Dönitz: The Last Führer (11 page)

In July 1915 the
Breslau
ran into a deep-sea mine the Russians had laid off the entrance to the Bosphorus; now both German ships were out of action. While the cruiser was being repaired a naval brigade was formed to assist the Turks in the vital struggle against allied landings at Gallipoli. Dönitz himself either volunteered or was sent to the infant Air Service where he received some training as a pilot and served as observer-gunner in reconnaissance flights over the enemy positions.

He was in high spirits at this period; he had just become engaged to Sister Inge. As he tells the story in his memoirs, the flooded
Breslau
had scarcely made fast inside the Bosphorus after running into the mine, than a Turkish destroyer came alongside to take the cruiser’s landing party to the Dardanelles. He had no time to wash or shave before jumping aboard her, whereupon she steamed off for the Sea of Marmora, making a brief call at Stamboul to fill the water tanks.

This would have been in character; as his friend, von Lamezan’s, wife described him, all his life he was a ‘pusher’!

Nevertheless, the early proposal—in terms of his age and rank—raises questions. Was it a need for the feminine element in his life missing since the age of three and a half, a desire to regain something of the permanence lost when his father died, a temperamental need for very close companionship such as had distinguished his cadet time with von Lamezan, even an inner sensitivity that he masked in the masculine ethos of the mess? Such speculations come to mind, particularly as young officers were not encouraged to marry—partly on financial grounds, mainly perhaps because dependants at home might take the edge off their risk-taking aggressiveness in battle. So far as money went, Dönitz was the most junior kind of lieutenant, not yet two years out of his time as a
Fähnrich
, and needing for the next two years, by official estimate, some 600 Marks annually over and above his salary just to keep up the style of a single officer. Then again, it was wartime and he was about to embark on an even more hazardous service than he had been engaged on up to that time. And yet it may be that he was simply very much smitten, a natural ‘pusher’ and young enough not to count the cost.

Of one thing there can be no doubt: he was regarded by his superiors as a model officer. A personal report on him at this time (dated August 1915) by his Captain, von Klitzing, is the first of a series of brilliant commendations preserved in his personal file in the German naval archives:

That autumn the
Breslau
got a new Captain, von Knorr. Dönitz came to respect him enormously for his first-rate intellect, professional skill and energy. The regard was fully reciprocated, and when the cruiser came out of dock in February 1916 and started working up again to battle readiness, von Knorr chose Dönitz as his Adjutant—after which, he recorded, he had no free time: in harbour, if von Knorr was aboard, Dönitz had to be in attendance, and at sea he never moved from his side. ‘If by night we were not in touch with the enemy we sat together above the bridge on the compass platform on two empty soap boxes and kept a look-out. I am very grateful to Captain von Knorr for my tactical education.’
⁸⁶

On March 22, Dönitz received his step up to
Oberleutnant zur See
, equivalent to a junior lieutenant in the British or American services. Evidently he thought this gave him sufficient financial base to marry; the Kaiser’s personal office which dealt with officers’ marriages must have agreed for he received the Royal consent. Perhaps his father had left some investments; certainly Ingeborg brought a marriage dowry with her.

The wedding was arranged for late May. A few weeks before, Dönitz was awarded the Iron Cross first class for his part in an encounter with a Russian dreadnought battleship. She was a new ship, the
Imperatriza Maria
, commissioned during the cruiser’s time in the dockyard. She had upset the balance in the Black Sea for she was practically as fast as the
Breslau
and had enormously more powerful guns.

Dönitz described the action in his 1917 book in imaginative style with dramatic pauses marked by lines of dots:

Soon they made them out as the new dreadnought and a cruiser, but the
Breslau
merged into the dark background of the Caucasus coastline and the Russians did not spot her. Dönitz’s story spins out the agony as the ships passed each other; in his memoirs a more accurate account describes how von Knorr called down to the engineroom for no sparks from the funnels, and manoeuvred the cruiser so as to open the way clear to the west. Shortly afterwards a light flashed from the Russian battleship. Dönitz answered the signals by repeating the same letters back, and von Knorr called down to the engineroom for the utmost power on both engines. To return to the more dramatic, earlier account:

The Russian dreadnought, meanwhile, continued to call up with her searchlight and Dönitz continued to repeat the signal letters back to her; long after the war he learned that the battleship’s gunnery officer wanted to open fire, but the Admiral would not allow it in case the unknown cruiser turned out to be one of their own they were expecting to meet that morning. So it went until they appeared to be at extreme gun range when the Russians tired of the game. The dreadnought altered to bring her broadside to bear and they saw the flash of the great guns and counted the seconds—ten, twenty, thirty, forty …‘
Achtung! Aufschlag
!’

