The Franco Prussian War at Sea - Turns out Coal and Men are important
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- Опубліковано 10 лис 2021
- Today we take a special look at the naval element of the Franco-Prussian War, learn more about the war and the Battle of Havana here: t.co/QChWFtgCAu?amp=1
Sources:
The war for the Rhine frontier 1870, its political and military history, tr. by J.L. Needham: Volume 1
www.amazon.co.uk/Franco-Prussian-War-German-Conquest-1870-1871/dp/052161743X
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Pinned post for Q&A :)
What’s that story about why they are called Stokers again and I emailed my Question about Henery the IV being Tuff
If Germany actually had focused on Submersibles prior to and during the Second World War, would their lack of a surface fleet would free up RN capital ships for refit or service elsewhere? What impact do you see this having and would it REALLY be of benefit to the Axis overall?
Were lightning strikes a serious problem for wooden sailing ships in a storm? Are there any well documented cases of fires being started by them?
Would it have been possible to make Jeune École work with subs and coastal battleships rather than cruisers and torpedo boats? (Or more likely you would use all the options but with a focus on subs)
Do you think that a reason that the US ships at the Battle off Samar got as many torpedo hits as they did, could be the Japanese mistaking the DDs for crusers? Since US cruisers were known to not carry torpedos, there was no reason to maneuver to avoid torpedos.
It never ceases to amuse me that the entire european naval doctrine from 1800 through the First World War was "DON'T UPSET THE BRITISH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD"
It is rather amusing that a tiny island nation that can only conduct trade and warfare using ships... _got scary good at building warships._ You'd think they wouldn't have enough resources for such shipbuilding power on their home islands, but that's the British for you. If they can't find the timber in England or Wales, they'll just take it from Scotland or Ireland (not like the Scots or Irish got a _say_ in the matter mind you!).
@@internetzenmaster8952 according to Lord Castlereagh the Irish do not need trees they are magical potato aliens conspiring with the French to bring us down BURN THEM ALL
@@internetzenmaster8952 And later on, they got it from America. Timber and mast trees were the most valuable resources the settlements here provided.
@@internetzenmaster8952
And we plated the hulls in copper for speed, regardless of the cost.
Then we built HMS Warrior and obsoleted every other fleet in the world, _with a single ship._
Then we transitioned the world to all steel warships with turreted beach loading cannon.
And THEN we built Dreadnought.
And then we built Argus, the first aircraft carrier.
Then the first super carrier, Ark Royal (1938)
Submarines weren't really by us though, although we did make the first practical torpedo, the Whitehead.
It's because we're an island, it was the navy or nothing.
Same as Japan.
Tirpitz didn't get that memo though Germany did find out why it existed
"Where the Spanish corvette, which had been acting as a referee"
Mental image of the corvette hoisting a Yellow card....
Much like the USS Kearsarge vs CSS Alabama
Line judge from my understanding. 😂
I do imagine that none of the participants did any deliberate dives (unlike today's soccer ⚽ matches)
If only they had taken the time to apply dazzle style paint to complete the look
@@johnbuchman4854 Well no, they weren't submarines
I just want to say. 2 gunboats challenging each other to a duel in a far away port medieval style is pretty awesome.
Someone should make a movie about that.
@@chriswriter9087 Yep just hope not Hollywood... Sorry about the spoiler but the script said : A full task force is at port when attacked by the whole villa s aircraft carriers fleet with support of alien starships. The hero who is dancing with the hottest girl of the country rally his mates (one black, one Asian, one trans one gay one lesbian and one non binary) and they destroy the villain fleet using their. 45 guns.
It's not that far off what happened at the River Plate, only the Germans were given a limited time in port to repair then scuttled their larger ship after some bluffs.
I really enjoyed that bit :)
@@khaelamensha3624 go outside, touch grass
I didn’t even know ships were involved. I’d always assumed the Prussians marched in and did the usual thing.
Well yeah, that’s the actual important part of the war
"The French navy was actually in a lot of trouble, but had almost nothing to do with the opponent."
By 'opponent', I assume you mean the usual one, i.e. the French government.
