THE WOLF'S LAST VICTIMS
BY MURRAY DEAR Raider Wolf at sea
I
n November 1916, the German raider Wolf armed with four 150mm guns, one 105mm gun, four torpedo tubes, 465 mines and a seaplane, sailed from Kiel. With a coal capacity of 6000 tons, and consumption at eight knots of only 35 tons per day, this raider had a prodigious range. After successfully avoiding the Royal Navy blockade, Wolf slowly sailed southward and then eastward into the Indian Ocean. Mines were laid off the Cape of Good Hope, Bombay and Colombo. In April 1917, Wolf slipped south then east of Australia and New Zealand for a self refit at Sunday (now Raoul) Island in the Kermadec Islands. At Sunday Island PNG, Wolf seized the steamer Wairuna and the schooner Winslow then sailed south to commence mine laying operations in the Tasman Sea.
Three minefields were to be laid athwart choke points where there was likely to be a concentration of merchant shipping. On the night of June 25 and 26, 25 mines were laid between Cape Maria Van Diemen and the Three Kings Islands. Off Farewell Spit, 35 mines were laid during the night of June 27-28, and this was followed by a small field of 17 mines laid off Gabo Island off Australia's southeast tip near Cape Howe, on the night of July 3-4. The Gabo Island minefield was meant to consist of 25 mines but was not completed as a vessel sighted by the Wolf, incorrectly identified as the cruiser HMAS Encounter, forcing the raider to run for safety. After capturing two sailing vessels and the steamer
Matunga in the South Pacific, the Wolf then laid 110 mines in the South China Sea before successfully returning to Kiel. During its cruise of 64,000 miles, the Wolf sank or captured 13 victims and a further 16 ships were either sunk or damaged by mines laid by this determined raider.
Each minefield laid in the Tasman Sea resulted in a victim. The first to be sunk was the steamer Cumberland off Gabo Island on July 6, 1917 and the second was the steamer Port Kembla, sunk off Cape Farewell on September 18, 1917. Both the Australian and New Zealand governments believed that the two ships had been sunk by internal explosions resulting from sabotage. The Wolf's minefields were not revealed until a prisoner's message in a bottle
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