A Better Rifle at Halloween

[diesal]

3rd September 1914, St Petersburg.

The young Tsarevich was running towards his sister who was standing by the entrance to the winter palace. He had just returned from a visit to the front with this father, where they had inspected the siegeworks before Konigsburg, Alexai had been there to watch a long range gun being emplaced. That gun had been transported from the state arsenal by railway before being hauled by a team of oxen from the railhead, thousands had laboured to transport it and its pair into position. The gun could fire on the channel which connected Konigsburg to the sea and thus cut of its hopes of supply and reinforcement.
As he ran to his sister his foot caught on a loose paving stone and he stumbled and fell striking a planter filled with his mother’s favourite flowers. A sickening snap sounded as his arm, which he had put out to protect himself broke. He curled up on himself, cradling the arm and whimpering. His mother, standing with his sisters, dashed to him calling his name and then ordering that they send for Rasputin.

 

[sonofpegasus]

That is going to cause real angst in the RN! Two of Fishers BC's blown apart. The Admiralty board of inquiry will be vicious . Will the press Lionise Beaty of tear Him apart?

 

[diesal]

I think you mean on an "even keel" not an "even keep".

Would the RN order a ship that was incomplete and non-fully functioning into battle? HMS QUEEN MARY (sounds like a liner's name to me) had a non-functioning fire director an essential piece of equipment...

Fixed,
The Queen Mary was equiped a Dreyer Table and Argo Clock for fire direction in 1914. the ship with the incomplete system was HMS Invincible which sailed for the Falklands with it in that condition in OTL.

 

[Geordie]

Lot of lives lost, there. Surely one clear lesson for the RN is the importance of accurate fire. Queen Mary seems to have done more damage than the rest of the force combined, although that might be downplaying HMS NZ's role. Lion's immediate destruction, followed by Invincible going bang, may cause questions in parliament about battlecruisers. With the death of Beatty, I wonder how much of the orders arrive ammunition handling will come to light. He'll either be a Martyr or a scapegoat. Losses in light forces for the Germans are quite worrying for them. They'll also make it harder to claim a draw or victory in the press.

FYI, I found this section:

HMS Queen Mary was the single British battlecruiser to be able to boast, her 3rd salvo bracketed SMS Seyderlitz, another followed as quickly as her well trained gunners could load the 13.5” guns. A heavy shell smashed through her deck armour and deflected downwards penetrated the barbette of a midships turret. The explosion when it came rippled down through the barbette and caused a charge being loaded into the hoist to deflagrate, this spread to ready charges awaiting loading, the resultant fire and explosion burst into the magazine, which detonated tearing her apart.

Slightly ambiguous in wording. It took a second reading to make sure that it was Seydlitz that had been hit. At first I thought QM had bought it.

 

[diesal]

Lot of lives lost, there. Surely one clear lesson for the RN is the importance of accurate fire. Queen Mary seems to have done more damage than the rest of the force combined, although that might be downplaying HMS NZ's role. Lion's immediate destruction, followed by Invincible going bang, may cause questions in parliament about battlecruisers. With the death of Beatty, I wonder how much of the orders arrive ammunition handling will come to light. He'll either be a Martyr or a scapegoat. Losses in light forces for the Germans are quite worrying for them. They'll also make it harder to claim a draw or victory in the press.

FYI, I found this section:

Slightly ambiguous in wording. It took a second reading to make sure that it was Seydlitz that had been hit. At first I thought QM had bought it.

Thanks I will rewrite it. I felt that a battle where the two groups met at shortish range would be bloody and quick. I tried to use the forces from OTL heligoland bight as my basis. I also felt that Beatty would have been a straight at them commander in that situation. HMS New Zealand did pretty well a heavy cruiser and a chunk of a battle cruiser isn’t bad.

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

Would the RN order a ship that was incomplete and non-fully functioning into battle? HMS QUEEN MARY (sounds like a liner's name to me) had a non-functioning fire director an essential piece of equipment...

HMS Prince of Wales still had builders aboard during the Battle of the Denmark Straits trying to sort out her turrets.

 

[diesal]

Meanwhile the original object of this timeline are still training in the UK.

 

[pjmidd]

HMS Prince of Wales still had builders aboard during the Battle of the Denmark Straits trying to sort out her turrets.

To be fair that's not comparing apples to apples. PoW was the only capital ship available at all that could sortie alongside Hood that was fast enough to have a chance of intercepting Bismarck. Even the RN was not going to put an old battlecruiser against Bismarck alone.

 

[diesal]

Director firing was a concept that the Royal Navy was not entirely sold on, Percy Scott was a strong advocate along with Churchill but many didn’t see the need. Scott’s return has already upped the urgency. In OTl very few ships were equiped for it in 14-15. That will change in this timeline and has already started too.

 

[NotBigBrother]

To be fair that's not comparing apples to apples. PoW was the only capital ship available at all that could sortie alongside Hood that was fast enough to have a chance of intercepting Bismarck. Even the RN was not going to put an old battlecruiser against Bismarck alone.

The wrong world war.

 

[pjmidd]

The wrong world war.

Read the comment I was replying to

 

[diesal]

4th September 1914, New York.

The newspapers had already largely relegated the European war to the second page, but it bleeds it leads was a truism in publishing for a reason.

“Royal Navy Wins Battle” screamed the headline.

The Royal Navy fought its first major battle of this war smashing a German attempt to attack the Belgian port of Zeebrugge. The bloody battle ended with the few German ships to survive entering Dutch waters to evade the victorious Royal Navy. The battle was a bloody one with 2 British and 3 German Battleships sunk along with other minor warships. The death toll was in the thousands with bodies washing up on the Belgian and Dutch Coast.
The Dutch foreign ministry has protested the German survivors violation of its waters and its ambassador has been recalled from Berlin for Consultations.

