Meanwhile the _Fukui Maru_ had also reached her destination, and as we
pushed off in the boat from the side of our own sinking ship, we heard,
through the din of firing and the explosions of bursting shells, the
roar of her cable as her crew let go her anchor. I was sitting with my
back turned toward her, intent upon getting our boat as close inshore as
possible, when the engineer, who was sitting beside me, touched my arm
and pointed.
I turned and looked, to see Hirose's ship brought up right in
mid-channel--the berth assigned to her; and, bearing down upon her, a
Russian destroyer, her funnels and guns spouting flame and smoke as she
tore furiously through the water. Another instant, and the destroyer
swerved, just clearing the stern of the _Fukui_; there was the flash of
a torpedo from her deck tube, a terrific explosion, and the _Fukui_
seemed to be hove up out of the water on the top of a great cone of
leaping sea intermingled with smoke and flame. The ship had been
torpedoed, quite uselessly, indeed worse than uselessly, for the
Russians had simply saved our people the trouble of sinking her.
The destroyer passed on, and we temporarily lost sight of her in the
darkness and wreathing smoke. We saw the _Fukui's_ boat lowered, and
the crew get into her; but she remained alongside so long that she only
got away barely in time to avoid being dragged down with the ship.
Meanwhile, shells were falling not only all round but also aboard the
_Fukui_, and we presently saw that she was on fire, as well as sinking.
Nearly or quite a dozen shells must have struck her before she finally
foundered; but it was not until the next day that we learned the full
extent of the tragedy. It then appeared that the explosion of the
torpedo had either disconnected or shattered the wires connected with
the explosives in the _Fukui's_ bottom, and a petty officer named Sugino
had gone below to explode the charges. It chanced that this man was a
blood-brother of Hirose, and, not returning to the deck as he was
expected to do, Hirose went in search of him, after ordering the boat to
leave the ship. A few seconds later a shell was seen to strike Hirose
on the head, of course killing him instantly. Later on, we heard that
his floating body had been picked up in the harbour by the Russians,
who, to do them justice, buried it with military honours.
A small air of wind at this time came breathing down the harbour,
momentarily dispersing the thick veil of smoke that overhung the water,
and we were thus enabled to see that our third ship, the _Yahiko Maru_,
had also succeeded in reaching the berth assigned to her, and was at
that moment in the very act of sinking, close to the Pinnacle Rock, a
great monolith which rose high out of the water on the western side of
the harbour's mouth. Thus far, therefore, everything had gone well with
the expedition; and now all that remained was for the fourth ship, the
_Yoneyama Maru_, to close up the gap that still remained.
I looked round to see if I could see anything of her, and presently the
shifting of the searchlight beam from the _Yahiko_ revealed her coming
along in fine style, and heading straight for her appointed berth.
Hitherto, the Russian batteries had been too busy, attending to us
others, to take much notice of her, and she appeared to be all ataunto
and quite uninjured. I felt curious to see what was going to happen to
her, and gave my crew the order to "Easy all, and lay on your oars!"
As I did so, a Russian destroyer--I could not tell whether it was the
craft that had torpedoed the _Fukui_, or another--emerged from the
darkness, heading straight for the _Yahiko_, as though to run her down!
Would they dare? I wondered. Surely not. But if they did not, there
was no reason why the _Yahiko_ should not; she was a stout-built,
merchant steamer, and, old as she was, would shear through the
destroyer's thin plating as though it were brown paper. If I had been
in charge of the _Yahiko_, I would not have hesitated an instant, indeed
I would have jumped at the chance, and in my excitement I leaped to my
feet and, making a funnel of my hands, yelled frantically:
"_Yahiko_ ahoy! Give her the stem, man; give her the stem!"
But at that precise moment the Russian guns opened again, this time
directing their fire upon the _Yahiko_, and my hail was effectually
drowned by the crash of the explosions.
