While German technicians set about arming Ryazan—it would become Cormoran II—Emden took on supplies. The crew unloaded superfluous personal items on the quay. They loaded two auxiliary vessels in the harbor with supplies, to serve as tenders to Emden. Müller even took extra crewmen aboard, increasing the vessel’s complement to approximately four hundred, including three Chinese laundrymen. While the radio room maintained a full-time alert for any hint of attack from the sea, the crew filled every available space on the cruiser with coal.

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At 6 p.m. on August 6, Emden weighed anchor and moved slowly out of the harbor. Neither the ship nor most of its crew would ever see Tsingtao again. The ship’s band gathered on deck and played “Watch on the Rhine,” followed by much cheering. “All were highly confident,” one of the ship’s officers would write. “Here was reproduced, on a smaller scale, the same war-enthusiasm as was being shown in Germany.”

Emden was not alone. Following the cruiser, in equally frantic departures, were a supply ship, Prinz Eitel Friedrich, and a modern collier, Markomannia. The goal of the three vessels, arranged by radio, was the island of Pagan, where the remainder of Spee’s squadron waited. Steaming south, the three German ships attempted to disguise themselves as neutrals. Emden’s crew painted the Japanese characters for Nagato Maru on its hull and life­boats. Its escorts painted their funnels the colors of two British lines, P&O and the Blue Funnel Line, respectively.

The German flotilla reached Pagan without incident on August 12, and Spee called a conference of his captains the following day. For all his appearance of rigidity, the admiral respected the opinions of his officers and valued frank discussion. Nevertheless, he had all but decided to take his squadron home by way of Cape Horn, harassing enemy shipping as he went. Having a German squadron roaming the Pacific would certainly cause apprehension in London.

When Spee invited comment, Müller asked to speak. He feared that the squadron would contribute little to the war effort in the course of its long voyage across the Pacific, and establishing a German presence in the Indian Ocean appealed to him. While coaling an entire squadron there would be a problem, might not a single cruiser operate successfully? Müller seemed eager for the assignment. The other captains found Müller’s argument persuasive, and Spee promised to think it over.

After lunch a boat from the flagship pulled over to Emden with a dispatch from Spee: “You are hereby allocated the Markomannia and will be detached with the task of entering the Indian Ocean and waging cruiser warfare as best you can….Tonight you will stay with the Squadron; this order will come into force tomorrow morning.”

At about 8 p.m. on August 13, Spee’s squadron left Pagan, steaming in two parallel columns. There were twelve vessels in all, four warships and eight supply ships. They steamed eastward through the night, and then, at dawn on August 14, Scharnhorst hoisted a signal to Emden: “Detached. Wish good luck.” Müller replied by semaphore, thanking the admiral for the trust reposed in him and wishing the squadron luck. Both would need it.

Emden and Markomannia pulled out of the German column and steamed south. Their goal—some two thousand miles to the southwest—was the Indian Ocean.

Emden made its way slowly across the southern Pacific. Eager to save coal, Müller used only six of his ship’s twelve boilers, cruising in the smooth waters south of the Marianas at an average twelve knots. As the ship steamed toward the Dutch East Indies (present-day Indonesia), each day brought it closer to the equator, and conditions on board grew increasingly uncomfortable.

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