An Editorial had been published at the same time.

This German attack on the Royal Navy at sea was destroyed but had the British failed, German shells fired by German guns would have spread more destruction on the hapless people of Belgium. They could do nothing but rely on another power for their protection.
Likewise the Netherlands could do nothing to prevent the flight of the survivors, its navy is too weak and with the German Army engaged in battle on its borders the threat to its safety is too great.
The German ambition is to conquer Europe, and with that great continent and its empires yoked to the Kaiser, what will be the fate of this United States. We must prepare ourselves to resist.

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

I'm not convinced the RN wouldn't have gone after the fleeing German ships when they can plausibly claim a simple navigational error in the heat of battle to explain violating Dutch waters. Slap a bandage on the head of the flagship's navigator, claim he was knocked out and say his less experienced assistant made a mistake. Even better if you can point at an officer who died (Whatever his actual duties in action, the Dutch and neutrals investigating won't know if he was a navigator, gunner of engineer). With any luck even if the Germans aren't sunk they'll have to enter a Dutch port to escape and end up being interned.

 

[yulzari]

I display my ignorance, but would this not be in ‘hot pursuit’?

 

[AlanJWhite]

. PoW was the only capital ship available at all that could sortie alongside Hood that was fast enough to have a chance of intercepting Bismarck

Not actually True ...

PoWs sister ship KGV was available and fully worked up. In fact she sailed soon afterwards and was there at the death.

It was a command decision by Tovey to retain the Fleet Flagship at Scapa..
IMHO it was a bad one even without any expectation of the OTL disaster in the Denmark Strait
In the days of wireless there's no advantage in an admiral chained to the shore until its (almost) too late

 

[AlanJWhite]

Both the Royal Navy and the German Navy had lost a pair of Battlecruisers and a heavy cruiser, but the German losses of light ships were catastrophic, four cruisers and six destroyers gone. Compared with British losses of one cruiser and two destroyers lost and one cruiser badly damaged.

The battle was a bloody one with 2 British and 3 German Battleships sunk along with other minor warships.

Bit of confusion there even allowing for the possibility of Blucher being a "heavy cruiser" to the RN and a battleship to the Yankee Press
since it was nearly as large as the early I class British Battlecruisers but not armed or engined to a "dreadnought" level.

The main question I suppose is

What was the "heavy cruiser" that the RN lost? (in addition to the other cruiser which was presumably a "light" one)
as far as can see the OOB of both the BC force and the Harwich squadron had only "lights"
and the armoured cruisers predreads from Grimsby were never engaged

 

[Coulsdon Eagle]

Bit of confusion there even allowing for the possibility of Blucher being a "heavy cruiser" to the RN and a battleship to the Yankee Press
since it was nearly as large as the early I class British Battlecruisers but not armed or engined to a "dreadnought" level.

The main question I suppose is

What was the "heavy cruiser" that the RN lost? (in addition to the other cruiser which was presumably a "light" one)
as far as can see the OOB of both the BC force and the Harwich squadron had only "lights"
and the armoured cruisers from Grimsby were never engaged

You have to remember two things about the authors: -

1. Journalists
2. Americans

Neither would be clued up to the niceties of ships types in the RN or HSF. Indeed, for a lot of folk almost any warship is a battleship.

 

[pjmidd]

Bit of confusion there even allowing for the possibility of Blucher being a "heavy cruiser" to the RN and a battleship to the Yankee Press

Bit of a problem as heavy cruiser is not a term that exists in 1914 , its from later Naval Treaties that split cruisers into 6 inch armed " light" and bigger gunned "heavy". Blucher was an armoured cruiser and was actually built to counter the British Invincible class battlecruisers ( the Germans underestimated what the RN was actually building, badly ). So technically she could be classed as a very small battlecruiser

 

[AlanJWhite]

Thanks for reading my posts but clearly I was too oblique/ Mea culpa

You have to remember two things about the authors: -

1. Journalists
2. Americans

Neither would be clued up to the niceties of ships types in the RN or HSF. Indeed, for a lot of folk almost any warship is a battleship.

I was well aware of that hence my words

allowing for the possibility of Blucher being a "heavy cruiser" to the RN and a battleship to the Yankee Press

Similarly

Blucher was an armoured cruiser and was actually built to counter the British Invincible class battlecruisers ( the Germans underestimated what the RN was actually building, badly ). So technically she could be classed as a very small battlecruiser

How is that different to what I wrote above ?

it was nearly as large as the early I class British Battlecruisers but not armed or engined to a "dreadnought" level.

Bit of a problem as heavy cruiser is not a term that exists in 1914 , its from later Naval Treaties that split cruisers into 6 inch armed " light" and bigger gunned "heavy". Blucher was an armoured cruiser and was actually built to counter the British Invincible class battlecruisers ( the Germans underestimated what the RN was actually building, badly ). So technically she could be classed as a very small battlecruiser

I was aware of that too but @diesal used both these terms in his posts. so I followed suit

Notwithstanding such possible confusion. I think my original basic question remains

@diesal said (my emphasis)

Both the Royal Navy and the German Navy had lost a pair of Battlecruisers and a heavy cruiser, but the German losses of light ships were catastrophic, four cruisers and six destroyers gone. Compared with British losses of one cruiser and two destroyers lost and one cruiser badly damaged.

The RN has lost Lion and I class BCs I simply would like to know the names(or at least the class/type) of those two cruisers.

 

[pjmidd]

How is that different to what I wrote above ?

Seriously , don't quote a single sentence when its tied to the one before it. You may have known Heavy Cruiser was an incorrect term but as I'm not psychic, and the entry I was replying to did not indicate you knew it was, I was merely explaining why. Less aggression makes a happier board.