Part 12 (2/2)
I exclaimed.
”It is more than possible,” answered Togo, with another heavy sigh, ”it is a disastrous fact. And in addition to those two s.h.i.+ps, we have also lost the _Yos.h.i.+no_, fortunately not one of our best fast cruisers. Oh!
it is terrible, terrible! And all three disasters have occurred to-day, within a very short s.p.a.ce of time. The news reached me by wireless in the interval between my sending for you and your arrival.
”It appears that while the _Yos.h.i.+no, Takasago, Chitose, Kasagi_, and _Kasuga_ were to the westward of Port Arthur this morning, just after dawn, they ran into a patch of dense fog, while steaming through which, the lookout aboard the _Yos.h.i.+no_ sighted a floating mine a short distance ahead. Thereupon the officer in charge seems to have temporarily lost his presence of mind, for instead of sheering out of the line, as it seems to me he might have done, and so avoided the mine, he instantly stopped and reversed his engines, without warning the _Kasuga_, which was his next astern. The inevitable result of course was that the _Kasuga_ struck the _Yos.h.i.+no_ heavily, making such a terrible rent in her side that, in spite of collision mats, she speedily filled, capsized, and sank, drowning over two hundred of her crew. The _Kasuga_, badly damaged, is on her way hither, and may be expected to arrive some time to-night.
”That disaster, however, serious as it is, is nothing compared with the loss of the _Hatsuse_ and _Yas.h.i.+ma_, which occurred shortly after midday. Little did we dream, as they steamed away from here, this morning, that we should never see them again! It happened about ten miles south of Port Arthur, the two s.h.i.+ps striking mines within a few minutes of each other. The _Hatsuse_ appears to have struck two mines, the second of which completed her destruction, for she foundered in less than two minutes after the second explosion occurred. I understand that considerably more than half her crew have gone down with her.
”There were hopes at first that the _Yas.h.i.+ma_ might be saved, as collision mats were got over her damaged bows and the steam pumps were started, while she headed for here under her own steam, with the rest of the squadron in company; but the latest news is to the effect that she cannot possibly be kept afloat, and that her crew are being taken off.
Well, it is the fortune of war, I suppose, and it is useless to murmur; we cannot hope to always have things go well with us, reverses _will_ happen occasionally; and I am afraid that we have been growing just a little too careless and over-confident of late. We must take the lesson to heart and see that it does not again happen. But it is a paralysing blow for us.
”And now, to return to the matter which more immediately concerns you, Captain. I have given you the earliest possible warning of what I am going to ask you to do, in order that you may have an opportunity to think over the situation and make your plans. I want you to be ready to start at practically a moment's notice; but I shall not dispatch the squadron until I have further news from Oku, which may arrive at any minute.”
As it happened, however, although a communication arrived from Oku the next day, it was a full week before we got our orders; for a careful reconnaissance revealed that very important preparations would be necessary before it would be possible to take Kinchau, or storm the Nanshan Heights.
Just about sunset the _s.h.i.+kis.h.i.+ma_, with her attendant cruisers, hove in sight, and before they were hull-up it was possible for us to distinguish that the _Yas.h.i.+ma_ was not among them. She had gone down off Dalny--in shallow water, fortunately--but not until every man had been safely taken out of her.
The other losses to which the Admiral had referred were torpedo-boat Number 48, and the dispatch boat _Mikayo_, both of which had come to grief, the one on 12th May, and the other two days later, through striking mines in Kerr Bay, some thirty miles to the north-east of Port Arthur. Torpedo-boats Numbers 46 and 48, it appeared, were engaged in sweeping for mines when the accident happened. They had already found and destroyed three mines, and had discovered a fourth, which they fired several rounds at without result. Then Number 48 imprudently approached the mine with the intention of securing it, when it exploded, blowing her in two, and killing or wounding fourteen of her crew of twenty-three.
It was two days later when the _Mikayo_, believing the bay to be clear, entered it to make sure. She was pa.s.sing in through the channel supposed to have been cleared by our torpedo-boats, when she, too, struck a mine; there was a terrific explosion, and she went to the bottom, with eight casualties in her crew of two hundred. She was a useful little s.h.i.+p, having a speed of over sixteen knots when she was destroyed, although she had been known to achieve as much as twenty.
She mounted two forty-sevens and ten 3-pounders, and was therefore not a very formidable fighting craft.
The story told by the Russians concerning her destruction was to the effect that she fell a victim to a mine, placed overnight, in the channel previously cleared by our boats, by a young Russian naval officer, who stole out from Port Arthur in a small steam launch, under the cover of night. Whether the story is true or not, I cannot tell, yet there is nothing very improbable about it, for it is indisputable that many of the Russians displayed as fine a courage as even the j.a.panese themselves.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
AT WORK IN KINCHAU BAY.
