THE TURKISH NAVY

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 60, 8 September 1914, Page 7

THE TURKISH NAVY

DISLIKES PROSPECT OF WAR ( COEIEN AND BRESLAU BEING REPAIRED. (Received September 8, 8 a.m.) CONSTANTINOPLE, 7th September. The Goeben and the Breslau are lying in the Gulf of Ismid, in the Sea of Marmora, repairing. Turkish naval officers decline to participate in the war, which is inexpedient, as far as the navy is concerned, despite the presence of 2000 German officers and men in the fleet. A hundred and fifty German officers have arrived in Turkey via Roumania. They boarded a steamer at San Stephano, for a secret destination. [The Goeben, one of Germany's most powerful Dreadnought cruisers (22,640 tons, 27 knots), was caught with the Breslau, a light cruiser of equal speed, in the Mediterranean at the outbreak of hostilities. Wild rumours came about both ships being captured, but eventually — after a long flight through the Mediterranean, in which the Breslau was engaged in a stern chase by the British cruiser Gloucester and damaged— both German Warships turned up at Constantinople in friendly Turkish waters. Had not the British Mediterranean fleet been engaged in convoying French transports across from Algeria .to Marseilles, the two German cruisers would undoubtedly have been captured. As it is, they have been a source of trouble in Turkish waters ever since, and diplomacy has been much exercised about them. Officially it has been announced that they have, been Sold to Turkey, but the German engineers were retained, ostensibly to look after the turbines, but probably to make repairs also. The Gulf of Ismid is the easternmost gulf in the Sea of Marmora, a few miles south of Constantinople.]