Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1898-11-03

hear of his safe return, but regret tc
learn of the loss of his eye-sight:
1t is hurrying hungry crowd that usual,
alights at the Arcade depot in the morning
from the 80 Sau Francisco train. Every mar
is intent on his own breakfast and his own bust
ness and has but little heed for his neighbor
So it is not probable that many of the passen
gers paid much attention to pieasant-faced
elderly looking man, dressed in the uniform OF
a petty officer of the United States navy, as
with the uncertain step of one whose eyesight
is dim, he slowly went down the steps and
out of the depot enclosure Friday morning. His
name is John P. Brotherton and he is Just home
| from Manila where he took part in the great
eStof our country's naval battles on that memoir
Mr.. Brotherton is an oiler, which rank he OBJ
tanned by twenty-six years of faithful service in
the navy. He arrived at Mare Island on the re-
ceiying ship Independence a few days ago. and
was there granted an honorable discharge from
| the service on account of his rapidly failing
vision. The home for his remaining days is a
where he expects to live with his brother and
the latter's family. Mr.. Brotherton is very in.
teresting man to talk with. hav-
Departure ing all of the easy, natural f1uen.
for cy common to men of the sea. He
~. received Herald reporter cor
TIC daily and proceeded to tell his
Orient story which is here given as near
lyas possible in his own language
:" Joined the gunboat Concord. Capt j. P.
Walker, at Mare Island, on the 4th Of last Jan
uary. said Mr.. Brotherton. On the Sth, we
left for Honolulu, where we stopped three days
to take on coal From there we sailed for Yo-
kohama where we Joined the flagship Olympia
| and delivered her some ammunition. Then we
went over to Chemulpo, Coreo and after spend
ing night there set out for Hong Kong: We
reached there about February 22d and found
the Raleigh and Petrol waiting for us.
Il did not get on shore during the time we
were at Hong Kong, but Ihad no trouble find
ing out that the feeling among tile, English
a ri
Frenchmen and Spaniards had good deal of
sympathy for Spain.
talking about war with Spain, but we really
knew nothing about it until April 18TH when
we got orders to paint the ships war color. A
received orders from the British government to
get out. We did SO and went to Mrs Bay, a
Chinese harbor seven or eight miles from IN! Hong
came up from Manila. He was taken on board
the Baltimore. The Baltimore and the Boston
had joined us a few days before we left Hong
Kong. Then when all was ready
Hong Kong we started out for the Philip
IN pines. The trip took us about
four days, and on Saturday after
Manila noon, April Goth, the Concord and
Boston ran ahead of the rest of
the feet into Subig bay in the island of Luzon,
about seventy miles north of Manila. Subig bay
resembles the bay of Manila in having a narrow
entrance and good depth of water, although it
I" Ali the way down from Mrs bay we had been
the, way and could be of no service in battle,
and by the time we reached Manila bay we
were in fighting trim. The ships were in fine
condition from top to bottom and the, boys
wanted nothing but to get at the Spaniards.
About midnight we passed Corregidor Island
lying in the entrance to the bay. Not light
on the island several hundred feet above the
water, and water batteries, too, we didn't hear
a sound from any of them. But out in the
channel between Corregidor Island and Ell
Erai!e island there was spy in little tug boat
waiting for us, and when he saw few sparks
fly from the Bostons funnel he sent up two or
three rockets.
There We're three modern fve-inch guns
mounted on El Fraile, and they at once opened
fire in the dark. The Concord and the Boston
each returned with three shots but none of
them hit. The ships entered the harbor in or
der of senioTity.that is, the seniority, of the
CAPTAINS. The , first vas the olympia, then + the
rel. After these came the Mccullough and the
transports Zafiro and Nanshaw. These three
were left about three miles to the rear of the
morning. Well you know the story of the battle
pretty we'll. You want me to
The Battle give my Impressions OF til 1t
into routine target practice.
Manila There was no great excitement.
b his %sIn Just
it was very hot; it was hot morning anyhow.
But we didn't have time to think of the heat;
there was Just one idea for us all and that was
did t
1.-THE firing commenced about half-past 5. We
had not had thing to eat NO Tmt cup
stayed with the work until every one of the enc
my's, ships was ruined or sunk. Then we ate
breakfast There wasn't much of it, but what
there was good beef tea and the sort of
things that brace man up.
AS soon as the firing ceased the command.
flagship. You can imagine the admirals sur.
prise when they reported no one killed or badly
hurt. He congratulated each of the captains
on their fine work, and told them to do the
admiral was just the man for that place! He
knew what he was doing, and every man in the
fleet thinks the world of him :"
1t was a beautiful sight to see the old salts
face light up with pleasure and devotion as he
| spoke of his beloved e1-commander. One hear.
| ing him could not doubt the sincerity of his
words.
| when the captain came back tell you there
was lot of cheering. The boys We're crazy and
OF course some of EN- used kind o strong Ian
guage; but | remember we'll one fellow who
said: Well fellers, feel as though we've got
| those pepper eaters to the bottom at last
You see, during the fight the boys didn't say
much, but they turned loose afterward. On the
way down the captain read us the proclamation
sui Wildman had brought copy of it with him
from Manila. 1t called us Americans pigs, saw
| ages. cut.throats and everything that was bad
About 9 O clock we went back
Capture into action again and in half an
| of hour the forts at Cavite were
| done up. We hadn't been through
CaVite very long before the insurgents
| got in and took everything in
| sight that they mould carry otf-organs, pianos
sewing machines everything you could think of
81 have picture here which took from the
commandments house. They would have had
that if it hadn't been so high on the wall that
they probably didn't seeit
| THAT evening Sunday just before sunset a
| boat hove in sight, coming into the harbor
| Dewey sent out the Concord and the Raleigh
with the Instructions Find out what that ship
| is. If she is German warn her off if she is
English, admit her; if she is Spanish, capture
her. So you see that even then Dewey had his
suspicious of the Germans.
But as we drew near to the vessel we noticed
smoke rising from her farther side We went
| to look it up and found that it was Spanish
tug, evidently tryi ng to escape past our fleet bs
hugging close to the side of the larger ship. We
took her commander on board the Concord and
| found out afterward that he was the same who
had caught us entering the channel the night
before and that he had this same tug at the
| time. The ship was an English gunboat but
| don't remember her name.
THE Olympia and the Petrol did most of the
! work in reducing the forts, and the next da.