield possession as pointed out above by trackend, was uncommon in naval theories and put forward exclusively by historians. Altough it must be said that the battlefield possession of the GF directly lead to the scuttling of the CL´s ROSTOCK ELBING in the next morning and to a lesser degree may have played a role in the scuttling of SMS LÜTZOW (Not wanting to say that she could make port otherwise but without having the GF that near, Lützow wouldn´t have driven to unadvisable high speed as she did historically. The main reason why the weakened principal transverse bulkhead (forward) gave way at about midnight).
Jutland was a minor tactical victory for the HSF but not the decisive they were seeking for. In the meantime, it was a bad lesson for the GF but without suffering real substantial losses, so that they could keep up the tight blockade over Germany. True, the GF seeked for a second Trafalgar and the way things developed were not favourable but in the end, the GF chased the HSF, and that´s what counts.
I think that both, Scheer Jellicoe did a hell of a job out there with the limits in communication in mind. 

Regarding the ability of the QE´s to survive in the battleline, WARSPITE might not be the proper example. The events of her steering gear jam made a spectacular story but this is not reflected by the damage inflicted. She was withdrawn because her buoyancy and stability was compromised (caused by some flooding aft), along with a significant limitation in speed. Her combat factors were not that much imited. Other QE´s suffered more in the brief engagement with the van: Placed as the last ship of the line, MALAYA did not waited until WARSPITE finished her turn and turned together with her out of sight from the german van. MALAYA received seven major calibre hits in this event, suffering 63 dead and 68 wounded (much more than WARSPITE), with her whole secondary starboard 6" artillery out of action following two contemporary hits. She was lucky to survive the turn as smoldering fragments defeated the main armour deck via ammunition hoists and landed on cordite bags of the shell handling rooms. The prompt action of PO Day and L/S Watson prevented the disaster, they removed the debris. If these cartridges had ignited, there is little doubt that the forward 6" magazine (located above the shell rooms and in open condition with it) would have exploded and as this magazine was adjacent to the forward 15" magazine, as pointed out by Campbell, the loss of the ship must have followed. A diving shell also caused some flooding so that MALAYA technically was in a far worser state than was WARSPITE, developing 4 degrees list. Even BARHAM suffered from more losses (28 dead, 46 wounded) by only 4 major calibre hits than did WARSPITE.


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## renrich (Feb 10, 2007)

At the time of Hipper's Death Ride, Scheer had only 4 effective BCs and, I believe, only16 dreadnoughts, whereas Jellicoe had 24 dreadnoughts, 3 super dreadnoughts, and either 5 or 6 BCs at his disposal. The HSF was so heavily outnumbered I don't see how, short of some miracle, they could have prevailed. Jellicoe was truly the only man on either side who could lose the war in one day and his handling of the GF, all things considered, was quite good. I would give Jellicoe an A, Hipper an A plus, Beatty a B minus and Scheer a C. Scheer was fortunate to get back to the Jade with as few losses as he had. Another point is that the GF was ready for battle just a few days later whereas the HSF was not ready to answer bells for some months.


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## delcyros (Feb 10, 2007)

> At the time of Hipper's Death Ride, Scheer had only 4 effective BCs and, I believe, only16 dreadnoughts, whereas Jellicoe had 24 dreadnoughts, 3 super dreadnoughts, and either 5 or 6 BCs at his disposal. The HSF was so heavily outnumbered I don't see how, short of some miracle, they could have prevailed. Jellicoe was truly the only man on either side who could lose the war in one day and his handling of the GF, all things considered, was quite good. I would give Jellicoe an A, Hipper an A plus, Beatty a B minus and Scheer a C. Scheer was fortunate to get back to the Jade with as few losses as he had. Another point is that the GF was ready for battle just a few days later whereas the HSF was not ready to answer bells for some months.



The numbers might support Your view. However, the real difference was the cordite issue. On the paper, Hipper faced 4 QE´s (for most of it) and 6 BC during the Run to the South solely with his five BC´s. He was outnumbered 2:1 but got the better end of it (agreed, with a lot of an visibility advantage), just only because of the cordite. Had the battle, specificly the night battle prolonged or turned into a melee, the GF would get slaughtered with very high probability due to the dangerousness of their propellant charges. There is some room for a decent debate on this but most factors favour the HSF in night engagements (ruggedness in design [higher metacentric stability= more flooding tolerances], stable main propellant charges, fully efficiant APC-rounds, coordination of searchlights with FC, starshells, proper night training, 600mm torpedoes[The LONG LANCE of WW1])
beside of armour (which at the expected close distances wouldn´t play / provide such a huge role / protection on either side). 
Personally, I would give Scheer an A-, that´s only because I understand the second turn about maneuvre now (more on that later).

