Arizona republican., 1916-02-28

Mrs. Mcleod, wife of General Me Leod
 II was about 10:30 in the morning lOja was steaming down the channel, children playing on the deck and most of the passengers carrying life belts in their hands. Suddenly ter rife explosion blew in the side of the second saloon and twenty minutes later the Maloja sank
 Just before she went to the bot tom the vessel turned turtle and in a few seconds the keel was visible above the surface According to eye
 witnesses there was a second explo- sion and while under the water the vessel righted itself; the masts be- came visible and then she went down.
 Ire captain and officers stuck by the ship to the last. Though all were saved not one of them left the ship in the boats: they were all picked
 out of the water
 The captain from the bridge di- ieclet tIc loNeIlHS Ol liie pOdtS anu called to everybody to keep calm and 1 everybody kept calm wonderfully. Several children were blown to l pieces and the deck was covered with wreckage and wounded but there was no sign of a panic.
 Only a few boats could be lowered | and the heavy sea made the rescue work difficult. The majority of those | saved were on rafts, of which the l sh:D carried a large number. Most of the women and children lost their | lives owing to the fact that one boat | already in the water drifted under another which was being lowered and 1 capsized
 The captain remained on the bridge | until thrown into the water by the | lasl lurch of the ship.
 Thousands of the inhabitants of Dover witnessed the rescue work l from shore. A considerable number actually saw the blowing up of the ship, while most the entire population reached the water front before the vessel want down. Just before the Maloja sank those watching from the shore had another thrill, a second steamer, the Empress of Fort Will 1 liam. being lost under exactly similar conditions.
 Captain Shepherd of the Empress said that the sinking of the Maloja bore a remarkable resemblance to the familiar picture of the sinking of the German cruiser Bluecher with her keel nearly showing and swarms of | persons clinging to her sides. Cap tain Shepherd photographed the ship | as it was sinking but his own vessel struck a few minutes later and his camera was lost.
 The Peninsular and Oriental lines has issued the following statement: The Peninsular and Oriental line regrets to state that at 10:59 o'clock Sunday morning when the Maloja
 was midway between Dover and l Folkestone, she was struck by a | mine the after part of the ship being | blown up. There was a high sea | running at the time The captain | tried to beach her but was unsuccess- | full. The vessel sank in about half
 an hour. There were 119 passengers | on beard. of which a large number were rescued from the water and l from the ships boats by torpedo 1 boats and other craft and landed at | Dover, where they were attended by
 the hospital ship St. Davids. It is
 believed that almost all of the pas
 sengers were saved. The captain re- ports that all of the passengers and
 members of the crew behaved splen-
 didly."
 Market Hall was converted into a
 morgue. where the police laid out
 the bodies of the dead on improvised
 piers for identification today. Only
 two or three bodies have as yet been
 identified.
 | Several deaths occurred on board
 rescuing vessels, the victims suffer- | ing from exhaustion and exposure.
 Captain c. c. Irving was in command
 of the Maloja.
 1 The Peninsular and Oriental line | | mail boat and a sister boat of the
 Persia, which was torpedoed and sunk
 off the island of Crete December 30
 last, with the loss of 336 lives.
 The Maloja was last reported as 1 having arrived at Mareilles January
 31, bound for London from Sydney New South Wales.
 The steamship was $50 feet long 62 feet beam and 34 feet deep. She
 was built in Belfast in 1911. In February of 1915 it was reported ! that the Maloja on entering the Eng fish Channel with 400 passengers on
 board, was ordered to stop by an un- known armed merchantmen. The mai
 boat is said to have ignored the or
 der and made for Plymouth, where upon the merchantmen fired five
 shells at her, but all fell short. The Empress of Fort William was formerly the Mount Stephen and was
 built at New Castle in 1908. She was
 250 feet long, A feet beam and 2i
 feet deep. The vessel was owned by
 the Empress Transportation company
 of Midland, Limited.