_Told by M. Bokanowski, Deputy of the Department of the Seine_
The French auxiliary cruiser _La Provence II_, formerly a
passenger liner, was sunk by a submarine in the eastern end of the
Mediterranean while serving as a troop transport. Nearly 4,000 men
are said to have been on board, of whom only 870 were saved. One of
the survivors, M. Bokanowski, wrote this thrilling description to
President Poincaré of France:
MONSIEUR LE PRESIDENT: You are doubtless familiar, in all
its details, with the fate of the _Provence II_. I should like to
describe to you--to assuage in a measure the grief of France--the noble
behaviour of those who made ready at that moment, between sea and sky,
to die for their country.
We had on board a battalion and some detachments of the Third Colonial
Regiment of Infantry. At the moment of the explosion I was on the
bridge, with the commander of the ship, his second in command, and
several of the higher officers. We directed the steps to be taken,
distributing lifebelts, superintending the launching of boats and
liferafts. Not an outcry, not a complaint, not the slightest sign
of panic--only the dignified tranquillity of men who long ago had
consecrated their lives to the sublime cause that had put arms in their
hands.
Everybody would have been saved had it depended only on officers and
crew. Unfortunately the ship sank rapidly. The water soon found its way
into the boilers. When they began to explode, about ten minutes past
5, I jumped into the sea and swam as fast as I could in order to get
beyond the radius of suction. A few moments later there were several
deafening explosions. I turned and saw the end. The ship was going down
stern foremost. Captain Vesco, still standing on the bridge, cried in a
voice above the uproar: "Vive la France!" The survivors, swimming about
the ship, or safe on boats and rafts, saw the _Provence_ make a sudden
plunge, her forward deck standing perpendicular in the air. They, in
their turn, saluted with a cry of "Vive la France!" It was a quarter
past 5.
After swimming for half an hour I succeeded in reaching an overloaded
raft, the occupants of which pulled me aboard. Night was falling,
the wind was chill and nipped the flesh of the men, who were almost
entirely naked. Throughout the endless night, not a whimper! My
companions in misfortune had no words except to lament the fate of
those who were drowned and to curse the Boche, who, neither before nor
after his treacherous shot, had dared to appear and show his flag. In
water up to the waist, with teeth chattering from the cold, but upheld
by the desire to survive and be able to punish the villains, we were
picked up eighteen hours later by a trawler. Several men had died from
the cold on the rafts, and several others had lost their reason.
An English patrol and a French torpedo boat divided the survivors
between them, some heading for Milo, others for Malta. I was among the
latter, and we arrived here about 1 o'clock yesterday. Captain Vesco,
who was in command of the _Provence II._; Lieutenant Besson, second
in command; Colonel Duhalde, commanding the Third Colonial Regiment
of Infantry, remained on the bridge until the very last second of
the ship's life in the most noble spirit of self-sacrifice, giving
with perfect calmness precise and effective orders for saving the
passengers.
The gunners of the _Provence's_ stern gun, having loaded it when the
torpedo struck, remained at their posts, trying to discover the hidden
foe in order to repay him in his own coin.
Surgeon Navarre of the Third Colonial Regiment, being taken aboard a
trawler nearly exhausted by his eighteen hours on a raft, refused to
change his drenched clothing or to take any food until he had dressed
the hurts of the wounded and looked after the sick. He was prostrated
a long while after such superhuman labours.
And I must mention this other incident, which brings tears to my eyes:
Gauthier, Assistant Quartermaster of the _Provence_, having been taken
on board a greatly overloaded raft, was hailed by a soldier asking
for help; he jumped into the water to give him his place, saying: "A
sailor's duty is to save the soldiers first of all."
He was picked up, twenty-one hours after the wreck, clinging to a plank.
I call attention also to the devotion and zeal--meriting our profound
gratitude--of Lieutenant Sinclair Thompson, commanding the English
patrol _Marguerite_, and of his officers and crew, by whose labours
about 300 survivors were taken from the place of the wreck to Malta.
Pray pardon the form of this story, Monsieur le Président. I have
written it hurriedly, with a bruised hand, and with a head still in a
sad muddle. I wished, before my impending departure for Saloniki, to
say to you with all my heart: "That is what these noble fellows did!"