The Battle of Jutland (German: Skagerrakschlacht, lit. 'Battle of the Skagerrak') was a naval battle between Britain's Royal Navy Grand Fleet, under Admiral The Battle of Jutland (German: Skagerrakschlacht, lit. 'Battle of the Skagerrak') was a naval battle between Britain's Royal Navy Grand Fleet, under Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, and the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet, under Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer, during the First World War. The battle unfolded in extensive manoeuvring and three main engagements from 31 May to 1 June 1916, off the Nort From… The pre-arranged signal to the waiting submarines was transmitted throughout the day from the E-Dienst radio station at Bruges, and the U-boat tender Arcona anchored at Emden. Only two of the waiting submarines, U-66 and U-32, received the order. === British response === Unfortunately for the German plan, the British had obtained a copy of the main German codebook from the light cruiser SMS Magdeburg, which had been boarded by the Russian Navy after the ship ran aground in Russian territorial waters in 1914. German naval radio communications could therefore often be quickly deciphered, and the British Admiralty usually knew about German activities. It was usually necessary for a signal to be confirmed by each ship before it could be relayed to other ships, and an order for a fleet movement would have to be received and acknowledged by every ship before it could be executed. In a large single-column formation, a signal could take 10 minutes or more to be passed from one end of the line to the other, whereas in a formation of parallel columns, visibility across the diagonals was often better (and always shorter) than in a single long column, and the diagonals gave signal "redundancy", increasing the probability that a message would be quickly seen and correctly interpreted. Accompanying them were eight armoured cruisers (classified by the Royal Navy since 1913 as "cruisers"), eight light cruisers, four scout cruisers, 51 destroyers, and one HMS Abdiel (1915) destroyer-minelayer. British reconnaissance was provided by the Battlecruiser Fleet under David Beatty: six battlecruisers, four fast Queen Elizabeth-class battleships, 14 light cruisers and 27 destroyers. Air scouting was provided by the attachment of the seaplane tender HMS Engadine, one of the first aircraft carriers in history to participate in a naval engagement. The German High Seas Fleet However, due to another mistake with signalling by flag, and possibly because Queen Mary and Tiger were unable to see the German lead ship because of smoke, the second German ship, Derfflinger, was left un-engaged and free to fire without disruption. SMS Moltke drew fire from two of Beatty's battlecruisers, but still fired with great accuracy during this time, hitting Tiger 9 times in the first 12 minutes. The Germans drew first blood. Aided by superior visibility, Hipper's five battlecruisers quickly registered hits on three of the six British battlecruisers. Seven minutes passed before the British managed to score their first hit. The difficulties of the 5th Battle Squadron were compounded when Beatty gave the order to Evan-Thomas to "turn in succession" (rather than "turn together") at 16:48 as the battleships passed him. Evan-Thomas acknowledged the signal, but Lieutenant-Commander Ralph Seymour, Beatty's flag lieutenant, aggravated the situation when he did not haul down the flags (to execute the signal) for some minutes. At 16:55, when the 5BS had moved within range of the enemy battleships, Evan-Thomas issued his own flag command warning his squadron to expect sudden manoeuvres and to follow his lead, before starting to turn on his own initiative. Luckily for Scheer, most of the light forces in Jellicoe's rearguard failed to report the seven separate encounters with the German fleet during the night; the very few radio reports that were sent to the British flagship were never received, possibly because the Germans were jamming British frequencies. Many of the destroyers failed to make the most of their opportunities to attack discovered ships, despite Jellicoe's expectations that the destroyer forces would, if necessary, be able to block the path of the German fleet. The most powerful British ships of all (the 15-inch-guns of the 5th Battle Squadron) directly observed German battleships crossing astern of them in action with British light forces, at ranges of 3 mi (2.6 nmi; 4.8 km) or less, and gunners on HMS Malaya made ready to fire, but her captain declined,deferring to the authority of Rear-Admiral Evan-Thomas—and neither commander reported the sightings to Jellicoe, assuming that he could see for himself and that revealing the fleet's position by radio signals or gunfire was unwise. From 23:20 to approximately 02:15, several British destroyer flotillas launched torpedo attacks on the German battle fleet in a series of violent and chaotic engagements at extremely short range (often under 0.5 mi (0.80 km)). At the cost of five destroyers sunk and some others damaged, they managed to torpedo the light cruiser SMS Rostock, which sank several hours later, and the pre-dreadnought SMS Pommern, which blew up and sank with all hands (839 officers and men) at 03:10 during the last wave of attacks before dawn. The British preferred signalling using ship-to-ship flag and lamp signals, avoiding wireless, whereas the Germans used wireless successfully. One conclusion drawn was that flag signals were not a satisfactory way to control the fleet. Experience using lamps, particularly at night when issuing challenges to other ships, demonstrated this was an excellent way to advertise your precise location to an enemy, inviting a reply by gunfire. Recognition signals by lamp, once seen, could also easily be copied in future engagements. British ships both failed to report engagements with the enemy but also, in the case of cruisers and destroyers, failed to actively seek out the enemy.