in this manner; above all he was afraid of the German mines strewn
before the entrance of Zeebrugge, but my officer reassured him by
telling him we should lead the way and he would therefore run no risk.
He finally had to resign himself to his fate. So we proceeded towards
the shores of Flanders; we, in the proud consciousness of a new
achievement, and the Dutchman lamenting over the seizure of his
valuable cargo. The passengers must have wondered what was in store
for them. Many of the ladies were lightly clad, having been roused in
fright from their morning slumbers, and their anxious eyes stared at
us, while we merrily looked back at them.
Our officer on board exchanged continual signals with us, and we were
soon conscious, with a feeling of envy, as we gazed through our field
glasses, that he was getting on very friendly terms with the fair sex
on board our prize. We had feared at first that he might have some
disagreeable experiences, but his first message spelled, "There are a
great many ladies on board," and the second, "We are having a
delicious breakfast," and the third, "The captain speaks excellent
German," so after this we were quite reassured concerning him.
An hour may have elapsed when a cloud of smoke on the eastern horizon
announced the approach of another steamer, and the idea that we might
perhaps capture a second prize ship was very alluring. The wisdom of
abandoning for a while our first captive was considered somewhat
doubtful; if we delayed it might escape after darkness set in, but
when I heard my officers exclaim "What a fine steamer!" I decided to
try for it. The "Batavian" was ordered to proceed slowly on the same
course, and we would catch up with it later; then turning my attention
to steamer No. 2, I made quickly in her direction to intercept her on
her way to England. After half an hour's pursuit we signaled for her
to stop, and we discovered she was also Dutch. The captain, seeing it
was useless to try and escape, put out a boat and came on board with
the ship's papers; he seemed thoroughly displeased at the meeting, and
hoped no doubt by coming himself to get away more easily, but of this
expectation he was to be sadly disabused. On discovering that he was
also carrying contraband of war--cases of eggs for London--I ordered
him to follow us to Zeebrugge. One officer and a stoker, for I could
not spare another sailor, accompanied him as our prize command on
board his ship, the "Zaanstroom," and after a lapse of an hour and a
half, followed by No. 2, we caught up with No. 1.
The difficulty of my task can be easily imagined, for I was obliged to
make the two steamers follow each other at a given interval and at
the same speed; like a shepherd dog herding his flock I had to cruise
round my two captives and force them to steer a straight and even
course, for one tried occasionally to outdistance the other, probably
with the desire to escape in the foggy weather, which increased my
fear of not reaching the Flemish coast before dark.
But finally I got the steamers into line, and where persuasion might
have failed the menace of my cannons was doubtless my surest reason
for success.
My second officer on the "Zaanstroom" signaled that everything was
going to his liking and that they were just sitting down to a savory
meal of dropped eggs. This was reassuring news, and I could also feel
tranquil on his behalf; besides in a few hours we should be safely
under cover of our coast artillery. We notified the Pilot Depot by
wireless to send us a pilot for each ship, and our messages having
been acknowledged we were certain of being warmly welcomed, and that
every preparation would be made for the reception of our two prizes.
The closer we got to the coast the heavier the fog lay upon the water,
a not unusual experience at sea. We had to advance with the greatest
caution; our U-boat led the way to confirm anew the assurance we had
given our two steamers that they were in no danger of mines. We had to
measure the depth of water repeatedly with the lead, and so doing we
had to stop very often; otherwise the lead being dragged by the
current draws the line to an inaccurate length. It is but too easy a
matter to run aground off the coast of Flanders, as submerged
sandbanks are everywhere to be encountered, and this would have been
in our present case a most unfortunate occurrence. This continual
stopping rather disturbed the order of our march, for steamers are
more unwieldy and less accustomed to rapid maneuvering than war
vessels. Luckily all went well with us, for after a fine trip of
several hours we gladly greeted our German guard-ships lying off the
port of Zeebrugge, and the lighthouse on the mole beckoned to us from
afar through the thin afternoon mist.