That reminds me of a David Flethcher quote about French tanks...
"The French really had nothing to do with tank design for 4 or 5 years until they had the Germans coming around and telling them what to do"
9.47 "The resulting hesitancy, higher up the food chain..." Yup. nailed it.
I think this quote fits well here:
“The opposing forces of evil; namely bureaucracy, parliament, satan, and above all, the treasury”
- Admiral Jackie Fisher
@@gryph01 The english really had always nothing to do with food until they had the French coming around and telling them what to do ,but rostbeef food still crap.
@@jomo350350 thank god the french didn't show the rest of the world how to get bent over and pounded by Germany or you'd be eating schnitzel
Extra rations? Is Drach about to order us to go do something with little chance of survival and less strategic value?
We gotta go put down an uprising at Jingle's Salt mines.
The Death Ride of the Drachists!
tzktzk...
Honi soit qui mal y pense.
@@CSSVirginia right. I’ll pass on the word to activate the Tillman battleships. We’ll need them for that.
@@Tbt19-110 Very good. See you all at muster in a few months.
I can just imagine a iron clad captain stopping a merchant vessel then hears a sound of steam engine in the distance.
Turns around and sees the entire British Navy.
"Hello there"
In fairness, the French Navy's biggest problem was that Prussia basically couldn't be hurt by naval warfare meaningfully enough to influence its land operations fast enough to matter. The Prussian Army was built around being faster to mobilize and operate at full power for a single campaigning season (roughly five months) than anyone else. They had the money, weapons, and supplies already on hand. You could completely cut Prussia off from sea trade and it would mean absolutely nothing to the Heer's operational capability for at least five months, and Prussia banked on the damage done in those five months either winning the war or setting up Prussia in a strong enough forward position to mobilize its domestic economy for a longer war.
Even a French landing of troops would have to have been both massive and very quick to even partially derail a Prussian mobilization, because among the first troops called up are the reservists who man static fortifications, such as coastal forts. Thus, if France landed a small force quickly, it would either be facing regular troops still waiting for replacement by reservists, or a lot of reservists. If the French landed enough manpower that the immediate coastal defenses didn't seem adequate to contain it, well the distance between the coast and the mustering points for the army inland was not that great, so you could have divisions and corps of Prussian troops arriving in days, maybe even hours. Either way, France would have needed to have a lot of men landed quickly to really force the Prussians to divert significant manpower from invading France.
ya and amphibious landings just weren't a thing yet, you just unloaded supplies and troops on a beach or port and hope you don't get shot at
The Franco-Prussian War was a replay of McClellan's Peninsula Campaign where he won every engagement in the Seven Days Battle. . The French won their way to defeat. After each victory they retreated toward Sedan.
It is true that the French Navy could not have ever had a large strategic effect even if a landing had been carried out (since such a lading would be isolated quickly). That said, knowing what happened is still a learning opportunity and adds depth to both the Franco-Prussian War and to the awareness of how pre-war planning impacts new foes.
@@Lawofimprobability For sure, and the French Navy's experience in 1870 was arguably the first time anyone truly tested a forward blockade by a fleet built foremost on engine-power, not sail power, and the difficulties attendant to that. As much as people laud the American Civil War as the first "Modern War," I find that the Franco-Prussian War is much more aptly described as such, because both sides went into the war with most all the modern technology, not just feeding some modern technology in over years. Previous naval actions like the Crimean War had all still mostly happened at a pace where sailing ships remains relevant, but in 1870, France really demonstrated how paramount fuel supply had become in determining naval operations.
@@genericpersonx333 A lot of the land tactics were still riding off of the expectations from the Napoleonic Wars so I still wouldn't call it the first Modern War.
France:"Cute fleet you have there Prussia, would be a shame if something were to happen to it!"
Prussia:"Oh no, not my fleet, what shall I do? ...anyways, after I distracted him with shiny things, I marched my army across the border!"
Bismarck afterwards: Good thing my intel was right and the French were still modernizing or we'd be F8cked.
Kaiser Wilhelm: Wait what.
Bismarck: What?
