Iles war diary, 1914-1919 / G. H. Iles - Page 77
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[Page 77]
Bound East – she signalled to us press news and very soon she was lost sight of in the darkness Weather was still very beautiful and onward we speedily went to Colombo.
Nov 14th [1914] at noon we arrived at Colombo, and found numerous ships there, one of which was the Russian five funnelled cruiser "Askold" which together with the "Emden" had previously reported sunk in a battle to the finish of both in the Eastern Seas, but here she lay peacefully at anchor and very much alive. Numerous ships, now prizes of war and once German were also laying at anchor
As soon as we were secured we at once commenced to coal from lighters by natives and at 2 PM we took in oil At 6 P.M. a tremendous heavy thunder storm broke over the harbour, the likes of which I have never before witnessed - the rain was that thick and heavy that you could only see but a few yards ahead, and some of the peels of thunder was about 30 seconds duration at least
Nov 15th at 7.30 A.M. we finished coaling and at