18. World War I’s First Naval Engagement Was Also Its Most Chill
In the early 20th century, Lake Nyasa lay on the border between German Tanganyika (today’s Tanzania) and British Malawi, and each empire maintained a small naval presence there. The British assigned the task to Commander Edmund Rhoades, in charge of the gunboat HMS Gwendolen. He shared the lake with a German Captain Berndt, in command of the SS Hermann von Wissman. In the decade preceding the war, Rhoades and Berndt became good friends, and boon-drinking companions. When Britain declared war against Germany in 1914, Rhoades was the first to receive the news, and decided to end the war in Lake Nyasa before it had even begun, without hurting his friend.
The German gunboat was docked for repairs, its captain still unaware that there was a war on, when Rhoades showed up in the Gwendolen, and disabled the Hermann von Wissman with a single volley. Captain Berndt leaped into a dinghy and had it rowed furiously to the Gwendolen, which he boarded while cursing out Rhoades and questioning his sobriety and sanity. Rhoades sat Berndt down, and over whiskey, explained the situation to his erstwhile boozing buddy. He then led away his livid prisoner of war, who by then was loudly cursing German officials and his chain of command for not keeping him up to speed on developments in Europe. Thus concluded WWI’s first naval engagement.
