Wilbur Wright. The interference made it impossible to get the message,
but I got parts of it. I have been trying to get the Wilbur Wright
again, but now I don’t receive any answer at all, and the other
station has also stopped sending. I sent out a general call too, in
the hope that the nearby craft might answer in case the Wilbur Wright
didn’t, but there’s no reply. Here’s what I managed to get through the
interference.”
The operator handed Captain Smith a slip of paper on which was written
parts of a message, just as they had been received by the operator, as
follows:
“Captain Smith ** *** ** Honol * Wilbu * Wright *** itude 15.2 ** 52.35
** craft believe ***** pirate ***”
“That’s all I could get, Sir,” added the operator “and it’s just as it
came in.”
Captain Smith and Commander Heathcote both pored over the fragmentary
message intently for several seconds. Then the former said:
“It looks as though he were being attacked by the pirate and was trying
to tell us. Those figures are undoubtedly his position.”
“Yes,” said Heathcote, “that’s probably the case. The first of those
figures is most likely to be his latitude, and the other his longitude.
There must be a figure missing though. It’s probably 15.2 N. and 152.35
E. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to send out some patrol craft in that
general direction. I’ll order my outfit to proceed there immediately.
It may be that the station interfereing was the pirate himself.”
Turning to the operator Commodore Heathcote asked whether any of the
aircraft, or the naval vessels had received the call from the airship.
“I imagine they did, Sir,” replied the former, “but as soon as the call
came in I told everybody to keep off while I took the message. They
would probably listen in too, and take the message down, but I don’t
think they got anything more than I did. I didn’t bother to ask them,
because I have been busy trying to raise the Wilbur Wright ever since.
If you want me to I’ll ask them now.”
“You might as well,” said the Commodore, “and then when you get the
flagships I’ll give you a message to send to the commanders.”
The operator proceeded to send out a general call, and shortly
afterwards received replies from the flagships of the naval unit
and the aircraft squadron. He asked both of them whether they had
received the message from the Wilbur Wright, and after a brief wireless
communication learned they had received no more than he.
While the operator was calling the patrol craft, the two commanders had
picked up a chart and pin-pointed the position given in the message.
“It’s about four hundred miles from here,” said Heathcote. We could
probably get out there as soon as any of the ships on patrol duty.
The big P. Q. flying boat is the fastest thing around here. It’s
practically ready to take off any minute. I’m going out in her, do you
want to come along?”
“You bet,” replied Captain Smith, glad to be active, and greatly
relieved that some of the uncertainty had passed.
Heathcote turned over a message he had hurriedly written to the
wireless operator and ordered him to send it immediately to the
commander of the patrol aircraft. It advised the commander to proceed
to the position given with all possible speed, and make a careful
search within a radius of one hundred miles, and also to listen
carefully for any wireless messages from the Wilbur Wright.
The two officers then went out to the seaplane landing beach, and
gave orders to the handling crew to get the P-Q flying boat ready.
This was quickly obeyed, and ten minutes later the big aircraft had
risen gracefully from the smooth waters of the harbor and was circling
rapidly to an altitude of five thousand feet. As soon as this height
was attained, the ship was straightened out and placed on a direct
course to the position given in the message from the Wilbur Wright.
Swiftly it passed over the mountainous archipelago, skirting the lofty
peaks of the volcanoes.
Two hours later the look-out man in the forward gun nest shouted back
through the inter-communicating telephone: “There are some small
objects in the water, Sir. I can’t make out what they are.”
Commodore Heathcote took his glasses and looked down, and then ordered
his pilot to make a landing near them. He also swept the skies in
search of other aircraft. In the distance the war planes that had been
on patrol duty were coming up at rapid speed. Heathcote ordered the
wireless operator of the P-Q to tell them he was going to land and
request them to circle around the vicinity until further orders.
The pilot of the P-Q threw over the wheel control and pushed the rudder
bar with his feet. The big flying boat nosed over and down, then
went into a swift spiral dive. In rapid corkscrew movements it swept
down through the air five thousand feet in sixty seconds, and then
straightened out fifty feet above the surface of the sea. Two seconds
later it was skimming over the smooth surface less than a hundred feet
from the nearest boat.