Bismarck "nice army you have there..."
Britain: [taps France on the shoulder] "Do you mind? That's my line!"
It’s crazy how much German Navy grew in just 40 years,going from a tiny coastal defence force to world’s second largest battle fleet.
"Sir, we stopped three ships flying the British Flag!"
"You WHAT?!"
*Angry Nelsonian noises in the distance*
yeah, I can see the French hesitancy!
"Britain rules the waves, and waives the rules!"
Was not expecting this on a Thursday but here we are
Nor was I.
A surprise, but not an unwelcome one
Ill have my Wednesday rum ration on any day.
Wondered what day it was then decided it was happyday
So rum every day? Never have been so happy to be a drunkard 😂 One thousand thanks for Drachinifel for his work as well as for his wife and her patience and understanding. May they will live a long happy life! 🙏
Interesting how the good people at Krupp were as big of a bother for the French Navy as they were to the French Army. The Franco-Prussian War can be simplified down to a fight between the Chassepot rifle and the Krupp field gun.
Nonono.
It was a fight between red pantaloons and picklehelms.
@@joearnold6881 lol good one
you are right on.I have the book about Krupp
The impression I got was that French field Artillery was better but that the Prussians were better at infantry tactics and were able to close the distance enough to render the French superiority in Artillery moot.
@@Lawofimprobability, the French went into the war thinking that but were quickly corrected. They did have a multi-barreled type of gun called the mitrailleuse, which was a sort of machine gun but they didn't understand how to use it effectively. The Krupp field guns were VASTLY superior to the French ones which were still muzzle loaded, and since the French rifle similarly outclassed the German one, the Germans decided to just bombard the French into submission from range instead of marching their men into withering fire for no reason.
I'm pretty sure after some 800 years of thumbing their noses at one another, the paperwork for "How to go to war with Britain." could have been bound together and used as ammunition for a fairly lengthy gun battle. :P
It is Remembrance day, so give all likes to all who serve, lest we forget.
Take care, and all the best.
Very interesting, often forgotten part of history.
Before the war with France, Prussia was at war with Denmark. The Danish navy had sunk nearly everything that could float.
Wish he'd make a video up that war's naval campaign.
Prussia wasnt exactly known for its navy....they generally saw it as pointless becaude every european great power had a land border with them or a navy so strong Prussia had no chance.
I mean the last strong north german navy force was propably the hanseatic league in the 16th century.
German states had the sensible problem of having their enemies basically a days march away so a fleet served no purpose for them whatsoever until the german empire. Every ship build was basically one less regiment in the army and thereby useless.
@@noobster4779 that probably explains why my Victoria II campaigns as Germany tend to go sideways...
@@noobster4779 I know, I am Dutch. We weren't known for our army, that's why Prussia was a natural ally of the Netherlands.
Don't you just hate it when breakfast bites back! The TBan found out about bad (ass) breakfast, as well!
Two rations of rum?
ALL HAIL CAPTAIN DRACH!!!!!!!!
Outstanding as usual.
From a Drach “Stoker”..
At least you didn't call yourself a Drach "stroker"
Aight, I'll sea. Myself out.
bram stoker’s drachula
@@saturn5mtw567 Stroking my mast and tackle every day
Interesting. (from Wikipedia):
Fisher was brought into the Admiralty to reduce naval budgets, and to reform the navy for modern war. Amidst massive public controversy, he ruthlessly sold off 90 obsolete and small ships and put a further 64 into reserve, describing them as "too weak to fight and too slow to run away".
That was in 1904. I wonder if a memory of the French performance in 1871 was a part of that decision.
And he built Dreadnought and made the largest fleet on earth obsolete.
Unintended consequence - we need all new ships boys.
Seems all the Wars of Napoleon III were hampered by supply and logistics problems. Very interesting dive into a little known aspect of a war whose importance is very underrated!
@CipiRipi00 The Crimean War also fits this pattern on both sides
The "Battle of Havana" was the single most awesome thing I ever heard on this channel.
