How would battlecruisers organize for commerce protection?

Would battlecruisers operate independently or in squadrons during commerce protection?

They could patrol widely, but the practiced hunting group combined a battlecruiser with a carrier, cruisers, and destroyers - the same basic pattern later seen in Force H.

Battlecruisers could spread over a wide patrol area while remaining the heavy unit around which supporting ships concentrated. A carrier supplied wide-area reconnaissance, cruisers extended coverage, and destroyers screened the formation and added attack options. Interwar exercises repeatedly used one carrier, one battlecruiser, several cruisers, and a destroyer flotilla in this pattern. Force H drew on that practiced package, even though its individual ships had to be assembled from what wartime commands could release.