The German Imperial Navy's main surface force is chiefly remembered for its 1916 Jutland duel with Britain's Grand Fleet. Often overlooked are the High Seas Fleet's activities, successes, and frustrations during the rest of World War I.
On 30 May 1966, two British destroyers sailed from Scapa Flow while a pair of German frigates sortied from Wilhelmshaven. The next afternoon—the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Battle of Jutland—they rendezvoused in the North Sea at the exact point the British Grand Fleet and German High Seas Fleet encountered each other a half-century earlier. The warships then commemorated the anniversary of the famous World War I fight by following the battle tracks of the opposing fleets. There have been few similar observances, and, sadly, the historiography of the Great War at sea is similar to its memorial record.