We quickly surrendered our two captive's to the patrol of the port
authorities, into whose care and surveillance they were now entrusted.
Our job for the day was over, and we could joyfully hurry to our
berth within the harbor. We passed along the tremendous stone quay of
the artificial port of Zeebrugge; it extends several kilometers, and
was built by Leopold II with English money; it had cost many, many
millions, and was intended to serve quite another purpose than its
present one. We could look with defiance at the mouth of our German
cannons that gaped over the highest edge of the jetty towards the sea,
as if awaiting the foe.
Farther on up the mole, instead of English troops that the King would
so gladly have sent over in transports to march through neutral
Belgium and pay us an uninvited visit, stood, side by side, our own
brave fellows of the Army and of the Navy. Men from every branch of
the service, in their different uniforms, were visible, as they
crowded on the pier to witness our arrival with our two prize boats,
for the news of this unusual capture had already spread far and wide,
and they all wanted to satisfy their curiosity. Their enthusiasm would
have been even greater had they guessed that concealed within the hull
of our two vessels an Easter feast of undreamed-of dainties lay in
store for them. But even without this incentive a tremendous cheer
from a thousand throats hailed our appearance as we rounded the mole,
and our thirty voices returned as hearty, if not as loud, a three
times repeated cheer for the garrison of Zeebrugge. Our tow lines were
caught by the eager hands of the sailors, and in a jiffy we were lying
securely alongside the quay, safe in port to rest in peace a day or
two after a many days' cruise enlivened by such exciting events. Our
friends of the Navy, whom we had not seen since the beginning of the
war, came to visit us at once; much gay news was exchanged and also
sad regrets expressed at the loss of dear fallen comrades.
Shortly afterwards one of the Dutch captains, escorted by two guards,
asked me to grant him an interview, and I was glad to make his
personal acquaintance; we discussed over a little glass of port wine,
which we were both surely entitled to, the incidents of the day, and
he gave vent to his affliction at being thus seized, by ejaculating:
"A great steamer like mine to be captured by a little beast like
yours!" I could sympathize with his feelings, for he had sustained a
severe pecuniary loss, and he well knew what would become of his ship
and cargo according to prize law, but I suspected he found some
consolation in having a companion in misfortune, for the other Dutch
captain had to submit to the same conditions. We shook hands and
parted excellent friends, knowing that each one of us had only
accomplished his duty.
Before making my official report I inspected my two prizes that were
docked just behind us; a chain parted them from the rest of the quay,
with sentries placed on guard. I gave the preference of my first
visit, naturally, as a polite man should, to the steamer with so many
of the fair sex on board. I hoped that by appearing surrounded by my
officers I should dispel their fear of the "German barbarians." I was
told the ladies belonged to a variety troupe that was to give a
performance the next evening in London. Poor London, to be deprived
by our fault of an enjoyable evening!
Among the other passengers were Belgians and French, who had waited
six weeks in Holland for a chance to get across, and also an American
reporter of the Hearst newspaper. He had a camera for taking moving
pictures, and we discovered later that he had photographed the whole
occurrence of the capture of the ship by our submarine. A few days
later the _Graphic_ of March 27, 1915, published several of his
pictures, which eventually found their way to many American papers.
I was ordered that evening to dine with the Commanding Admiral of the
Marine Corps, Excellency von Schröder, and a motor called for me and
took me to Brügge where he resided. The peaceful landscape and the
ploughed fields betrayed but few signs of war, and I saw Belgian
peasants and German soldiers planting together the seed for the coming
harvest.
