Portugal seizes German ships

On the afternoon of 23 February 1916 Portuguese sailors boarded the German and Austro-Hungarian merchant ships anchored in the Tagus off Lisbon. The operation was directed by Commander Jaime Daniel Leote do Rego, commander of the division of warships stationed in the capital. A Portuguese crew was left on each ship, the German flag was hauled down and the Portuguese flag raised, and the warships fired a 21-gun salute. According to the Havas agency and most accounts, 36 ships were seized in this way, although some reports the next day speak of 35. Several of them were large steamers of more than 8,000 tons.

Ships interned since 1914

When war broke out in August 1914, German ships that found themselves far from home took refuge in neutral ports to avoid falling into the hands of the Royal Navy. More than seventy of them lay in the ports of Portugal and its colonies. Portugal was formally not at war with Germany, although it was bound to Britain by the oldest alliance in Europe, and in 1914 parliament had authorised the government to take part in the war on the British side. In Africa Portuguese troops were already clashing with German ones.

At the beginning of 1916 Britain and its allies were feeling the shortage of tonnage acutely. Many ships were serving the armed forces, and German submarines and mines were sinking more. In February the British government, invoking the alliance, asked Lisbon to seize all German ships in Portuguese ports. The government of Afonso Costa, which since November 1915 had been seeking Portugal’s full participation in the war, readily agreed. According to a dispatch to the London Times, on 23 February the captains of the German steamers in the Tagus received, on the orders of the Minister of Marine, an official notice that the government was taking over their ships. The official gazette published a decree setting out how the ships immobilised in Portuguese ports would be used, and notices of requisition were served on the owners and agents of the ships.

Requisition, not confiscation

Lisbon tried to give the affair the appearance of an ordinary economic measure. The government explained that it had taken over the ships in the public interest, in view of the needs of the country’s economy, and that they would be used for transport. Costa denied that it was an act of war, and the Portuguese legation in Berlin was to assure the Germans that the shipowners’ rights would be respected. The Lisbon press welcomed the government’s decision.

Over the following days the Portuguese also seized German ships in other ports. On 25 February they took over eight at Mindelo on the island of São Vicente, in the Portuguese colony of Cape Verde, and at the end of February and the beginning of March several at Mormugão in Portuguese Goa. According to Portuguese researchers 72 ships were seized in all, of which only two were Austro-Hungarian. Germany protested, regarding the seizure of the ships as a violation of its treaty rights. Two weeks later, on 9 March 1916, it declared war on Portugal. The ships were taken over by a state shipping company, and a large part of them was placed at the disposal of the British and other Allies.