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[Page 96]
then & there from downright thirst – as not even a biscuit could be found among them. Most of the men survivors had been wounded & one Officer had several bullets in his legs. He had been capsized out of one of the overturned boats, & how he managed to keep afloat long enough to be picked up remains was a miracle. There were 2 or 3 officers amongst the saved – the others were Indians & some of the vessel's Dago crew.
Nothing could be done but make for a barren bit of an island which loomed on the horizon. After a long & bitter struggle, the wet, clothed & sodden sodden clothed, starved & thirsty survivors reached the shore. They found it to be habited only by a few ignorant Greek shepherds with goats who treated them with marked hostility & refused them food. No explanation of their misery or condition would make the blasted Dagos give them any help. So they found snails on the beach & lived on them.
One of the Dago crew volunteered to take a message to a cable station which he knew some miles away & taking one of the boats he succeeded in reaching the island from where an urgent message was sent to the Authorities for assistance. A reply came that a cruiser would be despatched at once. The Greek brought the reply back to the stranded wretches & after they had showed it to the inhospitable Dago inhabitants, they reluctantly killed a couple of goats on which the hungry survivors made a ravenous meal. Evidently, the fear of what vengeance the cruiser might enact upon them on her arrival stirred the blighters to some give some kind of help.
The cruiser ultimately arrived – she was a foreigner unfortunately, but she afforded what help she could & took the unhappy them away to the nearest port where proper attention could be given. A remarkable incident of the voyage back was that the Dago Surgeon on the cruiser refused to amputate one of the legs of the officer who was bleeding to death from a jagged shell wound. When He agreed to give an