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Updated: June 9, 2025
'Blitzen! exclaimed the German angrily. 'Then the message was true after all. Those verdomde British have managed to pass the mine-fields. 'And where is the submarine? he demanded savagely. 'She was forced to abandon us. One of your warships hove in sight. The German paused a moment. His eyes scanned the surface in every direction. But there was no sign of G 2's periscopes.
One day it was the excitement of watching trawlers from the cliffs firing-up mines; another, hunting along the beach among the silent evidences of some tragedy at sea, or riding convalescent horses that needed exercise, flying along the sands to see some special sight, such as the carcass of a leviathan wrecked by butting into mine-fields. Close to us was a large Canadian Unit.
For the time being its task had been accomplished; but only the enemy, counting the stricken ships that laboured into the shelter of the German mine-fields, knew how thoroughly. The succeeding dawn came sullenly, with mist and drizzle shrouding the shores and outer sea. As the day wore on a cold wind sprang up and rolled the mist restlessly to and fro across the slopes of the hills.
Naval strategy was reduced to the dull but arduous task of blocking the exits from the North Sea and guarding against the furtive German raids. The battle-fleet was stationed in Scapa Flow, the cruisers off Rosyth, while little more than a patrol backed by a squadron of pre-Dreadnoughts in the Channel was left to watch the Straits of Dover and supplement the mine-fields.
It was the town of Lieven, a straggling suburb of Lens, famous as the centre of the mine-fields of Northern France. The only occupants of the observation post were a youthful Canadian lieutenant and a sergeant of the "Buzzers," as they call the Signal Corps.
It has been stated that the English Navy has planted mines in channels leading from Zeebrugge and other submarine bases; but it is necessary only to recall the exploits of the E-11 and the E-14 of the British Navy at the Dardanelles, to see that it would not be impossible for the Germans to pass in their U-boats through these mine-fields into the open sea.
Static Defense of the Coast. But besides the mobile fleet which is a nation's principal concern, strategy requires that for certain points on the coast, where large national and commercial interests are centred, arrangements shall be made for what may be termed a "static defense," by vessels, mine-fields, submarines, aircraft, etc., assigned as permanent parts of the defense of these points, analogous to forts on the land.
He wants to know if you will have the great kindness to drop anchor alongside him until morning, for it is forbidden to pass through the mine-fields in the dark, and he hopes that you will have a very pleasant night."
Another day a small patrol, literally cut in half by a mine, was towed in. But though both in the air and under the sea all the ingenuity of the enemy from as near by as Ostend was unceasingly directed against that living stream, not one single disaster happened the whole winter that I was out. Our mine-fields were constantly being changed.
The most effective local defense of a naval base is a combination of mine-fields and heavy guns, which also give protection to which the wounded vessels can retire, as the German vessels did after the North Sea battle. Unless such protection be provided, swift destroyers can complete the work that guns began, as the Japanese destroyers did, after the artillery battle at Tsushima.
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