I am of opinion that, a moment later, the commander of the _Yahiko_ saw
his chance, just too late to fully avail himself of it, at all events
the bows of the steamer suddenly swept round, and although the destroyer
instantly shifted her helm, she was too late to entirely avoid a
collision; the rounding of the _Yahiko's_ bow struck her and roughly
shouldered her aside, both craft reeling under the impact; and at that
instant the destroyer let fly every gun that would bear, the fire from
them actually scorching the Japanese crew, who were at that moment
preparing to lower their boat. The _Yahiko_ passed on, and so did the
destroyer, the latter vanishing in the darkness to seaward, while the
_Yahiko_, the centre of a very galaxy of bursting shells, staggered on
in a sinking condition, and went down at the very moment when, with
astounding skill and coolness, her skipper had brought her to the exact
spot for which she was intended.
Then it was seen that, either through some miscalculation or, more
probably, because the Russians had widened the channel, there still
remained an unfilled gap, wide enough for a single ship to pass through!
It was a most vexatious thing, after all the trouble that we had taken
and the ordeal which we had passed through; but it could not be helped;
it was the fortune of war.
Stay, though! Why should it not be helped? All that was needed was
another steamer--or perhaps two steamers--to fill the gap, and the thing
was done. And, hang it all! I was game to do the job myself to-morrow
night, when the Russians would least expect me.
But, to do the job effectually, it was highly necessary to know the
exact width of the gap, and the depth of water in it; and now was the
time to ascertain those particulars, while we were on the spot. I would
do it!
Then came the very practical question: How? What means had we to take
soundings, or to measure the gap between the sunken _Fukui_ and the
_Yoneyama_? I looked about me, and found that all we had with us was
the boat's painter, a piece of rope some seven or eight fathoms long,
which might serve as a sounding-line, if only we had a sinker of some
sort, which, unhappily, we had not. Then one of the men in the boat,
realising what I wanted, informed me that, while preparing the boat for
lowering, he had chanced to glance into the locker in the stern-sheets,
and had noticed a fishing-line there. Would that be of any use? Of
course it would; the very thing for sounding, at all events. We had
that line out in double-quick time, cut away the hooks, and then
proceeded to knot it at exact intervals corresponding with the length of
the boat's after-thwart. Precisely what that length might be, we could
ascertain afterward.
But, how to measure the width of the gap? There seemed to me to be but
one way to do it, and that was by taking the length of our boat herself
as a unit of measurement; not a very satisfactory method, I admitted,
yet better than nothing. So thereupon we set to work.
Starting at the _Fukui's_ mainmast, we dropped the sinker of the
fishing-line over the stern and paid out until it reached her deck.
Then, giving way with the oars, we felt our way along her deck to her
taffrail, lifted the sinker, and dropped it again, clear of the wreck,
until it touched bottom. Then, noting the depth as so many knots and
fractions of a knot, I jotted the result in my notebook while, the
oarsmen keeping the boat in position, another cast was made at the bow
end of the boat. Proceeding in this manner, and taking the utmost care
to obtain accurate results, we accomplished our task in about half an
hour, under a heavy fire from the Russians on the heights, which,
strange to say, injured none of us.
This done, we pulled out to sea, and were soon afterward sighted and
joined by the _Tsubame_ and _Aotaka_, Japanese torpedo-boats, which took
us aboard, and exultingly informed us that, a quarter of an hour or so
earlier, they had engaged and driven ashore a Russian destroyer, which
afterward proved to be the _Silny_, the craft which had torpedoed the
_Fukui_, and had narrowly escaped being run down and sunk by the
_Yahiko_.
The torpedo-boats' crews made much of us and, I believe, would have
given us everything they had, if we would have taken it; but I contented
myself with a pannikin of _saki_, to counteract the cold of my drenched
clothing, and then asked them to run me off alongside my own ship, the
_Kasanumi_, which was hove-to about a mile further out. My crew
received me back with literally open arms and loud shouts of "Banzai
Nippon!" when I allowed it to be known that we had succeeded in doing
all that we had been ordered to do. Young Hiraoka was disposed to
regard me as a hero, and to treat me as such, commencing a long
complimentary speech of homage and congratulation; but I cut him short
by remarking that I was perishing of cold, and dived below to give
myself a good rough towelling and to change into dry kit.
