Seward daily gateway., 1932-08-05
PARTNER IF FAMOUS SEA DEVIL HAS A
 COLORFUL CAREER
CAPT. KIRCHEISS WILL WRITE BOOK: FROM ANTARCTIC
 TO ALASKA"


 TO ALASKA"
 What does a combined Captain Kidd, Drake, Morgan, Sir Walter Raleigh, Teach and other historic pirates of the Spanish Main look like?
 He is in Seward, tho minus all those picturesque sartorial habila- ments affected by his illustriouS predecessors, plus an absence of any trait of the blood -thirstinesS which accentuated the hectic lives of the time-honored pirates.
 He is Captain Carl KircheisS.
 It would take several editions of The Gateway to properly introduce Captain Kircheiss, extol his ex- ploits and give the hig h. lights of a wildly romantic and adventurous life. He may be termed the romantic pirate with a blood less eScutcheOn.
 He was the right-hand man of Count von Luckner, commander of the famous sea raider Seeadler, which ravaged the Seven Seas, talk ing toll of millions of dollars worth of property and ships, and finally winding up the Seeadler's career on a coral atoll in the South Seas. And during this wartime ac- tivity Count von Luckner shed no blood, but on the contrary, with Captain Kircheiss, emerged hold ing the respect and admiration of all with whom war made it neces- sary to meet like with like-des- troy the enemy'S force.
 Captain Kircheiss spent two hours last night at The Gateway office, chatting and retelling some of the experiences while serving as navigating officer aboard the See adler (Sea Eagle).
 It was difficult, after reading Lowell Thomas book, Count Luckner, the Sea Devil" to asso- ciate the pleasing, urbane Captain Kircheiss with the grim sea dog, whose life has known adventures and thrills such as would keep any juvenile awake long after the curfew had sounded "taps," devour- ing chronicles which would cause Robert Louis Stevenson's Treas ure Island" to pale into drab insig- nificance. It is equally difficult to picture him engaged in an enter prise which combined unbending discipline, prepared to shed or have his blood shed in the grim work of war. One would rather associate him with philosopher, observing statesman, a sense of the poet, steeped in deep, tender sentiment.
 In this one finds the deep, in- scrutable Teutonic nature-at once the glutton for tender sentiment and again ready to undergo the metamorphosis of the case-harden- ed soldier, prepared to, if needs be, give and ask no quarter, yet wave a hand of admiration to his van- QuiSher-aS a soldier.
 It was this chivalry which makes his combined adventure with Count von Luckner one of the epics of human warfare.
 Disguised as a Norwegian barque, the Seeadler ravaged allied ship ping with relentless ruthlesness. Yet prisoners aboard enemy yes sells were treated as honored guests rather than prisoners of war.
 Then came that day when, driv- en by stale water and threats of scurvy and beri beri, the Seeadler put in to Mopelia Island, one of the coral atolls of the Society Group, far into the South Seas, wrecking of the ship by an immense tidal wave, the establishing of a colony composed of the crew of the See adler and many allied prisoners of war, including Americans.
 Then the haste to be on the grim work of destruction of ships and cargoes, while being hunted by the