GEIER’S ESCAPADE

New Zealand Times, Volume XLII, Issue 9619, 27 March 1917, Page 6

GEIER’S ESCAPADE

CHASED BY CRUISERS FINALLY DISABLED AT HONOLULU. NEW YORK. February 11. Tlio interned Prussian gunboat Geicr, which was reported in dispatches last week to have been disabled at her pier in Honolulu,'" at the outbreak of the war in 1914 was cruising in the 1 acifio and while en route to the California coast was pursued bv three Japanese armoured cruisers. In order to escape, the German ship made her way into Honolulu, but finding that the Japanese maintained a .blockade off the Hawaiian port the Geier interned. As a precautionary measure, it is said, tho breech blocks of the Geier’s guns were removed and sent ashore, as were also the main crankshafts and cylinder heads.

During the Spanish-American- war the Geier sprang; into prominence hy an attempt to demonstrate the ineffectiveness of the American blockade upon Havana. The Geicr had obtained permission to pass through the American blockade at an early period of the war, at a time when a strong American naval force was present before the Cuban port, and she remained in Havana until only a. few lightly-armed cutters and' converted lighthouse tenders were on guard, the heavy ships having been withdrawn under Admiral Sampson to the eastward. MADE DASH THOM PORT. , Picking her time, the Geier one afternoon, in May, 1898, made a dash out of port, hugged the coast in a run to the westward, and would have made good her getaway without being spoken to had' it not been for the unexpected arrival a few hours earlier before Havana of the newly-built and fast Coast Guard cutter Manning. At the first cry of “Black smoke coming out of Havana!” which went up from every masthead lookout of the American vessels simultaneously, the senior officer present hailed the Manning, which was close hy, through the megaphone in the following language “Manning, there 1 “That fellow coming out of Havana is probably the German warship Geier. He must be overhauled at all hazards. You have the only ship present that can do it. Go in, and good luck to you!” , . The commander of tho Manning, Captain F. M. Hunger (now captain commandant, retired), called' out in reply:—"How close in under the hat'teries may I go?” The orders to the blockading force were not to draw the fire of the batteries on Shore needlessly, since it was of paramount importance to preserve, ships until the Spanish fleet had been destroyed. Tho reply of the seniop officer was:- — “Use your own discretion, sir, hut overhaul that vessel somehow!” FULL* .SPEED AHEAD.

With a flash the Manning’s engineroom indicator was whirled to full speed ahead, the bugles sounded all hands to quarters, and in another instant the Manning was tearing through the water at full speed. Steadily she crawled up, and as she did so her officers could see the stranger’s hull steadily rise on tho horizon. Then the gun! sponsons came in view; her flag was showing, but it was now plain that the vessel ahead was not only a large cruiser, .but unmistakably the Goier. A headline in the coast ahead compelled the stranger to haul out more to sea, and ns she did so she slowed down, then stopped, and slowly there fluttered to the gaff end the Imperial flag of Germany, 1 The Manning, without stopping her great speed, tore under the Geier’s stern, put her helm hard-a-port, and made a full round of the German cruiser, as much as to say, “Well, you didn’t get out without being spoken to.” As tho Manning spun round the German the officers of the Geier stood at salute, which was curtly acknowledged from the- Manning, and then, as the Manning headed hack, a great roar of laughter burst from the men, for there, coming down in the distance as fast as they could steam, was ©very onewof the eight little guard vessels, the fastest not able to make more than ten knots, and not one carrying more than a few 6-pound guns, but they were a 11 determined to.be in that fight if it .was possible to get there.

VITAL TO THE BLOCKADE. The significance of the Geier’s act lay in the fact that if she had been able to break through the American cordon without being spoken to sb© could, on arrival at Vera Cruz, where she put in a few days later, have cabled to Berlin that the American pretensions to a blockade before Havana wore unwarranted, and therefore the .alleged blockade was not recognisable. It is a principle in international law that a blockade to bo recognised must he effective. The commander of one of the blockading vessels before Havana on the above occasion, in writing Iris report of the share which his vessel took in tho war, declared that of all,the incidents which came under his notice during the West Indian campaign of 1898 the one which most vividly impressed him was the sight of tho Manning dashing in at full speed to engage an enemy which everyone "believed, and which was afterwards shown to be true, was treble the fighting power ot the shiii that obeyed the order to stop her.