CHAPTER XIV
THE THREE TORPEDOED CRUISERS

[Within a few minutes, on the morning of Tuesday, September 22nd, 1914, three large British cruisers, sister ships, foundered in the North Sea, after being torpedoed by German submarines, and nearly 1,500 officers and men perished. The ships were the Aboukir, Cressy and Hogue. Each was of 12,000 tons, with a speed of twenty-two knots, and each cost £750,000. The vessels were fine warships, but almost obsolete, and before the war it had been decided to sell them out of the Navy. The Aboukir was torpedoed, and while the Hogue and Cressy had closed, and were standing by to save the crew, they also were torpedoed. All three ships speedily sank. The boats were filled, and, later, destroyers and other vessels came up and rescued many of the survivors, amongst whom was C. C. Nurse, an able seaman of the Hogue, whose story is here retold. The casualties were very heavy; but, said the Admiralty, the lives lost were “as usefully, as necessarily, and as gloriously devoted to the requirements of his Majesty’s service as if the loss had been incurred in a general action.”]

The three cruisers, sister ships, were on patrol duty in the North Sea early on the morning of September 22nd. They were alone, protecting our own merchant ships and on the look-out for vessels that were mine-laying. The weather was nice, with a rather heavy swell on the water. There had been plenty of bad weather, and this was the first good day we had had for a week.

I had done my twelve years in the Navy and had been called up from the Royal Fleet Reserve. We had settled into our stride and had been in at the tail-end of the scrap in the Heligoland Bight, where the Hogue got hold of the Arethusa and towed her away. At that time the Arethusa had been commissioned only about two days. We knew that she was just beginning her life; but we little thought that the Hogue was ending hers.

It was my watch below, and I was asleep in my hammock when the bugles sounded the réveillé, and we were shaken up and told that one of our ships was going down. We had turned in all standing, and lost no time in rushing on deck. Then I saw that the Aboukir, which was about six hundred yards away, was heeling over, and that we were steaming up to her assistance. At first we thought she had been mined; but we quickly learned that she had been torpedoed by German submarines. We were very soon alongside of her, and were doing everything we could to save the survivors. It was very clear that she was sinking, that a good many of the crew had been killed by the explosion, and that a lot of men, who were far below, in the engine-room and stokeholds, would have no chance of escaping.

We instantly started getting out the few boats that were left in our ship. There were only three, because we were cleared for action, and as it was war-time the great majority of them had been taken away. This has to be done so that there shall be as little woodwork as possible to be splintered by shells. With extraordinary speed some of the Aboukir’s men had got to the Hogue, and some, who were badly hurt, had been taken to the sick-bay and were being attended to. The attack had come swiftly, and it was for us the worst of all attacks to guard against; but there was nothing like panic anywhere, and from the calmness of things you might have thought that the three ships were carrying out some ordinary evolution.

I was standing on the starboard side of the after-shelter-deck of the Hogue, and could see a great deal of what was going on. With remarkable smartness and speed our two lifeboats were got away to the Aboukir, our men pulling splendidly on their life-saving errand. Our main derrick, too, was over the side and had got the launch out. The launch was a big rowing-boat, which would hold about a hundred men, and not a second had been lost in getting her afloat under the direction of Lieutenant-Commander Clive Phillipps-Wolley. He worked the derrick to get the launch out, though he was not in the best of health, and only a little while previously he had been ill in his bunk. He was near me on the after-bridge, which was above the shelter-deck, and I saw and heard him giving orders for the getting out of the launch. That was the last I knew about him. He was one of the lost.

The launch was afloat, and the men were ready to hurry up to the Aboukir; but before she could get away the very deck under my feet was blown up. There was a terrific explosion, and a huge column of wreckage rose. I was stunned for a moment by the force of the explosion. I thought we had been mined; but almost instantly there was a second explosion under me, and I knew that we had been torpedoed. The Hogue had been badly holed, and she began to heel over to starboard immediately.