Winter did not stop the activity of the British submarines. In the latter part of 1915 E8, Eg and Eig (Comdr. F. A. N. Cromie) attacked the important iron ore trade from Lulua (Sweden) to Germany, and between Oct. n and 23 sank 14 large German steamers engaged in it. The " Prinz Adalbert " too was sunk by E8 on Nov. 8, and on Dec. 12 the light cruiser " Bremen " and- destroyer Vigi were sent to the bottom. The Germans now set to work vigorously to devise counter measures. Minefields were laid in the Sound off Drogden, in the Flint-Rinne at the southern end of the passage on the Swedish side and at Falsterbo; an old battleship was stationed to defend them; tor- pedo flotillas were despatched to patrol the entrance to the Baltic, and convoy flotillas were organized for the Swedish trade with the result that British submarine activity suffered a severe check and the difficulty of entering the Baltic was greatly in- creased. The work of submarines there was also seriously hampered by the inability of the Russian dockyards to cope with their demands, an unmistakable indication of the probable failure of any attempt to conduct a big campaign in that sea.
The Mediterranean. In the Mediterranean the ability of submarines to assist the Dardanelles campaign by interfering with Turkish transport in the Sea of Marmora was fully realized, but the passage of the Dardanelles was not an easy proposition. Twenty-seven miles long with a width of only a mile in the famous Narrows (the 35 m. stretch between Chanak and Nagara) lent itself easily to defence, and could be transformed into a veritable trap for submarines. It is impossible to give the details of every passage where every passage was an heroic venture. Lt.-Comdr. Norman Holbrook had made the passage on Dec. n 1914 in Bn and torpedoed an old battleship, the " Messidiyeh." 15 (Lt.-Comdr. T. S. Brodie) was now the first to go up on April 15, but grounded in Kefez Bay (on the Asiatic side some 10 m. up) and was lost, his ship being torpedoed later by a picket boat under Lt.-Comdr. Eric Robinson, to prevent it falling into the hands of the Turks. 14 (Lt.-Comdr. E. C. Boyle) followed, passing Chanak on the surface and running submerged for forty- four hours. She sank three ships, including the transport " Gul Gemel " with 6,000 troops, bringing her commander a V.C. AE2 (Lt.-Comdr. H. H. G. Stoker) made the passage on April 25, diving under the minefields, but on the 3oth broke surface suddenly, and coming under fire was forced to the surface and sunk. On May i the French submarine " Joule "attempted the passage and succumbed to a mine. En (Lt.-Comdr. M. E. Nasmith) passed safely at the end of May, sank 10 ships, pene- trated into the Bosporus and torpedoed the transport " Stam- boul " and an ammunition ship there. Passing KilidBahr on his way back, her commander found a large mine perched in the bows which he dropped neatly by dipping and going astern, and won a V.C. in its place. 12 (Lt.-Comdr. Kenneth M. Bruce), 7 (Lt.-Comdr. A. D. Cochrane), 2 (Comdr. David Stocks), 20 (Lt.-Comdr. C. H. Warren) and Hi (Lt. Wilfred Pirie) followed, doing the same heroic work in difficult and dangerous waters. 14 was up again in July and sank 22 ships, great and small, including a 5,ooo-ton steamer on Aug. 7, and clearing the Sea of Marmora. He was assisted in this task by En, who sank the old battleship " Hairredin Barbarossa " the same day and the transports " Chios" and "Samsoun" with the ammunition ships " Espahan " and " Tenedos " a week or so later. By this time a powerful barrage had been laid at Nagara, greatly in- creasing the risk of the passage. The French submarine " Mar- riotte " encountered an enemy submarine and was sunk (July 26) and 2 on her way in got badly entangled in the Nagara ob- struction, but managed after 10 minutes' plunging about to get ! clear. 7 was not so fortunate. Going up on Aug. 4 she got i enmeshed in the nets, and after the explosion of three mines in
- her vicinity was forced to the surface and sunk. E 12, who folio wed
in Sept., remained up 40 days with 20 and Hi in her company I for a time and sank 37 ships. On the way down she fouled a net in the Narrows and went down to 245 ft., with the hydroplanes jambed and the conning tower flooded; finally she struck the chain moorings at Kilid Bahr which swept away the entangle- ment, and though she broke surface and came under fire managed
chain i
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to win through. The French submarine " Turquoise " was sunk by gunfire on Oct. 30 1915, and a final toll of British boats was taken in 20 (Lt.-Comdr. C. H. Warren) which fell a victim to stratagem after passing through the Narrows. With the help of an Allied code probably taken from a captured submarine she was inveigled to a rendezvous and torpedoed by UBi4 on Nov. 6. Ei i remained up a record period of 48 days in Nov. and Dec., sinking 46 ships of different sizes. The last submarine to make the hazardous passage was 2, which was recalled on Jan. 2, a week before the final evacuation, and got safely through.
