Evening star., 1937-12-31
Alley
Continued From First Page

Perfect Target for Planes.
She was 20 miles above Marking, at
anchor, when the planes attacked her,
a perfect stationary target The
river was quiet, and we-reporters.
camera men and American embassies
staff-were sitting around the mess
table with cigars. chatting contented-
ly. What a relief after the Marking
slaughter house. Then from the sky
came that tiny hum. japanese scout
ing planes had been looking us over
al! day; ever since we left Nankine,
IN fact In turn. Comdr. Hughes and
his staff had kept constant binoculars
on them. We. too. down in the mess
hall had noted them before and had
become accustomed to the moaning
drone of their propellers
Nevertheless, some of us moved out
to deck to investigate this latest in
truder. I went along. There. flying
for the nose Of our craft, came a
little cluster of planes their wings
hlgh lighted like Furnished metal in
the afternoon sunlight. We recog-
nized the type. They were japanese,
they were bombers. That was ominous
but We couldn't believe they meant us
any harm. A second glance showed
us that they were of the big Japanese
Navy type with twin motors.
Yell Warns of Bombs.
Suddenly from somewhere aboard
came yell-like a warning. I turned
toward the sound. half puzzled for the
reason. then my eyes focused again
on the planes-and I knew why the
keener-sighted owner of the warning
voice had cried out. There were dots
Immediately under the planes-sepa-
rating downward from them in curv-
ing arch whose ends could visualize
terminating right upon us. Then the
sky was full of that death whistle we
knew so well-falllng bombs. an in
slant later one smashed on the deck.
just to the port side of the Panay
bridge. AS that French general said
about the charge of the Light Brigade
at Balaklavia, 1T was magnificent but
it Is not war"
1t was an incredible attack upon
peaceful -combatants. And terror
crazed refugees-civilians whose only
thought about war was to get away
from it. looked up at the stars and
stripes, which had been stretched
aWning-wise above the super deck to
prevent just such air raids after the
machine cunning of the British AM
bessador Knatchbull-Hu outside
of Shanghai. I looked at the other
American flags streaming from flag
poles, fore and aft, in plain view and
swore that what I saw was q night
mare.
The next move Of the japanese
bombers led me to believe that this
was the correct explanation. They kept
the altitude at which we had FIRST
spotted them, an altitude, I should
say. of about 1000 feet. They didn't
stop to unload any more eggs Of de-
struction. They kept right on buzzing
away in the general direction of
Marking, just as though they had
taken us for an enemy ship, loosed
bomb, found out they were wrong and
then proceeded to go about their busi-
ness. 1t didn't take long to show that
this wasn't the idea at ALL
Planes Swarm in Sky.
The first blast hit near the bridge
and shattered Comdr. Hughes right
leg. The yell Of men running to his
side and the clatter OF feet as the
alarm sounded fell on incredible ears
as far as was concerned. But few
seconds later we were all quite con-
vinced we had got it-and we were
going to keep on getting it. Almost
at once the sky was swarming with
Japanese raiders of the air This time
they were little fellows, six spiteful
wasps, pursuit planes. And almost at
the same instant our own decks were
swarming with American sailors, rush.
ing to their quarters as the assembly
call came to stand by
Nobody bothered now to question the
intention Of those air dragons of Nip
pom. Comdr Hughes. though wound
ed. kept his sharp profile raised to the
sky and knew he could wait no longer
to defend his ship, no matter how
great the odds. It was apparent that
those six planes were going to at
tack us.
And they did. They dived at us like
striking falcons, swooping low down.
With every dive they loosed 100-pound
bombs. In few internal minutes
that seemed like eternities, they
deluged us with no fewer than II
loads Of detonating hell-fire. Yet,
through it all. 1 could watch our sea-
men standing to their posts as though
on drill, pointing their chattering ma
chine guns at their swooping adver-
| saries.
did my best to live up to those
models Of courage. I knew this was
history and it had to be brought back
| on nv Aim to the folks at home I