Coronel and Falkland : Two Great Naval Battles of the First World War

In 1914 Great Britain's naval supremacy was challenged for the first time since Trafalgar.

A century of Pax Britannica had convinced the public that the Royal Navy was invincible.

But it was not, as von Spee demonstrated so ably at Coronel, and in Britain public bewilderment soon turned to anger.

First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill, and Lord Fisher, First Sea Lord, ordered the destruction of von Spee's squadron.

The Germans went to attack the Falklands and fell into the waiting clutches of a powerful British fleet, which wreaked a famous revenge upon the Germans.