DOVER PATROL

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 October 1929, Page 3

DOVER PATROL

THRILLING EXPERIENCES. SYDNEY, September 30. A thrilling account of the activities of the Dover Patrol during the war, and also of the victorious encounter of the destroyers Swift and Broke with six German destroyers, which made him famous as “Evans of the Broke” or “Broke Evans,” was given by Rear-Admiral Evans in a lecture broadcast from 2FC last evening. “We, in the destroyers, patrolled the Belgium coast at night, and, closing into the shore, had a splendid view of the burning houses and bursting projectiles as the two opposing armies made battle in the darkness,” RearAdmiral Evans said. “It was all unutterably weird and sad to watch the devastation of the Flanders seaside resorts. I shall never forget the red flashes of the exploding shells and the uncanny flames that showed through the battered windows of the poor Belgians’ abandoned homes.” Admiral Evans gave an amusing description of the destroyer Viking, in which, as commander, he bagged his first enemy submarine. “She was a sort of freak ship with six funnels, and if ever I did anything wrong, and that was pretty often, I was given away by those six funnels,” he said. “Although we were fitted with the most primitive anti-submarine devices, including a sort of Heath Robinson arrangements, we managed to get the submarine. “The Admiralty were so delighted that we had sunk a submarine with this funny Heath Robinson contraption that the D.S.M. was awarded to the man who pressed the electric button and blew up the submarine. He certainly deserved it, for it was an achievement equal in magnitude to the slaying of a lion with the jawbone of an ass. “It was usually a thankless task, this submarine hunting business, when we were so deficient in arms to meet them with,” he added. “But the Admiralty devised more and more schemes; and although it was not before 1917, we fairly put the fear of God into all but the most valorous of the pirate submarine skippers.” After describing the famous . Broke engagement, Admiral Evans said that his men soon got over the annoyance with the Germans whose destroyer opened fire after they had surrendered; and soon after dawn when no enemy vessels were in. sight he came down from the bridge to tell his men exactly what had happened; but when he entered the forecastle he found the British sailors so keenly interested, m giving their German prisoners a fried egg and bacon breakfast that he pocketed his little speech of explanation and returned to the bridge.

“I suppose we enjoyed ourselves after our fashion,” he concluded. “There was plenty of excitement. We did our best, and what we really fought, with our funny, old-fashioned ships, could best be described as a naval war in miniature.”