Meanwhile, I was spending my days poring over the maps and charts of Kinchau and its neighbourhood with which I had been supplied, leaving Commander Tsuchiya to carry on the work of constructing the long boom, and merely visiting it in a picket boat at the close of each day, to see how the work was progressing. My study of the maps and charts had reference to a scheme which had come into my head whereby it might be possible to determine the ranges of the several Russian positions from certain fixed points in the bay with the utmost accuracy, thereby greatly increasing the effectiveness of the naval fire when our flotilla should be called into action. The map in particular which had been issued to me was drawn upon a scale so large that even comparatively insignificant distances could be closely measured upon it, and it was so full of detail that apparently every building, however unimportant, was marked upon it; also it was ”contoured”--that is to say, it was covered all over with wavy lines, each of which represented a definite height above sea-level. With such a map before me it was of course the easiest matter imaginable to determine the position of all the most salient points of the landscape, of which there were several, and--a.s.suming the map to be correctly drawn--to measure the distances of these from one another.
With such a bountiful fund of at least approximately accurate information for a starting-point it was a simple matter for me to fix upon a number of points in the bay--as many as I chose, in fact--which could be clearly indicated by buoys bearing different coloured flags, the positions of which could be accurately determined by cross bearings; and my plan was, first to lay down these buoys and determine their positions, and then mark them on maps, a copy of which would be handed to each captain, from which, by the employment of a scale and a pair of dividers, he could immediately measure off with precision the exact range of any object desired.
Having at length arranged my scheme on the map to my liking, I proceeded with it aboard the _Mikasa_, and submitted it to the Admiral, who, with Captain Ijichi, the Commander, and several of the officers of the s.h.i.+p, examined it with the utmost interest, asking me several questions in connection with it. When I had fully explained the scheme, they all agreed that it was an admirable idea, and would undoubtedly be of the utmost value--_if_ it could only be carried out. Togo was of opinion that it could not; I, on the contrary, was convinced that it could; and at length I managed to get the Admiral's somewhat reluctant consent to make the experiment.
Armed with this, I went ash.o.r.e and, making my way to the carpenter's shop which formed part of our sh.o.r.e establishment among the islands, ordered a certain number of small triangular rafts to be made, of a size just sufficient to support a bamboo staff ten feet long, to the top of which a flag six feet long by three feet wide was to be firmly lashed, the flags to be of different colours, arranged in pairs. The rafts were constructed merely of rough timber stoutly nailed together, while the flags, being only required to last a day or two, as we hoped, were made of coloured calico, the edges turned over and hemmed with a sewing-machine, that they might not fray or tear. A couple of hours'
work sufficed to complete my small requisition, with which I returned to the _Kasanumi_.
It was within half an hour of sunset when I got aboard with my boatload of miscellaneous paraphernalia; and as the torpedo flotilla always kept steam while at the Elliots, excepting when it became necessary to clean flues or boilers, we at once got our anchor and proceeded to sea at a speed of twenty knots. I was bound round to Kinchau Bay, the distance of which from the Elliot group, by sea, was about one hundred and thirteen sea miles; I therefore reckoned on arriving at my destination about midnight, which would suit me admirably. The moon was in her third quarter, and was due to rise, that night, at a few minutes after one o'clock, which would also suit me excellently.
For a wonder, the night was fine, with a light air out from about south-east; there was no sea, and not much swell, and as the destroyer was running well within herself, we went along quite easily and comfortably, and I seized the opportunity to s.n.a.t.c.h a few hours' sleep, leaving the navigation of the boat to my chief officer, who was quite equal to the task.
The trip was uneventful, and at midnight Lieutenant Hiraoka aroused me with the intimation that we were standing into Kinchau Bay, and were already near enough to the land to enable the watch-fires on the hills to be made out; I accordingly turned out and went on deck to take a look round. I had studied my maps so exhaustively that, dark though the night was, I was able without difficulty to identify the various heights in sight, of which Mount Sampson was by far the most conspicuous; the general appearance of the land, indeed, was remarkably like what I had already mentally pictured it to be, and I seemed to be gazing on quite familiar ground. We were of course running without lights, and there was hardly a ghost of a chance of our being seen, but I eagerly searched the bay for craft, and was gratified to find that it was empty.
But if there were no craft, there might be a good many mines; therefore in order to avoid all possible risk we crossed the bay to its northern sh.o.r.e, keeping well out, and then, going dead slow and feeling our way with the lead, we hugged the northern sh.o.r.e line as closely as the depth of water would permit, until we arrived abreast a little indentation, or cove, when the engines were stopped, the boat lowered, and, with my revolvers in my belt, but no sword, a pocketful of cartridges, a water bottle, a wallet of provisions, an azimuth compa.s.s, and a box s.e.xtant, I was pulled ash.o.r.e and landed in the cove, the boat immediately returning to the destroyer, which soon vanished in the darkness, making for the offing.
There were some half-dozen small, crazy-looking fis.h.i.+ng-boats drawn up on the beach of the cove, and, groping about, I presently found a footpath leading somewhere inland. This I cautiously followed for a little distance until the crow of a wakeful c.o.c.k and the bark of a dog warned me that I was at no great distance from a human dwelling of some sort, when I struck off the path and waded through a field of millet, heading north-west for the summit of a hill which I easily recognised, even in the dark, as one of the points from which I purposed to take my set of observations. My more immediate anxiety, however, was to get away from the neighbourhood of all human habitations, for although I knew pretty well, in a general way, where the Russians might be expected to be found, there was always the possibility of running unexpectedly into a small detachment of them, or of encountering some Korean peasant who might be disposed to betray me, upon the off-chance of securing a reward for so doing.
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