The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1914-08-28
GREAT BRITAIN PLACES SEVERE
BAR ON ALL GERMAN DEALINGS

mines are attached, a repetition of
this is prevented, since there is no
sign whatever of the mine on the
surface of the water.
Pursued by Flotilla.
While the Koenigin Luise was busy
dropping these mines, which rolled
from the aft Of the ship on tracks
into the water, one English torpedo
destroyer put in appearance, noticed
the German ship and Immediately
sent wireless message to the cruiser
of the f1otilla she belonged to. Every
torpedo tiotilla has one so-called flag
ship, which is called in German
"Fuehrschiff," and this ship in ques-
ton was the Amphion. She was at
the head Of a f1otilla of torpedo de-
stroyers, which, in fact, is only
large of torpedo boat, and which are
called in German "Hochsee Torpedo
boote," ships of about 800 to 1900
tons. Immediately. upon receiving the
news from its torpedo scout, the en-
tire f1otilla under the leadership of
The Amphion went in pursuit of the
German ship, which tried to make her
getaway as quick as possible. But
since the Koenigin Luise, even going
FULL steam ahead, cannot make more
than % knots, while the torpedo boats
can average from % to IS knots, the
i; English flotilla was upon the enemy
inside of an hour, surrounded the ship,
which had no means to defend herself,
and blew her up in the air. After
this the Amphion, with it's flotilla,
by an objectionable tactical mistake
which should not have occurred with
an officer of such a we'll trained mer-
chant marine as the English, the Brit
ish ships went back over the same
! field of mines which the German ship
had just distributed, instead Of taking
! different, and therefor safer course.
| While the fiotilla passed safely over
The mines, the cruiser Amphion, hav-
ing the greater depth, struck one and
persisted.
German Fleets Position.
AS far as the present activity of
the German fleet is concerned, it is
very probable the older ships are
scattered all over the Baltic sea, for
two reasons: In the first place, to
guard the Russian Baltic coast, then to
guard the Sound, the small and the
big belt, the three straits leading from
the North sea into the Baltic between
Denmark and Sweden, in order to pre-
vent the slipping through of English
torpedo boats and an English attack
on Kiel and the Kaiser Wilhelm canal
and to keep the trade open with Swe-
den, Norway and Denmark. The new
er ships are presumably near Helgo-
land, awaiting a possible attack.
In regard to the far east German
fleet, it appears that it is entirely in
tact. 1t even seems that the best two
English cruisers of the East Asiatic
fleet have been damaged by it to a
great extent. A couple of days ago
the news circulated that two armed
cruisers, each having four tunnels
whose nationality could not be dis
cerned, had entered the English har-
Dor of Hongkong, badly damaged by
shells. 1t would seem that the prob
lem of "discerning the nationality OF
these two ships ought not to be such
a puzzling one for the English people
in Honglong. Outside Of that, it
} sounds almost impossible that two
German ships should seek refuge in
the hostile harbor Of Hongkong in
stead of the neutral American port
Of Manila. BY the way, it is not
j very fattering fact for the British
navy that England, in spite of hav.
: ing a far superior navy in the fal
east, which, moreover, is strengthened
protected cruisers, as we'll as by &
, by the French armored and Russian
considerable number of destroyers
} torpedo boats, and even submarines
, does not feel sure of being able tx
defeat those two German cruisers
; Therefore, another whole nation with
: it's big and powerful navy has been
: as all evidence shows, asked to helI
; the British against the much fearec
Germans.