PEN-PICTURES OF WAR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVII, Issue 36, 10 February 1906, Page 9

PEN-PICTURES OF WAR.

a THE TTRST SHOT AT PORT ARTHUR. BY ONE WHO SAW IT FIRED. (From Our Special Correspondent.) LONDON, December 29. By the courtesy of the author I am enabled to give some extracts from the advance proofs of an article which Mr Francis McCullagh is contributing' to the '•'American Press" on "The First Shot of the Russo-Japanese Wax." Mr McCullagh, as war correspondent of the "New York Herald," was aboard the British merchant steamer Columbia, lying in the outer harbour of Port Arthur, ■when Togo's attack on the Russian port ushered in the great war tragedy with such dramatic suddenness. He not only saw the first shot fired, but by astonishing good luck he was present in the thick of the bombardment, escaped unhurt in the Columbia to Chrfn, and was the first journalist to give the world the momentous news. It -was one of the greatest "scoops" in journalism, and Mr McCullagh's graphic and vivid narrative does justice to the tremendous tragedy' he was privileged to witness. Told -sinrpry and directly, without any -ft-i-Prg after effect* At gr-fss a- most

impressive picture of modern naval warfare and of tbe sensations which his thrilling indnced. The first shot of the war was the first intimation to those on the Columbia that war had been declared. Like the garrison of Port Arthur, they were taken completely by surprise. On the night before an air of perfect peace and quiet pervaded tbe dark waters of the bay, and the sailors on the Russian warships were chanting their evening hymn at the very hour when, only twelve miles from land, Togo's destroyers were sweeping round in a big semi-circle, like a hawk circling above its prey before making the final swoop. Mr McCullagh went to bis cabin and sat down to finish a newspaper article, in which he laid it down as a fnndamentaj axiom that the Japanese would never attack Port Arthur! A profound trance seemed to hold sea and land. And all the time, closer, closer, straight towards them at full speed, came the torpedo-boats"*of Togo. At exactly 11.30 p__L,.tbo correspondent heard three muffled explosions, which made the Cohunbia. rock, and which were followed immediately by the discharge of small guns. The wild thought, The Japanese are on us!" rushed through his brain, but in another instant the idea was * scouted as fantastic and impossible. So thought all the ship's officers, and when at daylight they saw two Russian warships rying disabled at the karbour mouth they n_______»asry agreed that tha yesfce_»ia _»B__Kra tjmjstg

the night. As for the firing, that was set down as gun-practice from the forts. About 6-30 next morning a Russian officer came aboard with orders forbidding the Columbia to leave port or to enter the inner harbour. He seemed very agitated, but said nothing about the night's occurrences. It was not until the light grew stronger, and the watchers on the Columbia saw three Japanese cruisers lying five miles out to sea, that the truth burst upon them. "I was thundeTstruck," said Mr McCullagh. "A tremendous electric shock seemed to go through mc. I dropped the telescope. My breath left mc. The deck sank beneath my feet. I was as one alone in interplanetary space, receiving an appalling supernatural revelation." An hoar later sixteen Japanese warvessels appeared in a long dark grey lino on the horizon, five miles away. The three cruisers had disappeared some time before. Meanwhile the Russians ordered the Columbia to move further across the bay, as a cruiser required her berth. THE FIRST SHOT. "At ILIS there was a big bright flash from the starboard side of the Mikasa, then about five miles distant, and immediately after a vast, invisible something rushed over the mast-bead of the Columbia with the mighty sound of a railway train hurled into space, and everyone on board, from the cook who had deserted his galley to the caphad not yet left off swe-uring, dnckssL a"w_»___-*u_r.

