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The bombardment of Madras was an engagement of the First World War, at Madras (now Chennai), British India. The bombardment was initiated by the German light cruiser Emden at the outset of the war in 1914.

With Captain Karl von Müller in command, on the night of 22 September 1914, SMS Emden quietly approached the city of Madras on the southeastern coast of the Indian peninsula. As he later wrote, "I had this shelling in view simply as a demonstration to arouse interest among the Indian population, to disturb English commerce, to diminish English prestige." After entering the Madras harbour area, Müller illuminated six large oil tanks belonging to the Burmah Oil Company with his searchlights, then fired at a range of 3,000 yards. After ten minutes of firing, Emden had hit five of the tanks and destroyed 346,000 gallons of fuel, and the cruiser then successfully retreated.

Soon the word Emden entered the Tamil dictionary and was used to describe someone powerful, frightening and with an wicked intent.

Background
Just prior to the outbreak of World War 1, the German cruiser Emden was the only cruiser stationed at the German concession in Qingdao, China. The rest of the German fleet in the Pacific was under the command of admiral Maximilian von Spee, whose fleet was sailing in the South Pacific. On 31 July, with war days away, the Emden 's captain Karl von Müller put to sea to begin commerce raiding once war had been formally declared. Two days later, on 2 August, Germany declared war on Russia, and the following day, Emden captured the Russian steamer Ryazan. The Russian vessel was sent back to Qingdao, and converted into the auxiliary cruiser Cormoran. On 5 August, Spee ordered Müller and the rest of the German fleet at Qingdao to rendezvous at Pagan Island in the Marianas. The Emden and the rest of the Qingdao fleet arrived there on 12 August, where the next day Spee was notified that Japan would join the war on the side of the Allies and sent a fleet to destroy the German fleet in the Pacific. There it was decided that while the majority of the fleet would try to get to Germany via sailing around South America, the Emden and the coiler Markomannia would do commerce raiding in the Indian Ocean in the shipping lanes between Aden, Colombo, and Singapore. On 5 September, Emden entered the Bay of Bengal, achieving complete surprise, since the British assumed she was still with Spee's squadron. Until the raid on Madras, Müller succeeded in sinking and capturing several Allied merchant vessels until the institution of a blackout and deployment of several enemy vessels to the area.

Bombardment
Prior to the bombardment, the governor of Madras, John Sinclair, 1st Baron Pentland, was staying in Uthagamandalam and it was erroneously reported by British authorities on 21 September that the Emden had been sunk. In late September, Müller decided to bombard Madras. Müller believed the attack would demonstrate his freedom of maneuver and decrease British prestige with the local population. At around 20:00 on 22 September, Emden entered the port, which was completely illuminated due to the lights from the celebration of Navrati, despite the blackout order. Emden closed to within 3,000 yards (2,700 m) from the piers before opening fire. She set fire to two oil tanks and damaged three others, and damaged a merchant ship, Chupra, in the harbor, destroying nearly 350,000 U.S.gal of oil stored there by the Burmah Oil Company. Several buildings were also damaged during the raid, including the General Post Office, the Port Trust, High Court Complex, and several others. British artillery opened fire on the vessel in response to the attack, but failed to make any hits and the captain of the Emden was not even aware of the response. Some reports by the Allies stated that due to the returning fire, the Emden blacked out its lights and fled, but this was not stated by the records made by German crewmen. At 20:15, the Emden sailed away and the attack was over.

Thousands of citizens fled the city to the surrounding suburbs like Perambore, with members of the lower-class leaving via bullock carts and jutkas whereas upper-class Bharati and Europeans used the local railway lines.

In the course of the 15 minute-long bombardment, Emden fired 130 rounds. The following day, the British again mandated that shipping stop in the Bay of Bengal; during the first month of Emden 's raiding career in the Indian Ocean, the value of exports there had fallen by 61.2 percent.

https://ia801604.us.archive.org/29/items/emdencruiser00mkuoft/emdencruiser00mkuoft.pdf

Legacy
gdjas

References and external links

 * The Last Corsair: The Story of The Emden by Dan van der Vat, 1984. ISBN 0-586-06265-3
 * The Last Gentleman of War. The Raider Exploits of the Cruiser Emden by R. K. Lochner, Naval Institute Press:. 1988. ISBN 0-87021-015-7
 * The Last Cruise of the Emden: The Amazing True WWI Story of a German-Light Cruiser and Her Courageous Crew by Edwin Palmer Hoyt, Globe Pequot Press, 2001 ISBN 978-1-58574-382-7
 * Karl Friedrich Max von Müller: Captain of the Emden During World War I by John M. Taylor
 * New York Times: "German Cruiser Emden Destroyed", November 11, 1914 a PDF of NYT report on Emden sinking along with some praise for its captain.
 * New York Times: "Captain of Emden Killed?", a PDF of a NYT article dated April 13, 1921
 * Cruisers EMDEN, Frigates EMDEN - 5 warships named EMDEN until today
 * World War I Naval Combat
 * Karl Friedrich Max von Müller: Captain of the Emden During World War I
 * How German cruiser ‘Emden’ struck terror in the heart of the British Empire, and became a Tamil word. The Hindu. February 23, 2020.
 * World War I Naval Combat
 * Karl Friedrich Max von Müller: Captain of the Emden During World War I
 * How German cruiser ‘Emden’ struck terror in the heart of the British Empire, and became a Tamil word. The Hindu. February 23, 2020.