While the authorities were passing judgment on my two prizes I had a
chance to visit the surrounding country. The English had destroyed in
their retreat everything in Zeebrugge, except the new Palace Hotel,
the new Post Office, and the Belgian Bank. I made the most of this
short opportunity to observe the doings of our men in this conquered
land paid for with German blood. I was interested to note how our
Marines had been incorporated in every branch of the Army service, and
how easily they adapted themselves to this new life. They served as
infantry in the trenches, as artillery behind the great coast guns,
and also as cavalry mounted on big Flemish mares. They had even been
transformed into car conductors on the electric line that runs behind
the dunes between Zeebrugge and Ostend. In fact they filled every kind
of position, and few Belgians were to be seen. We had created here a
second German fatherland and home, notwithstanding the enemy's reports
that we had acted like Huns and barbarians, but as neither the country
nor the people were of great interest to me my attention was centered
on the study of our own troops.
Meantime the unloading of our steamers had begun and I had to
supervise it myself. As the cargoes were composed of perishable
foodstuffs the usual delays were overcome, and hundreds of sailors
and soldiers were ordered to unload the ships. Out of the hold rose
newly slaughtered pigs, and sheep, and ducks, which were at once
distributed among the various regiments. Two hundred barrels of the
best Munich beer were rolled over the quays, and two barrels found
their way on board our little boat, which no one could begrudge us. On
the "Zaanstroom" there were 4,400 boxes of fresh eggs, each box
containing 1,800 eggs, and I was told by an Army officer that every
man of the Northern Army received eight eggs for the Easter festival.
On the following afternoon the nationality of the crew and of the
passengers was recorded; a number of them were sent as prisoners of
war to concentration camps, and many touching farewells ensued
between the men and the women who were left behind. The others were
taken on a special train under military guard to the Dutch frontier.
The German sailors on whom this mission devolved looked very jolly as
they sat armed to the teeth in the railway carriages, by twos,
watching over two pretty variety actresses, and I think they would
willingly have prolonged the journey farther.
I walked along the train to say goodbye to the passengers, who had so
unwillingly made our acquaintance, and I was warmly thanked by an old
American, to whom I personally had done a small favor, for my
courteous treatment; he spoke in the name of all the passengers who
had experienced also the greatest civility at the hands of the port
authorities. I declined these words of thanks, for they had only
received the treatment that was their proper due.
After the train had left, the hour of our own departure had struck; we
cast off the lines that had kept us bound for two such memorable days
on the Flemish coast. In passing by, I waved a farewell to the two
Dutch captains, and away we went--westward ho!
VII
OFF THE COAST OF ENGLAND
Our boat carried us speedily away farther and farther towards the
west, and soon the lighthouse on the mole and the outline of the
country we had conquered faded away in the evening twilight. Before
long we should be surrounded by only hostile shores.
We first sighted the French port of Boulogne where the imposing bronze
statue of Napoleon I stands on a marble column fifty-three meters
high, with eyes turned towards the English coast. It was built to
commemorate the expedition planned by Napoleon in 1803 against the
sons of Albion, whose descendants have so recently landed on French
soil, and as they lie there encamped, they may wonder, when gazing at
the statue of the great Emperor, if he would have welcomed them with
the same enthusiasm with which they have been received by the present
rulers of France.
On our very first day in the French Channel we were able to sink
several steamers, after the crews had left in their lifeboats, and on
general lines a similar picture was traced at every sinking. We were
now granted our first opportunity to steer a submarine above and below
the waters of the North Atlantic. The ocean seemed to rejoice at our
coming, and revealed itself to us in all the glory of a March storm.
Only those who have seen such a storm can realize its proud majesty.
The gigantic, blue-black waves, with their shining crests lashed by
the west wind, came rushing onwards into the open mouth of the
Channel, and the hemmed-in waters, roaring and surging, dashed
themselves against the sharp, rocky points of the French coast, or
broke less violently but in ceaseless unrest on the chalk cliffs of
England which glimmered white in the rays of the sun.