Ahh, couldn´t resist. My 1st drawing of Lützow, the mightiest ship to be sunk at Jutland on either side and the ship with the best gunnery record of that battle.


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## timshatz (Feb 10, 2007)

Sweet drawing Del. One thing about both the Germans, they built them pretty. Stil think the Prince Eugen is one of the best looking cruisers I've ever seen.

As usual, I bow to your math on the matter. Question though if the QEs were really in the game until the latter part of the "Run to the South". Missed the signal (not really their mistake, Beatty got a little wound up by events-IMHO). Got in at the end of it but that was after two BCs were gone, LION was mauled (going off memory here so could be a gap). Appreciate your perspective on this.

Definitely want to here you're ideas on the second turn. Always mystified me. What was he thinking? Did he want to fight his way through? I, personally, would've run.


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## delcyros (Feb 11, 2007)

The Run to the South:
Possibility A) Evan-Thomas starts in close order with Beatty.

Following the battle charts and ship logs, LÜTZOW opened fire at 15:48, followed by LION in the same minute. HMS BARHAM opened firing at 16:08, some 20 minutes later. The whole run to the South lasted 66 minutes till the turn of Beatty (and some more until Evan-Thomas turned). For the remaining 46 minutes (46 out of 66 means that the QE´s didn´t joined very late), the four QE´s recorded a total of six major calibre hits (four on MOLTKE and one each on SEYDLITZ and VON DER TANN). Note that by the time BARHAM opened firing, INDEFATIGABLE´s destruction was four minutes ago and QUEEN MARY was still intact (facing her demise 16 minutes later) as was LION for most (altough her "Q"-turret was already disabled by the hit at 16:00). 
If we assume that the gunnery would be around the same than was for the remainder of this phase of engagement, we cannot expect more than 2-3 additional major calibre hits on Hippers five BC´s. That´s insufficiant to make a difference. You might insist that the range was different (LION opened at around 17.000 yards while BARHAM opened at around 19.000 yards) but then it should be noted as well that BARHAM opened from a much more favourable position in terms of visibility than did Beatty (Hipper stayed quite well with the sun in his back against Beatty, which partly explains the low gunnery record of Beatty in this phase of engagement).

for explenation of the second turn about maneuvre, I will need to prepare some battle charts first.

regards,
delc


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## timshatz (Feb 11, 2007)

Good post, as always, Del.

Always thought the QEs started in much later. Thought the BCs were duking it out on their own for 2x the time posted on your response. Do you have a link to a description of the battle? Not questioning, just want to brush up on the details (and it's all in the details). 

If I do my math right, the QEs were engaged for 46 minutes, firing an average of 10 rounds a minute (figuring a lower number for the after turrets not getting into it until 20 minutes after the fight started). 4 ships, 10 RPM, 40 rounds for the group. That would mean around 1600 15" rounds fired in the first 46 minutes with 5 hits. Comes out to well less than 1% hit rate. 

Looking forward to your ideas on the second turn about. 

My Math has to be off: 
1 My RPM is too high.
2. Barnham opens fire 20 minutes into the fight but the ships further back do not start shooting until much later
3. Distance affected the accuracy.
4. Rumor I have heard- British FC was pretty poor, focusing more on rounds out than on rounds on target. Heard the Germans were more regulated and more accurate in their shooting. 

I guess the way to answer the question would be to find out when the ships in the QE group started shooting and how many rounds were fired by each ship during the fight. Even with the Barnham firing for the full 46 minutes, the shooting is pretty bad. Assuming all hits were hers, assuming she was firing the whole time-full out, she comes in with an accuracy somewhere less than 1% for her gunnery.


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## Henk (Feb 11, 2007)

Yes, the night battle were bad, but the Germans did quite well with the few they had and the Battle of Jutland still stays one of the best navel battles of all time. The Germans like it has been said could design them pretty, but the RN also had lovely ships. The German shell were also great. They were made to enter the hull or upper structure and then explode once inside the target. The RN shells exploded on impact. If you look at some of the damage on tyhe German ships after the batttle you would see the damage will show how the RN shells worked. The RN knew the German gunners were also great aimers and could shoot very well, but the RN showed that they also can hit there target.

Great drawing Del.


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## delcyros (Feb 11, 2007)

Thanks.



