The Vindictive and one or two other vessels received hits, and a few casualties were caused by this gunfire. The firing was heavily returned by our ships. Most of the crew of the Vindictive were taken off when the ship was at a little distance from the Ostend piers, only a few officers and men being left to navigate her between the piers and sink her there. A motor launch which was assisting in picking up the crew was hit several times by shellfire, and was in a sinking condition when it came alongside the Admiral's vessel, the destroyer Warwick, to which they were transferred. The motor launch had extensive damage in the fore part, and by order of the Admiral was sunk, as it was apparent that it could not get back to Dover. There was a heavy explosion when the Vindictive sank between the piers. The casualties in the second Ostend raid were forty-seven, of whom eighteen were killed or missing, the rest wounded. * * * * * The British Admiralty, in its official report of the second Ostend action, issued May 14, stated that the Vindictive was "lying at an angle of about 40 degrees to the pier, and seemed to be hard fast." Commander Godsal, who was on deck during the critical moments, was missing and was believed to have been killed; Lieutenant Crutchley blew up the auxiliary charges in the forward 6-inch magazine from the conning tower. Lieut. Commander William A. Bury, who blew up the main charges by a switch installed aft, was severely wounded. The Admiralty reported that the sunken ship would make the harbor impracticable for any but small craft and difficult for dredging operations. German U-Boat Claims Address by Admiral von Capelle _German Naval Secretary_ Admiral Von Capelle, the German Secretary of the Navy, delivered an address before the Reichstag, April 17, 1918, in which he asserted that the submarine warfare of Germany was a success. In the course of his speech he said: "The main question is, What do the western powers need for the carrying on of the war and the supply of their homelands, and what amount of tonnage is still at their disposal for that purpose? All statistical calculations regarding tonnage are today almost superfluous, as the visible successes of the U-boat war speak clearly enough. The robbery of Dutch tonnage, by which the Anglo-Saxons have incurred odium of the worst kind for decades to come, is the best proof of how far the shipping shortage has already been felt by our opponents. In addition to the sinkings there must be added a great amount of wear and tear of ships and an enormous increase of marine accidents, which Sir J. Ellerman, speaking in the Chamber of Shipping recently, calculated at three times the peace losses. Will the position of the western powers improve or deteriorate? That depends upon their military achievements and the replacing of sunken ships by new construction."