When I went on deck again, the dawn was just brightening the eastern
sky, and I then noticed that we seemed to have more than our proper
complement of men aboard. Inquiring the reason, I learned that the
_Kasanumi_ had picked up the crew of the _Fukui Maru_, poor Hirose's
ship; and they furnished me with the particulars of the gallant fellow's
heroic death. I also learned that while we had been engaged in the
endeavour to block the harbour, our destroyers had been busily employed
in sowing further harmless mines, in accordance with the Admiral's plan
to convince the Russians that Japanese mines were useless and need not
be feared.
As the daylight strengthened, it revealed our fleet, strung out along
the horizon, the Admiral having followed the blocking ships and
destroyers upon the off-chance that the Russians might be tempted to
come out and attack them, in the event of our failing in our mission.
And at first it appeared as though that chance might be afforded us.
For, as we steamed away to the eastward, we saw smoke rising from the
funnels of some of the ships in the harbour, and shortly afterward the
cruisers _Bayan, Novik_, and _Askold_ came steaming out, with the
battleships following. But it was no go; the Russians opened a
long-range fire upon us, to which we gave no reply, slowly retiring
instead, in the hope of enticing the enemy's ships to follow us beyond
the cover of their batteries. The Russian Admiral, however, was too
wary, refusing to be drawn, and, putting up his helm, he returned to the
harbour. Nevertheless, the event was not altogether unprofitable to us,
for as the Russian ships re-entered the harbour, the _Petropavlosk_ ran
foul of the _Sevastopol_ and damaged her so severely as to render her
unfit for further service until she could be repaired.
Meanwhile, the destroyers being no longer required, I devoted myself to
the task of reducing to an intelligible state the soundings and
measurements which I had that morning taken; and by the time that we
were back at our rendezvous I had a little sketch plan of the harbour's
mouth ready for the Admiral, showing the exact width of the gap and the
depth of water in it, thus enabling him to determine the precise size of
the craft required to fill it. I also volunteered to return and fill up
the gap that very night, if he could let me have a ship of the required
dimensions. But it appeared that he had no ship that could at that time
be spared; consequently the job had to wait.
But Togo was profuse in his thanks for my offer; and was pleased to be
exceedingly complimentary in his remarks touching my "gallantry" in the
matter of taking the soundings, as also upon our conduct generally in
taking in the blocking ships under such a terrific fire and sinking them
exactly in the required positions. He expressed great grief at the loss
of poor Hirose, who was, without doubt, a remarkably promising officer,
and would assuredly have further distinguished himself and gone far, had
he lived.
Just before we arrived at our rendezvous that night, our high-pressure
cylinder developed a bad crack, possibly through some unsuspected flaw
in the casting; and as there were no means of repairing it, except
temporarily, where we were, and as in the meantime the boat was useless,
I received orders to have the crack patched-up as far as possible, and
then to proceed to Sasebo, to have a new cylinder fitted. This mishap
involved an absence of the _Kasanumi_ from our rendezvous for ten days;
but, as events proved, it did not matter in the least; for the Admiral,
doubtless for good and sufficient reasons, now permitted a period of
inaction to occur, during which nothing happened beyond the usual
watching of Port Arthur harbour. I availed myself of the opportunity
thus afforded to have my little ship docked, scraped, and repainted;
while my engineer took his engines entirely to pieces, subjected them to
a thorough overhaul, and replaced a few brasses and other matters that
were showing signs of wear. He also overhauled the boilers, and fitted
quite a number of new tubes; so that when at length the boat left the
dry dock she was in first-class condition, and ready for any service
that could be reasonably asked of her.
I found awaiting me at the post office quite a nice little batch of most
cheering and encouraging letters from my friends, the Gordons, to which
I duly replied at considerable length, giving them--and especially
Ronald--full particulars of my adventures up to date; and the receipt of
their letters made me feel that while a man had such staunch friends as
they had proved to be, the world was not such a bad place, after all.
