The day after the declaration of war,
Moltke is commissioned into the German navy. She still needs to go through her shakedown cruise before being deployed to the Baltic, but now there are four active-duty
Schlachtkreuzer flying the
Schwartz-Weiss-Rot.
AHAHA. Torpedo Protection II. In
1910. **** you, fishes, our ships have beer bellies.
Most importantly, the Russians are
not blockaded. Unlike the
Italians had been. Which means that, for the first weeks after the declaration of war, they still try to slip merchant traffic through the Baltic. This proves to be a
very poor decision. The German submariners have been hammered into daredevil veterans by trying to sneak into Italian harbors; now they are faced with fat, unescorted freighters. It's a massacre.
The Russians, on the other hand, have no submarine force to speak of.
In an attempt to further drive the point home, the Germans mobilise their cruiser and
Schlachtkreuzer fleet in the northern Baltic, to hunt down more Russian shipping. The Russians sortie to meet them with the near-entirety of their battle-line.
The two fleets meet off the coast of Bornholm, in an eerie repeat of their past conflict.
Germany's battleships are still in the Mediterranean; this will be a test for the battlecruisers. The
Von der Tann,
Goeben and
Seydlitz are the core of the raiding force, escorted by the light cruisers
Hamburg,
Bremen and
Medusa and seven
Zerstörer. Büchsel has been recalled from the Mediterranean to command the battlecruiser force; Galster is still supervising the reconstruction of the heavy cruisers and has been placed in temporary command of the submarine forces. He will miss this battle.
The time is 07:00 in the morning of the 23rd of March. The German fleet is sailing north, near Bornholm.
For two long hours, the morning mist limits visibility. The Germans think that Intelligence might be wrong, and that the Russians may not contest their raid. They are proven wrong at 09:31, when the
Bremen and
Hamburg make contact.
It's a Russian cruiser line, and they've brought some of their heavy hitters. Three armored cruisers, of the
Rossyia and
Bogatyr class; as well as two light scouting cruisers. The
Bogatyrs would not have been a problem for the
Hertha and her sisters; but the lightly armored German cruisers present might have some serious problems with them. More importantly, however, the
Bogatyrs can only reach 22 knots. The German
Schlachtkreuzer can reach
25.
Büchsel closes in with his battle-line, as the light cruisers retrat. At 09:56,
Seydlitz takes the
Rossiya under fire; and scores a hit amidships. Büchsel remembers the old war and how the German gunners had laboured to score a single hit on the Russians. How things have changed!
His lookouts also spot smoke to the north-east. The Russian battle-line is closing.
Unfortunately, they arrive too late. It only takes half an hour for the German
Schlachtkreuzer to prove their worth against their cruiser opponents. By 10:24, the
Rossyia is a floating wreck, the
Bogatyrs are running in disarray and the German ships are
boring in toward the Russian forces at flank.
This...
confuses the Russians. They have
five pre-dreads on station, to match the three German capitals: four
Pervenets- and one
Imperator Pavel-class. As the German battle-line closes, the Russians
turn and
run, firing over their shoulder.
Their first shells (from 6- and 7-inch secondaries) strike the
Goeben at around eight thousand yards. The German
Schlachtkreuzer shrugs the Russian fire off and continues her charge.
Then, at around five thousand yards, the German ships turn to starboard and present their broadsides. Twenty-four 11-inchers speak in near-unison.
And
Goeben, in particular, reaps a bloody toll from the
Pervenets she has taken under fire. In two minutes, she scores five hits with her main battery, hits that rip through the Russian's belt and smash her superstructure to bits.
In the following ten minutes, the battle devolves to absolute chaos. This is not a civilised long-range duel; this is Büchsel taking his
Schlachtkreuzer into the Schlacht itself, in a no-holds-barred brawl. The escorting destroyer S13 gets
mauled by Russian secondaries as she seeks to lay smoke for her wards...
...the flagship,
Seydlitz receives several waterline hits that flood several underwater compartments and drop her speed to 22 knots; on the flipside, she has scored more than twenty main battery hits on her target...
...
Goeben continues not giving a flying
**** as she wades in after her
Pervenets, scoring
twenty six hits on her, while bouncing heavy and medium shells off her own belt and decks...