All doubt as to the nature of the objects in the water had now
vanished. There were six lifeboats, and they were from the airship
Wilbur Wright. As the flying boat taxied over towards them the
passengers let loose a rousing cheer and waved a welcome to their
rescuers. Through his glasses Commodore Heathcote made out the
uniformed figure of Captain Johnstone in the leading lifeboat. He told
his pilot to taxi over toward it. A few moments later the P-Q drew up
alongside.
“What happened, Captain?” shouted Commodore Heathcote.
“We were shot down by an airplane,” replied the airship commander, “we
have a lady passenger in serious condition and in need of immediate
hospital attention. It is Mrs. Ingleton, Secretary of the Navy’s wife.
Have you got any machine that would take her to Honolulu quickly? She
is in a critical condition. As soon as you take her off I’ll come over
and tell you what happened.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
One of the patrol airplanes, in response to an order from Commodore
Heathcote, came down and landed near the lifeboats, and transferred
Mrs. Ingleton from the captain’s boat. It then took off and started for
Honolulu at high speed.
As soon as this operation had been completed, Captain Johnstone was
taken off his lifeboat, aboard the P-Q, flying boat, where he was
received in the after gunpit by the two government commanders. “I have
wirelessed for a couple of destroyers to come along here and pick
up the passengers and crew, Captain,” said Captain Smith. “It will
take them a few hours to get here, and we will stand by you till they
arrive. Tell us how it happened.”
Captain Johnstone narrated the story of the second act of aerial piracy
that was destined within a few hours to shock the world into frenzied
action.
“We had been fully warned about the Langley,” he began, “so I put the
ship a hundred miles off her course. At first I decided to fly to
Manila without a stop, but when we fetched up with Hawaii without any
sign of the pirate I changed my mind and decided to make Honolulu.
“I’d scarcely changed my course when the lookout man observed a strange
craft at tremendous altitude. After an observation I figured it must
have been at least 45,000 feet up, and it was moving rapidly in
circles. Suddenly it commenced to spiral down toward us, and I decided
it was no time to take chances, and I ordered my wireless operator to
send out an S.O.S.
“The stranger came down on us with terrific speed. He didn’t make a
sound, with the exception of the hum of his propeller. He soon reached
our level and circled around us. Then he fired a shot straight at us.
It went clean through the middle of the envelope. I gave orders to nose
down and land, but it was useless. The pirate was doing some great
shooting, and he soon had us disabled.
“We settled quickly and he came down after us. As soon as we had landed
I had the boats out, and started putting the women in them. When we had
done this he came up alongside. A man leaned out of the window in the
body and shouted through a megaphone.
“‘You’ve got a Miss Mary Ingleton of Washington on board. Where is
she?’”
“As soon as he had asked this question another man stood up in a small
cockpit in the bows and fingered the trigger of a machine gun fixed
there. He looked as though he meant business. I hesitated a few moments
and tried to evade his question, but he shouted back:
“‘I know she’s on board. Tell her to come right here, I want to speak
to her. I’m not going to stand any nonsense. If she’s not here in five
minutes, you will be placing all your passengers in danger. It’s up to
you.’
“Miss Ingleton was in my boat with her mother and Commodore Fitzgerald,
and she heard what the stranger had said. Mrs. Ingleton immediately
became hysterical and pleaded with me not to let her daughter go.
Fitzgerald was also against it, as he was quite sure the pirate would
not have the heart to endanger defenseless people. ‘All we’ve got to do
is to stand firm against him, and he’ll weaken,’ he told me.
“I was in a terrible dilemma. Naturally I didn’t want to let Miss
Ingleton go over to the pirate, and I didn’t want to jeopardize the
rest of the passengers. We could only see the two men on the strange
airplane. They wore heavy flying clothes and had chamois masks over
their faces. I imagine that was for the high altitudes they were
flying, as well as for the purpose of disguise. While I was trying to
figure a way out, Miss Ingleton got up and said:
“‘Let’s row over there, Captain. It won’t do any harm to talk to him
and find out what he wants.’
