Wars may have specific starting dates, April 12, 1861 and September 1, 1939 to cite two, but the wheels on which they ride had been turning for some time. “The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel” is history, biography and mystery of a life that spawned machinery that drove World War I and instruments of war and peace to our day. Born in Paris in 1858, Diesel invented the engine which bears his name while working in Germany. The mystery involves his disappearance while on a crossing of the English Channel in 1913.
Diesel was active during an era in which inventors were searching for more efficient machines than steam engines that powered transportation and industry. Some pursued petroleum fired internal combustion engines, while diesel worked on an alternative model that could run on a variety of fossil and organic fuels. The book explains the process better than I could, so I refer you to it.
Having perfected a working engine, Diesel became a wealthy man by selling licenses for his inventions to established industrialists in various countries. He became a recognized expert who traveled the world giving lectures and entering agreements with investors. Though often adapted to civilian uses, the advent of the diesel engine coincided with arms buildups in the years leading to World War I. In Russia, an 1898 licensing with the Nobel (of Prize fame) family enterprises provided engines for their oil pumping operation in Baku and power for their screw oil tanker Vandal, prototypes that enabled oil to achieve its global dominance and its access a repeated casus belli. Though a late entrant, the British licensee, Vickers, would become a key player in the race to build submarines.
Two important personalities in the book are Kaiser Wilhelm II and Winston Churchill.
The Fleet Review during Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee displayed the weakness of the German navy. Determined to address the imbalance, Wilhelm allied with naval officer, Alfred von Tirpitz, both disciples of Alfred Thayer Mahan, to build a fleet that could contest the Royal Navy’s control of the North Sea. Sensing the advances diesel power brought, the Kaiser attempted to keep it a German monopoly.
Diesel-powered ships had advantages over steam in that they did not require room for teams of stokers or room for coal. The engine typically required no maintenance at all over periods of years and delivered far-greater speeds with greater fuel efficiency, so much so that transoceanic trips required no refueling stops. They provided the power plant that made submarines feasible. Diesel was a game-changer for merchant marine and naval fleets.The Royal Navy faced challenges that would require new technologies. Though diesel engines were initially employed in commercial vessels, the vision of British First Sea Lord, Jackie Fisher, and some-time First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, ensured the Royal Navy was not far behind. Submarines and surface ships powered by diesel engines were as transforming as the advent of steam had been at the end of the age of sail. Diesel engines played major roles in two World Wars and continue to propel transportation on water and land to the present day.
The mystery involves Diesel’s disappearance. He was alleged to have boarded the SS Dresden in Antwerp for a business meeting in London. Reportedly seen at dinner, the next morning his cabin was empty, bed was unslepted in, his watch nearby, and his hat and neatly folded overcoat were discovered beneath the afterdeck railing. Ten days later, a Dutch vessel found a badly decomposed body from which it recovered a pill case, wallet, I.D. card, pocketknife and eyeglass case identified as Diesel’s by his son. What happened? Suicide? His bank statements reflected empty accounts. Murder? His engines threatened the prosperity of John D. Rockefeller’s oil interests. The Kaiser may have been angered by Diesel’s willingness to do business with the British in development of naval engines. Or, was it all a plot hatched by Churchill to enable Diesel to escape to Britain? Was the mysterious body with identifying objects a precursor of Operation Mincemeat of 1943 in which British agents set a body laden with documents suggesting an invasion of Greece, rather than Sicily, adrift of the Spanish coast? By the way, a British owned Vickers shipyard in Montreal made dramatic advances in the development of diesel-powered submarines after Diesel’s disappearance.
Photos of people and places involved supplement the text. The Index assists in finding what you remember, but are not sure where, while the bibliography provides a guide to future reading. Author Douglas Brunt skillfully weaves known facts and a detective’s insight into an historic who done what?
We will never know and author Douglas Brunt presents the theories without answering the question. War History Network readers will find The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel” insights into early Twentieth Century technological developments with a mind-tingling mystery to boot.
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