"It was the first shot of the RussoJapanese War! The table had been overturned, the diplomatic chess-board kicked across the room, and one of the armed players had jumped to his feet and smitten the other on the face! "The detonation came some seconds after, and about the same time a big shell, which, I should say, was a 12-inch one, burst with a terrific roar in the small space of sea intervening between the torpedoed battleships and the group of torpedo-boat destroyers. "The report of this gun was like the report of a pistol fired into a powder magazine, for it provoked a terrific reply. The Russian batteries thundered like gods hurling a tremendous anathema at some sacrilegious intruder. Golden Hill fort howled in gigantic remonstrance. The electric battery bellows forth thunder. On the middle batteries there was a deafening, interminable chorus of cannon. The guns on Wieyuen fort and Tiger's tail erupted like active volcanoes. Spouts of smoke poured from Ldao-tau-shan, where smokeless powder did not seem to be used; and at intervals White Wolf Hfjl joined with a crash of artillery in this prodigious litany. That noise seemed too great to be terrestrial; it pertained to the solar system. It was as if the seven thunders had uttered their voices. It was as if the five thousand isles of- Japan were hurling themselves on us bodily It was as if the earth had come into" common with Mara. With the voicea .ww

A STUPENDOUS CANNONADE. j "It was difficult to measure things that pass all limit of measurement. It is difficult for a great writer, and im- ' possible for a minor journalist, to give in writing an idea of what far trans- j scends the ordinary. Nobody can get from books an accurate idea of the ocean, the Pyramids, the Himalaya mountains, the Grand Canon of the Colorado. He must go and see them for himself. And nobody that has not heard a great cannonade can understand what it is from books. It towers above ordinary noises, as Fujiyama towers above the hovels of Hakone*. What peculiarly struck mc about it was its quality of stupendous and overwhelming vastness. But the supreme limit of noise had not been reached, for whenever the 63-ton guns at the entrance to the harbour went off altogether with a vast shout like the crack of doom, all the lesser thunders were drowned; and through the air ran a giant, rending sound and a violent vibration, almost strong enough to knock mc off my feet as I stood on the deck of the Columbia. On such occasions my knees smote one against another, and I felt inclined to throw myself prostrate on my face, as if I had heard the voice of Jehovah. "The Japanese did not pause to contemplate the effect of their first shell. All their vessels now opened fire, running south-west in a stately line. The air was filled with.the whizz of highlyvelocity projectiles, hundreds of which passed over our heads every minute; the surface of the sea in our neighbourhood was dotted with columns of water, as the surface of a pond is dotted during a heavy rain-storm; and the din was intensified ten-fold. THE BRITISH FLAG. "The Columbia was now moving, but, of course, I expected she would soon anchor again.. . . We were so close to the beach tha. I could have thrown a stone ashore, and were still going south. I wondered vaguely why we had not yet anchored, but was afraid to ask the captain, as he was now absolutely unapproachable. Besides, what did it matter 1 We could no more expect to escape these thick-falling shells than a man standing outside in a thunderstorm can expect to escape the drops of rain. "The skipper had now hoisted his biggest British ensign to the mast-head. 'God d n them,' said he in a surly tone, speaking more to himself than to ns, and jerking his thumb upwards, while in his eyes there burned a lurid light which I took at the time to be the light of insanity. 