The Waterbury Democrat., 1939-10-24

! OALl Sl5C 4C Washington declined to give the source of their report of the City of Flint's capture. They said the ship, newly leased to the United States lines, was on its way from New York to Liverpool, Manchester, Glas- gow and Dublin with 8 general cargo which the German warship com- mander classed as contraband.
 There was no clue, at Washington, to the time or place of the City of Flint's capture, though it was aS- stunned that the ship, which sailed from New York October 3, was steaming a course we'll north of the usual shipping lanes in the North Atlantic.
 Mystery UnsOlved
 Tromsoe could only add details which made the mystery of the City of Flint's seizure more tantalizing
 It was said there that she arrived Saturday. It sent ashore 37 men, the entire crew of the British ship which had been sunk near the Bermudas" -26 British officers and men and Il Arabs. The British ship had been on its way to Europe from Chile, and thus presumably passed through the Pana Canal.
 It was only today that it was es- tablished by harbor authorities at Tromsoe that the City of Flint flew the German Swastika. There had been previously on:y a report that, as the the City of Flint left, a sailor aboard 1t hoisted the German flag.
 Tromsoe had understood that the City of Flint was on its way to Archangel, in the White Sea farther along the Russian coast than Mur- nanSk.
 The British steamship crew left Tromsoe Sunday morning for Stav- anger, on the southwest coast of Norway, in a small coastal steam ship and were expected to arrive Friday or Saturday.
 Home Port Newcastle
 The Britons were quoted as say- ing that their ships home port was Newcastle. Though 1t was said they asserted that their ship was sunk about two weeks ago near the Ber- mudas, officials of the hotel at which they stayed at Tromsoe quot ed them as saying that they had been abroad a German cruiser" for five days.
 Then, they were quoted as saying, the City of Flint was sighted and they were transferred" to 1t.
 The Britons were quoted as saying that when their snip was sunk they were given time to get into lifeboats and that then the cruiser" picked them up.
 One feature of the mystery was that until they were questioned to- day, informants at Tromsoe did not know that when the City of Flint arrived there, and left, it was a German prize. They said that the Britons talked little of their adven- ture. It was only the report that the Swastika flag was hoisted as the City of Flint left Tromsoe that caused town gossip that the Ger mans had captured it.
 Contradictory Reports
 The mention of Bermuda in con- nection with the British freighter crew brought recollection of the many contradictory reports which followed the sinking of the Clement oil the Brazilian coast October 2.
 What German ship, or what type of German ship, sank the Clement never has been made known. The first reports were that the Admiral Scheer, one of Germany's three formidable pocket battleships, was at large in the South Atlantic. Since then there had been rumors that the attacking ship was the mother ship Scharnhorst. which had been mid-Atlantic fueling and deport ship for German airplanes in the Europe South American commercial service, and that the Scharnhorst had been sunk later by a British warship. There had been rliinors also that the German Liner Cap Norte captured by the British near the Bahamas October 12, had sunk the Clement.
 Wife of Captain Melrose. Mass, Oct. "A (UP) - Mrs. Joseph Gaiaard, wife of the captain of the City of Flint, was out wardly calm today despite reports of German seizure of her husbands ship.
 After all, I'm the wife of a sea- faring man and I've got to expect those things - everything usually comes out all right" she said. T guess Joe's just one of those men. '
 She recalled that Gainard was a junioS officer aboard the transport ship oncoln when 1t was torpedoed and st K during the World War and recent figured in the rescue oi passen from tine torpedoed Brit ish LiI henia.
 Release to U. s. Moscow. Oct. 24--(UP)--American sources expressed confidence today