The Battle of Jutland - WW1 31st May - 1st June 1916

The Battle of Jutland

Date 31 May – 1 June 1916

Location North Sea, near Denmark

56°42′N 5°52′E

The Battle of Jutland was a naval battle fought by the British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet under Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, against the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet under Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer during the First World War.

The battle was fought from 31 May to 1 June 1916 in the North Sea, near the coast of Denmark's Jutland Peninsula. It was the largest naval battle and the only full-scale clash of battleships in the war. It was the third fleet action between steel battleships, following the smaller but more decisive battles of the Yellow Sea (1904) and Tsushima (1905) during the Russo-Japanese War.

Full details of the battle can be seen at WIKI - Battle of Jutland or at the links below under References, Sources and Further Reading.

The purpose of this project is to list British people involved and link them to profiles on Geni. 2016 is the centenary year of the battle.

The numbers are too many to list them all. A roll of honour can be seen at The Jutland Roll of Honour. The numbers involved can be seen at British Losses at Jutland

Please link Geni profiles of any participants to this project - regardless of rank. People of interest and note can be highlighted under Honoured and Notable Combatants below.

Statistics

Officers

Killed 328
Wounded 25
Prisoners of War 10

Enlisted Men

Killed 5769 (including civilians)
Wounded 485
Prisoners of War 167

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Honoured and Notable Combatants

Names with Bold links are to Geni profiles or projects. Other links take you to external biographical web pages.

Victoria Cross

The Victoria Cross is the highest military decoration awarded for valour "in the face of the enemy" to members of the British Empire armed forces.

• The Hon. Edward Barry Stewart Bingham (HMS Nestor)
  
  

Citation

For the extremely gallant way in which he led his division in their attack, first on enemy destroyers and then on their battlecruisers.
He finally sighted the enemy battle-fleet, and, followed by the one remaining destroyer of his division (Nicator), with dauntless courage he closed to within 3,000 yards of the enemy in order to attain a favourable position for firing the torpedoes.
While making this attack, Nestor and Nicator were under concentrated fire of the secondary batteries of the High Sea Fleet. Nestor was subsequently sunk.

Bingham was also awarded the OBE and was mentioned in dispatches. He was awarded the (Tsarist) Russian Order of St Stanislaus. In 1919 he published a memoir of his naval career, notable for his description of the worst part of naval life being, not nearly being blown to pieces in battle, nor the nervous hours and minutes before battle; it was the ordeal, in that pre-diesel age, of coaling.

• John Travers Cornwell - Commemorative Stamp John Travers Cornwell "Jack" (HMS Chester)
  

The recommendation for citation from Admiral David Beatty, reads:

"the instance of devotion to duty by Boy (1st Class) John Travers Cornwell who was mortally wounded early in the action, but nevertheless remained standing alone at a most exposed post, quietly awaiting orders till the end of the action, with the gun's crew dead and wounded around him. He was under 16½ years old. I regret that he has since died, but I recommend his case for special recognition in justice to his memory and as an acknowledgement of the high example set by him."

• Major Francis John William Harvey (HMS Lion)

Citation

An extract from "The London Gazette," No. 29751, dated 15th Sept., 1916, records the following:- "Whilst mortally wounded and almost the only survivor after the explosion of an enemy shell in "Q" gunhouse, with great presence of mind and devotion to duty ordered the magazine to be flooded, thereby saving the ship. He died shortly afterwards."

• Loftus William Jones Commander Loftus William Jones (HMS Shark) (13 November 1879 – 31 May 1916)

Citation

On the afternoon of the 31st May, 1916, during the action, Commander Jones in H.M.S. "Shark", Torpedo Boat Destroyer, led a division of Destroyers to attack the enemy Battle Cruiser Squadron. In the course of this attack a shell hit the "Shark's" bridge, putting the steering gear out of order, and very shortly afterwards another shell disabled the main engines, leaving the vessel helpless. The Commanding Officer of another Destroyer, seeing the "Shark's" plight, came between her and the enemy and offered assistance, but was warned by Commander Jones not to run the risk of being almost certainly sunk in trying to help him. Commander Jones, though wounded in the leg, went aft to help connect and man the after wheel. Meanwhile the forecastle gun with its crew had been blown away, and the same fate soon afterwards befell the after gun and crew. Commander Jones then went to the midship and the only remaining gun, and personally assisted in keeping it in action. All this time the "Shark" was subjected to very heavy fire from enemy light cruisers and destroyers at short range. The gun's crew of the midship gun was reduced to three, of whom an Able Seaman was soon badly wounded in the leg. A few minutes later Commander Jones was hit by a shell, which took off his leg above the knee, but he continued to give orders to his gun's crew, while a Chief Stoker improvised a tourniquet round his thigh. Noticing that the Ensign was not properly hoisted, he gave orders for another to be hoisted. Soon afterwards, seeing that the ship could not survive much longer, and as a German Destroyer was closing, he gave orders for the surviving members of the crew to put on lifebelts. Almost immediately after this order had been given, the "Shark" was struck by a torpedo and sank. Commander Jones was unfortunately not amongst the few survivors from the "Shark" who were picked up by a neutral vessel in the night.  The London Gazette, 6 March 1917

Others

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• Henry William Allingham (1896-2009) - The last surviving veteran of the battle. British RAF (originally RNAS) airman, died on 18 July 2009, aged 113, by which time he was the oldest documented man in the world and one of the last surviving veterans of the whole war.

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• George VI, Prince Albert was also among the combatants was the then 20-year-old , second in the line to the British throne, who would serve as King George VI of the United Kingdom from 1936 until his death in 1952. He served as a junior officer in the Royal Navy
  

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References, Sources and Further Reading

• Main Reference - Jutland 1916
  
• Battle of Jutland - Look Ahead

Reference WIKI - Battle of Jutland Information shared under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License - see Creative Commons Licenses

this project is in History Link