New-York tribune., 1918-12-17
1900 Wounded Among
Heroes Who Get Record
Welcome at Dock Here
9th Division Is
Well Represented
Former German Liner
Breaks Speed Mark of
Teuton Grew ON Trip

A floating castle rode up the river
yesterday. Two years ago William
Hohenzollern and the whole German
Empire boasted the Fatherland's super
efficiency in building it. Before war
was declared this sea palace was at
her Hoboken pier. She was the gigan-
tic Hamburg American liner Vaterland,
and, war or no war with America, Ger
many was satisfied that she was too
big and wonderful and intricate for
the Americans to attempt to use.
Trip after trip she made to France
With United States fighting men bulg-
ing from her portfolios. U-boat COM
manders were willing to sacrifice their
lives and those of their crews to sink
her, but yesterday she was back in 10.
boken with heroes who helped to crush
the nation of her builders, and instead
Of making the record speed of twenty
one knots an hour, as she did under
her German crew, she made twenty
two with her American personnel.
Her name now is the Leviathan, but
after her latest trip, when she put
sshore $3.50 soldiers and sailors, q
fourth of them wounded, she had the
rightful name Rainbow ship, for every
state in the Union was represented in
her uniformed passenger list.
Record Welcome Given
Above all, to be sure, was the well
come. 1t was unparalleled in size and
volume by anything hitherto known,
outside, maybe, of the noise the home
coming men made when they broke the
Hindenburg line.
That gallant division of regulars,
the 27th-made up mostly of New
York men that tore through the
Cambrai-St. Quentin line back in early
September, the beginning Of the end
Of Germany-was represented on the
ship by the hundreds. wounded, gassed
and manned, all wearing citations
Some of the 3Oth division, which, with
the 9th, was brigaded with the Brit
ish, were with them.
More than 1000 sailors-men who
fought off the submarines, men who
told of an American-made device that
would have ended U-hoat warfare for
ever if the war had continued, and
which has, now that it is over, filed
off down the gangplanks and went back
to Pelham Bay where they had trained
Truly Hero Ship
Aviators who brought down as many
as thirteen Prussian planes in a day
and wearing the mighty Victoria Cross,
given them by their British co-work-
ers, were there. It was truly a hero
ship, for there was not man aboard
(there were II ,224 with the crew. who
did not have stosy to tell, though
many were loath to do so.
NO, there was not man aboard not
hero, for it was the crew which made
the mighty speed of the Vaterland of
twenty-one knots increase the Levia-
tnan's to twenty-three, and it was
Father Eugene Mcdonald, chaplain of
tho vessel, who told Of the never-end-
ing labor Of the ships men to get the
speed the Germans couldn't.
Mingled with the returning soldiers
and sailors we're few civilians-Lord
Decies, who married Miss Vivian
could; the wife Of the American Con-
SUI at Brest, the wives of several re-
turning officers and Major General
Ieorge E. Barnett, of the United States
Marine Corps.
ihe arrival of the Leviathan was the
nrst time she has come to these water,
since the armistice and the lifting o1
she ban Of news censorship, and the
crew talked freely of her perilous trips
through the war zone.
Sank Two Submarines
The men say that when the Navy De
partment gets ready to make official an
Aouncements the Leviathan will bt
credited with the sinking of two sub
marines.
oh one eastbound "trip, when the Ger
'aaiis were waiting for her with fee
u o-ooats, she outdistaneed them, ane
~ her peculiar camouflage she puzzled
we lurking subsea craft as to the di
'ecVion she was going.
ihey tried hard to get u.s." said one
VI the ships officers, and it isn't theil
s@uie mat We are afloat to-day. 1t was
dangerous "; work lodging those subma.
..'"es and firing at them, but it didn',
nu8Se ~, bit of excitement on board
u"sfe was one big brute of U-boar
1' iaio for US off the French coast
cue came up too quick for her owr
.sSo We spotted her and opened ur
some real gunfire. We were foolinf
' ~ ana she couldn't do a thing unit
s"' got the right position on us, and W,
sse' gave her that position. We out
-. ea'Ssed her every minute. You know
~" camoufiage we had before We
W. a"ea up IN drydock in England KEEP
~ submarines guessing all the time
~ . heavy. choppy sea, where ther,
80 no wake at all, they could not tel