Von Knorr used helm to throw the Russian shooting out, but the third salvo fired from an enormous range fell just ahead; the cruiser listed heavily to port, her bows plunged as if she had fallen into a trough in the sea, then torrents of water cascaded over the foc’s’le and down on her deck amidships so that those standing to the guns were ‘literally up to
their waists in water’. Miraculously she came out of it unscathed, and the wild chase continued, the Russian gradually losing ground as she kept on turning to bring her whole broadside to bear instead of firing with her forward guns only. Some time late in the morning she gave up the chase. ‘This day will remain unforgettable to us.’
⁹⁰

Towards the end of May Dönitz travelled up to Berlin for his wedding—why Berlin is not clear. Perhaps Ingeborg had given up her post at the hospital in Constantinople, perhaps she gave it up in order to return to the fatherland to marry and set up a home. Nor is it clear what brother officers were present to support the slim, tanned lieutenant with the very erect military bearing which appeared to add some inches to his stature, and the Iron Cross, first class, glinting at his chest; his friend von Lamezan had been in a British prisoner of war camp since his ship had been sunk at the battle of the Falkland Islands the previous year; his brother Friedrich had transferred to the Navy and was commanding a U-boat.

The marriage was on May 27th; where the two went on honeymoon and for how long is as unclear as the other details.

Dönitz was soon back aboard the
Breslau
though with his demanding Captain and it was not long before they had an even sterner brush with the
Imperatriza Maria
. She came up while they were laying mines off the Caucasus coast, and as they turned and ran for home she chased, gaining rapidly. The
Breslau
had been provided with smoke chests by this time and as the
Imperatriza
reached long gun-range von Knorr ordered smoke and altered course under its cover. When they emerged they were horrified to see the dreadnought even closer and turning to bring her broadside to bear. Another chest was lit and von Knorr altered again. So it continued down the afternoon, the great ship closing inexorably and opening fire each time they emerged from smoke; one salvo straddled, splinters from a shell only ten metres short severely wounding the watch-officer, signalmate and two others on the bridge,
⁹¹
and as another smoke chest was lit von Knorr turned to Dönitz and said he was considering running the ship on the rocks so as to save the crew, at least. Dönitz found himself replying, ‘I don’t know that we should. Perhaps we’ll escape again.’
⁹²
Knorr held on and later in the afternoon they saw, to their inexpressible relief, the dreadnought had sagged astern.

It was plain after this that the cruiser’s speed would have to be increased by adapting her boilers for oil-firing. Before that Dönitz was ordered home to train for the submarine, or U-boat, arm, on which the naval High Command now pinned all hopes.

The Battle of Jutland on May 31st, trumpeted as a victory, had in truth finally demonstrated the futility of trying to wrest surface control of the North Sea from Jellicoe’s incomparably more powerful force; by contrast, U-boats were not only evading the British blockade but setting up a hugely destructive blockade of their own against allied merchant shipping. Naturally the focus of naval effort had been transferred to them; the chief of the Admiralty staff argued that with sufficient boats and an ‘unrestricted campaign’—sinking on sight without warning and stopping and searching—British supply lines could be so reduced as to force her to bow the knee. The U-boat building programme had been stepped up and suitable young officers sought; many were volunteers dissatisfied with the inactivity of battlefleet life. It is doubtful if Dönitz was a volunteer since he never made this claim and was not one to hide anything creditable to himself behind undue modesty. However, as a strong-minded, ambitious officer he would have welcomed the chance for early command and distinction that U-boats offered—and with his new responsibilities as a married man the extra allowances in the branch would have been attractive.

In the middle of September he baled up his precious carpets and took leave of his messmates with very mixed feelings; the cruiser had been home and mistress for four impressionable years packed with every variety of experience; on the other hand he was returning to the Fatherland for a spell of leave with his wife.

Von Knorr gave him another first-rate report as an officer of ‘above-average talent, especially good professional ability, great professional interest and a strength of judgement exceeding that to be expected from his age and experience’.
⁹³

In 1938 Carls, then an Admiral and fleet-chief, apparently said to him, ‘Dönitzken, the basis of my tactical knowledge stems from the
Breslau
. I do not believe another cruiser in the last war found itself in such incessant sorties and many-sided tactical situations—always playing cat-and-mouse in that dice-beaker of the Black Sea.’
⁹⁴

Dönitz reported to the U-School in Flensburg-Mürwik on October 1st and the following day went aboard the Torpedo schoolship
Württemberg
to begin the course, plunging into the work with his invariable keenness and application. From there on December 2nd he went to the
Vulkan
for the U-boat watch officer’s course, passing out on January 3rd 1917 with another exemplary report:

By this time he had set up home in a moderately large house near the harbour at Kiel, Feldstrasse 57; it had a master bedroom, two children’s and a maid’s rooms, a dining room and a drawing room, which contained his wife’s grand piano, his Turkish carpets and probably, to judge by his taste later, a number of engravings on the walls of scenes from Prussian history. Ingeborg’s marriage settlement must have helped; probably it formed a substantial part of their joint capital whose interest allowed them to live in a style befitting a general’s daughter.

She was expecting a baby in three months’ time, and no doubt it was again with mixed feelings that he received his first posting as a U-boat officer to a boat based on the Adriatic port of Pola, U 39. The Mediterranean promised pleasant weather and excellent hunting—indeed the Commander of U 39,
Kapitänleutnant
Walter Forstmann, was an established ‘ace’—yet it must curtail the time he could see Inge between cruises.