The Saint Paul globe., 1902-08-22
MIMIC SEA WARFARE
SECOND DAY OF THE MANEUV.
ERS OF THE NORTH ATTAIN
TIC FLEET
Officers and Men Work Apparently as
Hard as Though Actual Hostilities
Were On-Commander PIIsbury and
His Fleet Remain in the Mysterious
Distance.

ROCKFORD, Mass, Aug. 21.-At
midnight thirty-six hours had passed
of the possible 120 for the naval con-
f1ict between the attacking and defend
ing squadrons. The coming of another
day was recorded, but the anticipated
meeting between the hostile fleets had
not come to pass. After day which
had been on the whole devoid of any
sensations, the night, thick and cloudy
as it was, with the moon quite OBJ
scured, developed so many confusing
situation and so many extraordinary
reports that the Higginson squadron
had just cause for grave uneasiness.
Somehow the feeling grew that it
would not be such a difficult attain
ment after all for three auxiliary cruis-
erS of the white squadron to slip in
and anchor at some harbor, protected
as they would be by the inviting dark
ness which prevailed.
Perhaps the greatest danger which
came to Admiral Higginson was that
of yielding to the temptation to with
draw the Kearsarge and leave only the
Alabama and the Massachusetts to go
in search of the enemy, reported on
apparently reliable authority to have
been sighted at either this or that
point along the coast.
Perhaps the Enemy's Ship.
In the early part of the night the
station at the Isle of Shoals notified
the nearest mainland point, by the use
of torches and the secret code of the
navy, that large, strange, two -maSted
craft had been sighted outside the
shoals. Admiral Higginsons wonder
full system Of signals worked to per-
lection. Almost in a moment, it SEEM
ed, the destroyer Decatur was rocketed
from Portsmouth to put in to pursue
the mysterious conner, and in another
moment the Decatur, with the smoke
belching from her four great stacks,
was plowing furiously through the
heavy seas. The stranger turned and
fled at full speed, and this fact led
to the decision that she may have been
one of the attacking fleet passing on
ward on scout duty. At a late hour
the Decatur had made no report.
The admiral steadfastly refused to
leave his anchorage in the harbOr here
because he dared not leave Rock port
exposed to the enemy, which, taking
advantage of the needless passage of
the defending battleships to another
port, might easily creep in and drop
anchor at the very heart of the opera
tions of the blue squadron.
putting Enemy Out of Action"
1t was these considerations that
forced Admiral Higginson to the con-
| clusion that on none but the surest
authority would he leave the Rock
port station to join other members Of
his squadron in the work of putting
the enemy out of action.
The complications which developed
today in the shape of undoubted news
that Commander Pillsbury had secret
ly landed some of his officers ashore
to spy upon the movements of the blue
squadron, served only to increase the
perplexity Of Admiral Higginson's
position, and this reported shore sys-
| tenn of spying was one of the things
which led the admiral to establish the
new signal station of Straits Mouth
point and also to remove his ships as
he did early in the evening to a point
| just inside Thatcher's island.
In the early morning the position of