New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1914-09-24

around her all the time she was sink
ing. As long as the guns were ABOVE
water they worked them for all they
were worth, and they sank two OF the
| German submarines before the water
closed over her guns.
He also said that the captain OF the
/ Aboukir was last seen standing calm
, ly on the disappearing deck OF ms Doat,
whicl he had refused to leave, while hi'
mer swimming or clinging to wreckage
! in the water, cheered him.
I But the most interesting thing is the
/ action of a Dutch trawler, or vessel
which had that innocent appearance.
/ 1t was lying in the vicinity when the
| Aboukir was hit, and she came hurry
| ing up, apparently to render assistance,
/ but il was under her cover that the sec
! ond German submarine was able to
approach within 400 yards of the
/ Hogue and the Cressy. Then she came
4 out, quickly planted her four torpe-
( does into the easy targets that the
| cruisers made, and scuttled off.
/ Survivors here assert that the
Dutch" trawler was really manned by
/ Germans and deliberately used as a
blind In support of it they say. she
made no attempt to rescue any OF the
! British sailors.
The Amsterdam correspondent OF
the Reuter- Telegram Company tele--
graphs that a special train arrived
( there to-day with 266 survivors, in
/ GLIDING % officers, of the three British
} cruisers sunk in the North Sea.
! The party was guarded by q detach-
ment Of Dutch infantry. No one was
allowed on the station platform. Re-
freshment, cigars, cigarettes and
chocolate were offered the prisoners,
who were not permitted to leave their
/ train. Later the train pulled out for
/ Gaagterland, in the southwestern part
/ of the Province of Friesland. Specta-
: tors and survivors exchanged repeated
cheers as the train left the station.
A dispatch to the Central News from
Amsterdam says, however, that uncer-
tainty prevails there as to whether the
| British survivors of the disaster to
| their cruisers can be interned. 1t is de-
! clared that the conventions adopted at
! the second Hague conference regard
! ing warfare at sea did not provide for
a case Of this kind.
Survivors who have arrived at Har-
witch say that most of the men picked
up were on deck at the time of the
/ explosions, and that none of the YES
sells seemed to suffer much above the
water line. The severe casualties un-
doubtedly were suffered by the men be-
low decks, they declare, but these vic
tins never got out of the traps in
which they were caught by the sudden
ness of the submarine attack. Surviv-
ing officers here agree that the casual
| ties in the engine rooms and stoke
holes must have been terribly heavy.
The cruiser Lowestoft, which did
such remarkable work of rescue, is to-
! day anchored close to the dock where
/ the survivors were landed, at Harwich.
The Admiralty had informed as many
/ relatives as possible of the names of
the survivors at Harwich, and several
such relatives, catching early trains,
| arrived before the patients had had
breakfast. Among them was'the father
of the brave midshipman on the
! Aboukir, who was hurled from each
! ship in turn as it was struck by the
/ German torpedoes.
| This boy, scarcely in his teens,
( greeted his father with pathetic cheer
/ fitness The father, veteran retired
naval officer, broke down completely.
! According to the stories told by sur
vivors. the loss of life was heaviest on
! the Aboukir. This vessel was not eX-
pecting attack, and many members of
| her crew were below The other two
vessels, while preparing to aid their
doomed sister, had brought every avail
able man on deck.
/ One small midshipman, not taller
than a grammar school boy, related
that he was on board the Cressy, the
last Of the British cruisers TO go down.
| The three vessels had been scouting,
he said A slight mist over the water
obscured the view. Suddenly the
Aboukir was seen to keel heavily. All
hands on the Cressy were called, and
this cruiser stood by to render as
sistance. The Hogue, also coming in,
arrived first. Just as she was swing
ing her small boats over she seemed
to be lifted clear of the water. By this
time the Aboukir had gone down, and
the water around her was filled with
wreckage and swimming men. Just as
| the Hogue settled back into the water
! the watchers on the Cressy caught a
! glimpse of a submarine, and immedi-
ately fired at it. The submarine dis
I appeared, evidently hit.
Then" in the words of this young
midshipman, "our decks rippled be-
meath our feet, but the good old tub
recovered her balance and would have
stayed up if we had not been torpedoed
second time. She rolled over so
slowly that we had plenty of time to
jump we'll clear of the ship before she
disappeared beneath the water
Then it was swim for your life.
was picked up by the cruiser Lowestoft.
All signs of our hotilla of cruisers
had disappeared from the face Of the
waters"