LAST TO LEAVE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20623, 26 November 1941, Page 3

LAST TO LEAVE

ARK ROYAL CAPTAIN DOWN SIDE ON ROPE CHEERS BY SHIP'S CREW (Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (British Olfieial Wireless.) Reed. 9 a.m. RUGBY, Nov. 24. How the captain of the Ark Royal was cheered as he left the ship last of all is told by a petty officer who was the last man •to come up from the engine-room and abandoned the aircraft-carrier with Captain Maund some hours after the majority of the ship’s company left the Ark Royal. He describes how. after the torpedoing, most of the ship’s company were taken away from the anchor deck or to a destroyer which was skilfully manoeuvred alongside the aircraftcarrier. The engineer petty officer, who was asked to collect volunteers to go to the engine-room, said: "I got six volunteers. Then we had to get permission from the captain to go below. I went down first and the others followed. We raised steam. We managed to get. two dynamos running. That got eight pumps working. We Ihcn managed to get two degrees off the list of 19 degrees that the ship had at this time. After, however, it was seen that she was gradually going over all the while. “At approximately 3 o'clock in the morning she had listed so much that the water ran out of the feed tanks and we could not keep the boilers going. We had to shut down. Then we were all in darkness. Oil ran down into the furnaces and caught alight. We put the fire out. “An engineer officer stayed down, there to the last. The ship had a list of 241 degrees. We had to go up three decks, climbing like monkeys in the dark, getting heavy doors open on the way. With some others I was overcome by the fumes, but we managed to get to the top. Five hands came to help us. We had to crawl along the upper deck." Describing how Captain Maund left the ship, he said: “We went down the side of the ship on a rope. The last man to leave was the captain. As he went down over the side at about 4.30 a.m., they put a small searchlight on him. All of the ship’s company and survivors of the old Ark Royal in the destroyers cheered him. He went down the side of the ship on a rope and got into a boat. Two hours later the Ark Royal sank.”