The race was won by S. C. 131 (Lieutenant Joseph L. Day), which arrived at Ambrose Channel lightship at 1:17 a. m., August 19, 1919. Her running time was 56 hours, 56 minutes--8 hours and 43 minutes less than that made by the _Dream_, which had set the fastest pace in 1914. Four of the others also beat the best previous record. The sub-chasers, after long and wearing service in the war zone, had excelled the speedy light pleasure craft. It was a race of thoroughbreds, and when the winner tied up at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, there was the same absence of self exploitation that had signaled the services of the Cinderellas from the first day they began writing glowing pages of new achievement against new enemies. CHAPTER XVI "DO NOT SURRENDER"--"NEVER!" SHIP SHELLED, MEN WOUNDED, NAVY GUNNERS ON "J. L. LUCKENBACH" FOUGHT SUBMARINE FOUR HOURS--ARMED GUARDS SAILING WAR ZONE BEFORE WAR WAS DECLARED--HAD 227 ENCOUNTERS WITH SUBMARINES--FIRST IN SERVICE, THEY WERE FIRST IN SACRIFICE--"HAND IT TO 'EM, JOE!" Navy gunners, manning Navy guns on American merchant ships, were sailing the war zone before the United States declared war. First to get into action, these armed guards had more than two hundred encounters with submarines, many of them long-fought gunfire battles. First in service, they were first in sacrifice. The night President Wilson delivered his war message to Congress, when I returned from the Capitol to my office in the Navy Department, I was greeted by this dispatch from the American Ambassador to France: Paris, April 2. Secretary of State, Washington. Urgent: Foreign Office has just informed me that the American steamer _Aztec_ was torpedoed at nine p. m. last night far out at sea off Island of Ushant; that one boat from the steamer has been found with nineteen survivors who were landed this afternoon at Brest. Twenty-eight persons are still missing and although two patrol vessels are searching for them, the stormy condition of sea and weather renders their rescue doubtful. Foreign Office not informed of names of survivors. Will cable further details as soon as obtainable. SHARP. A later dispatch stated that only eleven were missing and that Lieutenant William F. Gresham and the boys from the _Dolphin_ were safe. This possessed a personal interest for me, for the _Dolphin_ was the vessel assigned to the Secretary of the Navy, and had furnished this first crew for an armed ship. The news that night was reassuring, but we were saddened to learn, next day, that one of our seamen had gone down--John I. Eopolucci, of Washington, the first man of the American armed forces to lose his life in service against Germany.