> The Germans like it has been said could design them pretty, but the RN also had lovely ships.


Agreed 100%, Henk. The QE´s and moreso the Splendid Cats were beauties on their own!



> Thought the BCs were duking it out on their own for 2x the time posted on your response. Do you have a link to a description of the battle? Not questioning, just want to brush up on the details (and it's all in the details).



My prime source for this is the comprehensive analysis made by Campbell: Jutland. An analysis of the Fighting (Neew York 1986), page 46.

"(...), _he (Evan-Thomas) altered course to 133 deg at 16:05 and 3 minutes later [note: 16:08] to about 160 deg, when BARHAM opened fire on the VON DER TANN with 15in CPC at about 19.000 yards"_

It´s difficult to find a netsource on that as every source seems to prefer a new timesetting. J. Campbell is the most agreed on but there is even room for a reduction of Evan-Thomas entry according to:

"_At 4.03 the British 5th Battle Squadron opened fire, rapidly hitting von der Tann and Moltke_".

Battle of Jutland, the battlecruiser battle

I ignored that information for our purposes altough otherwise the webpage turned out to be very accurate.

Campbell even has the round expandeture figures for the 5th BS:
1099 15" rounds have been fired. Altough this is for the whole battle and not seperated by times. I assume that until about 16:22 or so, not all guns of the 5th BS were put to bear on Hipper. It´s reasonable that no more than around 300 major calibre rounds were fired by the 5th BS during the first phase of engagement, and it is possible that the actual figure is as low as 240 rounds, equaling to a hit rate in between 2% and 2.5%. Those rate estimates would also perfectly agree with the average 5th BS hit rate, which was 2.64% for the entire engagement (bearing in mind that the visisbility was somehow better for the run to the north).
As You might notice, average rate of fire was much lower than the theoretical max. battery output. Cease fire times, drill errors, obstruction times and spotting+correction time reduced that significantly over a longer timeframe. For brief engagements, some ships put up a very high rapid fire rate (Kaiser and Derfflinger surpassed 3 rounds per minute in 44 and 48 seconds, respectively occassionally but not for a prolonged period). The ship with the highest ammunition expandeture figure was HMS NEW ZEELAND with 420 rounds on her own for some 3 major calibre hits in respond.



> Rumor I have heard- British FC was pretty poor, focusing more on rounds out than on rounds on target. Heard the Germans were more regulated and more accurate in their shooting.


Technically, the RN FC procedures were more advanced than the HSF procedures due to the introduction of centralized fire controll (spotter high placed) and the plot table. On the other hand, the HSF crews were much more methodical in their shooting (introducing ripple firing for quicker range adjustion) and significantly better trained. Prior to ww1 and until late 1915, there even was an annual gunnery championship in the HSF. Every crew could participate on different approaches and distances of target. All in all a quite modern maneuvre. Crack crews like those of AC SCHARNHORST repeatedly won that prize in 1913/1914, stunning the BB contenders. Precision was a key factor, but so was rate of fire according to our ww1 records (it should be noted that all german naval major calibre rifles were quick firing guns in opposition to breech loaders in the RN, which explains the better rate of fire).
All together, these efforts were put forwards in order to overutilize the fleet in an event of war.


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## delcyros (Feb 11, 2007)

Now back to the turn about maneuvre of Scheer.

Much has been said about the communication, under which Jellicoe suffered during the whole battle. The same should be mentioned when judging Scheers maneuvre. Since most ships were retreating behind a smoke screen during the 1st turn about, little -except gunflashes- could be seen from the GF. The scouting was done by the 2nd SG CL Frankfurt. They were cruising in a loop some 4 miles further to the east and could spot the enemy van during the whole procedure of the fist about turn (compare attached battlechart 1). Frankfurt radioed the positions of the enemy battlefleet in a signal timed 18:57 to Scheer but the position given was nearly 2 miles to far south than historically. Scheer therefore must have gotten the impression that he could cut off the enemy van, crossing Jellicoe´s "T" with a second turn about at about 19:00 (compare attached battlechart 2). This effectively would bring the german line in between the damaged ships of the 5th BS (whiches position was uncertain for Scheer by then) and the rear of the british van. Since Frankfurt radioed correctly that the enemy van was started to get into columns (turning "together") and pushed south (the direction radioed was off by a minor error), this indeed could bring Scheer in a favourable proistion if the advance is concealed by the remaining smoke screens as far as possible. It seemed to be a situation of opportunity, and Scheer did not wanted to discard such a possibility. As it turned out and contradicting to his informations, the enemy fleet was far more into the northwest and retook line formation with a southeasterly course but then it was already to late.


