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Updated: May 24, 2025
The world at large, and of course Von Spee, had no knowledge of the ships which had set out from Plymouth for the Falklands on the eleventh of the month, so he approached in full expectation of making not only a raid but for occupation.
Cradock had turned south, presumably to join the Canopus, but Von Spee secured the inestimable advantage of the in-shore course, and as the sun set it silhouetted the British ships against the sky while the gathering gloom obscured the Germans. The fight was really between the two leading cruisers on each side, the Good Hope and the Monmouth against the Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau.
Their destination was kept a close secret, for had the slightest inkling of their mission reached German ears it would at once have been communicated to von Spee. After the battle, the German admiral moved slowly southward, coaling from chartered vessels and prizes; and it was not until December 1 that he rounded the Horn.
Admiral von Spee in fact secured every advantage of position, between the British and the neutral coast, on the side away from the sun, and on such a course that the heavy seas from east of south struck the British ships on their engaged bows, showering the batteries with spray and rendering useless the lower deck guns. At 7 o'clock the German ships opened fire at 11,260 yards.
I never in my life so much desired the pow ow ower of spee ee eech!" He broke off, and, in an undertone, gave vent to certain exclamations which indistinctly reached the ears of the countess and Bertha.
Always to be remembered among these men of power are Johann Wier, Friedrich Spee, and notably Reginald Scot, who in his Discovery of Witchcraft, in 1584, undertook to prove that "the contracts and compacts of witches with devils and all infernal spirits and familiars, are but erroneous novelties and erroneous conceptions."
In the Pacific the German cruisers were at first widely scattered, the Emden at Kiao-chau, the Leipzig on the west coast of Mexico, the Nürnberg at San Francisco, and the armored cruisers Gneisenau and Scharnhorst under Admiral von Spee in the Caroline Islands.
Von Spee, who had been refitting at Juan Fernandez, left it on 15 November, possibly fearing the Japanese approach, and made for Cape Horn and the Atlantic. His plan was to snap up the Canopus and the Glasgow, get what he could out of the Falklands, and then proceed to support the rebellion in South Africa.
"The armored cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, the former the flagship of Admiral Count von Spee, and the protected cruisers Leipzig, Dresden and Nurnberg. Why?" "Well," Jack explained, "judging by the message just picked up, they must be separated. Couldn't we, by representing ourselves as one of these vessels, possibly pick up a little useful information?" "By Jove!" said Lord Hastings.
Light-weights or middle- weights have no business trafficking with heavy-weights in naval warfare. "Von Spee made a brave fight," said Sir Frederick, "but we kept him at a distance that suited us, without letting him get out of range." He had had the fortune to prove an established principle in action.
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