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About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (June 27, 1920)
THE SUXDAT OREGONIAX, PORTLAND, JUNE 27, 1920 Victory At 1 By Admiral William Sowden Sims LAYING THE . MINES NOW in the open seas, the ten mine-layers formed in two col umns, abreast of each other and 500 yards apart, and started for the waters of the barrage. Twelve destroyers surrounded them, on the lookout for submarines, for the ships were now in the track of the U-boats bound for their hunting ground or returning to their home ports. At a flash from the flagship all slackened speed and put out their paravanes those underwater outrigger affairs protected the ships from mines. It was not at all unlikely that the Ger mans would place some of their own mines in the field for the benefit of the barrage builders; not only this, but it was not entirely impossible that we might strike a stray mine of our own. This operation took only a few minutes; then another flash, and the squadron again increased its speed. It steamed the whole distance across the North sea to Udsire light, then turned west again and headed for that mathematical . spot on the ocean which was known as the "start point" the place, that is, where the mine laying was to begin. In carry ing out all these maneuvers sight ing the light on the'Norwegian coast the commander was thinking, not only of the present, but of the future; for the time would come, after the war had ended, when it would be necessary to remove all these mines, and it was therefore wise to "fix" them as accurately as possible in ref erence to landmarks, so as to know where to look for them. All this time the men were at their stations, exam ining the mines to see that every thing was ready, testing tbe laying mechanisms and mentally rehearsing their duties'. At about 4 o'clock au important signal came from the flagship:"Have everything ready, for the squadron will reach 'start point' in an hour and mine laying will be- Cin!" Up to this time the ships were sailing in two columns; when they came within seven miles of "start p,oint." another signal was broken out; the ships all wheeled like a com pany of soldiers, each turning sharply to the right, so that in a few minutes, instead of two columns we had eight chips in line abreast with the re maining two, also in line abreast, sailing ahead of theni. This splendid array, keeping perfect position, ap proached the starting point like a line of rac horses passing under the wire. Not a ship was off this line by so much as a quarter' length; the Whole atmosphere was one of eager ness; the officers all had their eyes Xaxed upon the stern of the flagship, lor the glimpse of the red flag which would be the signal to begin. Sud denly the flag went up and the sig nal came from the flagship: "First mine over." If you had been following one of these ships you would probably have been surprised at the apparent sim plicity of .the task. The vessel was going at its full speed, at intervals of a few seconds a huge black object, about five feet high, would be ob served gliding toward the stern; at this point it would pause for a sec ond or two as though suspended in air. It would then give, a mighty lurch, fall head first into -the water, sending up a great splash and then sink beneath the waves. By the time the disturbance was over the ship would have advanced 'a considerable distance; then, in a few seconds, an other black object would roll toward the stern, make a similar plunge and disappear. You might have fol lowed the same ship for two or three hours, watching these mines fall overboard at intervals of about 15 seconds. There were four plant ers, each of which could and did on several trips lay about 860 mines In three hours and 35 minutes, in a single line about 44 miles long. These were the Canandaigua, the Can onicus, the Housatonic and the Roan oak. Occasionally the monotony of this procedure would be enlivened by a terrible explosion, a great geyser of water rising where a mine had been recently disappeared; this meant that the "egg," as the sailors called it, had gone off spontaneously, without the assistance of any external contact; such accidents were part of the game, the records showing that about four per ceit of all the mines indulged in euch initial premature explosions. For the most part,' however, nothing happened to disturb the steady me chanical routine. The mines went over with such regularity that, to an ob server, the whole proceeding seemed hardly the work of human agency. Tet every detail had been arranged months before In the United States; the mines fell into the : ea in accord ance with a time table which had been prepared In Newport before the ves sels started for Scotland. Every man on the ship had a particular duly to perform and each performed it In the way in which he had been schooled under the able direction of .Captain finlknap. Tbe mine spherical case, which co tain the explosive charge, and the mec&nlsm for Igniting it, is only a part of thecontrivance.,. While at rest on board the ship this case stands upon a box like affair, about two feet square, known as the anchor this anchor sinks to the bottom after launching and it contains an elab orate arrangement for maintaining