“I gave the order and my crew pulled away until we came within a few
feet of the airplane. As we drew up the fellow in the cabin leaned out
and asked:
“‘Have you got Miss Ingleton on board that boat. Where is she?’
“Before I could answer Miss Ingleton stood up and said:
“‘Here I am, what do you want?’
“‘We want you to come on board here,’ he replied. ‘If you do so we will
let the rest of the passengers alone. If you don’t come willingly we’ll
be compelled to use force.’
“To this Miss Ingleton answered: ‘I’ve got my mother with me, can she
come too?’
“‘No, we only want you,’ the fellow replied.
“Mrs. Ingleton began to cry hysterically. ‘Don’t go Mary, don’t go,
I’m afraid.’ Her daughter spoke to her soothingly a few minutes and
tried to console her. Miss Ingleton was not in the least afraid and was
acting very calmly. I overheard her say to her mother: ‘I can take care
of myself, mother dear, don’t worry, you don’t want to make all these
other poor people suffer, do you. We can’t stop this man from doing
what he wants. If I don’t go willingly he can get me by force. I don’t
know what he wants, but he will probably let me come right back again.’
“After a little more pleading Miss Ingleton stood up again and shouted
over to the man in the airplane: ‘Alright, I’ll come over now.’
“I went to her, and said: ‘It’s funny that he should know that you were
on board. Do you recognize his voice.’ She said that as far as she knew
it was the first time she had heard it. It was quite strange to her
and she did not recognize it at all. I was trying to get a clue to the
man’s identity by asking her that question, but she couldn’t help me.
“When we came up alongside, the fellow stood in the doorway of the
cabin and assisted Miss Ingleton on board. While he was doing this the
other man in the gun cockpit stood over us with a revolver in his hand.
As soon as Miss Ingleton was on board the airplane the fellow in the
doorway ordered us to shove off and lay clear. I tried to look into
the small doorway while we were alongside, but he stood so full in the
small aperture that it was impossible to see anything.
“As soon as we fell away the cabin door was closed, and the airplane
started over to where the Wilbur Wright was lying awash in the water.
He evidently had a marine screw for use on the water, as his propellers
were not working. I saw some of the crew go aboard the disabled
airship. There seemed to be five of them. Whether any remained I don’t
know. They were there for upwards of twenty minutes, and during that
time one of them was engaged in passing most of the valuable cargo from
the airship to the airplane. Then they all got aboard the airplane
again and taxied away about a hundred yards. From that position they
opened fire on the Wilbur Wright and continued firing until she sank.
“Suddenly the propellers of the airplane began to whirl around, and in
a few seconds she was in the air. She climbed with incredible speed and
disappeared in no time. We could not hear any motor sound at all, and
there was apparently no room for the motors where the propellers were
housed. The propellers must have been connected to the motors by means
of gears.
“As soon as the airplane disappeared Mrs. Ingleton collapsed
completely. She had been buoyed up by the hope that her daughter would
come back, but now that the pirate had left without hesitation she was
heartbroken. We tried our best to console and revive her, but it was of
no avail.
“After the pirate had disappeared I made the rounds of the boats to
find whether all my passengers and crew were safe. In the hurry we had
not had time to make a roll call. The round showed all the passengers
were safely on board with the exception of Miss Ingleton. All the
crew were also on board, except the second officer Howard Redmond,
who is missing. I made inquiries, but no one seems to have seen him
anywhere on the ship. I am afraid he is lost. I can’t account for his
disappearance. He must have got tangled up somewhere in the ship and
gone down with her.”
CHAPTER NINE
The sinking of the airship Wilbur Wright by the unknown aerial pirate,
coming as it did twenty four hours after the airship Langley had been
shot down, shocked the entire world, and caused a wave of anxiety to
surge through every civilized country. “Where will he strike next?” was
the thought on every mind.