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## renrich (Feb 11, 2007)

Many thanks to you delcyros. I understand Scheer's actions much better now. Good picture of Lutzow, very purposeful looking. It really helped the naval architects when they decided they could superimpose all the turrets. I don't know whose idea the cage masts of the US Navy was but they made our BBs butt ugly. I have an original of the 1942 Jane's and also 1914 and 1945, both not original.


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## delcyros (Feb 11, 2007)

It´s a pleasure for me to discuss things properly.
The US SOUTH CAROLINA introducing the all centerline end layout with superimposed turrets represented a quantum leap forwards in naval architecture.
I must admit that Lützow probably wouldn´t have looked that elegant if she had survived Jutland. All german ships were refitted with heavy tripod masts for a high placed spotter. We might argue what is more ugly, a tripod or a cage mast, difficult question . I personally like the clipper bows of late war US dreadnoughts.
The König´s were the first to introduce the tubular tower in 1917 but not even the Bayern´s received that.
As pointed out by Henk, the Royal Navy also had very elegant looking vessels.


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## timshatz (Feb 12, 2007)

Great post Del. Going to have to stew on that one for a while. Gives the battle a whole new perpsective. Have to re-read and consider. I'll get back to you on it in about 6 months!

As for the looks of warships, I agree with the latter British BCs looking very nice. Less so the QEs. Kind of remind me of Japanese cars. All look the same. Think by the time the Hood came around they had run their course in terms of looks. Something about the Hood's turrets gave it an odd look.

Also like the triple turreted cruisers of both the US and Japanese navy during WW2. Great look to them. Serious, efficient. The Japanese definitely did a great job on their Cruisers. Less so their Battleships. Exempting the Yamato and Musashi, the Japanese Battleships looked old. Perhaps because they were. 

The American Boises were pretty ships. Also the Des Moines. But the interwar cruisers were duds in terms of looks. IMHO.


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## delcyros (Feb 12, 2007)

I have to underline, that this is a recent perspective. The turn about maneuvre is a critical aspect in considering Jutland. I was stumbling around after having read on another board that not only Jellicoe but also Scheer might have suffered from defective coms.
That´s what had to be expected but this issue isn´t covered extensively in books yet. There was some material in the Freiburg archive regarding the radio coms of rear Adm. Boedecker in CL FRANKFURT known for very long while other material (that of CL REGENSBURG f.e.) seems to have disappeared over the years. Campbell doesn´t even mentions german radio signals methodically (he does mention the british radio coms methodically), altough he spend some time in Freiburg for recherches (don´t know if he knew about Frankfurts radio signal but Campbell assembled that much material during his research that this might well went under). That´s somehow interesting as he pointed out that following the second turn about, the german van was steering 63 deg (which perfectly agrees to chart 2) first before the leading BB KÖNIG turned to 88 deg at 19:10. he doesn´t give an explenation but things become very clear with the coms in mind. By about 19:05, Scheer must have realized that the GF wasn´t where he expected her to be. 
What becomes seriously important for me is that neither Jellicoe nor Scheer blamed their subordinate commanders for wrong communication (both had reason) but Beatty did. And with the shortcomings of communications in mind, both did an excellent job in that battle.

P.S.: There is a typo in the charts: The command of 1st SG by 19:00 had Hartog in DERFFLINGER, not Behncke. Hipper transferred from LÜTZOW to G 39 and it took some 2 hours until he regained command position in MOLTKE due to the heavy utilization of the BC´s.

regards, 
delc


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## renrich (Feb 12, 2007)

What a pleasure to have a dialogue with gentlemen who are so well informed. I believe the South Carolina would have been the first dreadnought launched if the US Navy had not delayed her construction. I have always liked the tripod masts as far as looks are concerned. The Brooklyn class of CLs were handsome. Lots of guns too. Were built as a reply to the Mogami class. Of course the Mogamis were remodeled as CAs. Of course the Salt Lake City is my favorite ship because of an uncle who served on her in 1941-43. She and Pensacola were the first US treaty cruisers, launched in 1929, heavily gunned with 10 8 in guns on only 9100 tons. The foremasts were a little high but big space between the funnels account for the nickname of SLC being Swayback Maru. Both had stellar war records. I have never understood why the main batteries had the arrangement of triples over twins. Perhaps you might know delc. There are some good websites on the SLC.