the mine at the desired depth be neath the surface. The bottom of the "anchor" has four wheels, on which it runs along the little railroad track on the launching deck to the jumping off place at the stern. All along these railroad tracks the mines were sta tioned one back of another; as one -went overboard, they would .all ad- . " vnjtgjygjwTwM f n liipTTilnTTrrulTiiii i i in i hi inl ' 1 r-TFin--"jim " j ST qrOTSdSMS. ' t f - - . $ A h 1 I 1 ' 1 itfr . -" ' ' 1 V. ... A ) -"insert- 1 - 1L S-i-i , .3".f a f i . . , 1 i -. Ssi t TRUCKINP MINE CASES AT INVERNESS. . ' Each one of these globes contains 300 pounds of trinitrotoluol. Of the 70,117 laid In the northern exit to the North sea, the American ships pot font 56,571. They save the death blow to the German sub marine eampalgrn. vance a peg, a mine coming up from below on an elevator to fill up the vacant space at one end "of the pro cession. It took a crew of hardwork ing, begrimed and -sweaty, men-, to keep these mines moving and going over the "stern at trie regularly ap pointed Intervals. After three or four hours had been spent in this way and the ships had started back to their base, the decks would sometimes be covered with the sleeping figures of these exhausted men. J.t would) be im possible to speak too- appreciatively of the spirit which they displayed; in the whole summer there was not a single mishap of any importance. The men all felt that they were engaged in a task which had never been ac complished before, and their exhil eration increased with almost every mine that was laid. "Nails in the coffin of the Kaiser," the men called these grim instruments of vengeance. I have described one of these thir teen summer excursions, and the de scription given could be applied to all the rest. Once or twice the periscope of a submarine was sighted without any disastrous results but in tho main this business of mine laying was uneventful. Just what we accom plished the chart makes clear. In the summer and fall months of 1918 the American forces laid 58.571 mines and the British 13.346. The opera tion was to have been a continuous one had the- war gone on for two years we should probably have laid several hundred inousand: Admiral Strauss' forces kept at the thing steadily up to the time of the armi stice; they had become so expert and RACES BOAST THEIR NAMES ARE TAKEN FROM WOMEN Generous Tribute Paid to Those of Distinction Cities, Rivers, Provinces Tell Their Beautiful Story. WASHINGTON, D. C, June 26. ' Names of 'such women as Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell are written indelibly upon the hearts of people for all ages. Generous and well-deserved tributes have been paid lastingly to others, but so much have their names become a part of our daily lives that many who frequently pronounce them are unmindful of their significance. Cities, rivers, provinces and islands bear the names of women of distinction, says a bul letin from the National Geographical society. ' Lady Franklin Island, near Baffin , island in the Arctic circle. Is named for the wife of Sir John Franklin, th3 explorer who lost his life in first find ing the Northwest passage through the great Ice of the Polar regions. There is perhaps no more beautiful story of untiring devotion and per sistent effort than that of Lady Jane Franklin who, after the failure of many attempts,- fitted out a ship which, though it brought back to her the definite proof of the loss of her husband's expedition, established his achievement of his object. Pocahontas In "Favor. The picturesque stories of the lit tle Indian princess Pocahontas al ways -will hold a loved place in tha hearts of American childhood. Coun ties in Iowa and West Virginia, vil lages in Bond county, Illinois, and Cape Girardeau county, Missouri, and in the Rocky Mountains in Alberta, Can., are named for her. Queen Victoria's name is wrapped around the British' empire from the capital of British Columbia, over the heart of Africa at Victoria ' Nyanza and Victoria falls, and beyond into the Queensland and Victoria In far away Australia. America, too. In Its early days of colonization paid its tribute -to the queens of the mother country and to the gracious women who braved the dangers of untried shpres with their lords. Elizabeth, a cape in Maine and Elizabeth City in Virginia, as well as the state Itself, together with some' 25 other places In the United States, bear the-name of the clever, witty. - versatile coquette - who took the barrage was producing such ex cellent results that we had plans nearly completed for building another at the straits of Otranto, which would have completely closed the Adriatic sea. Besides this undertaking the American mine layer Baltimore laid a, minefield in the North Irish Chan nel, the narrow waters which sepa rate Scotland and Ireland; two Ger man submarines which soon after ward - attempted this passage, were blown to pieces, and, after this, the mine field was given a wide berth.' I Just what the North sea barrage accomplished in the actual destruc tion of submarines will never be def initely known. We have Information that four submarines' certainly were destroyed, and in all. probability six and possibly eight; yet these results measure only a small part of the Ger man