SMUGGLERS USE DESTROYER.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19153, 9 November 1927, Page 11

SMUGGLERS USE DESTROYER.

CAUGHT BY PATROL SHIP. CHASE ON BALTIC COAST. (BT CABLE—-PBE3S ASSOCIATIOS— COPTBIOHT.) (AUSTRALIA* AXD K.S. CAB LI ASSOCIATION.) (Received November Bth, 7.30 p.m.) RIGA, November 7. At the height of the gale, the Lithuanian patrol ship. President Smetona, sighted a vessel acting suspiciously on the Baltic coast and, on approaching her, recognised the stranger as a former German destroyer, which failed to answer her signals and, owing to her superior speed, escaped. Later some coastguards sighted and fired on the destroyer, apparently crippling n ei engines, for she surrendered to the Smetona as soon as the later liove in • V .1 The Smetona put a prize crew aboaid and later discovered that they had captured a desperate gang of smugglers who, for months past, had succeeded in landing big cargoes of spirits on the Lithuanian and Latvian coasts. The Smetona commenced towing the pri/.e to port, but the hawser parted and the destroyer foundered with the Lithuanians aboard. Hans Hofmeister, the captain of the bootleggers, was the sole survivor and was washed ashore in an unconscious condition. The coast was strewn with wreckage and casks of spirits. Hofmeister. who has recovered, says the destroyer was the Hafenbier, formerly of Danzig.