“Neither the Liverpool nor the other small warship that had steamed to the work of rescue was capable of saving the superdreadnaught.
“It was decided that the Liverpool could better risk hitting a mine than could the Olympic, and for this reason the Liverpool made a serpentine maneuver ahead of the Olympic as a feeler for mines.
“Hardly had the Liverpool cut across our bow when the order was given to man the starboard lifeboats. Before this a call had been issued for volunteers.
“More answered than the boats could accommodate, and when it came time for action the Olympic’s crew actually fought to get into the boats, so eager were they to do something for their country and for the sailors on the doomed Audacious. When one of the boats hit the water they found in it a little bell boy, eleven years old, who carried messages to and from the purser’s office.[Pg 59]
“Although the starboard lifeboats were manned, Captain Haddock suddenly changed his plan.
“Instead of dropping down on the port side of the pounding warrior, he decided to put about and approach on the starboard side. By so doing he made a lee, which enabled the fourteen lifeboats dropped from the port side to accomplish a task that never could have been done if the original plan had been put into effect.
“The seas were high, and the men in the Olympic’s lifeboats had a hard pull. It took them twenty minutes to get over to the Audacious, which lay about five hundred yards away. We could see the crew at quarters. They were the calmest body of men I ever have seen. The discipline was perfect. Through the binoculars the captain of the Audacious was seen walking up and down the deck calmly, with his hands behind his back. The rescue work proceeded rapidly, and there was but one fatality.
“The Olympic dropped anchor off Lough Swilly at eight p. m. An hour later a tremendous flash lighted up the entire ship. We rushed to the deck and could see, for fully twenty seconds afterward, burning fragments shooting upward from the place where the Audacious had been. Then there came a roar. It sounded, they said, as if some mammoth boiler were letting off steam. It stopped as suddenly as it came. That was the end of the Audacious.
“As a reason for destroying the Audacious it was said that the battleship was hopelessly damaged, and that if not blown up it would become a menace to navigation.”