FINAL DIVE OF JAPANESE STEAMER "HITACHI MARU." 6558 GROSS TONS. CAPT. KOKMOA. CAPTURED SEPTEMBER 26TH OFF MALDIVA ISLANDS, INDIAN OCEAN. SUNK BY BOMBS NOVEMBER 7TH.
The German auxiliary cruiser and minelayer Wolf was formerly a freighter belonging to the Hansa Line, a subsidiary of the Hamburg-American Line; of 6,728 gross tons; single screw, one funnel; two well decks, two telescoping masts, equipped with wireless, double bridge; two Sampson posts on poop and four sets of cargo booms. On the poop rigged from the Sampson posts were two faked cargo booms whose real purpose was to disguise a six-inch gun mounted there. On her boat deck she showed three life-boats, working boats from each side. The vessel was painted all black and had no particular distinguishing marks.
Wolf carried two six-inch ordinary guns, one mounted forward under the forecastle head and the other on top of the poop; four 4.7 ordinaries, two forward and two aft mounted on the well deck. The bulwark or rails at these guns, as at the six-inch forward gun, were fitted with hinges and spring catches, so that by one blow of a hammer they dropped down, giving the guns ample room for action. Under ordinary circumstances nothing of these guns could be seen above the rail. She was further armed with four torpedo tubes, two forward and two aft, on the well decks. The torpedoes forward were "Red Heads" and especially effective for short distances, while those aft were "Mannlichers" and used for long distance work. She also had four machine guns mounted, two on each end of the boat deck in such a manner that they could control the decks and the prisoners' quarters aft.
On leaving Kiel Wolf had a crew of three hundred and seventy-five men, including one Commander and Corvette Captain, one Lieutenant Commander, three senior and six junior Lieutenants, two Surgeons and twelve Warrant Officers, including gun mechanics, torpedo mechanics, mine experts, navigating sub-lieutenants and boatswains. She had a wireless crew of seven men, including one wireless expert. The signal corps consisted of six signal men in charge of a code expert, who had had several years of training at a school in deciphering various codes. I am led to believe from what I saw that this man was able to decipher naval and private codes used in the South Pacific, but was unable to handle codes used in the North Atlantic.
On leaving Kiel Wolf had on board five hundred mines, seventy-five hundred tons of Westphalian coal, three thousand tons of water, and twenty-five hundred tons of food and ammunition. This heavy cargo over-loaded the Wolf. I understand she was drawing over two feet more than her normal loaded draft when she left Kiel, and on getting safely through the blockade she encountered a very heavy series of gales in the North Atlantic, causing the vessel to labour heavily. This labouring strained her hull and topside and she dropped a good many rivets. As soon as she ran out of this bad weather repairs were made and all her topsides double riveted. Something like nine thousand rivets were driven, this work being done by her crew as the Wolf proceeded down the Atlantic. Among her mechanics she seemed to have representatives from almost every trade, and apparently an inexhaustible supply of materials for making repairs or new additions to her equipment.
Wolf was equipped with a triple expansion engine and three boilers and one auxiliary donkey boiler. Her power plant was unique in that she could steam seven knots per hour on a consumption of eighteen tons of coal per diem, and eleven and a half knots per hour, her maximum, on twenty-eight tons of coal per diem. I have heard it said that she had one of the most efficient power plants out of Europe, having a fuel consumption of 1.2 per I.H.P. Wolf was further equipped with a powerful searchlight, situated abaft the bridge, on a tower that could be raised or lowered at will. When not in use this light could not be seen above the top of the house. Wolf sailed from Kiel on November 21, 1916.
The Commander of the Wolf, Corvette Captain Nerger, of the Imperial German Navy, was a man of probably thirty-five years of age, of moderate height and slim build. He was immaculate in all things pertaining to his person, and was a strict disciplinarian. I was in Commander Nerger's quarters one day. I had visited him to thank him for the courtesy he had extended to my family and to myself, and found him a very agreeable man to talk to; a thorough gentleman and apparently anxious to do anything he could to make our lot bearable. In talking with him I found nothing to denote the arrogant Prussianism which is said to predominate in the higher branches of the German Navy.
And yet Commander Nerger was a man "all alone." He kept absolutely to himself; took no man into his confidence. No man ever knew an hour ahead what his plans or the vessel's plans were. He was the only one who knew when we started for home. On the fifteen months' cruise of the Wolf Nerger was in full charge and ran his vessel as a "one man ship." He lived in comfortable quarters on the boat deck, just under the bridge, and had his meals served in his private dining room. In the five months I was on the Wolf I do not think I saw him on the berth deck more than a dozen times, and then only on an inspection trip of some kind. He always had the appearance of having just stepped out of a bandbox, he was so immaculate in his dress. I was told by his officers that Nerger never gets excited; always remains cool under all circumstances. They tell a story of his being in command of a light cruiser in the battle off the Dogger Banks, and throughout this engagement he calmly passed back and forth on the bridge, with a cigar in his mouth, giving his orders as calmly as if at some gun practice or manœuvres. His officers and men all respected him, which to my mind is a good enough recommendation.
One of the peculiarities of the Wolf's cruise was that nobody, excepting the Commander, knew where she was going, when she was going, and how long she was to be away. The majority of the officers, thinking she would probably try to duplicate the raider Moewe's operations, took only enough clothes to last them about three months, and only augmented their supply from the various vessels captured. From one of the captured steamers they got several rolls or bolts of heavy dress goods, but unfortunately for them, they didn't have enough cotton thread to make them up into wearing apparel, although some of them, in more need than the rest, sewed their new suits with ordinary sail twine, similar to that which the grocer uses to tie up his parcels. The cloth was all dark goods, and it looked odd to see the coarse white string stitches against the dark background. Many of the suits were very well cut and fitted in the regular naval style.