German High Seas Fleet recalled from Norway to its war bases

On 14 July 1914 the main force of the German navy, the High Seas Fleet (Hochseeflotte), set out on its annual summer cruise to Norway. Commanded by Admiral Friedrich von Ingenohl, the ships first carried out exercises near the Skagerrak, and on 25 July they entered the Norwegian fjords. Like the Kaiser’s cruise, the voyage was meant to give the impression that an ordinary, quiet summer was under way in Germany.

News of the ultimatum to Serbia and of the breach of relations between Vienna and Belgrade changed the situation. Kaiser Wilhelm II, who was himself cutting short his voyage, ordered the fleet to return home. He did so against the wishes of Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, who feared that a sudden return of the ships would alarm the British. On 26 July the fleet began its homeward journey, and on 27 July all its squadrons assembled off the south-west coast of Norway and set course for their bases.

Their destination was the ports from which Germany intended to wage the war at sea: Wilhelmshaven on the North Sea and Kiel on the Baltic, linked by the Kiel Canal. By 29 July the I Battle Squadron was back in Wilhelmshaven. A fleet that only a few days earlier had been exercising in quiet fjords was now in its starting positions in case of war.

The movements of the German ships were watched closely in London. The naval rivalry between Germany and Great Britain, set in motion by Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz’s programme of fleet expansion, had for years been one of the main sources of tension between the two countries. In the same days the British Royal Navy halted the dispersal of its ships, and on 29 July it sent its main force to the base at Scapa Flow. Both fleets were preparing for a clash at the same time.

The return of the High Seas Fleet did not yet mean war, but it closed a chapter. From that moment the most powerful fleets in Europe stood ready, facing each other across the North Sea. The first serious clash between them came as early as 28 August 1914 in the Battle of Heligoland Bight.