Night action at the Battle of Jutland Hipper succeed in sinking two British battlecruisers during the chase. Once the German fleet came in sight, the British ships reversed course, now intending to lead the German fleet in pursuit of them back towards the main British fleet. Despite minimal information, Admiral John Jellicoe managed to deploy his ships to good advantage across the path of the approaching German fleet, so that some success was gained in the short battle before the Germans in turn reversed course and withdrew. Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer was now in a difficult position, because his smaller force was cut off from Germany by the
Order of battle at the Battle of Lowestoft indicated by a letter in parenthesis preceding the name: No attempt can be made to indicate order of battle as the Dutch had not adopted the line-ahead system at this date, but the ships are indicated by squadron, within each of which the order of precedence is given, with the ships of the admiral, vice-admiral and rear-admiral listed first. Four ships were left behind in the Texel when the fleet sailed on 23/24 May, due to shortage of men. These were the Amsterdam Admiralty's "Zuiphen" (36), "Groot Harder" (38), "Leiden" (36) and "Kat" (21). Order of battle at the Battle