Book Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1921 Excerpt: ...actions being fought astern of us throughout the night, and a Zeppelin was sighted shortly after 3.30 a.m. next morning. Various ships that had been near us during the day action reported that Colossus passed through a cloud of fire, spray, and smoke, and they quite thought that we were done for. I attribute our comparative immunity to the fact that we were gradually reducing speed all the time we were under fire, in order to correct our distance from the rear ship of the 4th B.S. ahead of us, consequently nearly all of the salvoes fell across our stem. The German shooting was good, and their salvoes had a very small spread, but it was curious that the return fire of the ships with which we were actually engaged apparently all went considerably over us, it being the salvoes from ships out of sight of us that straddled and hit us. The actual damage we sustained was unimportant, and fortunately our sea-going and fighting efficiency was unimpaired. The superstructure was.badly wrecked in the neighbourhood of the shell burst, also several cabins, and numerous splinter holes in the starboard side forward required plugging, but that was about all. I was chiefly impressed by the fact that so large a number of heavy shells could fall so close to us without actually hitting, and to the sort of kaleidoscopic effect produced on one's mind by so many incidents occurring in so short a space of time. Our own shooting was good, and no failures of any sort occurred; there was less "flap" than during an ordinary firing practice. The control officers aloft mistook the shell which hit us for " P" turret firing without orders, and only realised that we had been hit when they saw the flames from the burning cordite. Chronological Tabic of Events. H.M.S. &quo...