GERMANY IN THE PACIFIC

Feilding Star, Volume XI, Issue 2453, 22 September 1914, Page 1

GERMANY IN THE PACIFIC

OPERATIONS OF OUR FORCES. Sydney, September 21. Further news of the operations of the Australian fleet reached Sydney to-day. It states that the wireless station on the island of' Nauru has been destroyed, the two German civilian operators been taken prisoners and brought, to Sydney. At Apia a week ago shots were exchanged between a portion of the German Pacific fleet and the British troops. Very little damage was done. The Itaboul (New Guinea) natives are reported to be troublesome, and several conflicts have occurred with the Expeditionary Force stationed there. Mines were laid round- Raboul. During the fighting, thirteen natives of New Britain, under German officers, fought like maniacs, rushing right up to the Australian firing line. They showed no signs of fear. When the Australian ships took possession of Herbertshohe (German New Guinea), they used dumdums. Commander Elwell's body bore a hple largo enough to admit a cocoanut, caused by a jagged bayonet. The wireless station in the Caroline Islands has been destroyed. It is stated the Germans now have no installations in the Picific. The whereabouts of the enemy's cruisers Gncisenau, Scharnhorst, Nuremberg, Leipsic, and the gunboat Geir are known to the Australian fleet. Messages have been continually intercepted, and it is expected they will shortly be in dire straits, owing to the lack of coal. Suva has been thoroughly entrenched, in expectation of a siege, and every effort made to save the wireless sttation. In connection with the loss of the Australian submarine, it is supposed she struck a reef. Details of Dr. Pockley's death at Herbertshohe disclose that -he sacrificed his life for a wounded companion. As a member of the Medical Corps, he accompanied the landing party, and when the first encounter occurred he was attending a wounded sailor, and finding it necessary to send him to the rear he called a sailor and • ordered him to carry his mate into a safer position. To protect this man he took off his own Red Cross coat and wrapped it round him. lhe doctor then was attending to other wounded when he sustained a fatal revolver shot in his chest, allegedly fired by a German officer.