For the latter part of the year '191 5 two submarines had usually been working in the Sea of Marmora at a time. Altogether some 32 passages had been made or attempted by submarines, and though they had incurred the loss of 7 of their number (15, AE2, Ey, 20, " Joule," " Mariotte " and " Turquoise," their efforts had met with a large degree of success. The Sea of Marmora had been made unsafe, the Turks had been forced to send their troops by a roundabout route by rail to Rodosti and then a three days' march to Gallipoli. Their tale of losses in- cluded two old battleships, one destroyer, 12 sloops and small craft, 7 transports, and no less than 197 vessels of all sorts and sizes, steam and sail, of which 36 were over 1,000 tons. This was the end of the Dardanelles submarine campaign, whose record fills a golden page^in the annals of the navy.
In the autumn of 1915, when activity in British waters di- minished, five more German submarines were sent to the Mediterranean. With them went Max Valentiner in 1138 and Arnauld de la Periere in 1/35, two of the most distinguished German submarine commanders. The result was immediately evident. Valentiner, on his way from Gibraltar to Cattaro alone sank a round dozen' of ships, including the Italian liner " An- cona " with a loss of over 200 lives, and the sinkings in the Mediterranean in Nov. went up to 23 chiefly off Crete, Malta and Tunis. They were nearly all merchant ships. No more men of war fell to them, and out of 242 transports only three were lost, the " Royal Edward " (Aug. 13, loss of life 955), " Ramazan " (Sept. 19) and the "Marquette " on Oct. 23. On Dec. 30 1915 Valentiner sank the P: & O. liner " Persia " (7,974 tons) off Crete without warning with a loss of 334 lives, but Germany refused to admit that it was one of her submarines and tried to transfer the responsibility to Austria. This brought the year 1915 to an end, a year fertile in hope and speculation, begetting vast promises of further success. To all Germany the future of her navy lay beneath the waters, though few could read the riddle as far as the bottom of Scapa Flow.
Types of German Submarines. A short digression may be inserted here on the general types and characteristics of German submarines. They comprised four main classes converted mercantiles (Deutsch- land class), U boats, UB and UC. The converted mercantile num- bered a bare half-dozen (Uisi Ui55) and were used chiefly off the Azores and in 1918 off the coast of America. They were about 213 ft. long, large, slow and clumsy, going about nine knots only on the surface, but capable of remaining put for. three to five months. They had a good armament of two 5-g-in. guns, six torpedo tubes (4 bow, 2 beam) and 30 torpedoes. The U boats were the principal type, and were large boats which did most of their work in the Atlantic approaches. They were 210-225 ft. long, could go 142-17 knots on the surface, and 8-9 knots submerged. They could only maintain this speed submerged for an hour or so, but could continue at a speed of about two knots for as much as 48 hours ; then, like all submarines, they had to come to the surface and recharge their batteries with the help of their Diesel motors. They carried two guns (usually one 4-1 in. and one 22-pounder), with 4 to 6 torpedo tubes and 8 to 12 torpedoes, and remained out generally from 25-30 days. There was also a special class of U minelayers, which originally numbered 10, viz. Uyi-USo, carrying 36 mines and 2 torpedoes. They had only a single hull and were slow boats, rarely cruising at more than 5 knots. Though the work on the west coast of Scotland and off the Dutch coast in 1918 was done by these boats they were not as a class very- successful, and by 1918 there were only 5 of them left. The UB boats were originally built for coastal work, and the first 17 were small boats capable of being sent in sections overland. The earlier boats could remain out from 7-14 days, the Jater boats from 14-24 days. They carried one gun forward (a 4-1 in. or 22-pounder) and the earlier boats 2 to 6 torpedoes, which were increased to 5 tubes (4 bow, i stern) and 10 torpedoes in the later type. The UC boats were essentially minelayers, carrying one 22-pounder forward, 3. tubes with 4 to 6 torpedoes, and 18 mines. They remained out
