Ten months in a German raider

by John Stanley Cameron

Many of us were highly incensed because of this treatment of a white woman, but were powerless to do anything with Rose in the matter although we tried to make her lot as bearable as possible. Later on this woman took sick owing to the dampness of her quarters and my wife nursed her for three weeks until she finally recovered.

The Igotz Mendi was a product of war-times, being built in 1916, and built in the cheapest possible manner, both in hull, equipment and accommodations. In her saloon, ten of us could sit down fairly comfortably in good weather, but when the vessel was rolling as nearly always was the case, only eight could sit down at the table, as the chairs at the ends were not stationary. We were waited upon by a steward named "Manuel." Manuel was quite a character and had his own ideas about how much a man should have a day for two pesetas. One day we were talking together, and he said that he shipped to take care of three men only and now he had twenty-two, among whom were four women, any one of whom (the women) were more trouble than the original three men he had shipped to serve. I think Manuel had the largest thumb I have ever seen. When he brought in my plate of alleged soup the plate would be brimming full; on setting it down and withdrawing his thumb the plate would be only half full. This thumb would have been a valuable asset to some Yankee boarding house mistress in the States. Later on Manuel took a violent dislike to some of our party and used to spill the "coffee" or soup on them. This he did with malice aforethought and I don't know that I blamed him much, as some of our party imagined they were first class passengers on a modern liner with servants to supply their every whim.

On November 15th both steamers left the Chagos Islands, the Igotz Mendi going at slow speed to a point 300 miles south of the Cape of Good Hope, and the Wolf followed the regular sailing vessel route, where on November 18th she captured and sank the American bark William Kirby of New York, Captain Blum commanding. The Kirby was en route from New York to Port Elizabeth with a general cargo, the major part of which was automobiles destined for the African Christmas market. After transferring the crew, provisions, and what food stuffs were handily got at, the bomb gang got in their work and at 5:30 P.M. on November 18th the Kirby made her final bow.

LAST OF THE AMERICAN BARK "WILLIAM KIRBY." 1200 GROSS TONS. CAPTAIN BLUM. CAPTURED NOVEMBER 15TH, THREE HUNDRED AND TWENTY MILES S.E. OF PORT ELIZABETH.

On December 6th we met the Wolf again for a short time, exchanged signals, and received a further supply of canned crab, the Wolf having an inexhaustible supply which she had got from the Hitachi. We had so much crab that the very sight of a can of it was nauseating. I feel sure that should a waiter in a restaurant ever suggest crab to any of the ex-prisoners on the Wolf, he would have a very unpleasant time of it. During the night of the 6th, the Wolf left us, taking a more northerly route than we. At this time, Lieutenant Rose had told the Spanish ex-Captain that we were en route to Trinidad Island, Brazil, where Wolf would get what additional coal she required, and then we, the Igotz Mendi, should, after waiting 10 days at the island, proceed to Spain. This, of course, made us feel very happy and I know that the Cameron family were overjoyed with the prospects of getting safely landed after such a long time. Many of us took up the study of the Spanish language, and some very queer conversations were carried on. When I tried to talk Spanish, I would usually get stuck for a Spanish word and put in a German one; then if I couldn't think of the German word, would use English, the result was that neither a Spaniard nor a German could understand me. Sometimes I couldn't figure it out myself.

We enjoyed fine weather and managed to keep alive on the food, which was some task. When we got up from the table hungry, we would think of Spain and freedom in a few short weeks, and forget all about how empty we were. On December 18th the Wolf again picked us up; it seemed that she could appear at will like some gigantic evil spirit. The Wolf wig-wagged the information that on December 14th she met and sank the French bark Marechal Davoust, bound from Australia to France with a cargo of grain. This bark was equipped with wireless and had two guns mounted on her, but offered no resistance to the Wolf. Wolf took the crew, provisions, ships stores, the wireless, and also his two cannon, off the Frenchman, later in the day sinking her by bombs.

Both the Wolf and Igotz Mendi now proceeded together toward the Island of Trinidad and expected to get there early on the morning of December 20th. I had made arrangements with Lieutenant Rose so that I could have a jolly boat in the morning and the wife and I go fishing off the rocks on the lee side of the island, as this island is celebrated for its good sea bass fishing. At 9:30 P.M. on the 19th, while pacing the deck with the wife before retiring, I noticed that the Wolf suddenly changed her course to the Northward and signalled us with her flash light. We immediately changed also, and put on all available speed to the northward after the Wolf. Soon the explanation came: there were two cruisers of the Brazilian Navy anchored at Trinidad and the Wolf had picked up a wireless message from one of them to the Brazilian authorities. Needless to say, it didn't take Commander Nerger long to decide that he had business elsewhere. If these confounded gossipy cruisers had not used their wireless, in another few hours we should have run right into their arms. On the other hand, if they had been lying in the harbour of some big sea port as seems to be the custom with battle ships, and not off Trinidad Island, we should probably have carried out the regular schedule of freedom via Spain. Of the two, I should much have preferred the Brazilian navy to rescue us, as then I should have been sure of freedom, while on the other hand, I had only Rose's word that we would proceed to Spain. There was a bitter gloom on our ship for a good while after this; in fact the spirits of the prisoners never regained their previous buoyancy. The great question now was "What next?" We could see only Germany ahead of us, and that was not very encouraging. For myself, I felt quite confident that we should never get through the blockade and the mine fields. Captain Rose had often told us that in the event of our meeting a cruiser, we would go into the boats and the ship would be bombed and sunk. This was a very alluring proposition for a family man to look forward to but was better than the conditions on the Wolf, as there now were nearly 800 crew and prisoners on the Wolf, while its life-boats and rafts under the most favourable conditions could hold only 400, so it can easily be figured out just how much chance our poor chaps had of getting into the boats, in the event of the Wolf's meeting a superior enemy. Probably they would be battened down below in the hold, and would be sent down to "Davey Jones' Locker" with the Wolf. In our case on the Igotz Mendi we were about thirty souls to a boat, and if the weather conditions were favourable and we had a little luck, we should have been all right. The women naturally lived in a continual dread of having to go into the boats.

We had all been looking forward to eating our Christmas dinner at the island of Trinidad and were going to have a royal feed, as our German "hosts" were going to kill a pig and a cow that were on board the Igotz Mendi when captured. However, the Brazilian navy changed our plans as to where our dinner was to be eaten; though we had "Sir Pig" just the same. Owing to the sudden change of our plans (gaining freedom via Spain) we all felt very blue on Christmas day, which was not the enjoyable affair it would have been if everything had worked out as expected. I know I had the blues all Christmas as I got thinking about other Christmases spent under more enjoyable circumstances, which thoughts naturally didn't make me feel any more cheerful. Lieutenant Rose was around bright and early, wishing us all a merry Christmas and "many happy returns" of the day. I intend next Christmas, if Rose is still interned in Denmark, to write him a letter returning the compliment, and then he can possibly appreciate the subtleties of a joke of this nature. My wife wanted to stick a hat pin into him when he came around with his "many happy returns of the day." The German crew, too, appeared to be blue on Christmas.