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## delcyros (Feb 13, 2007)

It was not without reason that the SLC had such a layout. She was designed at a time when the USN had the most powerful BB´s (MARYLAND) of the world Their cruisers should also get an excellent armement. However, this was not without compromises. Since nobody in the design bureau was willing to reduce the engineering plant below 30 Kts, the turrets had to be placed on the very centerline ends to allow the compact machinery spaces amidships on the limited displacement. The barbette diameter was therefore limited by the narrow beam and excluded the use of triple turrets on the extreme ends due to the fine hullform. Having a raised triple turret behind became necessary but then the stability was compromised with having so much weight placed high in the ship. That´s the reason why the SLC and other ships of her class had a comparably low freeboard (to counter the negative stability effects). Another issue might be the weight. With 10.000 t. it simply isn´t possible to get 12 8" guns in 3 triple and a speed of 32+ Kts with adeaquat protection. In the SLC case, all triple turrets on the extreme ends also put a lot of weight to the ends, reducing the longitudinal structural strength of the whole design (it´s better to have a gradual increase in loads distributed from the stem to amidships instead of weight massively distributed the the very ends of a ship).
In subsequent US cruiser designs, these shortcomings were properly adressed . The use of 3 T3 8" guns also made it possible to move a little more backwards with the turret installation, so that neither weight not spacial issues had a detremental effect. As a positive side effect, the stability improved greatly, allowing the adoption of a higher freeboard and hence a generally better seakeeping ability.


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## renrich (Feb 13, 2007)

delcyros, You are a treasure. I am 71 years old and have been wondering about that ever since I saw the first picture of the SLC. My uncle did not know the answer and he was a GM1c and later a CGM. I had an idea that it might be related to the narrow beam, max 65ft but never thought about the weight forward and aft and the low freeboard which was a consequence. They were wet ships. I have seen film of the SLC during the Doolittle mission and she was taking green water over the bow. After fitting of bilge keels they were supposed to be very steady gun platforms above 20 kts. Many thanks to you. The US got their money's worth out of that class of CAs. After the SLC was used in the Bikini Bomb tests they used her as a target ship off San Diego. They could not get her to sink with aerial rockets and bombs so finally had to torpedo her from a DD. She only reluctantly rolled over and sank then.


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## trackend (Feb 14, 2007)

Thanks for the posts Delcyros all very interesting and informative


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## timshatz (Feb 14, 2007)

Del, you are the master of this thread. As well as other questions about warships. Great job.

Quick question about the interwar US Cruisers (seem to be in a minority in thinking less of them but that comes with the territory) that you might know the answer to. I hear there was a problem with scatter of the fall of shellfire due to the triple turret design. I am not sure the reason for this (heard it was the closeness of the barrels to each other) but would like to know your thoughts. Also, the same turret design was found on the battleships of the pre-war period. Did they suffer from the same problem if the problem did in fact exist)?

Appologies in advance for putting you on the spot but I think this would be more up your alley and would like to know your thoughts on it.


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## delcyros (Feb 15, 2007)

> Quick question about the interwar US Cruisers (seem to be in a minority in thinking less of them but that comes with the territory) that you might know the answer to. I hear there was a problem with scatter of the fall of shellfire due to the triple turret design. I am not sure the reason for this (heard it was the closeness of the barrels to each other) but would like to know your thoughts. Also, the same turret design was found on the battleships of the pre-war period. Did they suffer from the same problem if the problem did in fact exist)?



That´s a difficult problem You name and I can assure You that there is no overall agreed explenation to it. Perhaps Bill Jurens knows more about that, I will ask him. Much can be read on forums about this topic, but little has to do with the real problem and even less is the progress made by experts.

However, I have assembled some thoughts previously. Sadly nothing about cruiser guns but it would be greatly appreciated if You can send me a link.

To discuss this makes it important to look what happens to the projectile:

The accuracy of a major calibre turret depends on two, fundamentally different occurances, which are often mixed up:

1.) salvo dispersion: The distance from the point of impact of a particular projectile to the statistical mean point of impact of the salvo. Dispersion in range is measured parallel to the line of fire and dispersion in deflection is measured at right angles to the line of fire. A Dispersion Pattern is the combining of all the impact points of a particular salvo. Usually, the error in deflection is less than the error in range, equaling to an ovalized pattern distribution.
2.) gun to gun consistency: The distance from the point of impact of a particular projectile to the point of impact of a preceding projectile under identic circumstances (all factors beeing equal, single rounds firing).

