RAIDER PROWLS PACIFIC OCEAN

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11752, 29 January 1918, Page 2

RAIDER PROWLS PACIFIC OCEAN

i SCHOONER MANNED BYSEEADLER'S CREW HEPORTED. The San Francisco ''Chronicle'' of December 22 states :—The French schooner Lutece, with sixty of the , crew of the German raider Seeadler ' manning her. is prowling off the South American coast, was the information brought here yesterday by , passengers on a liner arriving t'rorn | Papeete and other South Sea ports. : The whereabouts of the Lutece has be on' a (mystery since' '.he Teuton "pirates" set sail in the vessel last August, leaving about forty Amerii cans marooned on Mopeha Island. Henri Ernest Grand, Jf Papeete, owner of the Lutece .was n passen!ger on the liner,. Grand and others coming from the Tahitian town said that the Lutece had been sighted by Captain A. E'. McDonald, of the brig Geneva, off the coast of Chile 111 October. MeDonald was familiar with the appearance of the schooner, having seenher many times at Papeete. He told friends there could be no doubt he had been in danger of capture by the Germans. The skipper was so fearful of the intentions of the strange vessel, which was only a few hundred yards away, that he got up Jill the steam possible on the donkey engine and planned to resist any invasion with steam and hot water. He said he intended to ram the schooner if the vessel was brought .near his ship. Night eame on and ' the suspected raider disappeared in the darkness. Grand was questioned by agents of the Department of Justice on his arrival, as he was at one time agent of a German firm at Papeete. .His standing was established, and he was not detained. He has a son in the French Army, who has beon decorated lor bravery, and two daughters attending school here.