[Illustration: _Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N.Y._
LIFEBOAT LEAVING THE SINKING P. AND O. LINER ARABIA]
It is a splendid sight to watch this great spectacle from the high
deck of a steamer as it ploughs its way through the foaming flood, or
to be borne aloft on the top of the waves with a ship under full sail,
but it is still more wonderful to behold Nature's great display from
the half submerged conning-tower of a U-boat, and to dive through the
mountainous breakers until they close gurgling over our heads and hide
us from all curious glances. Our little nutshell, in perpetual
motion, is drawn down into the deep valleys of the ocean waves, or
tossed upwards on the comb of the following breaker. We are soaked to
the skin, and the spray covers us like a silvery veil; our boat as
well as ourselves is daubed with a salt crust, our eyes smart and our
lips have a briny tang, but to us sailors it's a joy to be the sport
of the wild waves, and even those few unfortunates who always suffer
from sea-sickness never lose their love of the sea.
We were thus, in the midst of a strong southwesterly gale, lying in
wait for our prey at the entrance of the English Channel, but no ship
was to be seen; most of them took the northerly course beyond the war
zone, around the Shetland Islands, and it was not until the next
morning, north of the Scilly Isles, in the Bristol Channel, that we
caught sight behind us of a big steamer, running before the wind, like
ourselves. The wind had somewhat fallen and the March sun was shining
bright and warm; the steamer was heading for Cardiff, and we judged by
her course that she had sailed from some port in South America.
Turning about and breasting the waves we faced the oncoming steamer
and signaled to her to stop; but hardly had she espied us than she
also turned about in the hope to escape. She showed no flag to
indicate her nationality, so surely we had sighted an English vessel.
Even after we had fired a warning shot, she tried by rapid and
tortuous curves to return to her former course, and endeavor thereby
to reach her home port. Meantime she sent up rockets as signals of
distress in quick succession, to draw the attention of British patrol
ships that must be hovering in the neighborhood.
This obliged us to fire a decisive shot, and with a loud report our
first shell struck the ship close to the captain's bridge. Instead of
resigning himself to his fate, the Englishman sent up more signals and
hoisted the British flag. This showed us he was game, and the fight
began in dead earnest. All honor to the pluck of these English
captains!--but how reckless to expose in this manner the lives of
their passengers and crew, as we shall see in the present instance.
Circling around us he tried to ram us with his prow, and we naturally
avoided him by also turning in the same direction. Every time he
veered about he offered us his broadside for a shot; with
well-directed aim we took advantage of this target, and our successful
fire gave him full proof of the skill of our gunners. The latter had a
hard time of it; the high seas poured over the low deck, and they
continually stood up to their necks in the cold salt water. They were
often dragged off the deck by the great receding waves, but as they
were tied by strong ropes to the cannons we were able to pull them up
again, and fortunately no lives were lost.
On seeing our gunners struggling in the seas, our foe hoped to make
good his escape, but with each telling shot our own fighting blood was
aroused and the wild chase continued. A well-aimed shell tore off the
English flagstaff at the stern, but the Union Jack was quickly
hoisted again on the foretop. This was also shot down, and a third
time the flag flew from a line of the yard of the foretop, but the
flag had been raised too hastily and it hung reversed, with the Union
Jack upside down, and in this manner it continued to fly until it sank
with the brave ship.
The fight had lasted four hours without our being able to deliver the
death stroke. Several fires had started on the steamer, but the crew
had been able to keep them under control; big holes gaped open in the
ship's side, but there were none as yet below the water line, and the
pumps still sufficed to expel the water. It often occurred that in the
act of firing the waves choked our cannons, and the shot went hissing
through tremendous sheets of water, while we were blinded by a deluge
of foam. Of course we were all wet, through and through, but that was
of no importance, for we had already been wet for days.
It was now essential for us to put an end to this deadly combat, for
English torpedo-boat destroyers were hurrying on to the calls of
distress of the steamer. Big clouds of smoke against the sky showed
they were coming towards us under full steam. The ship was by this
time listing so heavily that it was evident we need waste no more of
our ammunition, and besides the appearance of another big steamer on
the southern horizon was an enticing inducement to quit the battle
scene and seek another victim. We cast a last look on our courageous
adversary who was gradually sinking, and I must add it was the first
and last prey whose end we did not have the satisfaction to witness.