losses. In the majority of cases the Germans had little or no evidence of sunken submarines. Th destroy ers, subchasers, and other patrol boats were usually able1 to'obt'ain some evi dences of injury; they could often see their quarry, or the disturbances which it made on the surface; they could pursue and attack It. and the resultant oil patches, wreckages and German prisoners and sometimes the recovered submarine Itself or. its lo cation on the bottom would tell the story either of injury or destruction. But the disconcerting thing about the North sea barrage, from the view point of the Germans, was that it could do its work so secretly that no one, friend or enemy, would neces sarily know a thing about It. A German submarine simply left its the ' dissension-torn England and whipped it into a place as a world world power. Elizabeth Carteret, the charming wife , of one of the aristo cratic proprietors of New Jersey, shares with Queen Elizabeth some of the honors of the name. Elizabeth town, in North Carolina, and Eliza beth City In New Jersey, are named for her. The name of Clara Barton is per petuated in Barton county, Kansas, and the wife of George Washington, who before her first marriage was Martha Dandridge, is honored In the town of Dandridge. Tennessee. Ha No Martha. ) There wasn't any Martha of Mar tha's Vineyard, however. The first name is supposed to be a corruption of Martin, a friend of the discoverer of the island. The word Vinevard wan added later on account of the wild grapes found on the island. Vinland. the name which Lief Ericson gave the North American continent, was sug gested in a similar manner. Maryland, and Virginia are fairly Despatierea witn the names of the queens and princesses of England, the very state names themselves being taken from that of Queen Henrietta Maria, the wife of Charles I, and the disputably fortunate estate of Eliza beth. Then, too, there are Annap olis, named for the Wife of James I of England; and Anne Arundel and Car oline counties in Maryland called af ter the wives of two of the Calverta; Fluvanna county and the North Anna river In Virginia named for Queen Anne; and Charlotte, Amelia and Car oline counties and Charlottesville, the home of the University of Virginia, Is called for the wives and daughters of the English kings. For Marie Antoinette. Marietta, Ohio, was named for the haughty, charming Marie Antoinette. The Aleutian islands, off the coast of Alaska, when that territory was Rus sian, were known as Catharine Archi pelago In honor of Catharine the great. Ekaterinburg was named tor the Russian Catharine who ruled through her husband, Peter the Great. I St. Helena, the rugged little island 27 TBTll Z Jf. -I THE 'These yeasrU, for the noil part, had Bunker Hill and the Massachusetts for many year paenBer boats plying; between New York and Boston, After the Interiors had been ripped out and entirely reconstructed, they were transformed Into mine-layers of an advanced type. home port; attempting to. cross the barrage, -perhaps at night, it would strike one of these mines, or its antenna; an explosion would crum ple it up like so much paper; wit,h its crew it would sink to the bot tom: and not a soul, perhaps not in the Pacific which has such a sooth ing effect upon the restless tenden cies of autocrats, bears the name of the mother of Constantine the Great, who, according to legend, discovered the cross upon which Christ died dur ing a visit she made to the Holy Land. She was known In the early days of Christianity for her rellgioust zeal and piety. Helena, Montana, though opinions differ as to the ori gin of the name, is said to have been so called because of the resemblance of its location to that of St. Helena. The naming of Hart county, Georgia, is a generous tribute to a Dixie hero ine of the Revolution, Nancy' Hart. Races Boast Women's Name. Races do not scorn to boast that their names were, taken from those of women. ".The Scots claim to be descended from Scotia, a daughter ol Pharaoh, and the Saracens from Sa rah, the wife of Abraham. The harbor Beara In Ireland is said to have been named by . Owen More, king of Munster during the reign of Conn of the Hundred Battles, for his wife, a Spanish princess. No sanit perhaps holds a dearer place in the Irish heart than St. Ite. or Ide, often called Brigld of. Munster. and we find her name in several variations in the names of many churches and places throughout . that country. 'A charming little legend hovers about, the naming of Charing Cross, the busy London station. At the spot In 1291 Edward I erected one of the 13 crosses marking the route followed by the funeral procession of his wife, his "chere reine,". from Nottingham shire to Westminster Abbey. Mitsui Heir Enters Army. , HONOLULU, T. H. T. H. Mitsui, Junior" partner in Mitsui & Co., some times called the "Rockefellers of Ja pan," passed through here recently as a voluntary recruit for military serv ice in the Japanese army. Mitsui, who is a graduate of Tufta college, ex plained that college graduates are not required to serve in the Japanese army, but that he was returning to his home land at his own Instance to serve a year in. the Nipponese forces. '- Clothespins' of One Length. Indianapolis News. ' About 20,000,000 feet of lumber is