STARTING EVENTS

Russia - Even before mobilisation is complete, the Russians fulfill their prewar plans as well as their promises to France, and launch attacks on Germany from north of the Russian-Polish salient, and on Austria-Hungary from the south:

Prussia - In the north, the Russian First (Gen Rennenkampf) and Second (Gen Samsonov) Armies faces a single German Eighth Army (Gen von Prittwitz) holding the East Prussian front.

Galicia - To the south, along the 200 mile Galician front running parallel to the Carpathian Mountains and down to the Rumanian border, the bulk of the Russian forces under Gen Ivanov (Fourth, Fifth, Third and Eighth Armies) faces the Austrian First, Fourth, and Third Armies and part of the Second (all commanded by Gen Conrad von Hötzendorff).

NAVAL BALANCE OF POWER

Russia's aging Baltic Fleet consist of five pre-dreadnoughts with four dreadnoughts completing, six old armoured cruisers, four light or protected cruisers, destroyers, torpedo boats and a few small submarines. Although the German forces allocated to Baltic operations are few in number, the Imperial German Navy with its 15 dreadnoughts, five battlecruisers and other modern ships, able to transfer at ease between the North Sea and Baltic via the Kiel Canal, is more than a match for the Russians.

For nearly a decade therefore, the Russian General Staff had set the Navy the objective of defending the Russian coastline and preventing any landings aimed at capturing Petrograd. A major plank in this strategy is the laying of offensive minefields off the Russian and German coasts. These claim many victims.

Although the Russian Navy is active in the Baltic through until 1917, probably its most significant contribution to the war at sea - in all theatres - happens just 25 days after the two countries went to war with the capture of German cruiser 'Magdeburg'.

The Royal Navy also comes to play a small but important part when the first of a number of submarines slip through into the Baltic, starting in October 1914

AUGUST 1914

Russia invades East Prussia - The Russian offensive starts on the 17th when First Army crosses the border north of the Masurian Lakes. First contact is made in the Battle of Gumbinnen and an attack on the 20th by three German corps is held. Gen Prittwitz panics and wants to fall back behind the Vistula River, thus abandoning the whole of East Prussia. Gen Moltke replaces him with Gen von Hindenburg, and Gen Ludendorff joins him as chief of staff. Meanwhile the Russian Second Army has crossed the border to the south of the Masurian Lakes in the Tannenberg area, making German retreat impossible. The bulk of German Eighth Army is therefore moved southwest by train from Gumbinnen. In the Battle of Tannenberg, starting on the 26th, the Germans attack the Russians, turning both flanks, encircling them, and in just six days destroying Second Army and taking 100,000 prisoners.

Austria attacks Polish Galicia -In the south of the strategically vital Russian-Polish salient, the Austrian commander Conrad takes the offensive first to beat the Russian's mobilization. His main effort is to be on the west with a strong left wing consisting of First and Fourth Armies. They are to move north between the Vistula and Bug Rivers to take the Polish towns of Lublin and Kholm. Russian plans are similar, and at the Battles of Krasnik (23rd-26th) and Komarov (26th-31st) just within Poland, the Austrians almost win, but only gain tactical successes.

The First Battle of Lemberg then takes place through into early September. The weaker Austrian right wing on the southeast flank s in trouble with its reinforced Third Army outnumbered three to one by the Russian Third and Eighth Armies. In the Battle of Gnila Lipa River (a tributary of the Dniester within Galicia) between 26th and 30th, the Austrians are pushed back to the west of Lemberg. The Russian south or left wing is now in a position to outflank the Austrian armies fighting to the north within Poland.

Baltic Sea

26th August - German cruiser 'MAGDEBURG' (1912, 4,570t, 12-10.5cm). German light cruisers 'Augsburg' and 'Magdeburg' continue minelaying and other sorties into the northern Baltic. Early on the 26th, in thick fog, 'Magdeburg' runs hard aground on the island of Odensholm at the southern entrance to the Gulf of Finland (59-18N, 23-21E). Escorting destroyer 'V-26' tries to tow her off, but without success. The crew attempt to scuttle, but Russian cruisers 'Bogatyr' and 'Pallada' come up and opened fire. 'Magdeburg' is only partly destroyed and the Russians recover three sets of the main German naval codes, complete with the current key. One of the sets makes its way quickly to the Royal Navy’s 'Room 40' in London. Added to other British captures, German naval codes are soon broken and give the Allies a major advantage at sea.

SEPTEMBER 1914

East Prussia - As the Battle of Tannenberg is being fought, Russian First Army (Rennenkampf) continues to push slowly into East Prussia north of the Masurian Lakes, but with the battle in the south lost by the Russians, Rennenkampf takes up a defensive position. German Eighth Army (Hindenburg) moves north to face them and on the 9th in the First Battle of the Masurian Lakes makes a frontal assault which is repulsed. But on the same day, the Russian's southern flank in the Lakes area is pushed back and out of East Prussia, covering their retreat with a small counter-attack on the 10th, and falling back towards the River Niemen. In the first East Prussia Campaign, two Russian Armies are broken and 300,000 men lost.

