Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun: A Story of the Russo-Japanese WarCollingwood, Harry
General
Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun: A Story of the Russo-Japanese War
Collingwood, Harry
Russo-Japanese War, 1904-1905 -- Juvenile fiction
From these conversations I gathered that after the squadron and the
_Kinshiu_ parted company off Gensan, while we in the transport headed
for Iwon, the squadron proceeded toward Vladivostock, being much delayed
by a dense fog, through which it steamed at half-speed, each ship towing
a fog buoy as a guide to the ship immediately following, though, even
with this assistance, keeping touch was only accomplished with extreme
difficulty. Thus they proceeded until, by dead reckoning, they arrived
at a point seventy miles south of Vladivostock, when, the weather being
much too thick to permit of fighting the enemy, even should the two
fleets blunder together, Admiral Kamimura decided to retrace his steps,
arriving at Gensan two days later. Here the Japanese consul boarded the
_Idzumi_ and imparted to the Admiral the startling information that on
the previous day four strange warships, accompanied by a couple of
destroyers, had appeared off the port, the warships being later
identified as those constituting the Vladivostock squadron. The
destroyers had entered the harbour, boarded a small Japanese craft
loaded with fish, ordered her crew to get into her boat and go ashore,
and had then torpedoed her; the expended torpedo being probably at least
as valuable as the ship which it sank! Later on, the Russian cruisers
had entered the harbour, but had left again without doing any damage.
In reply to an inquiry concerning the _Kinshiu Maru_, the consul replied
that neither she nor her escort had yet returned. This information
caused Admiral Kamimura some uneasiness, since there had been time for
us to do all that we had been ordered to do, and to get back to Gensan;
and the squadron was actually getting its anchors, preparatory to its
departure to hunt for the transport, when Commander Takebe with his
torpedo-boats arrived. Questioned as to the whereabouts of the
_Kinshiu_, he expressed surprise at her non-arrival, briefly relating
particulars of the discussion which had resulted in the transport
leaving Iwon, unescorted, while he remained in harbour to see what the
weather developments were going to be.
This was enough for Kamimura. Takebe's story, in conjunction with that
of the consul at Gensan, convinced the Admiral that something very
serious had happened; and he at once gave orders for the torpedo
flotilla to proceed along the coast to hunt for news of the transport,
while he, with his squadron, started off in chase of the Russians.
It was on the morning following this second departure of the squadron
from Gensan, that they sighted the junk from which I was rescued. It is
possible that, in his eagerness to overtake the Russians, he might have
pushed on without pausing to examine a small, apparently derelict junk,
but for the fact that, fortunately for me, two or three of the
_Idzumi's_ officers recognised her as the junk which the _Kinshiu_ had
taken with her to facilitate the landing operations at Iwon.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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