As someone who lived 9 years in France, French people have taken ownership of their Post Napoleonic military cringe and kind of laugh about it 😂
To an extent. I have little patience for surrender jokes, as it is an insult to the sixty-five thousand french soldiers who died during the month of May while (arguably badly) defending the country. As for any other factually inaccurate statements about the French armed forces from any era, for that matter.
But yes, everything else (i.e. the mountain of fuck-ups our armed forces did do) is fair game :)
More like Post-WWI They didn't do spectacularly well in that war, but they did as well as anyone else and better than most.
@@lefr33man As an American, I fiercely defend the French from surrender jokes. They fought just as hard as anyone else when the Germans invaded AND continued to do so for the rest of the conflict.
@@stevengoodloe3893 O o
Wtf u smart murican
@@lefr33man You can thank Bush Jr. for starting the French surrender jokes.
(Thank you, Termendous Baguette for the correction)
Thanks Veterans!
A good opportunity to mention it.
The Roshambo?
All I can think of now is Eric Cartman in an Admiral's uniform.
Respect ma authoraty !
LMAO it caught my attention
I'm not fat. I'm big boned.
Rochambeau started life as the USS Dunderberg - an oceangoing casemate ironclad.
Square in de nuts....
Was just re-listening to a previous Drach creation, now this unexpected pleasure. And how your French pronunciation shines. Good show!
Yes I am French and I can only say that Drach respect shows as he always try and succeed most of the time to have the good pronunciation of ships and men whatever the origin
@@khaelamensha3624 Better than dubious French transliterations of American Indian names such as "Keokuk".
I love these early Ironclad ships, they are unique in design for sure. Let me guess, the rushed, undersupplied French 50 ships vs 5 German ships what could go wrong?. The best part was the British sabotaging the blockade and the Germans coming out for a fight when the French were gone. No way, they fought an old fashion duel in the Havana Port?.
The Royal Navy looks on - "Oh, look, two kids having a slap fight."
They should say that with USS Monitor and CSS Virginia
Wait, what a new video? Have we travelled forward in time to next Wednesday? Well, not gonna say no to extra rum
Literally thought the same thing: was watching a Mighty Jingles vid then saw this pop up. insert record scratch sound effect here.
A Veteran’s Day/Armistice Day/Remembrance Day gift from Drach! Thanks!
With respect to the Battle of Havana, I have personal headcanon that after the French and German ship got back into port, the French captain sent a personal challenge in response to the German inviting him to settle the affair in a gentlemanly manner at dawn the next day.
German iron clads vs. angry seagulls. Dude, you made me snort beer out of my nose!
And a solemn Veterans/Remembrance Day to all my fellows of all branches of the Five Eyes.
Seagulls to Kaiserliche Marine: "NEIN! NEIN! NEIN NEIN NEIN NEIN NEIN!!!"
the french building ships for the enemy kind of hillarious in retrospect.
Just after RTHs latest episode on the Franco-Prussian war. Perfect timing :)
Bah, too many Karl Marx quotes from them.
I don't think it is a coincidence because Drach linked to the video of RTH.
@@Thurnmourer Nuts. Even if you hate the guy, you ought to welcome quotes from him. Much like most US politicians, the more you hear from Karl the more you realize he's an imbecile.
I suppose I could have dropped the "US" qualifier there, couldn't I?
Battles are won by men, iron, and blood.
Wars are won by manpower, supplies, and logistics.
Before this video I never knew anything about the naval side of this war. As you said I would have expected it to be very one sided towards the French but clearly that wasn’t the case. I guess German costal defences proved there worth. It kind of gives me Gallipoli vibes given how coastal defence guns and in that motivated defenders were able to mitigate the threat posed by naval landings so decisively. No wonder the French limited there fleet building, though of course retaining a large fleet, since the land threat proved the more significant with Germany rather than Britain being the more real threat. Great video. I especially enjoyed the naval duel and how honourable it was, though I think the French ship ramming its opponent ruined the spirit of the fight.
🤣🤣🤣🤣 You would have to look in the appendix.... until a few years ago, when it upgraded to the back pages" Your humour is outstanding Drach.
