1941-09-15 — Page 9

THE CHINA MAIL, SEPTEMBER 15, 1941.

NO ONE-WAY SHOW WHEN CONVOY BOMBED

John M. Leggat, a 22-year-old British subject who spent: most of his life in the U.S.A., dropped in at P.M. in New York one day to see how a newspaper is put together. Leon Goodelman, one of our reporters, learned that he planned to join up with the Empire's fighting forces. Young Leggat promised to write.

This is the second instalment of his first letter, describing his trip aerogs' the Atlantic as a sailor aboard a convoy ship..

I GOT TO KNOW everyone on the boat pretty well. Amongst the Dutch I found that near- ly every one of them had heard nothing from home, and did not know if their families were alive or dead. They never mentioned home, only the ship. If one did not question these men he would have no idea they were men without a country or a home.

There was one exception. One The force even then was e..ough man showed me a letter he re- to make the whole ship jump and ceived. It was from the Inter - | shudder. Imagine what force national Red Cross in Switzer- those same explosions must have land. The letter, if it can be understa! called a letter, was printed in

wounded bird limped off into the horizon. In a few minutes ship life resumed, the convoy con tinued on as if nothing had hap- pened, and 1 got a bit of a kid- ating from the bomb-hardened sailors for shaking like a leaf.

Not A Scratch

"We had a ̃few more ráids, but we beat them off before they could get alose enough to do their damage. In fact I'm happy to say that the first con. voy after the Lend-Lease Bil reached port without a scratch. Not without plenty of effort though.

A few days later a dark mound appeared on the horizon and soon land could be seen. England! And what a glorious sight she was after the long trek at sea. As soon as I could after making port. 1 le't ship and got a good bath, shave and haircut--swear-

black capital letters. the family "All Hell Broke Loose" ing to wait till a bridge was

was allowed to print 25 words on a slip not unlike a telegraph blank. The pathetic message just sudd, "we are all well.” But he had received it in April, 1940. No word since.

This is one ship, a Dutch ship There are other great merchant marines that tell the Same story. The ship they are on might be sunk but they will go on and on - till their country is their own again. In the meantime, the ship will keep sailing. In our fo'c'sle language

"It is very no goot

built before I made that crossing again. But not the sailors they headed for the first pub spent all their money and in a few days were back after more

The high spot of the trip was my first time under fire. It will always

remain vividly in my mind. The war in cargo. Europe seems close to America, but it is hard to visualica. || only had to be under fire once and it all seemed very clear to

me.

It was a wonderful experience seeing Q convoy In action, and now that I have seen it I can tell that anything Hitler can put against the men of the merchant marine and the Royal Navy, they It happened Easter morning will take it and give him back somewhere near Europe. Easter, more than he can put out. Ships 1941, at sea, dodging eggs instead are being lost it is true. But the to stop!"

of looking for them as I did, men are not. Give these men Concerning one chap whose when a boy. We were having the ships to run and the cargoes country is under the Nazi yoke coffee in the fo'c'sle, sitting re to carry and they will do the there is a rather ironical story,laxed and talking. All of a sud-rest in a very complete way I asked him what he thought den the air-raid siren went, then about the R.A.F. Bombing his home town, He said that he was all for it. that it was medicine that would have to be taken to get rid of a dreaded disease. He then went on to tell me that he had sisters working in a muni- tions plant.

another, and then it seemed as if every devil in creation was wailing out in the mast God- awful way. We all ran and put on our life belts and tin hats. went out on deck. As I reached deck all hell broke loose.

I

TIMUR THE LAME

Every ship is armed with ma- chine-guns and anti-aircraft, We "It is rather furny," he said, had a very large escort of des-

The skeleton of Tamer- laughing. "I bring bombe and troyers and corvettes which are lane the Great, which planes over to kill my sisters, well armed with anti-aircraft. and they build torpedoes to The first thing I saw were the was. disinterred at Samar- sink-ma. I don't want to bomb į bursts of shrapnel In the sky. kand, shows that the them and they don't want to Then I saw her! A huge four-

Condor.

sink me, but

with it."

We

Magnificent

It the right

was

leg was

much

both in our motored own ways have to go ahead first time outside of news reels shorter than the left.

I had ever seen a Nazi, I stood transfixed, just staring at her, as if I were still in a news reel, She was huge, filled the sky, and The convoy is a magnificent was swooping low over the con- thing. It seems the journalists voy-right into the barrage. of to-day like to play up the guess I stopped thinking, just subject of the perplexed skipper | watched with my mouth open. on a merchantman trying to keep

up with the modern methods of

the Royal Navy. I saw no per-

rain

Huge Geysers

I

the After removing

three-ton marble slab on which the famous jude cover used to dark green rest, the excavators had to prise up five rough limestone slabs be- fore reaching the well-preserved ebony coffin. This was still cover- ed in places by blackened brocade with a beautiful design and inscriptions in

and silver gold thread.