used each year In making clothespins. The latter are usually made in three lengths, five,' four and one-half and four inches, but eventually, it is said, all clothespins will be made of the four-inch length, - thus saving mil lions of feet of - lumber. - - "FIRST MIXE OVER." All the preparations for laying this barrage were made In the Vnlted State, where more than COO factories received contractu for tarnlni out tbe varlon njirt of mines. The bnrraa-e coat the United States 940,000,000, bat it was money well spent. MIXK-LAYINtt FLOTILLA AT WORK. seen many rrnrm' wervlee on the American eonnt. Two of them were the even the crew itself, would ever know what had happened to it. It would in truth be a case of "sinking without a trace" though an entirely legitimate one under the rules of warfare. The German records dis closed anywhere from 40 to 50 sub- MUSHROOM HUNTERS WARNED OF DANGERS OF IGNORANCE Rules Formulated to Enable Avoidance of Poisonous Species Personal Knowledge Much Better Than Trusting Self-styled Experts. w ASHINGTON, D. C, June 26. Those who, unadvised or ill advised, would gather wild species of mushrooms for the table should remember that they are em barking upon an adventure that may lead to a sudden and horrible death," says Louis C. C. Krieger to the Na tional Geographic society. To ask a person to gather his own mushrooms for the table, without pre vious Instruction that. will enable him to avoid the deadly kinds, is. equiva lent to. If not worse than, inviting him to put his unprotected hand into a den of rattlesnakes," he continues., "The names of the wild species of mushrooms marketed cannot be ascer tained definitely, since there is. with us no such legal control of the sale of mushrooms as obtains in most cit ies in continental Europe. Gatherers In the United States either eat their finds themselves or" sejl them pro miscuously to any mushroom-hungry individual who has the temerity or the knowledge to venture purchasing.' Six Rule Formulated. "General rules fur the guidance of mushroom nunters are trustworthy and serviceable only when formulated by experienced botanists. The follow ing six rules by tne late Dr. W. G. Farlow. Harvard university, will pre vent, if scrupulously observed, the eating of notoriously poisonous spe cies: "1. Avoid fungi when in the button or unexpanded stage; also those in which the flesh has begun, to decay, even if only slightly. "2. Avoid all' fungi -which, have death cups, stalks with a swollen base surrounded by - a' sac-like or scaly envelop, especially if the gills are white. ' "3. Avoid fungi having a milky juice, unless the milk is reddish. "4. Avoid fungi in which the cap, or pileus, is thin in proportion to the gills, and in which the gills are nearly all of equal length, especially If the pileus is bright-colored. "5 'Avoid all tube-bearing fungi in which the flesh changes color when cut or broken or where the , mouUis of the tubes are reddish, and stM iimWi r-r. . marines sunk which did not appear in the records of the allies; how these were destroyed not a soul knows, nor ever will know. They simply left their German ports and were never heard of again. That many of them I fell victims to mines, and some of (in the case of other tube-bearing fungi experiment with caution "6. Fungi which have a sort of spider web or flocculent ring round the upper part of the stalk should In general be avoided. "Professor Farlow adds that 'Rules 1, 2. and 5 may for the beginner be regarded as absolute, with the ex ception to rule 2, Amanita caesarea. the gills of which are yeMow. Rules 3, 4 and 6 have more numerous ex ceptions, but these rules should be followed' in all cases unless the col lector is content to experiment first with very small quantities and learn the practical result. Wooded Areaa to Be Avoided. "Other rules that will help to pro tect from serious poisoning are: jjo not collect mushrooms In or near wooded areas except for study purposes. This rule is very general, as it does not protect against the green-gilled Lepiota, nor against an occasional Amanita and some others; but It does prevent the beginner from entering the very 'lair' of the mankillers. "Do not accept mushrooms from a self-styled expert, even if you have to disoblige a dear friend. Lerrn the subject yourself. , "That an animal (Insect, squirrel, turtle, etc.) .has eaten a mushroom is no criterion of the edibility of that mushroom for man. Insect -larvae thrive and grow fat on the violently poisonous Amanita phalloides. "Soaking or boiling in water does not render a poisonous species edible." Pagopago Distributing Depot. PAGOPAGO, American ' Samoa. Rapid progress is being made in the construction of a large customs ware house here and it is hoped by local business interests that this will mark a step toward making Pagopago a distributing depot for American prod ucts in the South seas. Hawaiian Schools Congested. HONOLULU. T. H., May 17. Double - sessions of the primary schools of the territory to ease con gestion in classes which sometimes run as high as 70 pupils, were urged at a recent conference here of super vising principals. them to the mines of our barrage, is an entirely justifiable assumption. That probably even a larger number of U-boats were -n.'ured Is also true. A