The necessary move of the battle cruisers to the southward in their pursuit of the enemy, at a speed considerably in excess of that which the Battle Fleet could attain, resulted in opening the distance between the two forces, so that at the time of the turn of Sir David Beatty’s force to the northward, the _Iron Duke_ and the _Lion_ were over 50 miles apart, and closing at a rate of about 45 miles per hour. As soon as the position of the _Lion_ was known after the receipt of the report of enemy battle cruisers being in sight, Rear-Admiral the Hon. H. S. Hood was directed to proceed immediately to reinforce Sir David Beatty’s force, whose position, course and speed was signalled to the Rear-Admiral. The latter officer reported his own position and gave his course and speed as S.S.E., 25 knots. At the same time the Battle Fleet was informed that our battle cruisers were in action with the enemy’s battle cruisers, and an inquiry was addressed to Rear-Admiral Evan-Thomas to ascertain whether he was in company with Sir David Beatty, a reply in the affirmative being received, with a report that his squadron was in action. At this time I was confident that, under the determined leadership of Sir David Beatty, with a force of four of our best and fastest battleships and six battle cruisers, very serious injury would be inflicted on the five battle cruisers of the enemy if they could be kept within range. The report of the presence of the German Battle Fleet, which was communicated to our Battle Fleet, did not cause me any uneasiness in respect of the safety of our own vessels, since our ships of the 5th Battle Squadron were credited with a speed of 25 knots. I did not, however, expect that they would be able to exceed a speed of 24 knots; the information furnished to me at this time gave the designed speed of the fastest German battleships as 20.5 knots only. Even after making full allowance for the fact that our ships were probably carrying more fuel and stores proportionately than the Germans, and giving the Germans credit for some excess over the designed speed, no doubt existed in my mind that both our battleships and our battle cruisers with Sir David Beatty could keep well out of range of the enemy’s Battle Fleet, if necessary, until I was able to reinforce them. I learned later, as an unpleasant surprise, that the 5th Battle Squadron, _when going at its utmost speed_, found considerable difficulty in increasing its distance from the enemy’s 3rd Battle Squadron, consisting of ships of the “König” class, and on return to Scapa I received a report from the Admiralty which credited this enemy squadron with a speed of _23 knots_ for a short period, this being the first intimation I had received of such a speed being attainable by them.