Sinking of the gunboat Hedwig von Wissmann

On 9 February 1916 on Lake Tanganyika the British flotilla of Lieutenant-Commander Geoffrey Spicer-Simson fought its second and last action against the German vessels. Six weeks earlier his motor boats had captured the gunboat Kingani, which had been repaired and renamed Fifi. This time the victim was the larger Hedwig von Wissmann, from the start of the war the most dangerous German vessel on the lake. After a chase which, according to the report of the High Commissioner for South Africa, lasted about three hours, the German ship burned and sank. Once again no one was killed on the British side.

Hedwig von Wissmann had not been built as a warship. This wooden steamer, about 21–22 metres long and named after the wife of Hermann von Wissmann, was built at the end of the 1890s in Hamburg, and her parts were carried to the lake and assembled on the spot. Before the war she carried mail and cargo. In August 1914 the Germans armed her with light guns from the survey ship Möwe, scuttled at Dar es Salaam, and manned her with Möwe’s sailors. She was now commanded by Leutnant zur See Job Odebrecht. The Germans still did not know what had become of Kingani. According to the British official history of naval operations they attributed her loss to the fire of Belgian batteries and were unaware of the presence of the British boats. According to German and more recent accounts, Odebrecht was to reconnoitre the area of the Belgian post at Lukuga in February and meet the largest German ship on the lake, Graf von Götzen, the next day.

At dawn on 9 February news reached the harbour at Kalemie that a German ship could be seen on the lake, moving slowly southwards. Toutou, sunk in the harbour by a storm in January, was still under repair, so Fifi, with Spicer-Simson himself on board, and the faster Mimi set off in pursuit, followed by small Belgian vessels. According to Newbolt, the British sighted the enemy at 8.35 a.m. at a distance of about 7 kilometres, partly hidden by a mirage over the smooth surface of the lake. Hedwig turned round and fled towards Kigoma, and according to this account her crew poured oil on the furnace to squeeze more power out of the engine. Mimi quickly caught up with her and was the first to open fire. As Lord Buxton’s report described, the motor boat kept astern of the Germans, out of range of their stern gun, and Odebrecht, wanting to use his bow gun, had to turn the ship broadside again and again, which slowed his flight. Thanks to this the slower Fifi managed to come within effective range of her 12-pounder gun.

The shells from Fifi were decisive. According to the British official history, one exploded in the engine room, killing an engineer and smashing the oil tank, a second destroyed the engine, and a third holed the bottom and set the spilled oil alight. Accounts differ on the details of the chase: Newbolt credits Fifi with several dozen hits, while more recent studies, based on the recollections of participants, describe how Fifi’s gun jammed during the fight and how her ammunition was running out. Odebrecht ordered the burning ship to be abandoned and, according to German accounts, left an explosive charge on board so that she would not fall into enemy hands. Hedwig von Wissmann soon sank bow first. According to Newbolt the British picked up 12 Germans, among them the commander, and eight Africans. According to Buxton’s report two Europeans and three African crew members were killed; some more recent studies give seven dead.

From the prisoners the British learned that the Germans had only two vessels left on the lake: the small unarmed motor boat Wami and Graf von Götzen, which was larger and more heavily armed than the whole British flotilla. According to some accounts Götzen appeared near Kalemie the next day, searching for the missing Hedwig, but Spicer-Simson did not give battle. News of the victory reached British headquarters in Nairobi on 15 February. With the loss of Hedwig von Wissmann, control of the lake passed for good into Allied hands, which opened the way for the planned Belgian offensive from the Belgian Congo. Götzen never fought the British flotilla, and in the summer of 1916, as the Belgians approached Kigoma, the Germans scuttled her themselves.