Battle of Jutland Centenary

Debate between Oliver Colvile and Flick Drummond

Wednesday 25th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Portsmouth South) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to invite the House to pay its respects to those who fought at the battle of Jutland on 31 May and 1 June 100 years ago. At 10.30 pm on 30 May 1916, Admiral Jellicoe led 16 Dreadnought battle ships out of Scapa Flow after the Admiralty had intercepted a message suggesting that the German fleet was mobilising. He was to meet a squadron of eight Dreadnoughts coming from Cromarty to form the grand fleet. Admiral Beatty’s battle cruiser fleet comprising 52 ships left Rosyth a little later. In total, 151 ships of the Royal Navy were to rendezvous 90 miles west of Jutland.

At 1 am on 31 May, Admiral Hipper’s battle cruisers left Wilhelmshaven. The German main battle fleet of 16 Dreadnought class ships led by Admiral Scheer left Jade at 2.30 am and were joined by six pre-Dreadnought ships from the Elbe river at 4 am, giving a total of 99 ships in the German high seas fleet. Neither side knew that the other’s entire force was at sea. On 31 May at 3.48 pm, five of Admiral Hipper’s ships opened fire on the battlecruisers of Admiral Beatty. Within 36 minutes, the British fleet had lost two battlecruisers, HMS Indefatigable and HMS Queen Mary, with the loss of 2,264 men and boys, and just 21 survivors.

[Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that my grandfather served on HMS Valiant as a gunnery officer during the battle of Jutland? I shall be reading out his letters during a presentation in Devonport in Plymouth on Monday. The adrenalin that went through his body at the time meant that he did not need to eat anything for 36 hours after playing his part in the battle. He enjoyed only a glass of sloe gin and a ham sandwich during the course of it.

[Mrs Drummond]

The normal ration is rum, of course. I ask my hon. Friend to send those letters to the Royal Naval Museum in Portsmouth; I am sure that it would be very grateful to him. HMS Valiant, on which his grandfather served, also had a distinguished career in world war two, when it served in the Mediterranean and the far east.

Within 12 hours, the Royal Navy had lost 14 ships and more than 6,000 men while the German navy lost 11 ships and 2,500 men. The total was 10% of the number of ships at battle. The conditions in which the battle was fought were foggy and damp with a freezing North sea that claimed the lives of many of those who managed to abandon their shattered ships. Those lives are remembered at the manning ports of Portsmouth, Plymouth and Chatham, where the memorials designed by Sir Robert Lorimer bear plaques carrying all their names.

The biggest ships fired shells weighing nearly a tonne over a distance of 12 miles. Conditions aboard ships on both sides would have been uncomfortable and cramped at the best of times.