Remembering Hartlepool
On 16 December 1914, German RADM Franz von Hipper led his squadron consisting of the battlecruisers SMS Seydlitz, Von der Tann, Moltke and Derfflinger, the armored cruiser SMS Blücher, light cruisers SMS Strassburg, Graudenz, Kolberg and Stralsund; and 18 destroyers to the English coast. There, he bombarded the ports of Scarborough, Hartlepool, and Whitby, causing nearly 600 casualties. Some 1,150 shells were fired into Hartlepool alone, producing the first British military death on British soil in some 200 years.
An alarm clock with a piece of German shell embedded in the dial, destroyed by the German naval raid on Hartlepool, UK, on the morning of 16 December 1914.
In 1999, locals in Hartlepool established the Heugh Battery Museum as the only WWI battlefield in the UK. Today, it needs $5,000 to stay afloat and only has half that amount.