DOMINION'S NAVY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22404, 28 April 1936, Page 8

DOMINION'S NAVY

ffHE CRUISER ACHILLES NAME WITH A HISTORY SOME FAMOUS PREDECESSORS [from a special correspondent] LONDON. April 4 H.M.S." Achilles, which was commissioned at, Chatham on March 31 for service as flagship of the New Zealand squadron, is ; the ninth man-of-war to bear the. name, which goes back for two centuries and has an honoured place in naval history. A predecessor, the sixth 'Achilles, took part in the Battle of Trafalgar. The Achilles engaged the Montanez am}> when she sheered off, took on the Argonauta and silenced her. but could not take possession. Having exchanged broadsides with her trench namesake, she passed to the Berwick. 'After an hour's fighting, the French ship hauled , down her colours and was captured. The Achilles casualties were 13 killed and 59 wounded. The seventh Achilles was one of Vice- ' Admiral Hornby's squadron of six ships which passed through the Dardanelles in 1878 to protect British interests at Constantinople during the RussianTurkish war. Four years later this ship arrived at Alexandria after the bombardment. Her captain, Edward Kelly, became the head of the Transport Service and her crew assisted in the occupation of the town. The last Achilles was an armoured cruiser of 13,550 tons, built at Elswick and launched in 1905. Her armament Was six 9.2-inch and four 7.5-inch guns and her 23,000 horse-power engines gave a speed of 23 knots. Commissioned in 1907, she was. employed in the Home Fleet. At the outbreak of war the Achilles, tinder the c6mmand of Captain A. L. Cay, was at sea. On August 1 the Admiralty had received information that three German transports had passed the Great Belt, and the First "Battle Cruiser Squadron, under ViceAdmiral Beatty, with five cruisers,- including the Achilles, was ordered to sea at full speed on the evening of "'August 3 to cruise off the Fair Isle Channel. In Action with German Raider The Achilles was unfortunately in Idock at the time of the Battle of Jutland, but. nine months later took part in an epic action with a German raider. In March, 1917, the Achilles, under the command of Captain F. M. Leake, with the armed boarding steamer DunCommander Selwyn M. Day, H.N.R., was ordered to patrol north of the Shetland Isles. On the 16th, a bleak and cheerless day, with a bitter southeast wind, biting rain and snow squalls, a steamer was sighted just before noon. The Achilles gave chase and ordered the Dundee to follow, but it took two Lours to overtake the steamer, which bore the name of Bena and was flying the Norwegian flag. Eventually she stopped when ordered and obeyed a signal to turn towards the Dundee. Captain Leake ordered the Dundee to board her—the normal routine—and Lieutenant F. H. Lawson, R.N.R., proceeded alongside by boat. Commander Day, who was very suspicious, manoeuvred' his ship to a bearing from which he could use his two 4-inch guns to advantage. His position was a dancus one because, if the quarry proved to /he a raider, a broadside would mean destruction. ' The Achilles was nearly four miles away Tvhen, after much jockeying, the Eena disclosed her real identity by firing two torpedoes at the Dundee, hardly twenty yards away. Commander Day immediately opened fire and at the short range every shot found its mark. The raider drew away and then turned to engage the Dundee, whose shrewd icaptain countered the move and avoided a deadly broadside. The Achilles now opened fire and .Within five minutes of the Dundee's first salvo was hitting the enemy. A doomed vessel, for nearly an hour her crew withstood the hail of shell without any r sign of surrender, and then, belching forth smoke, spluttering with fire and her fore-part red hot, she with all hands. p There were no survivors, and unfortunately, Lieutenant Lawson and the boarding boat's crew, who were probably made prisoners on arriving on board, perished with the Germans. A Record Passage By August, 1917, ocean escorts were necessary for seven regular Atlantic convoys and the main burden fell on Great Britain. The Second Cruiser Squadron, Cochrane and Duke of Edinburgh, was detached from the Grand Fleet and transferred to the North American station, bringing the total number of ships on escort duty up to 43, seven of which were American. The present Achilles was first commissioned at Chatham on October 10, 1933, by Captain Colin Cantlie, D.S.C., for service 'in the Second Cruiser Squadron, Home Fleet. On returning from her shake-down cruise, she set up a new record by making the voyage from Gibraltar to Portland in 39 hours, at an average speed of 28 £ knots. Fresh honours have already been added to the name of Achilles by the present vessel. The first keel-plate was laid down by Prince George during a visit to the works of Cammell, Laird and Co., Limited, at Birkenhead, on June 11, 193], and it was in the Achilles that .the Duke of Gloucester proceeded to Belfast for the Jubilee celebrations <of last year.