DUEL ON THE LONE SEA.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 150, 20 November 1914, Page 2

DUEL ON THE LONE SEA.

CARMANIA'S FIGHT WITH CAP TRAFALGAR. HOW THE GERMAN WENT DOWN. Tho following account of the action between the armed merchantmen Carmania and Cap Trafalgar, in which the latter was sunk, is given in a letter written by one of the men of the Carmania to his wife:—

HjM.S. Carmania, Gibraltar. September 29.

We left Liverpool on August 15, wont round the British Isles, and sailed to the westward.

S'omo days later we had sighted land •ahead, and were sitting' down to dinner when "action" sounded off. As it was a usual thing on sighting a ship to sound off, we thought it was the usual turnout. However, we got to the guns and then began to look for the ship. Wc saw straight ahead of us a large liner something like ourselves, but boater looking. She had a collier each side of her coaling. On seeing us, she evidently cast the colliers off, for they took different directions, she going ahead. We thought she was trying to get away, but after she was well clear of the colliers she turned broadside on to us and waited. Our captain ordered a gun to be fired, but to be careful not to hit her. This was done, and immediately this was done she replied with a whole broadside surprising us all. However, there it was. It was her or us, so we immediately started pasting her, she in turn sending her shot, which was uncomfortably close, right over us whilo wo were putting ours into her waterline Swith good effect. However, she began j: to get our range, and let us have it hot J: and strong. j. For the first quarter of an hour she ; was firing four or five shots to our one, ;not including her pom-poms. Our cap- , tain had his wits about him, and manoeuvred the ship, which is a huge one, so that she always presented a much smaller target—that is-bow or stern on. By this method he was able to get the four foremast guns in action at once, and -when stern on the. four aft ones. After about twenty-five minutes there was only one ship in it, and that was not her. She broke out in flames forward, and the fire seemed to spread like lightning. Smoke was coming from her from end to end. She, however, continued fighting, although she was not firing so many guns. About this time she decided to run away, but this was useless, as she had taken a slight list to starboard in the first quarter of an hour, and this had continued to increase. Consequently, when she decided to run, she could har'd•ly budge. The list continued, and we still kept on, showing no mercy. It was noticeable then that only one gun wa3 firing, "the starboard aft-er." The list had increased to such an extent by this time that she seemed as if she was going to turn turtle. Wo had practically ceased firing by now, watching her, •when the gunlayer at the starboard gun must have elevated his gun and fired at us in his last effort, for we saw the gun flash and the projectile drop about 20 yards from his own ship, but I expect it was three or four hundred yards. She then began to settle—you could see her propellors. , The captain, seeing that she had not hauled down her flag ordered three rounds to be fired into her, which was done on the port side. She then gradually heaved over until you could see right into her funnels, which were level with the water. There was then a sort of an explosion, and her bows disappeared, bringing hei stern out of the water. Then there seemed a second explosion, and she disappeared altogether, leaving five boats full, which were picked up by one of the colliers. . . . Before we went ints action the German sent out wireless to say, that she was engagig a British cruiser, and later, just as the engagement had terminated a wirelss in German was picked up on board, and as it was from a warship it was deemed advisable to run, as we had not escaped seathless. . . . We then ran as hard as we could—and that is not a snail's pace—for the whole day, and again the next day, until we were picked up by one of our cruisers, who escorted us part of tho way here. ...

I expect we will remain here for a week or ten days to relit, for the Germans got 73 hits, which made 3SO holes, so we have a pitch to patch up. We only had two serious shots in our side, and she is 70 feet long and fiO feet out of the water, so that you can tell on the whole that her shooting was very poor. I am thankful it was, for if we had been in her place, we would not have been able to get out our boats, as there was not a sound one aboard of us Every blessed one had been riddled. We opened fire at 9000 yards and got as close at 3200 yards, and finished up at WOO yards, and fired 417 rounds, the action taking one and a half hours from start to finish.

I have just read a message to the effect that a collier had landed at Buenos Ayres 279 officers and seamen from the Cap Trafalgar, which was sunk by the British cruiser (that's us), most of them seriously wounded, so I don't