As You see, only the first one includes salvo firing. The latter one just shows what the bottom line error margin of a particular gun / shell / propellant / turret installation is. The latter is necessary to verify the salvo dispersion! 


we do have gun consistency figures for:
16/50(Iowa class)
range l standard deviation
yards l in range I in deflection
26000---91-------13
28000---93-------14
30000---95-------16

12/52(Marat class&coast artillery)
range I probable error
yards I in range I in deflection
26000----104-------17
28000----108-------20
30000----116-------23
Note that these are consistency figures and not salvo dispersion figures!

For example, during test shoots off Crete in 1987 (with all recent upgrades in FC), fifteen shells were fired from 34,000 yards (31,900 m), five from the right gun of each turret (this implies no salvo shooting!). The pattern size was 220 yards (200 m), 0.64% of the total range. 14 out of the 15 landed within 250 yards (230 m) of the center of the pattern and 8 were within 150 yards (140 m). Shell-to-shell dispersion was 123 yards (112 m), 0.36% of total range.

Dispersion patterns for full salvos are naturally much higher than these consistency figures:

The highest recorded dispersion patterns do come from
2 row, quad mount 15"/45 of Richelieu (note that all eight guns are positioned close to each other):

5/30/47 :
- projectile : BOF (= HC)
- charge = E3 (practice charge)
- range = 12,000 meters
- dispersion = 1,500 meters
(12.5% seems to be an unrationally high dispersion. But please note that the elevation at 12.000m for this particular gun is only 4.6 deg, so that the max. error in elevation is only +-0.45 deg)

6/6/47 :
- projectile : BOF (= HC)
- charge = E1 (practice charge ?)
- range = 25,000 meters
- dispersion = 1,775 meters
(7.1% at 25.000m still "seems" to be higher than any triple or twin turett designs. At this distance the elevation is 14.9 deg and the max. error in elevation is ~ +-0.5 deg)

(full salvo dispersions of eight gun salvos, fired without delay coil)

The gun consistency for this gun is not published.

So now we do have a big problem, don´t we? Cannot compare different figures on the same base, because the guns are different!
I will throw in some more on that later. Sorry if I cannot present a simple answer, the problems is a complex one and I can only try an aproach to it.

(to be continued later)


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## timshatz (Feb 16, 2007)

Outstanding post Del. Exactly the line I was thinking down. Good to break it down to Gun and Salvo questions. Good info. Great info.

Do not have a link as all this came from a book I have sitting around my library. It was written by Norman Friedman. Title was "An Illustrated History of US Cruisers". Or something close. Read a while back. Dispersion was a problem he mentioned. It seemed the interwar cruisers had triple turrets with guns packed together. As a consequence, the scatter of the rounds was high enough to be a problem. If I remember right, this lead to the tubes being spaced further apart in later WW2 designs. Going on memory here.

Those gunnery numbers for the Richelieu are almost scary. Must've given the gunnery officer fits. Truthfully, I would not be overly suprised if the dispersion was 1,000 meters at 25,000 yards (even consider that somewhat high) but to have such a spread at 12,000 yards is questionable if the main armament was effective at all. 

Question for consideration (given the above numbers). Does the dispersion increase with the number of barrels? If so, at what rate? It looks somewhat higher than an arithmatic increase. More along the lines of a geometric affect. Also, is there a maximum dispersion value beyond which it will not increase. 

Thanks again for your post. 

Still kicking around your post on Jutland. Plenty to think about. Need to print out the maps and look at them. But just looking at it so far, your arguement has weight. It would be in keeping with Scheer's initial objective of destroying a segment of the GF. Downside is the 2 mile drift in reporting of the CLs. Two miles at sea is nothing much. On the other side of that, the weather conditions were poor at Jutland (for the most part), and that would be a contributing factor. I guess the question that rears it's head at this point:

1. Did Scheer think he was fighting a division of the GFat this point and not the whole thing? That would explain the second turnabout.
2. But if that is the case, why did he turnabout in the first place?


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## delcyros (Feb 16, 2007)

> Dispersion was a problem he mentioned. It seemed the interwar cruisers had triple turrets with guns packed together. As a consequence, the scatter of the rounds was high enough to be a problem. If I remember right, this lead to the tubes being spaced further apart in later WW2 designs.



