EPIC ACTION

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 2, Issue 166, 29 May 1940, Page 5

EPIC ACTION

RIVER PLATE BATTLE RECALLED STRIKING PHOTOGRAPHS We have received from Wellington a supplementary issue of Ihe Illustrated London News, showing, in striking photographs, the career and end of the German 'pocket' battleship Admiral Graf Spee. One amazing picture shows the bulk of the enemy warship twisted, torn and ablaze after she had been scuttled off Montevideo, This photograph, 20'" by 12," presents the wreck in detail. Other photographs record the sinking of British merchantmen by the raider and were taken from the 'Graf Spee/ Two show torpedoes striking ships, the 'Ashlea' and the 'Doric Star/ The 11-inch guns of the battleship are seen in action, as is a gun crew leading one of the 5.9*s by hand. The epilogue to the British victory off the River Plate, the rescue of the prisoners from the 'Altmarck' in a Norwegian fjord, is depicted in two particularly impressive drawings by the well known artist, C. E. Turner, and by photographs of the rescued men returning to England in the destroyer 'Cossack.' Others show the 'Altmarck' aground in Jossing Fjord after the dramatic rescue and one, presenting a view of the prison ship locked in the ice, gives some idea of the brilliant seamanship displayed by the commander of the 'Cossack' in taking his vessel alongside to allow boarding. The statement that the encounter Avith the Graf Spee was entirely due to the genius of Admiral Haywood was made by Commander D. M. L. Neame at. a korero of the Auckland Savage Club on Saturday evening. He said that Admiral Harwood had guessed the workings of the mind of the captain of the Graf Spee and that he would make for the roads of the River Plate. The three British cruisers were each at a different South American port when Admiral* Harwood ordered a rendezvous. They met the evening before the battle-And practised the tactics they were to pursue.,., miral Harwood was then confident the Graf Spee would be encountered next day.