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[Page 6]
attended in full dress uniform. That is the only case which they deserve credit.
This finished we steamed for the "Maldave Islands". The other ship with a prize crew on board following.
Below we were straightening things up from the afternoons happenings. We arrived at the "Maldave Islands" at midday on the 27th September and there the ship came alongside. I shall never forget the sight I saw then, my first grim realities of war. She was a Japanese Mail Boat named, "Hitachi Maru", one of the Nippon Yusen Kaisha line. Part of her stern was blown away, and there was blood and pieces of men all over the place. Where three Japs had been blown to pieces, the blood had been running into the scuppers. The decks were all torn with schrapnel, and there was a large hole blown in the deck on the starboard side, by a bomb from the seaplane. She also had half her funnel blown away by another bomb.
The reason of all the trouble was that the "Hitachi Maru" had a 4.7 gun on her poop, and when the "Wolf" fired the first shot, a gun crew was sent to man the gun, but they were killed or wounded by a shot from the "Wolf". Then another crew was sent up. But the same fate befel them. She then tried to use her wireless but another well directed shot put an end to this and killed the wireless operator. Then started a panic amongst passengers and crew. They manned the boats, but only half reached the water safely. The other half capsized before reaching the water. The total casualties on the Japs side were 15 killed and 35 wounded.
The Germans decided to keep the "Hitachi". So they began patching her up. She was finished on the 6th October, and the women and their husbands the men over sixty, and the boys under seventeed, were put on board her, and she was sent away with orders to meet the "Wolf" at a certain place on a certain date. Meanwhile we were given our boat stations in case we met anything. Had we have done so the Jap was to be blown up and every-