The raider Kormoran (ex-Steiermark) was commanded by Lieutenant-Commander Theodor Detmers. The largest of the German raiders, the Kormoran weighed in at 8,736 tons. Her overall length was 515 feet, she had a beam of 66 feet, and a draft of 30 feet. She had a maximum speed of 18 knots. She was armed with six 5.9-inch guns, two twin 37mm, five 20mm cannon, four twin 21-inch torpedo tubes (mounted above the waterline), two single 21-inch torpedo tubes (mounted below the waterline), 420 mines, and one mine-laying motor launch, in addition to two Arado 196 scouting aircraft. Her complement was 397, although this varied considerably due to prize crews and new drafts.
Operating in the South Atlantic, Indian Ocean, and the South Pacific, Kormoran sank eleven ships (Antonis, British Union, Afric Star, Eurylochus, Agnita Canadolite, Craftsman, Nicolaos D.L. Velebit, Mareeba, and Stamatios G. Embiricos) for a total of 68,274 tons. She stayed at sea from 12-3-40 to 11-19-41 (352 days). Her cruise ended when she encountered the Australian light cruiser Sydney (about 7,000 tons displacement and armed with eight 6-inch guns, eight 4-inch anti-aircraft guns, four 2-inch anti-aircraft guns, twelve heavy machine guns, eight torpedo tube and two reconnaissance planes). Lured into range of Kormoran's guns, the Sydney was lost with no survivors. However, she did enough damage to the Kormoran to ensure that the raider could not stay afloat.
Eventually, Detmers and approximately 320 of his crew were rescued and spent the remainder of the war in Australian prison-of-war camps.
The following excerpt is taken from _The Raider Kormoran_ by Theodor Detmers (London: Tandem Publishing Ltd, 1975. Edward Fitzgerald, trans).
Edward Wittenberg
wew@papa.uncp.edu
There was no sign of any diminution of speed on the enemy's part, and she came up steadily with an unchanging bow wave, still showing us the narrowest possible silhouette. She was still obviously still curious about us, and now she wanted to know what cargo we were carrying. I replied vaguely 'piece-goods'. They could make what they liked of that. My signalman were working away slowly and inefficiently, and it was terribly difficult for us to make ourselves understood. I now hoisted the Dutch flag and to make the confusion still worse I began to use my wireless, sending out the 'Q' signal: 'QQQ Straat Malakka', and informing the world that we were being challenged by an unknown cruiser. Perth wireless station picked up my signals, acknowledged receipt, and gave the 'understood' sign, telling me to keep in touch.
My men had been at action stations for over an hour now and it seemed a long time to wait, particularly as they could see and hear nothing; and as I expected action to be opened at any moment I now spoke to all stations over the intercom informing them that we were about to go into action with a small cruiser which we should be well able to dispose of. An answering cheer told me that everything was in order.
I could now see that the enemy cruiser now had a plane on the catapult. The engine was probably warming up. At any moment it would be catapulted into the air; and once the observer spotted us from above he would recognize us at once for what we were, an auxiliary cruiser.
Or at the very least he would wireless back that we looked highly suspicious. It might be possible to conceal the range-finding crew with their apparatus before the plane arrived, but the camouflage of the guns in Hatches 2 and 4 was not so perfect that it could stand such close scrutiny. The plane was almost certain to start; the wind and weather conditions simply called for it.
But at least the enemy was only something over three thousand yards away now, a beautiful shooting range. Would she slow down?
Would she order us to heave to? Would she turn her broadside on us?
And what should I do? Had the time come to de-camouflage and run up the war flag? Was the enemy in the best possible position for me to open fire? No, not yet, I decided because three thousand yards was about the extreme effective range of my anti-aircraft guns; and I wanted every gun I had to bear at its maximum effectiveness in order to give me the biggest possible chance. So let her come a bit closer still. The closer she came the better it would be for us. I therefore continued to leave the initiative to the enemy.
For some time now we had been expecting a signal that would call our bluff, but so far nothing had come beyond almost casual queries which we had almost no difficulty in answering with some show of reason. The enemy now changed course to a point or two starboard so that the cruisers silhouette became a little broader, which was also to the good. But at the same time she morsed: 'Give your secret call!'
We had been expecting some such signal for about an hour. There it was at last. The denouement was very close now, because, of course, we did not know the secret call sign of the Straat Malakka.
