ORDEAL OVER TURKEY

The flight of the 13th led to an important discovery. When calculating how much the ship could carry at take off, the Germans had assumed that the air temperature at Yambol at 1,500 feet altitude would be about 43 degress F. It was, in fact, as high as 62 degrees F. which meant that in the warmer, less dense air, the airship would not be able to lift as much as had been expected.¹⁸ The ship was overloaded. After the flight of the 13th, Bockholt had already unloaded 7,060 pounds, 5,300 pounds of it was cargo, mostly ammunition, but as he saw it, a safe start could be made only by unloading another 4,400 pounds. Bockholt was not keen on leaving more cargo behind; the alternative was to wait for colder air. It would be denser and give the ship greater support. He had lost one ship already and had come close to losing this one too. He could not gamble again by taking off under marginal conditions. Bockholt decided to wait for colder weather. The present weather pattern had lasted eight days already; it would soon have to change.

Events, however, generate their own pressure. The English news reports about East Africa of the 12th, 13th and 15th continued their doleful litany - 142 Germans and 1,400 askaris surrendered; many rifles and machine guns captured! Captain Tafel's detachment, near Mahenge, was desperately trying to break through to reach Lettow's force. The British forces, which had advanced from Lindi and Kilwa had met at Ndanda Mission, possibly trapping Lettow between them. Numerous hospitals had been captured, Mahina, Masasi and Malembwe had been taken. The report of the 13th placed the British south of the Makonde Plateau. "Enemy breaking up in East Africa" proclaimed the London Times on the 15th.

On the 14th, the Naval Command sent an urgent wire to Yambol, advising that the landing should take place south of the Makonde Plateau, somewhere between Kitangari and the Rowuma River, the border between the German Protectorate and Portugese Mozambique. At best, this was a strip 25 miles wide.

The moon was new again on November 14th. There would be only a few moonless nights now and if "L 59" was to have the cover of these dark nights, the start would have to be made soon. On the 15th, the Naval Command telegraphed Bockholt again:" When is take off planned for. Everything OK?" to which Bockholt once again replied: "According to weather. Ship ready".

The morning of November 16th was overcast and rainy. The weather forecast was for westerly crosswinds at low altitudes, changing to stiff headwinds higher up. Despite the unfavorable weather, Bockholt took off at 8:48 a.m. Drawing on the experience gained on the 13th, he had increased his ballast to 15,400 pounds at the expense of his cargo which now stood at 30,200 pounds.

Under a low lying dense cloud cover, "L 59" flew east to the Black Sea. Near Burgas, the ship was approached by an airplane of the German squadron at Varna. The Varna station should have been notified that a German airship would be operating in the Balkans but somehow this had not been done. There were some tense moments as the plane flew alongside "L 59" but then it dropped away in acknowledgment that it had recognized the ship as a friendly craft.

The ship turned south and flew towards Constantinople. The most direct route to East Africa which it could have taken was directly south across the Aegean Sea, well to the west of its present course. This was in fact the route envisionaged in the original "China" plans. The many islands which dotted the Aegean Sea, were mostly under Greek, some under Turkish sovereignty. Pushed by internal and external pressures, Greece had gradually shifted from a German-friendly neutrality towards the Allied camp until Greece formally declared war on Germany in June 1917. As a result, Allied bases and airfields were now spread across the Greek as well as some captured Turkish Aegean islands. The Allied airplanes stationed in the Mediterranean were a mixed bag of obsolete Farmans, Bristols and Short seaplanes but the German planners were well aware of the potential threat which even these elderly planes represented and had carefully studied the disposition and strength of Allied air squadrons. Among the reports in the German files was one about the interrogation of a Flight Lieutenant Alcock. Flying a large, twin engined Handley Page 0/400 bomber, Alcock had greatly annoyed the Turks by singlehandedly attacking such targets as Constantinople (Istanbul)¹⁹ and Adrianople (Edirne). On June 17th, when he raided Hayda Pasha on the Gallipoli Penninsula, his plane lost one of its propellors, forcing him to come down in the water a half mile from the beach. Alcock and his companion swam ashore but were obliged to surrender to the Turks the next morning. They were interrogated numerous times, once by the commander of the German forces in Turkey who told Alcock that he lied well. Alcock's name was to appear in the annals of aviation history again when in 1919 he first challenged the long distance capabilities of the airship by flying a Vickers "Vimy" bomber across the Atlantic.

