_An Associated Press dispatch from Liverpool, dated July 13, 1915,
reported:_
How an American ship is alleged to have been used as a shield by a
German submarine for the sinking of another vessel is related by
members of the crew of the American bark Normandy, which has arrived
here from Gulfport, Miss.
The story is that the Normandy was stopped by a German submarine sixty
miles southwest of Tuskar Rock, off the southeast coast of Ireland,
Friday night. The captain was called aboard the submarine, whence his
papers were examined and found to show that the ship was chartered by
an American firm January 5.
The captain of the bark, it was asserted, was allowed to return to
the Normandy, but under the threat that his ship would be destroyed
unless he stood by and obeyed orders. These orders, it was stated,
were that he was to act as a shield for the submarine, which lay
around the side of the bark, hiding itself from an approaching vessel.
This vessel proved to be the Russian steamer Leo. Presently the
submarine submerged and proceeded around the bow of the Normandy, so
the story went, and ten minutes later the crew of the Normandy saw the
Leo blown up.
Twenty-five persons were on board, of whom eleven were drowned,
including three stewardesses. Those saved included three Americans,
Walter Emery of North Carolina, Harry Clark of Sierra, and Harry
Whitney of Camden, N.J. All these three men when interviewed
corroborated the above story. They declared that no opportunity was
given those on board the Leo for saving lives.
The Leo was bound from Philadelphia for Manchester with a general
cargo.
The Captain of the Normandy told the survivors that he would have
liked to signal their danger to them, but that he dared not do so,
because his uninsured ship would then have been instantly sunk.
_In a Washington dispatch to_ THE NEW YORK TIMES, _sent July 13,
appeared the following:_
The State Department received a short dispatch late this afternoon
from Consul General Washington at Liverpool, confirming the report
that three Americans were among those rescued by the American bark
Normandy at the time of the sinking of the Russian merchant steamer
Leo by a German submarine off the Irish coast Friday night. This is
the case in which press dispatches asserted that the submarine
commander forced the Captain of the Normandy to use his bark as a
shield behind which the submarine hid before firing the torpedo which
sank the Leo.
The cablegram from Consul General Washington makes no mention of this
phase of the affair, and does not show whether the German submarine
gave any warning to the commander of the Russian merchant ship before
firing the shot which destroyed the latter vessel. The official
message says that the Normandy was stopped by the submarine, that the
Normandy's papers were examined, and that she was allowed to proceed.
The message added that the Normandy rescued three American citizens
who were members of the crew of the Leo, and names them as Walter
Emery, seaman, of Swan Quarter, N.C.; Harry Whitney, steward, of
Camden, N.J., and Harry Clark, fireman, of 113 East Fifty-second
Street, Seattle, Wash.