WAR MISCELLANY

Evening Post, Volume XCVI, Issue 156, 30 December 1918, Page 10

WAR MISCELLANY

FIGHTERS AND SERVERS

(FROM 00S OWN CORRESPONDENT..)

LONDON, 4th October

One of the most remarkable experiences of the waT is ?that o£., a British stoker petty officer, who escaped in a miraculous manner from one o£ our submarines which had sunk in home waters from an accidental cause. Alone, in almost complete darkness, with the gradually-rising water, receiving electric shocks, he worked on for nearly two hours, and ;it the seventh attempt at opening the hatch succeeded. Water was pouring in at the lower conning tower hatch in a mighty- volume, so^ that his chances of closing it were perfectly hopeless His only hope of escaping drowning was to shut' himself in the engineroom. Getting in, he closed the doors. A pilot lamp jjas the only .light, The effect' of the salt water on the. electric batteries was to generate chlorine gas, and the ai) was becoming overpowering. Practically everything he touched gave him a. shock. He tried to think of a mear.s of escape, and conceived the idea of opening the hatch and floating to the surface, but the tremendous pressure of the water* ontside prevented his moving it So to increase the pressure" inside he opened a valve and admitted more water. Then he opened the hatch, but it instantly closed to again. • With his shoulder lie lifted the hatch, but again it slammed to, crushing his fingers. He. once more opened the valve and .admitted water until the engineroom was flooded right up to the coaming of the ifiatch- The air in s*his confined space was undev tre,mendous pressure greater than thai of the water outside, so he was able to open the hatch and rise rapidly to the surface, where he was ,picked up by a destroyer. . THE, M'CUDDEN BROTHERS. The Military Cross awarded to the late Second-Lieutenant J. A. M'Cudden, P..A.F.,"a younger brother of.the famous Major J. T. Byforfd M'Cudden, V.C., was presented to his mother, Mrs M'Cudden, at Kingston Barracks. Second-Lieutenant M'Cudden was credited- with having brought down eleven enemy machines on the Western front. Mrs. M'Cudden's four sons havq all served In the R.A.F. The eldest son, Flight-Sergeant Pilot-In-structor W, T. J. M'Oudden, was killed while flying in England. Major M'Cudden, V.C., met his death in a flying accident- in France a few weeks ago, and Second-Lieutenant J A. M'Cudden was killed in action last spring. Th© youngest son also belongs to the R.A.F. BRITISH COLONEL WITH THE ARABS. Th« Echo de-Paris writes:—"Side by Bide with General Allenby and the French Colonel de Piepapa we must mention Colonel Lawrence as having played a part" of the greatest importance in the Palestine victory. The name of Colonel Lawrence, who placed, at the disposal of the British leader his experience of the country and his talent for organisation, will become historic in Great Britain. At the head of the cavalry force which he had formed with Bedtiins and Druses,' he cut the railway at Beraa, thus cuting the enemy communications between Damascus and Haifa and the western side of the Jordan. The troops of the King of the Hedjaz are co-operating with great skill and remarkable effect in these victorious operations against the Turks." BRITISH OFFICERKILLED Brevet-Lieut.-Col G. D Pike, M.C., Gurkha Rifles, is officially reported :to. have been accidentally killed at Vladikavkaz on 15tb August Colonel Pike accompanied his battalion from India to Franco with the Expeditionary .Force. He was-appointed British 'Military Agent in the Caucasus in January, 1918; During -.a fight between Cossadks and Bolshevists Colonel Pike, who had been requested by a Red Army officer to remain within the building to which he had been conducted for safety, proceeded to a window to observe the fighting, when he was struck in the head % a bullet, and died a few hours later /unconscious A brother officer who remained with him to the last expresses gratitude for the treatment received by them from the Red Army. ; The Army Council have expressed their deep regret at his untimely death, and state that he kept up the influence and prestige of the British Military Agency in spite of all kinds of difficulties. . V.C. ABSENTEE Lance-Corporal Arthur Henry Cross, V.C., M.M., was charged at »Dereham, Norfolk, with ' being absent from the Army without leave. Corporal Cross explained that after his investiture in London he "was granted leave to go and see his mother, at Shipham, where he was to receive a presentation from 'his native village. He admitted that he had no documentary proof; but adhered to his assertion that his.leave did riot aspire until midnight on Saturday. The'-presid-ing Magistrate said he saw no other alternative than to hand'lu'm over to the I military, although they- had tried to avoid doing so. Cross was then handed over to an escort. CARE OF OVERSEA SOLDIERS. Since the opening of the war 30,000 treatments have been given to wounded and invalided officers and men at the hot mineral baths at Bath. • In addition, nearly 80,000 treatments had been given to n.c.o.V and men at the Royal Mineral; Water • Hospital, with water from the city springs. FROM- ARMY *TO SHIPYARD. t , Up to the present about 13,000 skilled men have been transferred from the Army to tha shipyards. Tliey form part of the 2.0,000 whose* release for this national work of first importance was sanctioned by the War Cabinet in January. The process of release is hot so rapid as, perhaps, may have been expected. In the first place, the men it is proposed to restore to their trades have to be selected, and after that .they have to be found. With an army of millions, constantly j moving from place to place, it takes.some j time to fix the whereabouts of,- say, the one man required in every 300, and if at the end of each quest he. is found to be in France, it may be taken for granted that he remains there, for the time being. ■ Representatives s have picked out men from the armies in Egypt, Palestine, Salonika,, and India? • and still the shipyards call for more men Skilled workers who may dribble through the hospitals at Home come within reach of the Admiralty- representatives, who know from details given- on enlistment which soldiers are likely'to meet their requirements. . . : A GUILD FOR* AIRMEN Cardinal Bourne, preaching at tile Church of' St. Michael, Ashford, on tlie inauguration of the Guild of St Michael for Airmen,, said jit was fitting that this new and potent weapon, and those who wielded it, should be placed under the special patronage of one who stood near to the Throne of God, the great Archangel St. Michael. There was, ever before us the thought. ofi that tremendous conflict which took place once in the heavens—St. Michael and hia angels do : ing battle with the dragons; with .Lucifer and his'angels, the fight between the powers of Good and Evil. To-day we witnessed a'war of principle, not a war of conquest,. not a war so much for dominion., not a war for dynasty, but a wa.r between two contending" sets of principles, and we believed in our. consciences that in the main we and those vh ° «« flgnttaff with as wevu detn« *.b*Ms iwr-prißfipJja t&t jveifl . .right '

