EXPLOITS AT SEA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 May 1942, Page 4

EXPLOITS AT SEA

FREE FRENCH SUBMARINES. MANY THRILLING ADVENTURES. The names of two Free French submarines are on the lips of every Free Frenchman, the Minerve and the Rubis. At the time of the Vichy betrayal, as the Free French call the signing of the armistice, the Minerve was lying severely damaged in a British .port and many thought she would never float again. Admiral Muselier, commander of the Free French Naval Forces entrusted its command to a Navy Lieutenant, only 30 years old, but who had ■had submarine experience before the war. His first problem was to- get together a submarine crew, and he spent two anxious months, including 42 night train journeys, searching for one. When he got his men together they repaired the submarine themselves. The reconditioning of the. submarine was something of a miracle, and now the men look upon her as so much their own that they will allow no one else to effect any repairs on her. Many and thrilling are the adventures the Minerve has lived through. On one occasion she sank a heavily laden German tanker off the Norwegian coast and then surfaced accidentally, to find herself within a few yards of a German destroyer and a German armed trawler, added to which a Nazi bomber was circling (overhead. The Minerve did a crash dive and lay on the bottom, where she was pelted with depth charges and bombs. The Germans thought they had sunk her. Thirteen hours later she limped back to a British port. A blonde French nurse is the submarine’s godmother, and her portrait hangs in the rest room provided for the crew by British friends in a certain port, with rows of French books also provided by these friends. The exploits of the Rubis cannot yet be told in full, but this submarine has earned the distinction of having the order of the Cross of Liberation pinned on her flag by General de Gaulle. Heavy damage has been inflicted by her on German shipping. On one occasion she was seriously damaged by enemy action, and was only brought back to safety through dangerous minefield thanks to the prodigious efforts of her crew. A dog, Bacchus, is the submarine’s mascot, a cunning animal who seems to know when danger’ is nigh and gets out of the way into a corner as though taking up his action station.