Real Time History and Drachinifel on the same day.... educational overload! 🤯
In some ways, life is good!
Real Time is the next one up for me, I saw the videos next to each other in my subscriptions.
@trueblueprussian 23
Here you go.... ua-cam.com/video/NVzypWlv4hY/v-deo.html
I like that my tiny tiny hometown of Lübeck looks very big on the first map xD
Who would thought that starting out with such a small and unimpressive fleet, Germany would one day bloom into becoming ... a land power.
I mean ww1 navy was aigth
@@romaboo6218 Aight?They literally had world’s 2nd largest navy when the war began.It was massively overshadowed by twice as big Royal Navy.But still neither French nor Russian navies stand a chance if Britain wasn’t involved.
@@Tutel9528,
I think it's a deliberate understatement for humorous effect
This sounds like, in part, another example of the classic issue of military strategy: If you fail to plan logistics, your plan fails to happen.
It always astounds me when you look at stories of Roman legions on the march (sure, classical era numbers are often rather substantially overblown - "enough ships that you could walk from Greece to Troy without getting your feet wet" is one of the more hilarious examples - but there's more plausible records in the Roman era that actually discuss the logistical issues to some extent), you hear about how much attention was paid to their logistical support in order to make them as mobile as a few thousand people mostly on foot can be...and yet when you look at examples that are *far* more recent in history (like, even WWII and since then), you often see military leaders with grand plans and no logistical basis effectively marching (or sailing) their forces off a cliff (waterfall) because "meh, the logistics will sort themselves out."
Like, yes, logistics is absolutely 100% the most boring part of strategy. Battle planning is incredibly interesting and is of supreme importance in actually winning the fighting part of the war. But....to implement that battle plan, you need to actually *get stuff to where it's going* and if you've not planned out your logistics at least as well as your battle plan, your master plan isn't going to happen because your army or navy is either literally not at the battlefield or arrived in a state that makes it impossible to actually carry out their orders.
How is it that supposedly highly trained generals/admirals who've studied military strategy and military history keep screwing this up? It's one thing have a logistical plan that falls through, but I keep seeing examples in history where the top level generals and admirals just....send off their forces and hope that their logistics corps is capable of keeping up with whatever they dreamed up. (Which, yeah, they often do keep up, that's kinda their job, but when you start a new operation, maybe call them up and run your plan by them, see if they can offer you a decent assurance that you'll actually have supplies for the whole job.
I actually did a term paper on the logistics of the Roman Army with my argument being that Rome was so dominant, not just because of the combat effectiveness of its armies, but especially because of just how much effort was put into the support network of these armies. It's truly an eye-raising feat when one considers their technological level that they were constantly able to keep fairly large military forces in the field, often on multiple campaigns simultaneously.
Great to see a collab with RTH. When the notice for their vid and yours came out at the same time, I suspected you guys were working together. Jesse and crew do a great job.
Absolutely well done on both accounts.
I came from REALTIME History right to here. Good to see that two of my favorite channels are buds.
Kind of an impromptu network of quality History. Take that History Channel! Keep up the good work gents.
I was wondering why Drach would all of sudden talk about Franco-Prussian naval warfare...
French: Hey, Prussians, what the hell do you wanna do with that puny fleet of yours?!
Prussians: They have a stronger fleet, oh no! Aaanyway, lets get back to conquering their country...
Great video Drach!
It came out 3 minutes ago...😂
@@mosheberkovits3586 My dirty little secret: I had read the script beforehand.
@@realtimehistory oh you work with Drach?
@@mosheberkovits3586 Watch the video till the end. All is explained there.
@@realtimehistory I will I watch it in parts
I think this is the earliest I've ever gotten in on a Drach video.
Drach, you continue to amaze me with yet another interesting story I had never heard of. Superb work!
Funny, the task the French navy experienced here sort of reminds me of WWII when sometimes the British had to take measures completely out of proportions in order to try to contain the threat of the German navy.
A much more interesting naval scenario than expected. Thanks for this !
Hi,your narration is as informative and as entertaining as ever…thank you Roly 🇬🇧
Well done Drach with just enough cheek to give me a few chuckles, thanks.
