HEROES IN PLENTY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 September 1939, Page 6

HEROES IN PLENTY

SCENES AT THE SINKING OF THE COURAGEOUS GRIM ORDEAL FACED GALLANTLY. BRAVE EFFORT BY SERGEANT OF MARINES. By Telegraph—Press Association —-Copyright. LONDON, September 19. Survivors of the Courageous brought home stories such as England expected of her seamen. William Britten, of Glasgow, a stoker pensioner, aged forty-five, said: “I saw a young able seaman go overboard twice to save shipmates. Officers in the boats carried on after the Courageous sank and gave orders. There, was no panic. At about 7.50 p.m. 1 was playing rummy on the mess deck, and I found myself shoulder deep in water. In complete . darkness, 1 groped my way to the top deck, but only twelve out of fifty in the mess deck thus escaped.” A seaman named Andrew Logue, of Dumbarton, said he felt the suction of the Courageous as she went down, while he was swimming. A whaler took him to a destroyer. He passed a float on which all the men were singing. A lad of 17 described how a boatful of 30 men sank, forcing the occupants to swim, as the stern of the Courageous went aloft, and she plunged to the bottom. A gunnery officer declared that the weather conditions and everything else favoured the sub-, marine. Many of those aboard the Courageous, owing to the vessel listing, failed to jump clear of the side, and for this reason many were killed. “I was torpedoed in the last war and have seen 25 years’ service, the officer said, “but I have never seen anything finer than a sergeant of the Royal Marines swimming enormous distances from man to man, exclaiming: ‘Keep going my lad, keep your heart and head up!’ There were heroes in plenty, but he was the greatest of Them all. “Before that, I saw two seamen lash a frightened little drummer boy to a raft and heave the raft into the sea. I hope the poor little devil came through. A man appealed for help while I was swimming. I grabbed his hair and kept him afloat. His long absence from a barber saved his life. ATTACK. CHEERED BY SURVIVORS SWIMMING. NO DOUBT THAT U BOAT WAS DESTROYED. (Received This Day, 12.40 p.m.) LONDON, September 19. A sixteen-year-old Exeter lad told how swimmers cheered when destroyers attacked the submarine. “I don’t think anyone aboard her survived,” he said. “They dropped depth charges and blew her straight out of the water. Then she disappeared. “When I last saw the captain, he was standing on the bridge.” Another survivor said there was no doubt the submarine was blown up. The conning tower went one way and the stern another. Oil shot up from the water after a destroyer- had dropped depth charges. Others told similar stories, which varied in individual particulars, but were alike in establishing the absence -f panic. A typical sentence was: “There were a number of men aboard as the ship went down. It was amazing how compneed they were:”