A seaman serving on a ship in Cork Harbour died from alcohol. Found drunk and unknown, he was put on a stretcher and died.
Facts in “Cork Constitution,” December 9, 1915
“Over three-quarters of the court-martials I have had anything to do with are due directly or indirectly to drunkenness. Many thousands of competent N.C.O.s and soldiers have been punished, and become useless to the nation during their punishment, as a result of drink.
“I have never been a teetotaler, and have rather opposed the radical temperance agitation, but am now changing my views as I see our success over here hampered and our progress towards victory retarded so obviously by drink.”
Letter from a Lieut.-Colonel at the Front, seen by the Author
The captain of a British merchant ship, drunk on the bridge, ordered his chief gunner to fire 50 rounds of shell at nothing. The gunner fired four rounds to appease him. Going through the Mediterranean, the drunken captain ordered his gunner to fire at a British hospital ship, and the incident led to a struggle for life, which ended in the captain’s being put in irons, tried, and sentenced to five years’ penal servitude.
Record of Devon Assizes, Exeter, February 2, 1917
An officer was left in charge of a British ship. Mad with drink, he went among the men and shot one dead. He is now in an asylum.
Case reported to the Admiralty
The crew of a Dutch ship arriving in the Tyne was placed under a naval guard after a drunken riot in which three were killed.