In the late 1910s PD, he held the rank of Kapitän der Sterne and served as commanding officer of the heavy cruiser IANS Todfeind. When Captain Thomas Bachfisch, master of the apparently harmless freighter Pirates' Bane, handed over thirty-five captured pirates to him and reported that the pirates' ship had been destroyed by the Bane, Schweikert was quite impressed. He invited Bachfisch and his senior officers to supper aboard Todfeind, but Bachfisch had to decline because he already was behind schedule. (HH10)