Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1903-06-04
CNSi X.sG WQCD Aj
ready, not man could be found in

ready, not a man could be found in
Callao to go with me.
AS high as $4,000 was offered, but
there was no moving a patriot 1t
was considered a sure thing that the
launch would be blown to pieces along
with the blockader, and, although all
loved their country, they didn't want
any sure thing in theirs.
In this emergency, and thinking to
put the men to shame, Donna Calinte
came forward and offered to go along,
and she was very much in earnest, too.
The scheme didn't work. The men
still hung off, and under no considera-
ton would l have taken a woman
along.
The affair was at a dead standstill
when I decided to go alone. had the
electric wires run aft to the wheel, and
one night at 10 O'Clock left the wharf
| for a five-mile run through the dark
ness and against a choppy sea by COM
pass.
There had been so much talk about
the enterprise that I expected to find
discovered and sunk beore l had come
within a cables length of her, but I
was going out because | had promised
! to, and because l wanted to show the
Peruvians how we did things on this
side of the pond.
Steam had been generated to the
| last notch and the furnace doors
| locked Instead of a light in the bill
nacie | had two firefies imprisoned on
! the compass, and | sat at the tiller
and held a straight course for the spot
where the Vengeance had been seen as
darkness closed in.
You need not ask if I was afraid. I
was. My teeth chartered and my
limbs trembled, AMI in my desperation
| l wished it was all over.
When [ had run cut four miles, as |
| Judged, | slowed down to half speed.
| Another half mile and | was moving
| through The water like a log. There
was something of fog outside, and l
was within 800 feet CT the steamer
when l caught the glare of her lights.
l was making for her broadside on,
| hut changed the course and quietly
approached her stern.
l made the last hundred feet almost
| by inches. Every second | expected
| to be hailed and fired en- but to my
amazement no lookout seemed to be
kept. I was that wrought up that I
wanted to scream cut for relief, and
my heart pounded at my ribs until I
WINGED under the GlC0s
l wondel ed at ny courage in going
ahead, but go ahead I did until I
finally felt rather than heard the END
of the torpedo spar against the iron
side of the ship. l was fairly under the
counter when 1 pressed the button.
There was a mighty roar, followed
by flash. crash and a hundred
screams, and then my life was blotted
out.
1t was morning when l lived again,
and l was in the cabin of an English
merchant vessel. l had been picked
off piece of cabin wreckage at day
light, wreckage from the cabin of the
Vengeance.
lHSIS was ~ OlIISl HAL dllOdI, anu
how l reached that wreckage and
chung to it through the night Provi-
dence alone can tell. l was not great
ly injured, but L was carried to Lon
don and it was only after reaching that
port that learned I had sent the man
of-war to the bottom and earned my re-
ward from Donna Calinte
When I returned to Peru for it the
war was over, the ChiIeans had con-
quered, and the donna no longer had
simply showed her weakened coun-
trymen how Yankee could do it.