TRIBUTE PAID

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20122, 16 December 1939, Page 5

TRIBUTE PAID

GALLANTRY-SKILL BRITONS AT SEA ; FIGHT AGAINST ODDS | FOES HEAVY ARMAMENT FRIGATES RECALLED “BRAVE DAYS OF OLD” (Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (British Official Wireless.) Rccd. 11 a.in. RUGBY, Dec. 15. The tribute paid by the Prime Minister, Mr. Neville Chamberlain, to the very gallant action fought by the three comparatively small British ships against the much more heavily armed Nazi adversary off the coast of South America is warmly endorsed in the press. “The running fight in which, outarmoured and out-gunned, the cruisers compelled the battleship to take punismnent and chased her, damaged and ineffectual, to an inglorious refuge in a neutral port, will,” says the Daily Telegraph, “rank with the most splendid exploits of frigates against three-deckers in the brave days of old.” Half at Great Again The Times, recalling that the broadside of the Graf von Spec is in weight of metal half as great again as ihat. of her three assailants put together, says: "So powerful a ship was bound to do damage and the Exeter was forced to drop out of the swiftlymoving light, but not before her guns, the heaviest in the British squadron, had done severe execution. Indeed, by the time the Exeter was crippled die German ship's retreat had already become something like flight and she was forced to take refuge, with her side breached, her bridge blown awa> and'several guns out of action, in the territorial waters of Uruguay. So notable a discomfiture of a greater by a,lesser armament can only be explained in one way—by outstanding superiority in seamanship and gun. nery on board the ships possessing the lighter guns.” In their tributes to the magnificent seamanship shown by the Exeter, the Ajax and the Achilles, the Manchester Guardian and the Daily Mail do not overlook the fact that it was due to the tactical disposition of the Admiralty in dealing with commerce raiders that the Graf von Spee was so soon brought to bay. Emphasis is also laid on the fact that if the Graf von Spee, which it is believed already tp have sunk seven merchantmen, had been permitted to continue to operate at a focal point of ocean commerce traversed by neutral shipping of all nationalities, she might have become even more menacing than during her predatory career to date.