MULTITUDINOUS TRAGEDIES AT SEA
TWENTY-NINE VESSELS SUNK IN ONE WEEK -- EIGHTY-TWO NON-COMBATANT
VESSELS DESTROYED IN GERMAN WAR ZONE -- THE ATTACK ON THE GULFLIGHT.
The fact that the Lusitania was the twenty-ninth vessel to be sunk or
damaged in one week in May in the war zone established by Germany around
the British Isles throws into grim relief the ruthlessness of modern
war. The naval battles of the past were engagements of dignity in which,
when a vessel was lost, it went down with a certain tragic magnificence
after a fair fight; but most of the vessels lost in the European war
have been the victims of torpedoes, struck by stealthy blows in the
dark. In less than three months, from February 18 to May 7, 1915, no
less than eighty-two merchant vessels belonging either to the Allies or
to neutral nations were torpedoed or mined in the war zone, with a loss
of life estimated at 1,704 non-combatants--a terrible sacrifice to
modern warfare.
Naturally the greater number of these merchant ships were British, but
the fact that the war zone was proclaimed by Germany with a view to
stopping neutral shipping as well is established by the figures which
show that among the eighty-two non-combatant vessels destroyed there
were French, Russian, Norwegian, Swedish, Dutch, Danish, Greek and three
American vessels, the latter being the Evelyn, sunk by a mine explosion
February 20; the Carib, sunk by a mine explosion February 22, and the
Gulflight, torpedoed May 1.
In addition to these eighty-two cases of non-combatant vessels
destroyed, there have been innumerable instances of unsuccessful
attacks, of which a notable example was the double attempt to sink the
American tank steamship Cushing, once by a Zeppelin which aimed three
bombs at the vessel, and once by a submarine which placed a contact mine
directly in the path of the ship; her bow narrowly missed the mine, and
her stern struck it a glancing blow, but not with sufficient force to
explode it.
THE ATTACK ON THE GULFLIGHT
It would require many hundreds of pages to recount the details of all of
these crimes against non-combatant merchant ships, and to show the
relentless severity with which neutral commerce has been attacked, but
the organized military measures even against neutral ships are well
illustrated by the case of the American ship Gulflight, as described by
the second officer, Paul Bower:
“When the Gulflight left Port Arthur, Texas, on April 10, bound for
Rouen, France,” said Bower, “we were followed by a warship of some
description, which kept out of sight, but in touch by wireless and
warned us not to disclose our position to any one.
“At noon Saturday, May 1, we were twenty-five miles west of the Scilly
Islands, a small group about thirty miles southwest of England. The
weather was hazy, but not thick. About two and one-half miles ahead I
saw a submarine.
[Illustration: WHERE LUSITANIA WAS TORPEDOED.
Kinsale, on South Coast of Ireland, close to Cork Harbor.]
“Twenty-five minutes later we were struck by a torpedo on the starboard
side, and there was a tremendous shock. The submarine had not reappeared
on the surface before discharging the torpedo.
“Previous to this, we had been met by two patrol boats, which
accompanied us on either side. The boat on our starboard side was so
badly shaken by the explosion that her crew imagined that she also had
been torpedoed. We immediately lowered the boats and left our ship and
were quickly taken on board the patrol boats. But the fog increased and
we drifted about all night and did not land at Scilly until 10.30
o’clock Sunday morning.
“At midnight of Saturday, while still on board the patrol boat, Captain
Gunter summoned me. I found him in bed and he said he wanted some one to
roll a cigarette for him. He then tossed up his arms and fainted. From
then until the time of his death, which occurred about 3.30 o’clock
Sunday morning, he remained unconscious.
“Captain Gunter’s speech was thick and indistinct, but we could
distinguish that he wished some one to take care of his wife. The crew
had always regarded Captain Gunter as a healthy man and had never heard
him complain.”
Second Assistant Engineer Crist, of the Gulflight, said:
“I was on watch in the engine room when we were torpedoed, and so
terrible was the blow that the Gulflight seemed to be tumbling to
pieces. She appeared to be lifted high in the air and then to descend
rapidly. I told the boys to beat it as quickly as possible and shut the
engines down.
“Reaching the deck, I found them launching both life-boats. We got
safely into them, with the exception of wireless operator Short and a
Spanish seaman, who had dived overboard when they felt the shock, and
were drowned.”