You have such a way with words, suh! Chuckling all the way!
This can't be a coincidence. Real time history released video on war at sea durring franco-prussian war today as well
Well I should have watched till the end...
i love the subtitle in the thumbnail Drach. As much as i enjoy all ages and topics of history, it's the humor (and quality) of Your presentations i am addicted to!:-)
I was not aware of any naval action in this war, so thank you again. It is astonishing to me how just about every aspect of this war can be found to be hilarious if you look at it cynically enough. The naval conflicts clearly lived up (or down) to this standard.
What a happy event. I had just finished watching the latest episode of Valor & Glory, when I noticed the link to this video in the comments.
This and realtimehistory's video in consecutive order on my subscription feed... Interesting. Will have to check out after work.
BEAUTIFUL ART WORK, DRACH! ! ! ! !
Fabulous effort and fabulous knowledge to have.
Fascinating history I never knew of. many thanks!
Perfect timing! I just started studying the Franco-Prussian War. I appreciate you doing a video on the naval aspect since there is so little about it.
Great story Drachinifel. I didn't know there was a naval dimension to this 1870 European conflict. Thank you
Love these style of videos from Drachinifel
Really enjoyed the Italian Austria episode ww1
Too.
What a story
Ships duelling
An unexamined theater of naval operations told with humor. Thanks
thank you for uploding this
Awesome thanks for the great work Sir
Drachinifel, Thank you.
Thank You,
A much forgotten, but very historically important war.
Also showing how France and Germany are princibly land powers.
I've just finished watching your amusing and insightfully brilliant and richly researched docolet' ; THE LAST STAND of HMS REVENGE . Bloody marvelous .
Good video dude!
Another fine video. Love the wit and snarkiness thrown in for spice
Thanks for providing coverage on the naval aspects of the Franco=Prussian War.
I really like the opening music, along with gun sound. Explains a bit, what the channel is about.
Very interesting. Most accounts of the Franco-Prussian War ignor any naval elements as do the Austrian-Prussian War against Denmark. Kaiser Wilhelm II named all his racing yachts Meteor now I know why.
Great Video! ⚓
You will never get Drach burning bad coal unless pressed by Enemy Action .
And everyone gets involved with the recoaling of the Channel.
An interesting footnote in the conflict, thanks Drach.
DANKE! GREETINGS FROM GERMANY ... THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR VERY GOOD WORK!
Thank you for this. Up until now, I didn't even know there had been any sea action at all in the Franco-Prussian war. Nobody else talks about it. I find the duel off Havana quite interesting. :)
Drachinifel, you are "Dialed-in" on the most fascinating naval stories.
I have a historical question --
If I wanted to know more about French Naval operations 1890- 1910, especially around the West Coast of Africa/ Dahomey? Especially Naval bombardment of Coastal positions?
Very nicely done. 👌
Thursday Rum Rations keep a man's mind sharp.
Nice topic.. like the etchings...
Both channels are great! Thank you both. Great job as always Drach.
French and German naval jousting awesome
Thoroughly enjoy these. Who does the narrative? Wonderful creative.
I almost cant wrap my head around the fact that this is somewhat recent history. Looking at the world today its hard to imagine these things transpiring...
Interesting subject, with little coverage, keep up the good work
Fascinating!
Fascinating, never knew there was even a naval blockade face off.
Great forgotten battle brought to life
My college was founded by the shipbuilder who built the Rochambeau!
Thanks!
woo hoo! A rare Thursday Drach sighting!
this is back to back with another Franco Prussian video in my subscriptions
Oooooooo an extra vid to go with last nights release? You really are spoiling us drach. Thanks!
Looking forward to Reel Time History's doco series on the Hundred Years War.
Well it's a good Thursday 🤠
That recitation of French ironclads was Drach's French language examination. Passed.
Bismarck to Napoleon III - "I'll Rochambeau you for it!"
Great video as always. I also hope everything is fine with the Loch Ness Hamster ✌️
I was not expecting this...
Would love to see a photo of the crew of the Gauloises ironclad