History of Orkney should continue to be observed in Orkney and Shetland. Thus the udal succession and mode of land tenure (that is, absolute freehold as distinguished from feudal tenure) lingered to some extent, and the remaining udallers held their lands and passed them on without written title. The islands cluster round the huge deep-water anchorage of Scapa Flow like a protecting hand, and in both World War I and World War II, the Royal Navy had a major base there, enabling them to challenge any attempt by German warships to emerge into the ocean through the Norwegian Sea. After the Armistice in
History of the United Kingdom during the First World War accompanying cruisers and destroyers bombarded the coastal ports of Yarmouth and Lowestoft. Although the ports had some military importance, the main aim of the raid was to entice out defending ships which could then be picked off either by the battlecruiser squadron or by the full High Seas Fleet, which was stationed at sea ready to intervene if an opportunity presented itself. The result was inconclusive: nearby Royal Navy units were too small to intervene so largely kept clear of the German battlecruisers, and the German ships withdrew before the first British fast response battlecruiser squadron or the Grand Fleet