LITMIR.BIZ

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against the forces of darkness and savagery.

      The morning was an unusually brilliant one. The storms which had tossed our little vessels on the seas for ten days, and which had followed them nearly to the Irish coast, had suddenly given way to smooth water and a burst of sunshine. The long and graceful American ships steamed into the channel amid the cheers of the people and the tooting of all harbour craft; the sparkling waves, the greenery of the bordering hills, the fruit trees already in bloom, to say nothing of the smiling and cheery faces of the welcoming Irish people, seemed to promise a fair beginning for our great adventure. "Welcome to the American colours," had been the signal of the Mary Rose, a British destroyer which had been sent to lead the Americans to their anchorage. "Thank you, I am glad of your company," answered the Yankee commander; and these messages represented the spirit of the whole proceeding. Indeed there was something in these strange-looking American ships, quite unlike the British destroyers, that necessarily inspired enthusiasm and respect. They were long and slender; the sunlight, falling upon their graceful sides and steel decks, made them brilliant objects upon the water; and their business-like guns and torpedo tubes suggested efficiency and readiness. The fact that they had reached their appointed rendezvous exactly on time, and that they had sailed up the Queenstown harbour at almost precisely the moment that preparations had been made to receive them, emphasized this impression. The appearance of our officers on the decks in their unfamiliar, closely fitting blouses, and of our men, in their neat white linen caps, also at once won the hearts of the populace.

      "Sure an' it's our own byes comin' back to us," an Irish woman remarked, as she delightedly observed the unmistakably Gaelic countenances of a considerable proportion of the crew. Indeed the natives of Queenstown seemed to regard these American blue-jackets almost as their own. The welcome provided by these people was not of a formal kind; they gathered spontaneously to cheer and to admire. In that part of Ireland there was probably not a family that did not have relatives or associations in the United States, and there was scarcely a home that did not possess some memento of America. The beautiful Queenstown Roman Catholic Cathedral, which stood out so conspicuously, had been built very largely with American dollars, and the prosperity of many a local family had the same trans-Atlantic origin. It was hardly surprising, therefore, that when our sailors landed for a few hours' liberty many hands were stretched out to welcome them. Their friends took them arm in arm, marched them to their homes, and entertained them with food and drink, all the time plying them with questions about friends and relatives in America. Most of these young Americans with Irish ancestry had never seen Ireland, but that did not prevent the warm-hearted people of Queenstown from hailing them as their own. This cordiality was appreciated, for the trip across the Atlantic had been very severe, with gales and rainstorms nearly every day.

      The senior officer in charge was Commander Joseph K. Taussig, whose flagship was the Wadsworth. The other vessels of the division and their commanding officers were the Conyngham, Commander Alfred W. Johnson; the Porter, Lieutenant-Commander Ward K. Wortman; the McDougal, Lieutenant-Commander Arther P. Fairfield; the Davis, Lieutenant-Commander Rufus F. Zogbaum; and the Wainwright, Lieutenant-Commander Fred H. Poteet. On the outbreak of hostilities these vessels, comprising our Eighth Destroyer Division, had been stationed at Base 2, in the York River, Virginia; at 7 P.M. of April 6th, the day that Congress declared war on Germany, their commander had received the following signal from the Pennsylvania, the flagship of the Atlantic Fleet: "Mobilize for war in accordance with Department's confidential mobilization plan of March 21st." From that time events moved rapidly for the Eighth Division. On April 14th, the very day on which I sent my first report on submarine conditions to Washington, Commander Taussig received a message to take his flotilla to Boston and there fit out for "long and distant service." Ten days afterward he sailed, with instructions to go fifty miles due east of Cape Cod and there to open his sealed orders. At the indicated spot Commander Taussig broke the seal, and read the following document—a paper so important in history, marking as it does the first instructions any American naval or army officer had received for engaging directly in hostilities with Germany, that it is worth quoting in full:

      NAVY DEPARTMENT

       Office of Naval Operations

       Washington, D. C.

      Secret and Confidential

      To: Commander, Eighth Division, Destroyer Force, Atlantic Fleet, U.S.S. Wadsworth, Flagship.

      Subject: Protection of commerce near the coasts of Great Britain and Ireland.

      1. The British Admiralty have requested the co-operation of a division of American destroyers in the protection of commerce near the coasts of Great Britain and France.

      2. Your mission is to assist naval operations of Entente Powers in every way possible.

      3. Proceed to Queenstown, Ireland. Report to senior British naval officer present, and thereafter co-operate fully with the British navy. Should it be decided that your force act in co-operation with French naval forces your mission and method of co-operation under French Admiralty authority remain unchanged.

      Route to Queenstown.

      Boston to latitude 50 N—Long. 20 W to arrive at daybreak then to latitude 50 N—Long. 12 W thence to Queenstown.

      When within radio communication of the British naval forces off Ireland, call G CK and inform the Vice-Admiral at Queenstown in British general code of your position, course, and speed. You will be met outside of Queenstown.

      4. Base facilities will be provided by the British Admiralty.

      5. Communicate your orders and operations to Rear-Admiral Sims at London and be guided by such instructions as he may give you. Make no reports of arrival to Navy Department direct.

      JOSEPHUS DANIELS Q.

      No happier selection for the command of this division could have been made than that of Commander Taussig. In addition to his qualities as a sailor, certain personal associations made him particularly acceptable to the British naval authorities. In 1900, Commander Taussig, then a midshipman, was a member of the naval forces which the United States sent to China to co-operate with other powers in putting down the Boxer Rebellion and rescuing the besieged legations in Pekin. Near Tientsin this international force saw its hardest fighting, and here Commander Taussig was wounded. While recovering from his injury, the young American found himself lying on a cot side by side with an English captain, then about forty years old, who was in command of the Centurion and chief-of-staff to Admiral Seymour, who had charge of the British forces. This British officer was severely wounded; a bullet had penetrated his lung, and for a considerable period he was unable to lie down. Naturally this enforced companionship made the two men friends. Commander Taussig had had many occasions to recall this association since, for his wounded associate was Captain John R. Jellicoe, whose advancement in the British navy had been rapid from that day onward. On this same expedition Captain Jellicoe became a sincere friend also of Captain McCalla, the American who commanded the Newark and the American landing force; indeed, Jellicoe's close and cordial association with the American navy dates from the Boxer expedition. Naturally Taussig had watched Jellicoe's career with the utmost interest; since he was only twenty-one at the time, however, and the Englishman was twice his age, it had never occurred to him that the First Sea Lord would remember his youthful hospital companion. Yet the very first message he received, on arriving in Irish waters, was the following letter, brought to him by Captain Evans, the man designated by the British Admiralty as liaison officer with the American destroyers:

      Admiralty, Whitehall

      1-5-17.

      My Dear Taussig:

      I still retain very pleasant and vivid recollections of our association in China and I am indeed delighted that you should have been selected for the command of the first force which is coming to fight for freedom, humanity, and civilization. We shall all have our work cut out to subdue piracy. My experience in China makes me feel perfectly convinced that the two nations will work in the closest co-operation, and I won't flatter you by saying too much about the value of your help. I must say this, however. There is no navy in the world that can possibly give us more valuable assistance, and there is no personnel in any navy that will fight

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