In 1914 Britain's Naval supremacy was being challenged for the first time since Trafalgar. At large in South American waters within reach of the convoy routes across the Atlantic and the Pacific was Vice-Admiral Graf von Spee with the East Asiatic Cruiser Squadron of the Imperial German Navy, including the armoured cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Graf von Spee's belief that a cruiser squadron was of more strategic value than independent raiders seemed amply justified at Coronel on 1st November, when the powerful German unit inflicted a heavy defeat on four courageous but weaker British ships under Rear-Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock.

Reaction in Britain was immediate and violent. A century of the rule of pax Britannica had left a deep-rooted impression that the Royal Navy was invincible. Now, in the first major engagement in which battle had been offered since the days of Nelson, it had suffered a morale-shattering blow. Public bewilderment turned swiftly to anger: the Royal Navy thirsted for revenge. The Admiralty, in the persons of the First Lord, Mr. Winston Churchill, and the First Sea Lord, Lord Fisher, ordered the destruction of the East Asiatic Squadron; everything must be done to recapture command of the Southern Seas. A powerful force including the two battle-cruisers Invincible and Inflexible, was sent to the Falkland Islands, prepared for a long search and a battle of annihilation. The Battle of the Falkland Islands was fought on 8th December. The desperate gallantry of the Imperial German Navy challenged the vengeful pride of the Royal Navy in a struggle for control over the ocean trade-routes of the Southern Seas.

Barrie Pitt came to prominence as a writer on naval history with his brilliant account of the Zeebrugge raid. In Coronel and Falkland he presents a vivid picture of these epic battles of the first World War. His description of the actions are precise and graphic, his judgement of the motives and decisions of those in command, scrupulous and detailed.

Two of the major participants, Cradock and von Spee, died with their ships, and the reasons for many of their actions can only be assumed, not proved. Basing his text upon German and British records and upon information not available to, or unconsidered by earlier chroniclers, Mr. Pitt has reconstructed the events of the two 'missing periods', the fatal hours during which Cradock decided to fling his puny force against von Spee's squadron, and the days between 1st November and 8th December, when von Spee was forced to hazard his ships and the lives of his men upon the information contained in an ill-considered telegram and an unfounded rumour.

List of Illustrations

• Rear-Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock, K.C.V.O., C.B., M.V.O.
• H.M.S. Glasgow
• A.M.C. Otranto
• H.M.S. Good Hope
• H.M.S. Monmouth
• H.M.S. Canopus
• Winston Churchill and Admiral Lord Fisher
• Sinking the tender Titania (from Hans Pochhammer's Before Jutland)
• Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Nurnberg leaving Valparaiso Bay, 4 November 1914
• Vice-Admiral Graf von Spee (from Hans Pochhammer's Before Jutland)
• S.M.S. Scharnhorst
• Vice-Admiral Sir Frederick Doveton Sturdee, K.C.B., C.M.G., C.V.O.
• H.M.S. Invincible
• The guns of Inflexible
• H.M.S. Inflexible
• H.M.S. Bristol
• H.M.S. Carnarvon
• H.M.S. Cornwall
• H.M.S. Kent
• `Enemy approaching Port William' (from the water-colour by Lieut-Commander Verner)
• `Last rounds falling about Scharnhorst' (from the water-colour by Lieut-Commander Verner)
• Survivors from Gneisenau (from Hans Pochhantmer's Before Jutland)
• S.M.S. Dresden

MAPS

• The Battle of Coronel, 1 Nov.
• The Routes to the Falkland Is., 1 Nov.-8 Dec.
• Port Stanley Harbour, Morning, 8 Dec.
• Battle-Cruiser Action, 8 Dec.
• The Battle of the Falkland Is., 8 Dec.
  

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