'God d n them, let them fire on that-'. "It seemed to mc to be one of those childish but infinitely mystic and significant things -which, all unconsciously, dying men sometimes do. Did the captain want to go down under the old flag? Did he think, for drowning men grasp at straws, that the Japanese might refrain from firing on that flag out of friendship, or the Russians out of fear? H the former were the case he was mistaken, for the Japanese projectiles continued to fall very close. One fragment of shell made a small hole in the deck forward, another fragment tore the flag. "Before the engagement began I had been reflecting with exultation that there was a chance of my getting to Chefoo before any other war correspondent; but when the shells began to sing through the air and raise huge pillars of water before, behind, and close to'both sides of the ship, I forgot all about the matter, or if I reflecled on it at all, it was only to curse my luck at falling in-a fight which was not mine. For I regarded myself as already doomed. I thought of writing a farewell letter to one dear friend: but the reflection that letters never find their way from the bottom of the deep made mc stop after the first few words. "What annoyed mc most was the uselessness of my death. To die for a great cause is glorious. To die as a combatant on board one of these warvessels would be an honour. "I felt, oddly enough, that if I had died as a regularly attached correspondent on board one of the Russian battleships, I would have been satisfied. Even if I had knowingly, willingly, sailed into the fray on board the Columbia, the project of death -would not have been so horrible. But it was by the merest accident that I had got caught in this whirlwind of great events, that I had got mixed up in this gigantic contest of empires. Any fool might have done the same. I ardently longed to get outside the danger zone so that I could bid my friends good-bye with a sad, sad smile, and then sail back again to meet my fate. FATE'S IRONY. "But in truth my death was going to be miserable. A non-combatant, struck by a stray shell while running away from the fight on hoard a harmless merchant steamer—Good heavens, what a fate! I looked into the engine-room and was surprised at the regularity with which the cranks and connecting rods were doings-heir duty. I looked around generally, and it occurred to mc that the Columbia had shrunk to the dimensions of a row boat. Compared with the iron leviathans who were battling around her in smoke and toe she resembled a pet lamb that has got mixed up in a bullfight. "I have a dim remembrance of moving about the ship with inconceivable rapidity. I fancied that if I remained still for a second a shell would surely fall on top of mc. First of all I went aft as far as I could. I don't know why I went aft, but I had a kind of vague idea that if the front part of the ship were blown away I could hang on to the rear. Here I found chief-engineer Smith, his face of a pallor which moved mc more than eloquence, one side of it splashed with powder or some black stuff shot up by a shell that had burst near the screw, and the other side glistening with perspiration. "Mr Smith did not even seem to hear the banal, consolatory remark I addressed to him; but in spite of his glassy stare and very preoccupied manner, he showed that he was aware of my presence by telling mc, in extremely emphatic language, the sort of fool I was for not having gone ashore in the doctor's boat. "There was always present in my mind the terrible certainty that there was no longer any cover, no more protection. A glance at the terrific splashes made by the shell that fell around showed mc that, if one of these formidable missilefell on the Columbia, all was avex with us. "Yet, in spite of this, I must say that I always breathed more freely for a second or so. after I had got behind something, no matter what it was. I also bad at times the strongest possible inclination to go below, to get down to the very keel of the ship, to go through the- keel if possible, to dive to the bottom of the sea, coming up for breath in the intervals between the shells. . . . "Between the cabins aft and .those forward there is an open space, and I snd_d___tg iwfc-jt ints asgg head b>. tnw-txso