Yes, that´s what I have read, too. However, I am not sure if that´s the explenation of the phenomena. It´s a multicausal effect, to name some aspects (isn´t complete, I am no ballistic expert):

1.) interior effects:
slight differences in manufacture of shell weight (that might be a good candidate for italian dispersion problems), propellant weight (and even burning temp), gunwear will cause a different spin and initial velocity of the projectile. These errors are usually only fractions but fractions are important in this dispersion analysis. These effects are shortliving. As a rule of thumb, the more chemical energy is used for firing, the larger the consistency error. Do not mix it up with high or low velocity, which is different but might have a comparable effect! F.e. the US 16"/45 is a low velocity gun but used much energy to propel it´s superheavy projectile and vice versa, the german 15"/52 as a high velocity gun but used far less energy to propel its light weighted projectile. 

2.) exterior effects:
All the drag related issues in flight of the projectile, differences in the stability, the spin rate and the deceleration. These effects are cumulative. As a rule of thumb, the projectile with a high transverse density will be more resistent to changes and therefore undergo less exterior effects under most (not all!) conditions. 

3.) surrounding effects:
The construction and damping of the turret mounting, the delay between rounds, the spacial distribution of the barrels, the energy coupling and my personal dispersion favourite: Recoil. These effects are pulse related.
Firing a salvo contemporarely with other barrels in a load exchanging structure (like a multi barrel turret) will cause slight differences in axes of firing either by blast effects of closely spaced barrels or via recoil (which is without time delay). I believe that the Richelieu had such a bad salvo dispersion pattern because two of the four guns of each turret shared the same gun weige (in order to safe weight), which means that recoil could cause intolerable interferences or trade effects between them by firing. Altough this is purely hypothetical and not quantifyable with the sources on hand.

If talking about gun dispersion patterns, we also make a significant mistake: we do compare it via distance measurement, which is misleading. Better to compare the elevation and deflection error, respectively.
You will notice that the error on our french example doesn´t increase greatly with range (from 0.45% to 0.5% which is a bit, but not beyond effects explained under 2.). That has to do with trajectory and velocity of naval guns: at short range, slight differences in initial elevation and / or deflection will cause a very large metric error (or other measured in any distance), due to the low trajectory and the very high velocity of the projectile, while at long distance, the velocity of the projectile is lower, the angle steeper and it would requirere a larger initial elevation / deflection error to achieve the same metric effect. However, this is only true for labor conditions. The cumulative effects described under 2.) cancel this partly or fully out, esspeccially as range increases. Just wanting to outline that comparably large dispersion patterns at short ranges for low trajectory guns isn´t something fully unexpected.



> Does the dispersion increase with the number of barrels? If so, at what rate?


 Depending on effects summarized under 3.), yes.
But in how far depends on the individual turret installation. Placing all guns together (Nelson, Richeliue) doesn´t looks good. The introduction of delay coils made things much better post war (Yamato had them from beginning).



> Also, is there a maximum dispersion value beyond which it will not increase.


 Good question. Hadn´t thought about this earlier.

Concerning Jutland, one must consider the bad visibility condition by this time. From Scheers ship (SMS FRIEDRICH DER GROßE) only WARSPITE was clearly visible. The HERCULES opened from 12.000 yards at 18:25 on the most visible of three ships and had to check firing 6 or seven salvos later. HMS IRON DUKE opened at 18:30 on KÖNIG, which was lit up by the sun at 12600 yards and expanded 43 rounds on her, showing a fine display of her gunnery skills before KÖNIG disappeared. The MARLBOROUGH commenced firing on the leading ships of the KÖNIG-class ( both first believing in KAISERS) on 10.000 yards at 18:34 and checked fire seven rounds later because of intolerable visibility. MARLBOROUGH and other ships (BENBOW, CONQUEROR, COLOSSUS, ST. VINCENT, NEPTUN, ORION, MONARCH, BELLEROPHON) opened later briefly on the german van but all soon lost sight to the enemy. The visibility also was degrading significantly by around 19:00 and only the fleet northwards of the other afterwards had an advantage in this regard. The second turnabout initially could bring the HSF very close to the enemy line (visibility issues?) and more importantly, the enemy would need to turn south of the HSF in order to bring all ships to bear (and thus giving the HSF a bit of an visibility advantage in theory) or to turn north, which would leave half of the RN ships obstructed by other RN ships (again giving a tactical advantage to Scheer).
By 20:07, the sun set down at the given date / latitude and records give a moonless night.




> 1. Did Scheer think he was fighting a division of the GFat this point and not the whole thing? That would explain the second turnabout.


Given that the german intellegence did not revealed Scheer that Jellicoe had mustered out (he believed the GF was still at harbour), this might be possible. But once he saw the enemy battleline before turn 1 at around 18:30, he undoubtly must got another impression.


