HMS Cleopatra - Relic of The Lowestoft Raid, 1916

In April 1916 the light cruiser HMS Cleopatra was the flagship of the Harwich Force commander Commodore Reginald Tyrwhitt. That same month a German raiding force shelled the east coast ports of Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth in an attack timed to coincide with Zeppelin raids and the Easter Rising in Dublin. On the 24th Cleopatra sighted the German 1st Scouting Group, consisting of the battlecruisers Seydlitz, Lützow, Derfflinger, Moltke and Von der Tann, and tried to draw them away from Lowestoft but they continued to their target. They opened fire on the town at 04:10 for 10 minutes, destroying 200 houses and two defensive gun batteries, injuring 12 people and killing three. The 1st Scouting Group then moved off to Yarmouth but were hampered by fog. Only a few shells were fired before reports reached the German admiral that a British force including Cleopatra was engaging the supporting 2nd Scouting Group (modern light cruisers) standing out to sea, causing the 1st Scouting Group battlecruisers to break off and rejoin them, whence Tyrwhitt, finding himself seriously outgunned, broke off the action.