Ambassador Gerard has telegraphed to the Department of State the following memorandum from the German Foreign Office relative to the damaging of the American steamer Nebraskan by a German submarine:
"The German Government received from newspaper reports the intelligence that the American steamer Nebraskan had been damaged by a mine or torpedo on the southwest coast of Ireland. It therefore started a thorough investigation of the case without delay, and from the result of the investigation it has become convinced that the damage to the Nebraskan was caused by an attack by a submarine.
"On the evening of May 25 last the submarine met a steamer bound westward without a flag and no neutral markings on her freeboard, about 65 nautical miles west of Fastnet Rock. No appliance of any kind for the illumination of the flag or markings was to be seen. In the twilight, which had already set in, the name of the steamer was not visible from the submarine. Since the commander of the submarine was obliged to assume from his wide experience in the area of maritime war that only English steamers, and no neutral steamers, traversed the war area without flag and markings, he attacked the vessel with a torpedo, in the conviction that he had an enemy vessel before him. Some time after the shot the commander saw that the vessel had in the meantime hoisted the American flag. As a consequence, he, of course, refrained from any further attack. Since the vessel remained afloat, he had no occasion to concern himself further with the boats which had been launched.
"It results from this that without a doubt that attack on the steamer Nebraskan was not meant for the American flag, nor is it traceable to any fault on the part of the commander of the German submarine, but is to be considered an unfortunate accident. The German Government expresses its regret at the occurrence to the Government of the United States of America and declares its readiness to make compensation for the damage thereby sustained by American citizens."
Results of Submarine Warfare
LIVERPOOL’S EXPERIENCE
A London cable dispatch to The New York Times, dated London, July 8, said:
Nearly 20,000 vessels have entered or left the port of Liverpool since the German submarine blockade began. This, said Sir A. Norman Hill, Secretary of the Liverpool Steamship Owners' Association, speaking at Liverpool yesterday, showed that the Germans had failed in their attempt to blockade British ports.
On these 20,000 voyages the Germans had captured or destroyed only twenty-nine ships, he continued. What did that represent? Ships which had sailed in and out of Liverpool had completed in safety 998 out of every 1,000 voyages upon which they started. That was a magnificent record, he held, of perils faced and overcome.