A FANTASTIC STORY

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2913, 8 November 1916, Page 5

A FANTASTIC STORY

FOR NEUTRAL CONSUMPTION ALLEGED CRUELTY ON THE HIGH SEAS Australian-New Zealand Cable Association. (Rec. November 8, 0.5 a.m.) London, November 7. The German Government's wireless news service to neutrals alleges that submarine U4l, for the purposes of search, stopped a steamer which was flying the American flag off the Scillies on September 24, 1915. Tho steamer appeared to be stopping, ostensibly to lower a boat, and the submarine approached within a distance of three hundred yards. The steamer suddenly opened her concealed ports, and fired cannon and rifles. The American | flag wan flying the whole time. The submarine was mortally hit. I Her lieutenant, severely wounded, and a petty officer, crawled out on the hatch before the submarine foundered. They were the sole survivors. Both swam and entered an empty boat, which was adriit. The steamer came on at full speed, with the intention, not of saving them, but of ramming tliem. Shortly before the boat was rammed the two survivors sprang into the sea, and clung to some wreckage for half an hour, when the steamer returned and picked them up. Instead of receiving medical care, j the lieutenant, who had suffered a double fraoture of the jaw and a shot in the left temple, besides the loss of an eye, as the result of the shelling of the submarine, was confined with his comrade in a deck compartment, one by two metres (about 3ft. by 6ft.). Their door was fastened by iron bars, and thoy remained there until the vessel reached Falmouth, on September 25. wbere tliey received their first medical aid. They were in hospital at Plymouth during October, and were imprisoned in York Castle on' November 6. They were transferred to Dyffrynalled in December.

Later, a medican man there proposed their transfer to Switzerland. The lieutenant's other eye is endangered. A committee of doctors and also tho chief examining body agreed to the transfer, which the goneral medical officer vetoed. The lieutenant vainly endeavoured to send a report to Berlin via the American Embassy. "As the English Government was unable to rid the lieutenant by death from his wounds, they attempted to prevent him from obtaining publicity for the duration of the war."