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The Sinking of the SMS Cormoran and the First US Shots of World War I

War In The Pacific National Historical Park

A large ship with two smokestacks and two masts.
The S.M.S. Cormoran in Apra Harbor on April 7th, 1917.

WAPA Photo Collection Box 12.66

On the eve of World War I, Germany had built a vast colonial empire in the Pacific. The German flag flew over all of the Mariana Islands except for Guam, the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, the Marshall Islands, and parts of New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, the Solomon Islands, and Samoa. These colonial holdings were protected by the German East Asia Squadron anchored in Jiaozhou Bay in China. [1]

Flight to Guam

When World War I broke out in 1914, this empire quickly came under attack. The Japanese navy seized German Micronesia while the Australian and New Zealand troops occupied the South Pacific territories. While the rest of the East Asia Squadron attempted to reach neutral territory, the SMS Cormoran, a German auxiliary cruiser under the command of Captain Adalbert Zuckschwerdt, was ordered to harass enemy warships in the South China Sea and Pacific. She sailed between the Solomon Islands, New Guinea and Yap, picking up stranded German citizens and sailors, but was unable to launch an attack. [2]

After two months of narrowly evading Japanese warships, low on coal and supplies, Zuckschwerdt decided to retreat to Lamotrek, a small atoll in the Caroline Islands. After two months, the Japanese were closing in, and Zuckschwerdt decided to make the run to Guam, 450 miles to the north. The Cormoran limped into Apra Harbor on December 13, 1941, so low on coal the crew had resorted to burning coconut husks for fuel. [3]

Trapped In Apra Harbor

Zuckschwerdt requested 1,500 tons of coal and a thirty-day supply of food and water, enough to reach the safety of German East Africa, the nearest German territory. Guam was dealing with a fuel shortage of its own, however, and Captain William Maxwell, the island's governor, could only offer the Germans 200 tons of coal. Under international law, the Cormoran had twenty-four hours to leave Guam or be interned for the remainder of the war. [4]

Out of fuel and out of options, the Cormoran was stuck.

Black and white photo of men in uniform sitting around a few tables
The crew of the SMS Cormoran dining abord the ship during their internment.

GC 35 12 Neg. 93-1-13

The Cormoran was anchored in Apra Harbor while interned. The crew was allowed to live on their ship during their internment. Nowhere on Guam was large enough to house the 373 sailors and crew, and Maxwell was also likely aware that the crew of the Cormoran outnumbered his own troops. The ship was disarmed, but her machinery was allowed to remain operational, and a small supply of coal was kept aboard in case bad weather forced her out to open sea for safety. The radio was also kept onboard, and the crew could receive messages, but were not allowed to send any.

Two Years on Guam

While technically captives, the crew's internment was relatively mild, especially once Maxwell was replaced as governor in 1916. They were allowed onshore as long as they were in full uniform and stayed within a restricted area between Tumon to Piti. The crew socialized freely with the American military and CHamoru residents. They attended moonlight parties on the beach, dinner parties, costume balls, musical performances and hunting parties. The ship's thirty-five-piece band gave regular performances in the Plaza de España in Hagåtña and even at the governor's palace.

Zuckschwerdt was allowed to rent a small bungalow in Hagåtña where he would host dinner parties, and the sailors rented a house onshore for overnight stays. Romance also blossomed. There were several marriages between German sailors and CHamoru women. On New Year's Day of 1917, Lieutenant Karl von Gebhard married Eleanore Blain, an American naval nurse. [6]

Far from Guam, however, U-boat attacks on American ships in the Atlantic were causing tensions between Germany and the United States to grow.

War Is Declared

In February 1917, the United States cut diplomatic ties with Germany, and it was clear that the United States would soon enter World War I. In preparation, Zuckschwerdt ordered six drums of coal dust mixed with gasoline and armed with electrical blasting caps be hidden in the Cormoran's coal bunker. The blasting cap could be detonated with a remote switch. Then, early on the morning of April 7, 1917, Captain Roy Smith, the new governor of Guam, received a cable from Washington. [7]

America was at war.

The First American Shots of World War I

Smith immediately sent Lieutenant Owen Bartlett and Lieutenant William Lafrenz to seize the Cormoran. Lieutenant W. A. Hall and a crew of eighteen sailors and fifteen marines followed on a slower barge. En route to the Cormoran, Hall encountered the ship's launch heading to shore for the daily supply run. Hall ordered one of the Marines, Corporal Michael B. Chockie, to fire a shot across the launch's bow.

While the United States had declared war on April 6, the time difference between Washington DC and Guam meant that Smith had sent his men to capture the Cormoran only hours after the declaration of war was signed, and Chockie had just fired the first American shot of World War I. [8]

Cormoran Scuttled

While Chockie was firing on the launch, Bartlett informed Zuckschwerdt that he and his crew were now prisoners-of-war and must surrender the Cormoran immediately. Zuckschwerdt agreed to surrender his men but refused to turn over the ship. When Bartlett returned to his boat to take the message to Smith, Zuckschwerdt ordered to his crew to abandon ship, then triggered the blasting caps in the explosives his men had prepared earlier that month.

The Cormoran immediately erupted into flames, exploded, and sank to the bottom of Apra Harbor within minutes. All but seven members of the Cormoran's crew were rescued from the water. [9]

A ship with one smokestack and two masts flying the American flag.
As Bartlett confronted Zuckschwerdt, the USS Supply blocked the entrance of the harbor to prevent the Germans from fleeing. After the explosion, she immediately began to rescue sailors in the water.

U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph NH 105955

Prisoners of War

The Cormoran's crew was imprisoned in a stockade at Punta Assan (Asan Point), while the officers were held at Camp Barnett on Mount Tenjo. Von Gebhard was given a separate cabin so his American wife could stay with him during his confinement.

Rows of tents in a clearing surrounded by palm trees.
After the Cormoran was scuttled, the crew was imprisoned in the stockade at Asan Point for three weeks.

National Archives 71-CA-149 G-3

Six of the seven Germans who died during the explosion were buried with full military honors in the U.S. Navel Cemetery in Hagåtña. The seventh body was never found. A three-foot tall cement obelisk was erected next to the graves. [11]

After three weeks in prison, the crew of the Cormoran's time on Guam finally came to an end. The German prisoners of war were transferred to prison camps in the United States on April 29. The twenty-eight New Guinean crew members and four Chinese laundrymen were not imprisoned with the rest of the crew. Instead, they were released and lived on Guam until the end of the war, then returned to their home countries. [12]

Today, the wreck of the SMS Cormoran still rests at the bottom of Apra Harbor next to the Tokai Maru, a Japanese transport vessel sunk in World War II. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975 and is a popular diving site. [13]

Three white men in sailor uniforms wearing hats that say SMS Cormoran standing next to a young Asian boy.
SMS Cormoran sailor Fritz Bayer and two of his crewmates pose next to a local boy during their time on Guam.

GC 35 13 Neg. 93-1-16

The Sinking of the SMS Cormoran
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On December 13, 1914, the German auxiliary cruiser SMS Cormoran, out of fuel and cut off from Germany by World War I, took refuge from Japanese warships in Guam. The ship spent the next two years interned in Apra Harbor. When the United States declared war on Germany in 1917, the Cormoran's captain blew up the ship rather than let her fall into enemy hands.

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Last updated: March 17, 2025