ON THE SEA.

Taranaki Daily News, 28 June 1916, Page 5

ON THE SEA.

SUBMARINE'S EXPLOITS. IN THE SEA OF MARMORA. BUDYARI) KIPLING'S STORY. Received June 27, 11.20 p.m. London, June 27. Mr. Rudynrd Kipling's third article continues the adventures of the submarines in the Sea of Marmora, and includes a detailed description of El2'.s exploits and Commander Bruee's cutting-out affair. Her main motors gave trouble and she was a cripple for most of. the trip. She sighted two small steamers, one towing two and the other towing three sailers. She stopped the first steamer, and noticed that she carried stores, while the crew were all on deck with lifebelts. Not seeing any guns, El2 ran alongside and told the first lieutenant to board the steamer. Then the alien on board the steamer threw a bomb at El2, which struck unexploded, and opened Are on the boarding party with rifles and a concealed Mie-incher. The El2 answered with six-pounders, also rifles. The two sailers in tow tried to foul the Elr2's propellors and also fired rides. The first lieutenant in charge of the boarding party was engaged oil the steamer. Meantime the six-pounders were methodically .perforating the steamer from bow to stern, whilst the steamer's oneincher and the rifles on the .ailing ships were raking everything and everybody else.

Received June 28, 12.45 a.m. London, June 27. Continuing the narrative Mr. Rudyard Kipling states: — El 2's coxswain on the conning tower passed the ammunition to the vessels. One workable motor was developing slight defects at the moment when power for a manoeuvre was of vital importance. The story is almost as difficult to disentangle as the actual mess must have been. At any rate, a six-pounder caused an explosion of the steamer's ammunition, whereby she sank in a quarter of an hour, but giving time for the El2 to get clear and sink the two sailers. She then ceased the second steamer, which had slipped .her three tows and ran shoreward. The Kl2 knocked her about a good deal with gun fire, and saw her drive for the beach, well alight. The El2 carried externally a mounted gun, and while diving in the Dardanelles got entangled in the hawsers of a net which caught the conning tower gun. The submarine backed, got up speed; forged ahead and shored through the hawsers, but the submarine was wet, strained and leaky. For the rest of the cruise she did her work, though worried by tor pedoers and hunted by aeroplanes, but throughout the chief pre-occupation was the strained gun mounting, finally „he gun was got firing again, but the crew had to keejp the water down by means of hand pumps. Coming home, Mr. Rudyard Kipling concludes, the submarines throughout never willingly took the life of noncombatants. These they transferred to boats which were personally conducted safely to the beach.

THE JUTLAND BATTLE. GERMAN LINER LOST, Amsterdam, June 'id. A Dutch trawler passed a mass o f wreckage en tillc Danish coast and picked up a lifeboat and a number of capmarked "Koenig Willielm," evidently belonging to the Hamburg-South American liner, which is supposed to have been used as an auxiliary cruiser and sunk in the Jutland fight.

ITALIAN SHIPS LOST. ATTACKED BY SUBMARINES. Received June 27, 5.5 p.m. Paris, June 20. The Italian auxiliary cruiser Litta de Mesina was torpedoed in the Straits of Taranto. The cruiser Pourche, which was escorting her, r.ttacked the submarine, which disappeared.

The Pouche was later herself torpedoed and sunk. Nearly all the erew were saved.