We got back to our rendezvous at the Elliot Islands on the afternoon of
9th April, the little _Kasanumi_ looking as smart and spick-and-span as
a new pin, her hull, funnels, mast, guns--everything, in fact, except
her deck--painted that peculiar tint of medium smoky-grey which
experience had proved to render her almost invisible, even in daylight,
and absolutely so at night; and the moment that our anchor was down I
proceeded aboard the flagship to report myself, and also to deliver
mails for the fleet and dispatches for the Admiral, which I had brought
with me.
There did not seem to be very much doing at the rendezvous when I
arrived, beyond the rebunkering of such craft as needed it; but I
noticed a rather smart-looking steamer of about four thousand tons,
fitted as a mine-layer, with lighters on both sides of her, out of which
a number of very business-like-looking mines were being hoisted.
But when I got aboard the _Mikasa_, and was shown into the Admiral's
cabin, I found the little gentleman up to his eyes in business, as
usual. He dropped his work, however, when I was announced, and, rising
from his chair, greeted me in the most hearty and friendly manner; then,
bidding me be seated, he asked me how I had spent my time at Sasebo. He
expressed the utmost satisfaction with everything that I had done; and
presently, when the orderly brought in a bundle of letters and papers
from the mail which I had brought, he opened the latter and, selecting
from it a particular sheet--the Tokio _Asahi_, I believe it was--opened
it, glanced eagerly at a particular column, and then, with a smile and a
pointing finger, handed the sheet to me. It had been opened at the page
containing naval intelligence; and glancing at it, I perceived, to my
amazement and delight, that I had been gazetted to the rank of Captain,
"as from 27th March, in recognition of conspicuous gallantry in
connection with the second attempt to close Port Arthur harbour." The
two other surviving skippers had also been similarly promoted.
I scarcely knew how to find words eloquent enough to thank Togo for his
generous recognition of my services, such as they were; but he would not
listen to a word of thanks, insisting that I had honestly earned the
promotion, and thoroughly deserved it.
"And now," he concluded, "I am going to give you a further opportunity
to distinguish yourself. I have in hand some work, the successful
execution of which demands a man who can be depended upon to keep his
head and his nerve under the most trying conditions, such as those which
existed when you took those soundings and measurements, under, fire, the
other day; indeed it was that piece of daring which caused me to select
you for the work. You may perhaps have observed a steamer shipping
mines--You did? Yes, I thought you would. Well, that steamer is the
_Koryu Maru_, a very smart boat, steaming twenty-two knots, which I have
had fitted as a mine-layer. The Russians have passed to and fro over
our mine-field off Port Arthur, and have had full opportunity to learn
that our mines are so harmless that they may be regarded as negligible,
so, now, I propose to teach them a new lesson. The mines which the
_Koryu_ is shipping are not harmless; on the contrary, they are
exceedingly formidable affairs, containing charges ranging from one
hundred to two hundred pounds of Shimose explosive, and they are
arranged to automatically adjust themselves to varying depths of water.
The ship which strikes one of them will be done for! Having told you so
much, you will readily understand that they are ticklish affairs to
handle, particularly when it comes to laying them; hence my choice of
you, Captain Swinburne, to supervise and execute the task. I shall be
glad if you will go aboard, at your earliest convenience, and make
yourself thoroughly acquainted with the mode of handling them, which is
essentially different from that of handling the mines to which you have
been accustomed."
I thanked the Admiral for this fresh manifestation of his trust in me,
and took my leave, pausing only for a few minutes, on my way to the
gangway, to exchange greetings with some of the officers of the ship,
and reply to their congratulations upon my promotion, the news of which
had already got abroad. Then I went down the side, got into my boat,
and was pulled across to the _Koryu_, where I found the delicate
operation of shipping and stowing the mines in brisk progress. I
introduced myself to the officer in charge, who at once proceeded to
explain to me the structure and mechanism of the class of mines being
dealt with; thus enabling me to understand the danger to be guarded
against while handling them; after which he conducted me to my cabin,
perched high on the boat deck; and I immediately took possession,
sending my boat back to the _Kasanumi_ with a note for young Hiraoka,
requesting him to take charge during my absence, and another to my
steward, instructing him to send me across such things as I immediately
needed. The change was greatly the better for me; for whereas my
quarters aboard the _Kasanumi_ were cramped and of Spartan simplicity,
the captain's cabin of the _Koryu_ was a spacious and almost luxurious
affair, handsomely and comfortably furnished, with all the accommodation
that a reasonable man could wish for.
