Navy Secrets Divulged

Horowhenua Chronicle, 6 January 1917, Page 4

Navy Secrets Divulged

* BROTHER'S CHEERING STORY. ' SURPRISE FOR THE HUNS." ~ For having imparted naval information to his brother without authority, in a. letter, Robert Dickinson was fined £10 and ordered to 1 pay .£■ll '18s 6d costs, at Berwick, England. When the letter was written, ■on 28th September, defendant's brother was an engineer on an Admiralty transport at a port in a, neutral country. The letter ran : — "I just want to give you one or two naval 'ban mots' which haVe not been published yet; in fact, are being kept, veiry dark, for the surprise of the Huns." Various vessels were named and their construction and the calibre of their guns given. The letter continued : "Nothing of all this has appeared in the papers, and I was cautioned not to but it is too good to keep. Who isays England is beat?" Defendant said the letteir only Contained rumor and gossip which, everyone had hoard, and was selected as likely to interest a marine engineer. The tomly object he had was to be interesting and cheering to a sailor cut adrift for so; long from ia.ll news. He was trying to convey the assurance that the British Navy was being maintained at the top waiter mai\k of perfection.