and true according to the mind of God Himself, VOTES BY POST. A. White Paper has been issued by the Local Government Board explaining the,methods that have been adopted in •rranging, under the Representation of. the People Act, 1918, for the registration of absent voters and for the recording of their votes by post, or, the appointing of proxies to vote on their behalf. Absent votere will ordinarily record their votes by post oxt ballot papers^ During the war, and for 12 months afterwards, a period riot exceeding oight days may be required to elapse between the close of the poll and the time at which the votes will be counted. In the case of naval or military,, voters engaged abroad in Red Cross or other recognised war work, the organisations with whom the voters are serving have agreed to receive the cards and forward them to the voters THE SPAGNUM HARVEST Spagnum moss for surgical _ dressings is gathered on Dartmoor and in Ulster, but specially in Scotland. In the early days of the war Lieutenant-Colonel C. W. Cfrthca'rt established a committee in Edinburgh to provide the mce's.fdr such military hospitals as cared to have it, and, owing to the increased demand, a joint committee, representing the Department of the Director-General of Voluntary Organisations and the Scottish branch of the Red Cross Society, was formed to organise the gathering and mechanical cleaning of moss on a* large scale. Scotland was divided into.. four large gathering areas, with centres for storing, making up, and distributing the finished dressings. Near . Stirling the workers are housed and fed in tra veiling caravans. In Perthshire the

Thike of Atholl has lent several of hk shooting lodges for the accommodation of voluntary gatherers, and in Aberdeenshire, • Banffsnire, Ross-shire, Inverness shire and the Orkney and Shetland Islands enormous quantities of moss have been gathered '—even on the Sabbath—parish ministers exhorting their flocks to worship on the moors and spend the remainder of the day in moss-gathering.