But for the moment I was still interested in stringing the enemy along, because every passing minute was improving my position. 'Slowly! Slowly!' I called to Ahlbach, who was still deliberately fumbling with the signal flags, and dragging out matters as long as possible. The cruiser now repeated her morse signal: 'Give your secret call!' So much time had now been gained that she was broadside on a sailing a course parallel to that of the Kormoran at a reduced speed. The range was only about a thousand yards now and we could see the cruiser's pantrymen in their white coats lining the rails to have a look at the supposed Dutchman. It was the sort of happy picture you see on a sunny day in peacetime when two ships meet at sea. But it was a peaceful picture soon to be shattered.
In reply to the cruiser's signal demanding that I should give my secret call I could still have done what I would certainly have done had she asked me earlier on. I could pretend to be mistrustful, and instead of replying I could have asked the cruiser her name. Had I done so I am quite certain that I would have gained further time, because that was just the suspicious sort of attitude a cautious Dutch sea captain might have been expected to adopt in such circumstances. He would have wanted to be quite certain before revealing his secret call sign.
But the situation was different now. I needed no more time. My eyes were glued to the bearings compass, and as soon as I saw that the enemy had come practically to a standstill I gave the order 'De-camouflage!' The time was exactly 17.30 hours. The Dutch flag was hauled down, and the German naval war flag ran up and fluttered proudly in the breeze from our foretop.
As soon as my Chief Signalman reported 'War flag flying' I gave the order to open fire to my gunners and torpedo batteries. From the moment the order to de-camouflage was given the miracle speed and efficiency which my men had been preparing for and practising for months took place. The ship's rails folded down, the heavy camouflage covers fore and aft were whisked away, Hatches 2 and 4 opened up to reveal their guns, the 2 cm. anti-aircraft guns were raised, the torpedo flaps opened, and all barrels and torpedo tubes swung on to the target. Within six seconds of the order to de-camouflage the first shot was fired from our leading gun. Four seconds later the other three went into action, scoring direct hits on the enemy's bridge and in his artillery control post.
Immediately after the enemy opened fire too, with a full salvo. But it roared away harmlessly over us, probably over our stern. Then we fired eight salvoes, with six seconds between each salvo, without any answering fire at all from the enemy. Obviously his artillery control centre had been put out of action by our very first salvo. At that short range every shell we fired was a direct hit. At the same time our anti-aircraft guns peppered the enemy's upper deck and his torpedo batteries, and our army 3.7 anti-aircraft guns pumped shells into his bridge.
Our own torpedoes were now discharged at the enemy, and to do this I had to turn to 260 degrees, which I did with very little helm movement in order not to disturb the our gunners. One of the first two torpedoes passed across the cruiser's bows, but the other hit her abaft Turret A. An enormous column of water shot into the air and her stern dipped into the water up to the flag staff. Both fore turrets seemed to be out of action, for we didn't get another shot from them. After we had fired eight salvoes, Turrets C and D began to fire independently.
Turret D fired two or three salvoes, but they went wide. After that it ceased firing altogether. But Turret C continued to fire, and with some considerable accuracy. The first salvo was too high, and it ripped through our funnel at about bridge height, but its next hit us amidships and set our engine-room on fire.
Our own guns were continuing to fire rapidly and steadily and doing the enemy a tremendous amount of damage. A motor-cutter was hanging helplessly halfway over the side, the heavy turret deck of Turret B had been lifted out of its emplacement and hurled overboard.
The plane which had been on the catapult had been blown into the sea, and flames were shooting up everywhere. Not a man could show his face on the upper deck, because the fire from our 2 cm. anti-aircraft guns and our heavy machine-guns was so intense, whilst our 3.7 anti-aircraft guns continued to pump shells into the bridge structure. Not a torpedo was fired at us. In all probability the hail of shells from our anti-aircraft weapons was so intense that no one could release the safety catch on the tubes.
The enemy cruiser now turned towards us and passed behind our stern. It almost looked as if she was trying to ram us, but for that she was already too far down by the stern, and she no longer had any speed. I thought perhaps she was turning in order to bring her starboard torpedo tubes into action after having released the safety catches of the tubes under cover of her lee. But no torpedoes were discharged, and our anti-aircraft guns now swept her starboard side devastatingly.
