THIRTY YEARS AGO

Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 158, 4 June 1935, Page 2

THIRTY YEARS AGO

EXTRACTS FROM “STANDARD,” JUNE 4, 1905. Three damaged Russian vessels which hail survived the encounter with the Japanese fleet, had arrived at Manila with many wounded on board. Two vessels captured by the Japanese were being commissioned dor service. It, transpired that the Russian Admiral Diebogatoff’s crews wore largely recruited from the prisons. Some 140 hopelessly wounded mcm were thrown overboard from one Russian vessel in order not to hinder fighting operations. Admiral Rozhdestvensky, in charge of the Russian Fleet, was discovered wounded in a destroyer to which he had transferred after the sinking of his flagship. Captured Russian vessels were covered With moss below the water linos, and their guns were rusty, after their long voyage from the Baltic. Transports at Shanghai were to be interned. One of tlie reasons for the Russian defeat was the deplorable inaccuracy of their firing. Aforcover, many shells failed to explode. Almost every Japanese torpedo struck, one causing a Russian battleship to turn turtle. A Japanese expedition was starting for the island ot rtaglinlien The Dowager Empress of Russia’s name was at tlie head of a list of those condemned to death by terrorists. Riots had occurred in flic streets of St. Petersburg, ■where the Cossacks charged, using their swords.

A hurricane had wrecked a largo area in Natal. There was a water famine in Durban in consequence of the bursting of a reservoir.