this space. in order to join the other officer?, who had all gathered at the other extremity of the boat. I did so, running as quickly as my legs could carry me° as if I Were running from one certain shelter to another, and might be caught . half-way across if I did not hurry. Of ! course, I did not reason about the matter. My legs simply ran off with mc. .. . "On my reaching the ■shelter' of the forward set of cabins. 1 found, in the unprotected space in front of them, that is, in the extreme bows, the captain and the rest of the officers grouped together, wild-eyed, pallid, and silent. The quartermaster was at the wheel. . . . PROFANITY STOPS A MUTINY. "I decided to stick to the captain. At the same time I began to conceive an intense animosity for the Japanese in general, and for Admiral Togo in particular, for how can one retain his good opinion of people who are throwing 12----inch shells at him? I thought it vile, treacherous. 'Oh, won't I 'roast' them in tfce 'Herald' if ever I get out of this!' I told the captain what I would do, but did not catch his reply, for at that instant a shell exploded with a tremendous detonation right under the bow, splashing the deck with water and making the gallant little craft first baulk like a horte, and then tremble violently from stem to stern. Everybody's face grew a shadle whiter, and with a shiver that penetrated to the marrow of my bones I caught the dreadful words, 'contact mine.' The faces of the Chinese sailors grew livid, and it looked as if they would rush overboard, carrying the rest of us along with them. "I ran into my cabin, and remember feeling astonished and hurt for the millioncth part of a second on perceiving that things were just as I had left them on getting up in the morning—toothbrush, soiled water in the I bed unmade, pyjamas lying on the floor, I half-smoked cigarette on the ash-tray, enlarged photograph of captain's wife beaming at the head of the bed. ... "Glancing mechanically at the lookingglass, I was horrified to see ' reflected therein a face that was not my face at all, but that of a disinterred corpse. Then a terrific, vicious whiz-z-z-z-z overhead made mc suddenly bury my head in the bed clothes and stop my ears with my fingers; but hardly had I done so than an uncontrollable desire to get outside into the open air seized upon mc. I felt that if I remained in that cabin a second longer I would snmther. I felt that if I joined some group or knot of men I would be safe. Accordingly I fled fr«vf the cabin like one pursued by the fur.c*~ I went so quickly that I might have gone overboard bad I noj; heard the captainsay at that moment in his usual tones to his Chinese 'boy,' who was standing white-lipped beside him, and dressed, for some reason or other, in his best silk gown: "Boy, bring mc some cigarettes! Hurry up! D you! !! !!!!!! !!!!' whereupon the boy's tense face relaxed, as if he had been instantaneously cured of some painful malady, and he went away, smiling and assuring his panicstricken countrymen, who were bunched behind him in the attitudes of men about to go mad, that it was all right. The skipper's lurid blasphemies had saved us from a mutiny. SAFE AT LAST. "After forty minutes of the sort of experience that I have been trying to describe, the Columbia got clear of the rival fleets. For some time after we had got' out of reach of the shells we still felt uneasy, for a shot from the forts or a Russian torpedo boat might still overtake us; b-it at last the battling iiavie* "arid'the, headlands of Port Arthur sauts below the.' horizon, and we were safe, The change was so sudden that for some tiihe I had difficulty in remembering who and where I was. The air was so rarefied and the silence so profound, that I wondered if we were not floating in the clouds above the highest peak of the Cordilleras. My voice sounded singularly small, as if it were not I that was speaking but a diminutive person inside mc, and, owing to the drumming in my ears I could not for some moments hear anybody else. I had a vague idea of having seen the skipper before. It must have been about a thousand years before. I wondered what he had been doing in the meantime. At present he was concocting a bowl of marvellous and potent punch- With Chinese unconcern the waiter was laying the table for luncheon. Good heavens! It was only half-past one o'clock, and all these things had happened during the last four hours! The officers were affectionately examining the ship, just as you examine a favourite horse which has run away, smashed things and had thrilling and admirable adventures. The barefooted Celestial crew were picking up twisted'fragments of projectiles with the happy smiles of children gathering shells by the sea-shore. A dim, faraway voice told the captain about his flag having been torn by a projectile. The captain did not curse. He smiled tolerantly, saying, 'No matter! Haul it down, and let's have a look at the old. rag!' We drank to the health of the rival fleets and of each member of tha British Royal Family. . . . THE HARBOUR LIGHTS. "I shall never forget the delight witH which I saw again in the distance the calm harbour lights of Chefoo. An age of horrors seemed- to have elapsed since I had seen them last. The captain, anchored afar off, alongside a- Russian steamer, which, in blissful ignorance of all that had 'just occurred was getting ready to proceed to Port Arthur with a cargo of cattle. He then sent mc ashore in the ship's boat, so that I could send off my wire before any of the correspondents in Chefoo got the news. It was an hour's long rowing before we reached the pier; and thep, though the boat with the Chinese crew immediately pushed off again, leaving only mc and tho chief officer of the Columbia op the land, a few quick sing-song monosyllables which passed between the men in the boat and the pig-tailed loungers about the quay betrayed our secret to the keen Celestial merchants of the town, and within an hour the Russian rouble had fallen to depths such as it had never before fathomed. "As I hurried towards the telegrapK office I laughed hilariously at the utter, sleepliness and respectability of this staid little outport, which reminded mc strongly of an obscure village in England on a wet Sunday afternoon, for I knew that I carried news that would; stir it like an earthquake. The telegraph office was as silent as a ehnrclon a week day. An invisible clock ticked loudly, and an old woman was explaining a small telegram to a pale, boredlooking clerk, who gazed at mc reproachfully when I came in, judging doubt_es3 from my appearance that I was dnrnk. In ten minutes more that clerk rushed: out from his sajjetum with flushed faca and gripped mc in silence by the hand. I wound up that night in the Japanese Consulate, where Commander Mori, of the Imperial Japanese Navy, was displaying to an enthusiastic audience a British flag torn to rags by a shell. It was the flag which had fluttered at tho masthead, of the CohnnbU, d-Lher m_4 aoo j-cwa fort Artlmr.T - v