Its immediate effect was the wholesale cancellation of all commercial
air transport schedules along the Pacific railways, completely
isolating Australia and the Orient from rapid communication with the
rest of the world.
This was followed by a universal demand that the pirate be tracked down
and brought to justice. Throughout the North American continent there
was an insistent demand by every newspaper for immediate action in
running down the menace.
The question was immediately brought up before the executive committee
of the League of Nations, but at the request of the American member it
was decided to allow the United States Government to patrol the airways
and apprehend the pirate, particularly as only American ships had been
attacked thus far.
The news of the Wilbur Wright attack brought the utmost consternation
to official Washington. To the Secretary of the Navy it brought the
added fear for his daughter’s safety and anxiety over the seriousness
of his wife’s condition. With his daughter actually in the power of the
unknown pirate, he was fearful lest harm should come to her when the
forces of the government bore down upon the outlaw.
This fear weighed so heavily upon him that he gave expression to it at
the cabinet meeting which was called at once by the President to plan
the campaign against the pirate. As soon as the meeting was called to
order Secretary Ingleton arose and addressing the President, gave voice
to his fears and concluded by saying: “Therefore Mr. President I desire
to be excused from taking any part in formulating the plans that will
be devised to run down this man, because I feel my judgement might be
influenced by fears for my daughter’s safety. I will, however, pledge
myself to carry out as far as possible, wherever my department is
concerned, any plans that my colleagues may decide upon.”
The President and the other members of the cabinet expressed their
sympathy with the Secretary of the Navy and assured him that in the
plans laid down every possible precaution would be taken to insure the
safety of his daughter.
Then George Cowl, Secretary of Air, arose and read an official cipher
cablegram he had received from Commodore Heathcote describing the
attack on the Wilbur Wright in detail.
“You will see,” he said, after reading the cablegram, “that its details
coincide exactly with those of the attack on the Langley. The methods
adopted in both cases are practically identical, except of course for
the abduction of Miss Ingleton. In fact to me there seems to be no
possibility of any doubt as to the pirate being the same in both cases.
The chances of there being two pirates operating in that vicinity are
extremely remote.
“In laying our plans to hunt him down there is one important point to
bear in mind. He cannot operate without a base. He must have a base to
replenish his fuel, food and execute whatever repairs are necessary to
his machine after each flight.
“It seems to me that our first task is to locate this base. It must be
on one of the Islands in the mid-Pacific groups. Another problem which
we must solve is this: What is his method of keeping his base supplied
with the necessary stores?
“These are two very important points, and I think it would be wise
to investigate whether any coast vessels have been carrying cargoes
necessary to airplane maintenance, and whether they have been destined
to unusual places. It would also be a good plan to make inquiries at
all aircraft factories to ascertain whether they had by any chance
constructed the machine used by the pirate. Even from the meagre
description we have of the machine one gathers that its design is quite
out of the ordinary, and should be easy to trace if it was constructed
by any ordinary manufacturer.
“The next thing in my opinion would be to issue explicit instructions
to all the naval radio operators in the Pacific. The incident yesterday
when the pirate shot down the Wilbur Wright and then inquired for Miss
Ingleton shows that he must be equipped with wireless, because there is
no other way in which he could have known she was on board.
“The fact that he has wireless on board and uses it is borne out by
what occurred when the Wilbur Wright sent out an S.O.S. call. The
operator at Pearl Harbor was unable to get the complete message because
of interference, which, judging from all the facts in the case, could
have come from no one else except the pirate.
“Under these circumstances I would suggest that a description of his
signals be obtained from the Pearl Harbor station operator and sent out
by rush cable to all the other operators with instructions to listen
for them at all times.
“Then I would also suggest that the operators at Pearl Harbor, Guam and
Manila be instructed to adjust their Direction Finder apparatus on the
pirate immediately they hear him, and get a bearing on him. In this
way we might possibly be able to trace him to the base. We could also
arrange a new code for the operators to use in transmitting the results
of their Direction Finding bearings. This code should also be rushed
to them by cable, with the request that they repeat it back to us, so
that there will be no chance of any error.
