Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1918-06-26

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tackle fouled and we were towed
along by the Oronsa. remember
wondering how there could be so
much current, forgetting that the
Oronsa was making Roadway In
fact, all of us owe much to the third
engineer who remained below long
enough to stop the engines. He was
badly injured.
"Tin Ribs" signal boy, called for
knife. / handed him one. It broke.
A second one broke. The man with
the third said, "Wait moment
can't open it." / opened it. 1t cut the
rope and we shot away from the side
of the Oronsa, for our momentum
from being towed was great and as
our bow was at an angle from the
ships side, it carried us to safety.
Only three or four members OF the
crew were in the boat with us. ~"
men manned the oars.
AS we pulled away, a man declared
he saw the captain on the bridge and
we started back to get him. 1t was
false alarm and we pulled fast
away to escape the suction Of the
sinking ship. 1t was submerged to
the second cabin smoking room at
this time l was proud of those men
who, knowing the danger, were will
| ing to face it in order to give the
Captain a chance for life, Later we
found that he had gone off in No. 5
with the women passengers. Fire
broke out on the thing that had been
great living vessel a few moments
before. 1t was yellow fire. The
magazine in the stern blew up. The
great vessel broke in two and sank
beneath the waves, another victim of
German Kultur.
It was exactly 1:15 o'clock, or
twelve minutes, from the time the
torpedo struck us till the Oronsa
went down I could hardly believe
the time and so looked again to
verify it. For some reason or other,
l kept looking at my watch from the
time the torpedo struck till we
climbed abroad the destroyer
! AS the lifeboats began to huddle
together a cry came from one of
them:
i "a submarine is coming up. There
is periscope." | looked for mo-
ment and could see nothing. Later
two or three men declared that a
submarine came to the surface and
fred on the small boats. This was
mistake. 1t would have meant GER
tain destruction which no commander
would court, for the submarine to
come to the surface, open its guncase
and fire on us, with half dozen alert
destroyers ready to pounce upon 1t.
Two depth bombs were dropped. The
firing of these was probably mistaken
for gunshOts.
| A destroyer came toward us and
probably the most welcome words
ever heard were those uttered by the
commanding officer who hailed us and
said, Come abroad" We lost no
time, though practically all the bag
gage that was. in the lifeboats was
put on the destroyer.
The best description of these Eng
| lish lads who welcomed us was given
afterwards by the Rev Philip Cook,
Rector Of the Episcopal church Of st.
Michael and All Angels, Baltimore,
who said:
DIRTY and grimy, those men look
ed like devils straight from He'll and
yet they acted like angels straight
from Heaven"
Fearing another torpedo, most of
crew steamed slowly up and down
among the wreckage, for fear some
chap might be floating about on
spar or life preserver. By two
o'clock however, we were under way
for port.
stoker and asked:
did all you fellows get off," "All
but one," he replied. "He broke his
leg in getting up the ladder and we
had to leave him behind"
This was the fourth time of hor-
ror. Again / could see man with a
broken leg lying on the floor of the
fire-rOom, unable to help himself and
yet knowing that death was surely
coming I could imagine his thoughts
and at that moment I came to realize
that there are things man may fear
worse than death-leaving a comrade
to face death alone without even a
fighting chance. Later met a stoker
with broken leg. / asked how he
got off and he replied:
ooh, after the rest got out Of the
way, I crawled up the ladder and
along the deck to the lifeboat." How
was that for pluck? That time of
horror was wasted at any rate, for
1T did not happen.
(To be continued next week..
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