COMMANDER SAUNDERS, V.C.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 October 1918, Page 5

COMMANDER SAUNDERS, V.C.

DEED WHICH WON HONOR. DECOY SHIP 'AND SUBMARINE. London, Aug. 0. The circumstances in which the late Lieutenant-Commander E. W. Sanders, of Auckland, and Captain Gordon Campbell won, the V.C. have ibeen released for publication by Sir Erie Geddes, First Lord of the Admiralty, there being 110 longer any need for secrecy- The story introduces the "mysteTy ships," which form a gpecial department in the hunting for submarines. They are known as Q-boats. Speaking at the Palace Theatre to a gathering of service men of all the Allies, Sir Eric said the Q-boat was a decoy. She might be an ordinary old wind-jammer, or a collier, or a tramp; but she was something more. His story was that of QSO. A Q-ship looked like a merchantman, but on a button being touched she 'became, with the speed of a quick-change artiat, a veritable man-of-war. QSO, on which were the two officers named, was an old collier, and sailed with seal si! orders, whijfli read:— "Submarines are sinking British ships in such-and-B'ieh n position. Proceed there forthwith." 'Her crew looked like a merchant crew, and a fairly undisciplined lot they appeared, Ibut when they got out to sea a change took place in their aspect.

It was in the Atlantic at about 7 o'clock on a summer morning when a submarine was seen from the QSO, which started to run away. Her maximum cpeed was eight knots. Her fires were stoked and volumes of smoke came from her funnel. The order was given by her captain to slow down to seven and then to sis. A gun was fired—a 2J-pounder. The submarine overhauled the Q-boat, and shells burst on her decks, killing and wounding men. Th» Q-boat held on, and signalled that a submarine was following and shelling her, that the crew werg about to abandon the ship, and asked for help. The signaller in the submarine took in the message. An hour and a-half passed, and the submarine was getting well within range, when a "panic" boat's crew—a very undisciplined-looking lotleft the Q-ship, one sailor taking with him a cage with a parrot in it. A shell from the submarine struck the poop of the QSO, and blew one of the guns and the gun's into the air at a timei' [when the submarine had only to proreed another 100 yards, and three of the guns of the QSO would have been j trained on her at 400 yards' Tange.

When it was disclosed that the 050 was not what she had pretended to foe, but was a fighting ship, the captain signalled to the man-of-war -waiting below the horizon, who had answered his first call for assistance, to keep away, for the action was not ended. The submarine fired torpedo after torpedo. To allay the suspicions of the Germans, the captain of the decoy again gave the signal to abandon the ship, and -some of the men jumped overboard, but the captain, with an officer or two and the picked gun's crew, still remained hidden, and Mew off steam, to make the submarine's crew think that the boiler was holed. Completely deceived, the submarine came up. Then shell after shell was Sired at her, and, she went I down, her end hastened by the fire from [the warship, which Jiad come up. The i fight lasted from 11 a.m. until about 4 lp.iri.