We had been truly impressed by the captain's brave endurance,
notwithstanding his lack of wisdom, and we knew that the men-of-war
were coming to his rescue. We read in the papers, on our return to a
German port, that the "Vosges" had sunk soon after we had departed,
and what remained of the passengers and crew were picked up by the
English ships. The captain was rewarded for his temerity by being
raised to the rank of Reserve officer, and the crew were given sums of
money; but all the other officers had perished, as well as several
sailors and a few passengers, who had been forced to help the stokers
in order to increase the speed of the flying steamer.
We hurried away, therefore, in the direction of the other ship, and as
we approached we soon recognized the Spanish colors flying from her
flagstaff and painted on her sides. The captain willingly stopped at
our bidding and dispatched an officer to us bearing the ship's papers.
The stormy waves had somewhat subsided, and although the occupants of
the boat got very wet, yet they were able, without danger, to come
alongside our submarine. There was no contraband on board the Spanish
steamer, and before dismissing the officer I admonished him always to
stop at the first signal from a U-boat; he assured me that since the
English were constantly hoisting the Spanish flag he had lost all
desire to navigate again in the dangerous waters of the war zone. Much
relieved at getting away so easily he went on board his own steamer,
which resumed its voyage towards the lovely city of Santander on the
Spanish coast.
I read an account later of our encounter with the "Agustina" in a
number of the _Matin_ of April 1, 1915. It was entitled "_Toujours
l'U_" and spoke of our undesirable presence in French waters; a
following number did us the honor to represent a large picture of our
boat with the officers standing on the bridge, taken probably by a
passenger on board the Spanish vessel. An arrow pointed to us with the
inscription, "_Voila l'équipage de bandits_." The English usually
refer to us as "the pirates," and in their rage describe our
activities as those of the "German submarine pest." We are accustomed
to these flattering allusions, and it amused me to preserve and frame
our picture from the _Matin_.
In the next few days we stopped and searched several neutral steamers,
and sank many English ones. The captains were occasionally stubborn
and refused to obey our signals, so a few accidents occurred; in one
case, for instance, a stray shot struck some passengers in a lifeboat,
which collapsed; but as a rule passengers and crews were picked up by
the many sailboats and fishing boats which circulate in the Irish Sea
and in St. George's Channel, and it was we who generally summoned
these fishermen to go to the rescue of their shipwrecked countrymen.
The method of capture was always the same, and now, our ammunition
being nearly exhausted, we steered a homeward course, with the hope
of securing a few more steamers on the way. We were again favored by
good luck, for at the entrance of the English Channel we ran across a
large steamer, coming from America and heading for a French port,
heavily laden with all the fine things that the Americans at present
so willingly export.
The chase began in the usual fashion as we followed closely in the
enemy's wake. Although the captain made an effort to escape, yet he
evidently felt certain from the beginning that he would be unable to
do so, for he immediately swung out the lifeboats, ready to be
lowered. We were economizing our ammunition and did not, according to
our custom, fire a warning shot, but as we drew near the steamer we
suddenly saw dark, round objects thrown overboard. The man at the
helm beside me exclaimed: "They are throwing mines," but I was not of
the same opinion. We proceeded quietly to examine these suspicious
objects more closely, and we discovered they were simply bundles of
clothes the sailors were trying to save. In pitching them into the
lifeboats they had missed the mark and the bundles had fallen into the
sea. A report had apparently spread through the English seaports that
the men had but scant time to save their belongings when they were
sighted by one of our submarines, and since that time their clothes
were strapped together ready for a sudden emergency. The steamer
stopped and the crew on this occasion took to the boats with a perfect
discipline we were little accustomed to witness; the "Flaminian" was
sent to the bottom of the sea with one of our last torpedoes.