Galicia - With the Russians threatening the Austrian left wing fighting inside Poland, the rest of Austria's Second Army is brought back from Serbia. In the Battle of Rava-Russkaya (6th-10th), Austrian Gen Conrad tries to outflank the Russian's Third and Eighth Armies in the south but the gap between Austrian First Army in the north and the rest of his forces is exploited by Russian cavalry. On the 11th, Conrad orders retirement behind the San River, and on the 16th to the Gorlice-Tarnow Line with his left flank on the Vistula River and the right in the Carpathian Mountains. The Austrians have now been pushed back 135 miles west of Lemberg, leaving all Austrian Galicia in Russian hands, the fortress of Przemysl besieged, and German Silesia threatened. The cost to the Austrians is 250,000 men dead and wounded and 100,000 taken prisoner.

With Germany threatened, four German corps move 500 miles from East Prussia to the Cracow area in Austria, just behind the Austrian defences. The relatively small German force becomes the Ninth Army and with Austrian support prepares to attack Poland aiming for Warsaw .

OCTOBER 1914

Poland - Pushing north into Poland in the First Battle for Warsaw, the Germans are in sight of the Polish capital by mid-month . But the Russians have the advantage in numbers - four armies and 60 divisions against the 18 divisions of German Ninth Army and the Austrians. After heavy fighting along the Vistula to the south of Warsaw , the Germans make an orderly withdrawal to their own frontier. The Austrians are also pushed back from the San River, once again leaving behind the besieged city of Przemysl.

Baltic Sea

11th October - Russian armoured cruiser 'PALLADA' (1911, 7,800t, 2-20.3cm). Three German U-boats have been sent to patrol the waters off the Gulf of Finland. The Russians are also patrolling the area using unescorted cruisers, and apparently unaware of the hard lessons the Royal Navy is learning about the danger from submarines. Armoured cruiser 'Pallada' is hit by a single torpedo from 'U-26', her magazines exploded and the entire crew of 600 men killed.

Arrival of British Submarines - The Russian Baltic Fleet has few really effective submarines and three British 'E'-class boats are ordered to make the hazardous journey into the Baltic through the Sound separating Denmark from Sweden. During the attempt in mid-month, 'E-11' (Lt-Cdr Naismith) is forced to turn back, but 'E-1' (Lt Cdr Laurence) and 'E-9' (Lt Cdr Horton of World War 2 Battle of the Atlantic fame) get through. Russia has abandoned the naval base at Libau and the British boats make their way to Reval in the Gulf of Finland, coming under the command of the Russian C-in-C. Joined in late 1915 by more 'E' boats and then by four 'C' class, the British submarines came to play an important part in stopping the German High Seas Fleet exercising freely in the southern Baltic and disrupting iron ore traffic from Lulea in Sweden.

NOVEMBER 1914

Poland - Gen Hindenburg is appointed C-in-C German forces on the Eastern Front. With the Germans outnumbered and the Austrians in the south shattered, the Russians attack towards German Silesia on the 11th. However German Ninth Army (Gen von Mackensen) has concentrated between Thorn and Posen on the northeastern border of the Polish salient, and attacks the flank of the Russian advance from Poland into Silesia. In the Battle for Lodz. the German drive almost succeeds, and Mackensen moves at least 50 miles by mid November, exploiting a gap between Russian First and Second Armies, but Russian Fifth Army moves up and counter-attacks. The threat to the German forces is too great and one Corps at Lodz has to struggle against a much larger Russian force before breaking out in late November.

Baltic Sea

17th November - German cruiser 'FRIEDRICH CARL' (1903, 9,700t, 4-21cm). On her way to bombard Libau, armoured cruiser 'Friedrich Carl', serving as a coastal defence ship, sinks on two mines in a Russian field laid by destroyers, west-southwest of Memel (54-41N, 20-11E). The shelling of Libau by other cruisers goes ahead.

30th November - German large torpedo boat 'S-124' (1904, 470t, 3-5cm, 3-45cm tt) sinks in collision with Danish steamer 'Anglodane' off the German Baltic coast (55-22N, 12-11E). She is salvaged, and broken up at Kiel in 1915.

DECEMBER 1914

Poland - In the Second Battle for Warsaw, the Russians pull back from Lodz and on the 6th, the Germans move in as major fighting grinds to a halt. The German moves into southwest and then northwest Poland are only partly successful, but have smashed the Russian Silesian offensive and removed any threat to Silesia for the rest of the war. By the end of the 1914, Hindenburg is receiving new troops and others transferred from the Western Front. But for now the Eastern Front is quiet. In the north, the Germans hold the western part of Poland including Lodz (but have not reached Warsaw), regained all East Prussia, and taken the southern part of the Russian Baltic provinces. In the south, Austrian Galicia remains in Russian hands.

Baltic Sea

12th December - Russian destroyers 'ISPOLNITELNI' and 'LETUCHI' (1906, 400t, 2-45.7cm tt). The two 'Lovki' class destroyers are lost in a snow storm off Odensholm during a planned minelaying operation southwest of Libau. 'Ispolnitelni' sinks after one of her own mines explodes, and 'Letuchi' capsizes trying to rescue the crew. Few if any men survive from the two ships.