As the battered cruiser came behind our stern she enjoyed a short respite, because on account of our midships structure our forward guns were temporarily unsighted, so that for a while we had only two guns in action. I kept to my course in order to show the narrowest possible silhouette to any torpedo attack, but none came. A lot of smoke was now drifting away to stern out of starboard from the fire in our engine-room. In consequence my gunnery officer at our artillery control point could no longer see a thing, and handed over to the anti-aircraft gunnery officer who was aft on the poop. He continued to direct the fire of our stern guns, but he was getting no counter-fire at all now, and all the enemy's turrets seemed out of action, and their gun barrels were pointing helplessly away. The enemy's anti-aircraft guns had not been manned at all during the engagement, and they were still silent. The crews of our guns 1, 3 and 4 used this enforced pause in their operations to cool down their barrels with fire hoses, because the rapid firing had made them so hot that they could hardly be used any longer. But it was only a short pause and then all four guns were in action again; that is to say, guns No. 2, 3, 4 and 6. Guns No. 1 and 5 were now in our firing lee and unable to take part in the further action. My gunnery officer took over again.
At about 18.00 hours I wanted to turn to port to run parallel with the enemy and finally destroy her, and the helm was already in position when the sailor at the engine-room telegraph reported that the revolutions of both machines was falling away rapidly and the contact with the engine-room had been broken. At that moment I saw the wake of four torpedoes the enemy had discharged at us, but to my relief it was clear that at our present speed and on our present course they were going to pass harmlessly astern. I therefore made no change in my course and they disappeared behind us at a distance of between one hundred and two hundred yards.
Immediately after they had passed the whole ship shuddered from stem to stern owing to the failure of our engines. Shortly before this I had given instructions to be passed to my Chief leaving it to his discretion to abandon his control stand - which was cut off from the engine-room by glass - if the heat he was complaining of increased intolerably. The orderly now returned and reported that he could get no answer from anyone. The engine-room itself was out of action. He was instructed to see if at least one of the engines could be got going again.
In the meantime, our guns were keeping up their devastating fire, and the enemy was receiving one direct hit after the other. From the fore bridge to the stern mast the cruiser was now a mass of flame and she was moving forward only very slowly. We were unable to move at all, so we sent a torpedo after her at about 8,000 yards, but it passed harmlessly behind her stern.
At 18.25 hours I gave the order to cease-fire. By this time the enemy cruiser was over ten thousand yards distant; drifting rather than sailing, and little more than a flaming hulk. It was growing dark rapidly now, and she gradually faded into the darkness, apparently making for Perth. Up until 21.00 hours we could see the glow, and then we saw the flames suddenly dart up even higher as though from an explosion, and after that the battered hulk of our enemy disappeared into the night.
My aim now was to lower and launch as many of our boats as were still serviceable, and now that the engagement was over I wanted to see whether or not it was possible to keep my ship afloat or not.
Amidships the Kormoran was well alight, and I hurried through the corridor on the port side and saw that the cabins there were burning. I opened the midships door into the engine-room, but billows of thick smoke rolled out, and darting flames shot up. With some difficulty, I got the door closed again, and then I hurried aft where I met the technical personnel, who informed me that the fire-fighting equipment in the engine-room had apparently been destroyed and that the whole starboard foam equipment was also out of action. An attempt to get into action from the screw machine chamber, which was quite undamaged, failed. There was no pressure in the damaged pipes.
In this hopeless situation it was obviously impossible to get the engine-room running again even in part, so we concentrated our efforts on trying to rescue our comrades who were shut in there, but unfortunately everything we tried failed, and we were beaten back by smoke, flames and heat wherever we attempted to force a way through. Detmers and his crew abandoned the ship at 23.00 hours after stripping her of any supplies which could prove to be useful and setting explosive charges near her oil bunkers. Shortly afterwards, Kormoran disappeared beneath the waves forever. Detmers' boat, containing some sixty-two men, was picked up by the steamer Centaur on the twenty-sixth. Centaur's captain would not allow the able-bodied survivors on board, for fear of their overpowering the crew and seizing the ship. He did, however, undertake to tow Detmers and his party into port while supplying them with food and water. Detmers and 320 of his crew would eventually be rescued, but of the Sydney and her 644-man crew no trace was ever found. Kormoran's officers were eventually housed at Dhurringile prisoner-of-war camp, while the remainder of the crew were housed at Graytown. Detmers and his crew remained in internment for two years after the end of the war, but were repatriated to Germany in February 1947.
Report on the Inquiry on the loss of the Sydney by the Australian government.