- The German III Reserve Corps occupies Ostend on the Channel coast today, but Falkenhayn orders a halt until the rest of 4th Army is ready to launch its offensive, in order not to tip off the Entente of the coming attack.
- The British cavalry corps reaches the Ypres-Comines canal, held by German forces from Hollebeke south, and chase the remaining Germans west of the canal to the far bank. To the south, III Corps closes up to the Lys River southeast of Armentières and secures three bridges, while French cavalry seizes Estaires. Finally, the final units of I Corps, the last part of the BEF still on the Aisne River, is pulled out of the line prior to entraining for Flanders.
- For over a month the 10th Cruiser Squadron, composed of six outdated armoured cruisers, has been patrolling between the Scottish coast just north of Aberdeen and the Norwegian coast to enforce the naval blockade of Germany, inspecting all ships they encounter for contraband. Today one of the squadron's ships, the armoured cruiser Hawke, is torpedoed by a German submarine just after 1030am as it steamed slowly east of Aberdeen, and there is time only to lower two boats before the ship capsizes and sinks. As the rest of the squadron was out of sight to the east, it was several hours before anyone noticed that Hawke had disappeared, and by the time a destroyer arrives to pick up survivors only seventy are found, nearly five hundred having drowned. A further demonstration of the threat of submarines to surface warships, the immediate response is to withdraw northwards the 10th Cruiser Squadron to a patrol line from the Shetlands to Norway. More generally, it begins a reconsideration of the methods of blockade.
No comments:
Post a Comment