Current History, Vol. VIII, No. 3, June 1918: A Monthly Magazine of the New York TimesVarious
History
Current History, Vol. VIII, No. 3, June 1918: A Monthly Magazine of the New York Times
Various
World War, 1914-1918
The propeller gathered in the net, and it rendered her practically
unmanageable. Shore batteries found her and pounded her
unremittingly. She bumped into the bank, edged off, and found
herself in the channel again still some hundreds of yards from the
mouth of the canal in practically a sinking condition. As she lay
she signaled invaluable directions to others, and her commander, R.
S. Sneyd, also accordingly blew charges and sank her. Motor launches
under Lieutenant H. Littleton raced alongside and took off her crew.
Her losses were five killed and five wounded.
The Intrepid, smoking like a volcano and with all her guns blazing,
followed. Her motor launch had failed to get alongside outside the
harbor, and she had men enough for anything. Straight into the canal
she steered, her smoke blowing back from her into the Iphigenia's
eyes, so that the latter was blinded, and, going a little wild,
rammed a dredger, with her barge moored beside it, which lay at the
western arm of the canal. She was not clear, though, and entered the
canal pushing the barge before her. It was then that a shell hit the
steam connections of her whistle, and the escape of steam which
followed drove off some of the smoke and let her see what she was
doing.
[Illustration: PERSPECTIVE MAP OF OSTEND HARBOR, WITH ZEEBRUGGE IN THE
DISTANCE]
Main Object Attained
Lieutenant Stuart Bonham Carter, commanding the Intrepid, placed the
nose of his ship neatly on the mud of the western bank, ordered his
crew away, and blew up his ship by switches in the chart room. Four
dull bumps were all that could be heard, and immediately afterward
there arrived on deck the engineer, who had been in the engine room
during the explosion, and reported that all was as it should be.
Lieutenant E. W. Bullyard Leake, commanding the Iphigenia, beached
her according to arrangement on the eastern side, blew her up, saw
her drop nicely across the canal, and left her with her engines
still going, to hold her in position till she should have bedded
well down on the bottom. According to the latest reports from air
observation, two old ships, with their holds full of concrete, are
lying across the canal in a V position, and it is probable that the
work they set out to do has been accomplished and that the canal is
effectively blocked. A motor launch, under Lieutenant P. T. Deane,
had followed them in to bring away the crews and waited further up
the canal toward the mouth against the western bank.
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