They were not zigzagging but all of the ships had lookouts posted to search for periscopes and one gun on each side of each ship was manned. Weddigen ordered his submarine to submerge and closed the range with the unsuspecting British ships. At close range, he fired a torpedo at "Aboukir". The torpedo broke the back of "Aboukir" and she sank within 20 minutes with the loss of 527 men. The captains of "Cressy" and "Hogue" thought "Aboukir" had struck a floating mine and came forward to assist her. "Hogue" hove to and began to pick up survivors. Weddigen fired two torpedoes into "Hogue", mortally wounding her but the submarine surfaced and was fired upon. As "Hogue" sank, the captain of "Cressy" knew that the squadron was being attacked by a submarine and should have tried to flee; this was not yet considered the proper action to take. "Cressy" came to a stop amongst the survivors; Weddigen fired two more torpedoes into "Cressy" and sank her as well. Dutch ships were nearby and destroyers from Harwich were brought to the scene by distress signals; the brave intervention of two Dutch coasters and an English trawler prevented the loss from being even greater than it was. The rescue vessels saved 837 men but of the crews, 1,397 men and 62 officers, were lost. A term (class) of Dartmouth naval cadets was aboard these ships, and many of the cadets were lost in the disaster. Otto Weddigen returned to Germany as the first naval hero of the war and was awarded the Iron Cross, Second and First Class. Each member of his crew received the Iron Cross, Second Class. The German achievement shook the reputation of the British navy throughout the world. Despite the age of "Cressy"-class vessels, many Britons did not believe the sinking of three large armoured ships could have been the work of one submarine but that other submarines and perhaps other non-British craft must have been involved. Admirals Beatty and Fisher spoke out against the folly of placing such ships where they had been. Churchill was widely blamed by the public for the disaster despite his memo of 18 September that the older ships should not be used in the venture. Rear-Admiral Arthur Christian was suspended on half pay and later reinstated by Battenberg. Drummond was criticised for not zig-zagging to shake off submarines and for not requesting destroyer support as soon as the weather improved.