“So much for that phase. We must now lay plans for tracking him down
with patrols. In my opinion we must proceed with this on well organized
lines, and should use both naval and aircraft units. The latter should
be fast scouts with long cruising range. Dirigibles are too slow for
this work, I think, and too vulnerable against this man. We must
arrange a complete co-ordination between the wireless and the patrol
units, and the latter should be advised of all codes.
“In this connection I have just received an interesting cable from
Commander Fitzgerald who was a passenger on the Wilbur Wright. Here it
is. He says:
“‘Respectfully request that I be given opportunity of leading any
expedition against airplane which shot down airships. As Miss Ingleton
was under my escort I feel it a personal duty to see no harm comes to
her and that she be safely restored to her parents. I am anxious to go
after the pirate, and strongly urge my request be granted.’
“Now Fitzgerald had ample opportunity of getting a comprehensive idea
of the attacking airplane, and he observed it both on the water and
in the air. Therefore he is the logical man for the job. Moreover,
he undoubtedly feels he has been remiss in the pledge to look after
Mrs. Ingleton and her daughter and seeks to atone, although personally
I do not think there is anything else he could have done under
the circumstances. I propose putting him in command of the pursuit
forces and having Commodore Heathcote at Honolulu in charge of base
operations. I think that Honolulu would be the best place to base the
expedition because of its central location to the apparent field of the
pirate’s operations.
“I think that we should have at least twelve squadrons of pursuit
airplanes for the task, and while they should be based on Honolulu for
repairs and refitting, I am in favor of having each squadron located at
some particular island so that it can be concentrated rapidly at any
particular spot the pirate is reported in.
“The task of running down the pirate should be carried out by a double
arrangement, first a daily patrol and second a special concentrated
patrol. In the first case I would suggest that the squadrons be located
on islands approximately five hundred miles apart and that each
squadron be assigned to patrol a definite territory of approximately
five hundred miles square. This could be done each day with four
airplanes, leaving each squadron with fourteen machines in reserve for
emergency.
“The patrolling airplanes would keep in constant wireless communication
with their squadron headquarters, and all the squadron headquarters
should be linked together by wireless or cable. The airplanes held in
reserve by each squadron will be kept in readiness at all times, and
in the event of a patrol airplane sighting the pirate, the reserve
machines will concentrate on the spot as soon as possible, after
receiving the wireless report. It would also be well to determine
the types of naval vessels to use, and the manner in which they can
co-operate with the aircraft.
“Those are my views gentlemen, but I am willing and anxious to
co-operate in any other plan that you may adopt.”
As Secretary Cowl finished, and even before he could sit down, a murmur
of approval swept through the room, and one or two of the cabinet
members actually clapped their hands in applauding the general plan
outlined by the head of the Air Department. For a few seconds there was
a spirited discussion as the members went over the points of Cowl’s
suggestions. Then John F. Seeley, the Secretary of War, arose and said:
“The Secretary of Air has stated the case concisely and admirably. I
agree absolutely with all his main points and heartily concur in the
methods he had so masterly proposed to meet the menacing situation.
There is, however, one phase of the situation that he only touched
upon--the use of naval craft in the pursuit.
“Under normal circumstances we would await the pronouncement of our
colleague of the Navy Department upon that subject, but in view of his
statement at the outset of this meeting I am presuming to venture a
suggestion in his place.
“Before I do so, however, I want to state that there may be a very
grave question as to the efficacy of a surface patrol in this
situation, and I would very urgently suggest that before anything
definite is done that we consult with the experts of the Navy
Department as to the utility and feasibility of using naval vessels.
“Should they decide that it would be feasible to use them, it seems to
me that since we are dealing solely with an aviation problem there are
only two classes of naval craft that can be at all considered in this
question--namely, destroyers and fast, light scout cruisers. Even these
are inadequate so far as speed is concerned, but we might find them
useful in long range, continuous patrol work.
“In using naval craft we must determine the amount of territory that we
are going to patrol. Having definitely done this, we can then decide
the exact number of vessels we shall require under the plan that I am
going to propose to you.