The Washington herald., 1916-10-23
By PAUL KOENIG.

! pOIldHSC Oh lCSL SuDIleTSlOnS ana 10
find out how infinitely necessary it is
to have the great, heavy boat firmly
in hand, with keen and constant
eye on all the inhinitesimal details
l had decided that in the following
night between the darkest hours, be-
tween and II o'clock we would
travel submerged with the "E" en-
gines.
| In the dusk of long summer day
we plunged downward; there was
only little wind, but the sea surged
high, a sure suggestion that within
few hours the wind would grow
into a storm.
About o'clock l gave orders to
rise. AS the boat rose to the surface
! its movements became wilder and
wilder, which proved to me that the
storm had come and with it a still
higher sea. Occasionally we made
veritable leaps, but we calmly blew
out our tanks" and got to the sur
face in quiet orderly manner.
Sea Dances wildly.
! AS we reached periscope depth, I tried
to look around, but it was still almost
| impossible to see anything, for every sec
ond or so the lanky weeds would cut into
! thick water mountains. Then, too, there
| was the dawn, which made the waves ap-
pear even more uncanny and bigger
through the periscope as they rolled on
with their crushing force.
| Then we came completely up to the
surface, and I mounted the coming
tower to get correct view OF the wild
! ly dancing sea
Fine weather this was,
Al laround US. in the misty dawn, was
a witches cauldron OF wavebergs with
toaming crowns. toys OF the wind, which
| blow of their water-dust and sent II
! sizzling through the air
The boat worked hard; It was a tough
tussle. Frequently, nutshell that she was,
she had TO give way before the all-pow-
erful element. The whole deck was
! flooded, of course. Every minute the sea
dashed against the tower and its force
broken. prickled past me in a dense
! spray-rain. l clung to the rim Of the
''bathtub" and searched the horizon-a
: curious horizon 1t was, a mass Of water
| mountains moving stepwise in and out
one another.
Gets Sight of Destroyer.
! I was Just about to give orders to
put on the oil engines. Alas! What
was that-that dark stripe over there?
! Wasn't that smoke flag?
But it's already gone, hidden behind
the back of a rising wave rising into
the dawn-gray sky.
! I waited and stared through the
glass till my eyes ached. There IT was
again! 1t was dark smoke flag. And
/ there!-look-a mast top, thin as
! needle-but I have 1t in my glass.
And now-now-I bore my eyes into
/ the glass. What is 1t that comes out
of the veil of waves-that dark thing
over there-the smoke above it-four
tunnels?
/ Duennerwetter! It's a destroyer
With one leap am back in the tur-
ret and have closed the lower hatch.
| Alarm" "Submerge quickly" Flu
ten" Depth rudder!" GO to twenty
metersI
The commands followed one anoth-
er as in a breath. But their execu-
tion?
with this sea, to submerge headIong
is, according to all experiences, sheer
insanity. But what will I do?
! The destroyer might have seen US
already.
! Down we must go. and in as big a
hurry as possible, too.
Forced to Go Deeper.
Below me, in the ''Zentrale," the men
are working in feverish, noiseless haste.
The rapid-airing vents are opened, the
compressed air Kisses from the tanks
| the sumberging valves are singing in all
| keys
I stand with tightly squeezed lips, gaze
| through the conning-tower lookout over
the raging sea all about US, feverishly
| looking for the first sign of going deeper.
But L still see our deck, again and
again a wave breaks upwards.
| We have not another moment to lose.
"Dive deeper" is my next command,
and both engines extreme power ahead"
| The whole boat <rembles and shakes
under the increased engine pressure and
makes a couple of real jumps; 1t literally
| staggers in the wild sea-will 1t not go
down soon?
With a sudden jerk the Deutschland
darts down below the wave-tide and now,
bending her bow lower and lower, she
/ rapidly descends into the depths. The
! light of the just dawning day disappears
! from the turret windows, the manometer
shows in quick succession two-three-
six-ten meters. But the bow bends lower
and lower.
Crew Lose FoothoIds.
We stagger. lean backwards, and slip;
we lose all foothold as the boat Jerks
abruptly downward-I manage to grasp
the ocular part of the periscope-and
down below in the "zentrale" the men
are clinging to the hand-wheels of the
/ depth rudder.
A few terrible seconds pass.
| We have not yet realized our new sit
uation-there is violent crash we are
hurled to the floor, and everything that
! Is not compact or nailed down is thrown
into a wild pell-mell
Recovering from the shock We find our
selves in the most extraordinary posi-
! tions; we look at one another, and for
a moment there is sulien silence; then
the first officer, Krapohl, says quite
dryly:
! well, so we have Arrived"
That breaks the abominable tension.
But We all had become quite pale
| What had happened?
| Why this unnatural bending Of the
boat? and why did the engines above us