Despite the presence of Allied air units in the Aegean, Strasser had approved the original plan to fly directly across the Aegean because he was of the opinion that it could be done safely during a moonless night. As far as the Germans knew, none of the Allied flying fields in the Aegean were equipped for night operations. Flying across the Aegean directly would have been preferable to flying across the Turkish mountains of Anatolia, up to 7,000 feet high, which would require the "China" ship to discharge a great amount of ballast to attain the necessary altitude. This was inadvisable at the beginning of the flight already since no one could predict how much ballast would be needed during the next three days.

In the end, the operations orders issued to Bockholt gave him the choice of crossing the Aegean or flying across Turkey. Bockholt, for once more cautious than Strasser, decided against crossing the Aegean. Perhaps he thought of the successful use the British had made of the new American Curtiss flying boats in harassing and shooting down zeppelins along the Dutch coast earlier in the year. He may have wondered how his former ship, the "L 23", was destroyed along the Danish coast, also a "safe" area.²⁰

Bockholt chose the Turkish route, but plotted a circuitous path through Anatolia to avoid its highest mountains. When he reached the Sea of Marmara, which divides Europe from Asia Minor, he began to follow the railroad which zig-zagged south from Panderma (Bandirma) through the valleys and passes of Anatolia to Smyrna (Izmir). As the ship penetrated the valleys southward, headwinds became more troublesome and low lying clouds hindered navigation. Heavy cumulus clouds signaled thunderstorms. At Soma, about ninety miles south of Panderma, the furies descended upon the ship. What everyone had so much feared happened. On the 7th, German headquarters in Constantinople had been requested to advise the Turks of the planned flight and the projected route over Turkish territory. "Firing on the airship by own forces must be avoided at all costs". The lessons learned by the army ballast still on board and 2,200 pounds of cargo tumbled out of the ship, followed by 14 drums of gasoline. The ship shot up to 2,300 feet. Bockholt decided that he would have to turn back. With the setting sun, he rose out of the treacherous valleys and came about at 4,800 feet.

At 7:30 p.m. "L 59" reached Constantinople. Bockholt attempted to contact the ground to obtain a weather report but his radio was not working. Rain had penetrated the electrical generator which powered it. The crew signalled with a searchlight but received no answer. Fearful of losing his way in the storm, Bockholt decided to ride it out over the glimmering city until day break.

With dawn came a short respite and "L 59" started north again. Soon the ship was once more tossing in a thunderstorm, bouncing up and down between 3,900 and 6,500 feet altitudes. Clouds enveloped the ship. Patches of darkness among the clouds suggested mountains below and Bockholt turned his ship in the direction of the Black Sea to escape them. He tried to climb above the cloud layer, which he estimated reached up to 6,900 feet, but did not succeed.²¹ When the storm at last abated, Bockholt cautiously took "L 59" down through the clouds to determine his position. He finally broke through the clounds and found the coast at Midia (Midye). Anxious not to lose this sure guide, he followed the coast line at only 1,000 feet until he reached Burgas. From there, a short dogleg of 50 miles, almost due east, took him home to Yambol. This time the ship was lucky. When it reached the base at 4 p.m., the wind died down sufficiently to risk a landing. The ship was safely brought into the hangar and as soon as it was secured, the storm began to rage again. Frozen and rainsoaked, exhausted by a wild 32 hour flight, the crew stumbled out of the ship. The storm had torn loose fourteen guy wires and broken some of the lateral braces of the hull. Five bullet holes were found in the gas cells.

The Naval Command allowed Bockholt three days to refit. On the afternoon of the 20th, when it had no report of a take-off, it lost its patience and fired off an ultimatum to Bockholt: "Trip must begin without further loss of time or attempt must be abandoned".