...and the
Von der Tann makes it through without a scratch, but having scored a respectable seven hits on her own target.
The German battle-line closes in from the east; and the Russians scramble to disengage. Their own line of battle is...disorganised to say the least. This lasts for a gruelling two hours.
By 12:00, the forward turrets of
Goeben...
...and
Seydlitz are silent. The Germans have expended their magazines.
And both fleets have lost any semblance of order. They both fall back, to regroup; light cruisers and destroyers patrol the no-man's-sea between them. As the smoke clears, Büchsel identifies a smoking, sinking wreck between the two forces: it's
Goeben's Pervenets, listing heavily, her engines dead. The Germans have scored their first kill.
The fleets close back in. To the east, the sharp
boom of the German cruiser 6-inchers cuts through the wind, as they engage the Russian cruiser
Flora.
It takes them about ten minutes to put her to the bottom.
Goeben wades into battle again, taking fire for the flagship. Her belt laughs at the Russian shells; but her rear starboard turret jams in its bearings.
It doesn't matter. She leads the charge, passing less than five hundred yards away from a second, foundering
Pervenets and raking her with secondary fire. Her main guns turn to engage the
Pavel and a third
Pervenets;
Von der Tann engages the nearby battlewagon and triple-taps her with her 11-inchers, just to make sure.
The order is: 'pursue'! And the German
Schlachtkreuzer do so.
Seydlitz and
Von der Tann focus their fire on the
Pavel;
Goeben seeks fresh meat and slams two 11-inch shells into the belt of a
third Pervenets.
And
another two hits from
Goeben. And
another three hits from
Seydlitz.
13:30: three
Pervenets-class battleships have now been sunk. the
Pavel is manoeuvering desperately toward the west, but the
Schlachtkreuzer are on her tail.
And by 14:45, the remaining two Russian battleships are in full retreat toward the north. Both are spotted; both are under fire.
Goeben is hot on the heels of the fourth and final
Pervenets, but is ordered to break off pursuit and focus on finishing off the
Pavel.
By now, she's taken heavy superstructure damage and is flooding slightly. She has only been hit six times by heavy-caliber guns, despite being in the thick of it; but she has soaked
many 6- and 7-inch secondary hits. It's a miracle she's not burning. More importantly, she has scored more than
sixty confirmed main bettery hits: her gunners are
ecstatic by her performance.
The
Von der Tann, on the other hand, seems blessed. She has taken minimal damage, all her turrets are operational and she has only been hit by three six-inch and three four-inch shells from Russian cruisers and destroyers. In return, she has scored nearly fourty hits on enemy ships with her main guns.
As for
Seydlitz, she has done Büchsel proud.
Sixty seven confirmed hits, while only taking five heavy shells in return; her waterline has been breached but flooding is under control and her superstructure still stands proud and relatively undamaged. Perhaps more importantly, three out of her four magazines are empty. She only has 14 AP shells left, in her starboard wing turret.
No,
Pavel. You will not escape.
16:28. Far to the east of the main battle-line, the
Medusa scores a hit on the
Pamyat Merkuriya. The shell penetrates the protected cruiser's magazines; she goes up in an apocalyptic fireball, which spells the doom of the Russian fleet.
Seydlitz empties her last magazine.
Goeben, however, will not give up her quarry.
And then, at 17:26, the
Von der Tann's luck runs out. The
Pavel launches an underwater torpedo,which buries itself into the German
Schlachtkreuzer's side. Three out of her six boilers are
immediately flooded; her engines sputter and nearly die. She can barely do 12 knots; and is flooding.
But the
Pavel is finished. The
S19 rushes in, under her secondaries, and launches a torpedo at fifteen hundred yards. The Russian giant shudders; and dies.
Perhaps more importantly, she is denied her kill. Germans
know how much torpedoes can hurt; and even though the
Von der Tann has no torpedo belt, she is big and heavily compartmentalised. By 18:00, her damcon crews have stopped the flooding.
Night has fallen. The German fleet turns to port; the
Von der Tann under heavy escort.
The mood is buoyant.
Four battleships.
Four. And only a destroyer lost, in the first chaotic moments of the fight.
Lang Lebe unsere Flotte!