The Story of the Great War, Volume 2: History of the European War from Official Sources
History
The Story of the Great War, Volume 2: History of the European War from Official Sources
World War, 1914-1918
that of the _Koenigsberg_, and the difference gave the latter a good
advantage, for she ran up the river and her enemy could not follow. Nor
could the English ship use her guns with much effect, for the gunners
could not make out the hull of the German ship through the tropical
vegetation along the river banks. All that the British ship could do
was to fire shells in her general direction and then guess what effect
they had. But to prevent her escape, colliers were sunk at the mouth of
the river. She had come to as inglorious an end as her victim, the
_Pegasus_.
The account of another raider, the _Kronprinz Wilhelm_, which left New
York on the evening that England declared war, with her bunkers loaded
with coal and other supplies for warships, has already been related. The
mystery concerning this sailing was cleared up when she was caught
coaling the _Karlsruhe_ in the Atlantic. Both ships made off in safety
that time, and soon after a British cruiser reported that she had been
heard in wireless communication with the _Dresden_. Thereafter the fate
of this ship remained a mystery till she put in at Hampton Roads on
April 11, 1915.
Most spectacular was the career of the _Emden_, a third-class cruiser,
which sailed from Japanese waters at the same time as the _Koenigsberg_.
Through the ability of her commander, Captain Karl von Mueller, she
earned the soubriquet "Terror of the East," for by using a clever system
of supply ships she was able to raid eastern waters for ten weeks
without making a port or otherwise running the risk of leaving a clue by
which British ships might find her. Her favorite occupation was that of
stopping enemy merchantmen which she sank. But her captain always
allowed one--the last one--of her prizes to remain afloat, and in this
he sent to the nearest port the officers, passengers, and crews of those
that were destroyed. At times he used prizes as colliers, putting them
under command of his petty officers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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