> 2. But if that is the case, why did he turnabout in the first place?


 Certainly his situation was unfavourable. Initiating a 8 point turning maneuvre would leave the turning point in the centre of the fire of the enemy battlefleet (while the enemy van itselve was mostly out of sight in the smoke and twilight), while all german ships had to pass that point. The first about turn therefore was the right decision as was the third.


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## renrich (Feb 19, 2007)

Amazing during that first about turn that there were no collisions. Fine seamanship!


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## delcyros (Feb 21, 2007)

They had some training for this extra. The RN as the dominating sea power didn´t need to develop this defensive maneuvre.
As far as I can remember, the trick was that the rearmost ships starts to turn first and then the next until the first ship of the line is reached and the about turn acomplished. This prevented that ships had to drop speed to avoid dropping out of the line.
The GF used divisional turn (signal "turning together") as basic maneuvres. The divisional turn is contemporary but cannot be used for more then 90 degrees change. A subsequent second divisional turn will have the same result. According to GF maneuvre lists, a single 90 degrees divisional turn with Jellicoes Battlefleet will take 21 minutes in peacetime (probably less in wartime).


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## delcyros (Feb 21, 2007)

Does anyone know if Henry Alingham still lives? He is the oldest British male and the only founding member of the RAF living as well as the only remaining survivor of the battle of Jutland. He will turn 111 this year!

BBC NEWS | UK | England | Southern Counties | Fly-past for Britain's oldest man


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## timshatz (Feb 21, 2007)

Whoa! 111! That is truely impressive. I hope he attributes it to booze, fast cars and alcohol, 'cause I'm working that angle myself.


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## renrich (Feb 23, 2007)

del, I was thinking last night that the USS Constitution, launched in 1797 may have been the forerunner of the battle cruiser. Her guns were of the sme size as many of the ships of the line although not as numerous since she had only one gun deck. She could outrun anything she could not outfight and she could out fight any ship she could not outrun. As the battle cruiser made the armored cruiser obsolete the Constitution and her sisters would have made the modest sized frigate obsolete if there had been more of them. What do you think?


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## timshatz (Feb 23, 2007)

delcyros said:


> They had some training for this extra. The RN as the dominating sea power didn´t need to develop this defensive maneuvre.
> As far as I can remember, the trick was that the rearmost ships starts to turn first and then the next until the first ship of the line is reached and the about turn acomplished. This prevented that ships had to drop speed to avoid dropping out of the line.
> QUOTE]
> 
> ...


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## delcyros (Feb 25, 2007)

Dear Renrich,

I have never been well in the good old sail age issues but it indeed looks as You describe. Will have to read something about it but I do think that the similarities between Constitution and Fisherized BC (or PBB) are on a conceptual stage, only. A good friend of mine, Prof. Harald Lohmann, the one who rebuild the 1909 Etrich Taube, has certainly more to say about this as he has expertise about the USS Constituion, I will ask him and post his answer here. Worth a discussion on it´s own!

maneuvreing such huge forces as was done in Jutland must have been horrible! The third about turn was carried out under the most unfavourable conditions and not all HSF ships acted as was thought of (at a critical moment the ships of the König class turned parellel instead of subsequently to avoid staying in the brief but effective aiming point of the whole GF.


BTW, from Tiornu on another board:


> If you haven't done so yet, go to Google Books, search the "Full view books," and get some free downloads. I found six complete volumes of old Naval Institute Proceedings. Most of the items I found available in pdf were pre-1930. I understand that those outside the US may not have access to all this stuff. I hope you're not using dial-up because my items ranged as high as 60+MB.


 There are some very good sources out in the net!

regards,
delc


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## renrich (Feb 25, 2007)

Thank you del. To me that is what makes Jutland so fascinating. All of that steel with all of those guns running around in a relatively small area at 20 to 25 knots. No sea battle that I know of approaches Jutland for the intensity and gunpower displayed. Some historians claim that Leyte Gulf was the largest sea battle ever but to me it is not one battle but rather 3 or 4 battles and not particularly well fought at that. Don't get me wrong, I don't think that Constitution was conceptualized as a BC. I think that the US was just trying to build the largest and fastest frigates it could so as to have a material advantage over other navies since they could not hope to have an advantage in numbers. They just happened to have some of the characteristics of Fisher's BCs.


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## delcyros (Mar 1, 2007)

agreed.
I do prepare some statistics for each major calibre impact at Jutland and will post it here when I finished. Will take some time to get the dataset for all 208 impacts...


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