German submarine captain, after the surrender at Scapa Flow, said that he personally knew of three sub marines ' including his own, which had been so badly injure" at the bar-, rage that they had to limp back to their German ports. The results othir than the sinking of submarines were exceedingly Im portant in bringing the war to an end. It was the failure of the sub marine campaign which defeated the German hopes and forced their sur render; and In this defeat the barrage was an Important element. That submarines frequently crossed it is true; there was no expectation, when the enterprise started, that it would absolutely shut the U-boats in the North sea; but its Influence in bi mak ing down the German morale must have been great. To understand this just place yourself for a moment in the position of a submarine crew. The width of this barrage ranged from 15 to 35 miles; it took from one to three hours for a submarine to cross this area cn the surface and from two to six hours under the su face. Not every square foot, it Is true, had been mined: there were cer tain gaps caused by the spontaneous explosions to which I have referred; but nobody knew where these open ings were, or where a single mine was located. The officers and crews knew only that, at any moment rn explosion might send them to eter nity. A strain of this sort is serious enough If it lasts only a few minutes; Imagine being kept in this state or mind anywhere from one to six hours! Submarine prisoners con stantly told us how they dreaded the mines: going through such a field. I suppose, was about the most dis agreeable experience in this aerv racking service. Our North sea ba rage began to show results almost Immediately after our first planting:. The" German officers evidently kept Informed of our progress and had a general idea of the territory wh'rj had been covered. For a considerable time a passageway, 60 miles wide, was kept open for the grand fleet just east of the Orkney islands; the result was that the submarines, which had hitherto usually skirted the Norwe gian coast, now changed their course and attempted to slip through th western passageway a course thut enabled them to avoid the mine field. When the entire distance from tl.s Orkneys to Norway had been mio- however, it became impossible to "run around the end." The Germans wero now obliged to sail boldly into this explosive field, taking- their chances of hitting a mine. Stories of this bar rage were circulated all over C many; sailors who had been in con tact with it related their experience to their fellows; and the result wr. extremely demoralizing to the German submarine flotilla. The North Sea barrage was probably, contributory cause of the mutiny which aemorai ized the German flct in the fall of 1018. I think 1 am justified in saying that this enterprise was a strong factor in overcoming the submarine menace, though the success of the convoy system had already brought the end in sight, and thus made it practicable to assign, -without danger of defeat, the tonnace necessary to lay the barrage and maintain and augment it as long as might be nec essary. The Germans saw the bar rage not only as It was in the fJ' of 1918. but as it would be a few months or a year hence. We had started a steady stream of mines from hundreds of factories in the United States to our Scottish base: these es tablishments were constantly Increas ing production, and there was prac tically no limit to their possible out put. We had developed a mine-laying organization which was admittedly better than any that had been hither to known; and this branch of the service we could now enlarge indefi nitely. In time we could have planted this area so densely with explosives that it would have been madness for any submarine!1 even to attempt a passage. To be sure, the Pentland Firth, between the Orkneys and Scot land, was always open, and could not be mined on account of its swift tides, but bt1des being a dangerous passage at best it was constantly pa trolled to make it still more oan gerous. The loyal devotion to duty and the skillful seamanship which our officers displayed in this great enterprise was not only thoroughly in keeping with the highest traditions of the navy but actually established new standards to guide and inspire those who follow us. These gallant officers who actually laid the mines are entitled to the na tion's gratitude and I take great pleasure in commending the work of Captain H. V. Butler, commanding the flagship San Francisco: Captain Har vey J. Tomb, commanding the Aroos took: Captain A. W. Marshall, com manding the Baltimore; Commander W. H. Reynolds, commanding the Can andaigua: 'Captain T. L. Johnson, commanding the Canonlcus; Captain J. W. Greenslade, commanding the Housatonic: Commander D. Pratt Mannix, commanding the Qulnne baug: Captain C. D. Stearns, com manding the Roanoke: Captain Sin clair Gannon, commanding the Sara nac, and Captain "W". T. Cluverius, com manding the Shawmut. (Copyright. 1920. by the World's Work. The copprlsht of the artcilea In Qreat Britain Is Btrictly reserved by Pearson's Magazine, London: without their permis sion no quotation may be made. PtrbUfhed by special arrangement with the McCIura i Newspaper Syndicate. Another article next bundy.