Office of the Historian

File No. 763.72/9158

The Minister in Norway ( Schmedeman) to the Secretary of State

[Telegram]
Christiania, March 12, 1918, 6 p.m.
[Received March 13, 12.50 a.m.]

581. The following official announcement appeared in the press this morning:

The German Minister in Christiania has informed the Foreign Office that owing to previous British declarations that the North Sea is a war zone1 and the German Bay (Heligoland [Bight]) a danger zone,2 the Imperial German Government is obliged, in order to meet the situation created by the said declarations, to proceed to the extraordinary measure of warning neutral ships against navigating in the German Bay and against further dangers to which it becomes necessary to expose neutral ships in consequence of British warfare in this zone. The danger of navigating in this zone can only be avoided by following special directions which can be obtained from the German naval authorities.

Schmedeman
  1. Foreign Relations, 1914, Supplement, p. 464.↩
  2. Ibid., 1917, Supplement 1, pp. 518–519 and 520.↩