Two days later our fleet weighed and proceeded to sea, leaving the
_Koryu_ at anchor, with our fourth and fifth destroyer flotillas and
fourteenth torpedo-boat flotilla--twelve craft in all--to protect her.
My orders were to proceed to sea in time to reach Port Arthur roadstead
at midnight of the 12th, sow the harbour approach with mines according
to a certain plan, and then retire, with the assurance that, if
attacked, there would be a force of ample strength lying in wait to
protect me.
One part of my duty--after laying the mines--was to endeavour to entice
the Russian fleet to come out in pursuit of me. Experience had taught
us that, for some reason with which we were unacquainted, the Russian
ships invariably followed a certain course when leaving the harbour,
while, when returning, they as invariably followed another; my
instructions, therefore, were to sow my mines over the area by which the
ships returned to port, while leaving free that area traversed by them
when coming out; the reason of course being, that as many ships as
possible should be enticed to come out, in the hope that many of them
would be destroyed upon their return.
The night of the 12th was a wretched one in some respects for our
purpose. The weather was thick; a strong breeze was blowing from the
southward, kicking up a nasty sea; it was bitterly cold; and a thin
drizzle of fine snow made the thick atmosphere still thicker; so that it
was impossible to see farther than a ship's length in any direction. I
foresaw, therefore, that I had a very difficult task before me, not only
in getting the little torpedo-boats across in the heavy sea, but in
depositing the mines in the right place after we should arrive.
To spare the torpedo-boats as much as possible while making the passage
against a heavy head sea, I decided to proceed at a speed of ten knots;
and we accordingly got under way at five o'clock in the evening, leaving
ourselves an hour in hand to cover any delay which we might meet with.
I had very carefully studied the tides and the current charts during the
afternoon, taken careful note of the strength of the wind, and, taking
these matters into consideration, had worked out a course that, unless
some of the conditions changed, should take me to the exact spot I
wished to reach, at eleven o'clock.
Punctual to the moment we started, "in line ahead," each vessel towing a
fog buoy behind her to serve as a guide to the next astern, and these
buoys I had at the last moment caused to be coated with luminous paint,
to make them visible in the intense darkness.
All went well with us; the destroyers rode the seas like gulls, while,
at the moderate speed of ten knots, the torpedo-boats were not only able
to keep station perfectly but also avoided washing their crews
overboard. At ten-thirty I made the prearranged signal, and my escort
hove-to, leaving me to finish my journey and carry out my perilous task
alone.
I knew exactly where I was--or rather, where I ought to be--for I had
kept a careful reckoning of our progress from the moment of starting,
and, unless something had gone wrong, we were then exactly two miles
south-east of the Pinnacle Rock lighthouse. But it was necessary to
make sure, otherwise I might lay my mines in the wrong place, and all my
labour would be useless; I accordingly shaped a course for the
lighthouse and cautiously stood in, with a leadsman stationed at each
extremity of the overhanging navigating bridge. These took continuous
casts of the lead and reported the result to me through my "Number 1,"
who stood outside my cabin and called to me through an open window,
while I stood at the table, with the chart spread open before me,
pricking off our position minute after minute, and comparing the
leadsmen's results with those shown on the chart, the two agreeing
accurately.
At length we reached a point beyond which it would be dangerous to go,
and I ordered the engines to be stopped and reversed, at the same time
stepping out on to the bridge, to ascertain if anything could be seen.
But it was as thick as a hedge, the lighthouse lantern was unlighted,
and there was not even a gleam from the searchlight on the cliffs above
to enable us to verify our position. True, the roar of breakers close
at hand told us we were not far from the shore; but that was all we had
to guide us; there was nothing for it, therefore, but to go ahead and do
the best we could.