Examination

plexed skippers. I saw extremely

Suddenly two huge geysers of

of the skeleton- well run ships keeping their place in formation through snow, ice, water shot up and then loud ex- continues, but there is no doubt is it Tamerlane's. The skull has and A three day gale, plosions. She was bombing! through air attack, submarine at-Then two more huge geysers; she been damaged by water. Besides. tack, and even dodging mines. was getting close and then I saw his grandson, Ula Beg, the astrono

It is a mystery to me, even she was headed right for us. I mer the remains of two of Tamer- though I took part in it, how a turned white as a sheet of paperlane's sons have been exhumed. very large number of ships can and with, my..., usual calm com- Tamerlane, whose” proper name keep in formation all through a posure yelled bloody murder, was Timur or Timur-i-Lenk...

gave a jump and slid twenty feet Lame Timur-was born in 1336 at some. 50 miles south of on my belly into a corner and Kash,

Samarkand. He founded an empire stretching from Syria to India, and died at Atrar in 1405.

long, dark night.

in its taln.

Black-out at soal A black-out waited. so black your very hand in

I didn't have long, she was front of your eye looks like the

coming fast. The roar of the centre of the ace of spadeo. yet comes the dawn and every motors increased, our guns start- ship is in position, steaming on ed barking and our machine-guns zig-zag course to Bri-chattering and then her machine- guns sprayed the deck. Then I saw out of the corner of any eye At the head of the convoy is the bombs falling big ones the commodore. He sails in one and the ship seemed to jump out of the regular ships of the con- of the water, as four separate ex voy, and leads us in our queer plosionsrent the air. I was trail across the Atlantic One really too scared to move, but I mistake by him, and the whole got up thinking we had been hit, -convoy is put in danger. But but no- everything seemed to

they are men who have spent be all right..........

many years in the Admiralty I learned later that the last of with a high office. They have the four she dropped missed us | "been called out of retirement and by very little. It is funny, the take to their important jobs like impressions I got from that bat a duck to water. The commodores tle, the continued scream of the just don't make mistakes. sirens, the deep booms of the * The convoy is well protected anti-aircraft and the long chat the whole trip." "No wireless is ter of machine-guns. : The "yip!" used, no smoke is made no yip" of the destroyer whistles as unnecessary noise either, Mythey cut through the water right| admiration goes out to the men into the Hun's path to paste him who conduct these convoys, with a good dose of Pom-Poms, every detail is done so complete-It was quite a fight while it last ly and so well. Convoys are ed, and it seemed to me, and escorted so well now that it is probably to Jerry too, that it practically suicide for a tiny fish | lasted for ages. She dropped to get within "hearing” distance, eight bombs and all eight were In fact I should hate to be in clean misses, probably due to the their place, One day one did terrifle barrage...we put up. : I come in for a try at us. Many think we hit her for she seemed depth charges were let off at to drop after she went over us, least two miles from my ship, then picked herself up and Uko a

DESSERTS

Phone 28183 THE DAIRY FARM, ICE & COLD STORAGE. CO., LTD.,

Ice Does the Job Better!

Better because ice offers a controlled moist cold which

does not suck out the mois-; ture and taste from fooda

and because ice offers air conditioned refrigera- tion, where fresh air clr- culates constantly. Ice. incans tastier desserts!

ICE IS BEST!

*GHADE TO THE HIGHEST STANDARD OF BRITISH EFFICIENTY AND RELIABILITY

Coldair

REFRIGERATORS

MADE IN ENGLAND

by the G.E.C.

THE GENERAL ELECTRIC CO OF CHINA

ReprintingTHE CENT

TREWERY

UB SHANGHAL

All good beer is a wholesome food, and when brewed, as U.B. invariably is, from none but the highest quality malt, hops and yeast with 100% pure water from a deep artesian well, its tonic effects are. beyond all question. U.B.

BEER AT ITS BEST

Sole Agents:-W. R. LOXLEY & CO., (CHINA) LTD.

AT YOUR SERVICE

CATERERS FOR EVERY OCCASION

The Managements

HONG KONG HOTEL

PENINSULA HOTEL

PHONE 30281

'PHONE 58081

REPULSE BAY HOTEL "PHONE 27775

WILL BE PLEASED TO QUOTE,

FOR ALL REQUIREMENTS

Functions, irrespective of magnitude, at our Establishments or any place, accorded the same dependable attention.

Inviting your enquiries !

THE HONG KONG & SHANGHAI HOTELS; LTD.

Page