Count Luckner, the Sea DevilLuckner, Felix, Graf von
History
Count Luckner, the Sea Devil
Luckner, Felix, Graf von
Germany. Kriegsmarine; Luckner, Felix, Graf von, 1881-1966; Seeadler (Ship); World War, 1914-1918 -- Naval operations
A sudden wind squall arose. It blew like a fury. The captain of the
_Antonin_ was a sensible skipper. He immediately lowered sail, took
in his royals and upper gallant sails. That was where we had it on
him, for we had no miserly shipowner to be afraid of. Our masts
wouldn't break, anyway.
"Keep every stitch on, boys! After her, my hearties!"
Of course, we gained rapidly on her now.
The wind continued to howl. The gale raged, and the captain of the
_Antonin_ thought we were quite mad. Gallants and royals up during a
wind squall--he had never seen such a thing in all his days at sea.
The sight was so funny that he wanted a picture of it. We watched
him, standing in the stern of his ship and gazing down into the
finder of his camera.
"Leudemann," I said to my helmsman, "we must capture that snapshot
for our collection of photographs, if we have to take a trip to Davy
Jones doing it."
We were attempting to keep a thorough photographic record of our
cruise, for the Imperial archives, and a picture of the _Seeadler_
running with all sails set through a squall, particularly if that
picture were snapped all unwittingly by the captain of a prize, would
indeed be a gem for our collection.
We were close behind the _Antonin_ now. The captain's picture seemed
to have been satisfactorily snapped. A machine gun began to rattle.
We were often bored during those long days at sea. Anything for a
bit of amusement. It would be funny to watch that captain's face
when he heard the typewriter of Mars rattling in his ear and when he
saw us sending a stream of lead through his rigging. First he
started, and then he glared. What did these lunatics mean? This
kind of insanity was too much. His rigging might be injured, ropes
cut or spars smashed. He began to roar at us in the most profane
French. When a Frenchman swears, you can hear it far off. Then he
saw the German flag at our masthead. He staggered back with a
dramatic gesture that only a Frenchman can achieve.
We sank the _Antonin_ just as we sank the others, but first we seized
that kodak and roll of film, by Joe.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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