There is no need for me to enter into a detailed and technical
description of the operation of laying mines; I will therefore merely
state that, despite the adverse conditions, we succeeded in
accomplishing our task and withdrawing without mishap. But we were not
a moment too soon, for the light of dawn was filtering through the haze
as we dropped our last mine and moved cautiously away from the completed
field.
The next thing was to find our escort, which we had left two miles out
at sea. We were groping our way slowly seaward through the fog, keeping
a sharp lookout for the destroyers, when all in a moment the mist
lifted, and we sighted them about half a mile distant. And at the same
instant, some four miles away to the north-east, appeared a squadron of
five destroyers, which we at once identified as our second destroyer
flotilla. And yet--no that could scarcely be right, for our "second"
consisted of only four boats, while yonder were five--with--yes--a sixth
close inshore. I turned to get my binoculars out of the case, in order
to investigate a little more closely, and even as I did so the five
destroyers became suddenly enveloped in a wreathing cloud of powder
smoke, while the sharp, angry bark of quick-fire guns broke the morning
silence. The five destroyers were unquestionably engaged in a fight
among themselves. The firing continued quite briskly for about five
minutes; then there pealed out a sharp, violent explosion, a great cloud
of smoke shot into the air; the firing abruptly ceased; and the smoke
cleared away just in time to show that one of the destroyers--the craft
which we had been unable to identify--was sinking, a shattered,
shapeless wreck.
At this moment a cry from my "Number 1" distracted my attention from the
interesting little drama which I was eagerly watching, and, turning
toward the harbour's mouth, in response to his pointing finger, I saw a
big, four-funnelled, two-masted cruiser, which I instantly recognised as
the _Bayan_, coming foaming out of harbour, evidently intent upon
driving off our destroyers, which were now busily launching their boats
to save the crew of the destroyer, which had by this time foundered. I
was in the very act of issuing an order for one of our Hotchkisses to be
fired, to warn the destroyers, when the _Bayan_ opened fire upon them
with her light guns, and they were obliged to retreat, double-quick.
Of course the _Bayan_ was no match for them in the matter of speed, so
after covering the retreat of the second destroyer, which was creeping
along close inshore, and pausing to pick up the survivors of the sunken
destroyer, the cruiser turned her attention--and her guns--upon us. But
we were out of range of her light guns, and for some unknown reason she
did not open fire upon us with her heavy weapons, we therefore quickened
up to about her own speed, or a trifle less, hoping we might be able to
entice her out to where we knew our own cruiser squadron was waiting to
cover our retreat. Unfortunately for the success of my scheme, Admiral
Dewa, who commanded the squadron, no sooner heard the firing than he put
on speed and rushed to our rescue, emerging from the mist and becoming
visible while still some three miles away. The instant that they were
clear of the fog bank, and could see what was happening, the squadron
opened fire upon the _Bayan_ with their heavy guns, when that ship was
in turn compelled to up helm and beat a hurried retreat, to my intense
disgust; for I felt confident that if our cruisers had only lain doggo
in the fog bank, I could have cajoled the Russian ship into following me
so far out to sea that her retreat could have been cut off, and we
should have nabbed her. As it was, the _Diana_ and _Novik_ came rushing
out to her rescue; whereupon Dewa, who by this time recognised the
mistake he had made, turned and retired, apparently in a panic, for
great clouds of smoke were presently seen to be pouring from the funnels
of all his ships. But before ten minutes were over it became perfectly
evident that the Admiral was "playing foxy," for despite the clouds of
smoke, his ships were barely holding their own, if indeed they were
doing as much as that. Naturally, we in the _Koryu_ at once took our
cue from the Admiral, and stoked up for all we were worth, using as much
small coal as we could scrape together, in order to increase the volume
of smoke pouring from our funnel, while we allowed the _Novik_ to gain
upon us a trifle from time to time, and then, by an apparently desperate
effort, drew away from her again. And this time it really looked as
though our ruse was going to prove successful, for the three Russian
cruisers continued to chase us with the utmost pertinacity and
determination.