The Sea Raiders

by Edward Keble Chatterton

“No more risky enterprise day after day, week after week, can be conceived than that of hovering about on the sea-lanes, usually within wireless range of the British cruisers; and the narrow escapes, the coincidences, the exciting moments rival breathless fiction.”In this gripping narrative, Chatterton describes the journey of German-American liners across the world’s marine highways, through rough waters to Pacific islands and tropical climates followed by treacherous winds and snow-capped mountains.He includes rare first-hand accounts and information from the British Admiralty Archives, providing unrivalled descriptions of one of the greatest and most controversial Naval adventures.

Genres: Military History

241 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1931

About the author

Edward Keble Chatterton was a prolific writer who published around a hundred books, pamphlets and magazine series, mainly on maritime and naval themes.

Reviews

[JD · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book about the German raiders at sea during World War 1 that covers the whole war. The book was first published in 1932 and the writing style old fashioned. The book is great with all the details it gives on the different raiders and the problems they faced that led the Germans to begin employing different tactics later on in the war. After reading this you can see how the Germans learned from this to employ the same raiding tactics during World War 2 to deadly effect. The writer was also a sailor and he puts his knowledge of the sea to good use to write this book. This book is not a page turner, but very interesting and enjoyable non the less.

[Erik Empson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The subject of this book -- the passenger liners and merchant ships which the German Kriegsmarine adapted to offensive raiders of Allied shipping during WW1, and the efforts of the navy to stop them -- is endlessly fascinating. Chatterton shares this view and manages to communicate this, but he does not succeed in instilling the same passion in his readers. That is mostly because the book is atrociously written. This is not just because the writing is archaic, it is because it was written in an epoch wheere books did not have editors, however much, as did this in spadefuls, they needed them. Hence we have a confused and disorientating and repetitive take on a subject that actually lends itself to great narrative.
Some of this book will be of use to the historian - namely details about the boats sunk, the difficulties encountered by the raiders and the guile of their commanders. But I think most readers will struggle to separate the wheat from the chaffe and that is a pity.
The author is right that the central weakness of the German strategy was the absence of fortified bases abroad that could refuel these boats. The ones most adapted to the role were not the fast transatlantic liners chosen, because they would burn fuel at a crazy rate, but merchant ships that could chug along economically. The problem with the latter is they would stand no chance of evading capture through speed. It is interesting to hear that at a certain point the Germans reverted to sail, presented as a way to deal with the refuelling problem, though whether this was down to a tactical decision or sheer lack of resources is unclear.
I wanted to like this book more, and I guess I will refer to it for various bits of information, but when you need to read a sentence several times because you can't work out the subject or object of a sentence, you have been let down.

[William Clement · Rating 4 out of 5]

History Buff Special!

Found this interesting as I was not familiar with this aspect of WW II marine warfare. There was compassion and chivalry extant at that time , but destruction nonetheless. At times there is just too much detail to digest.

[James Cobb · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating tale of derring-do by German merchant raiders in World War I. Their main achievement was to make the British nervous but the skill shown by some of the captains was remarkable.