Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 184, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 August 1917 — SUBMARINES RAID IRISH FISHERMEN [ARTICLE]

SUBMARINES RAID IRISH FISHERMEN

Blow Up Their Boats in Waters Around the Emerald , Isle. THREATEN COAST VILLAGES To Remark, “We Thought You Liked the Irish,” They Retort, “Ah, You Don’t Know Us Yet”—To Cut Food Supply. Skibbereen, County Cork. —German submarines have been actively engaged in the destruction of the Irish fishing fleets in the waters around these coasts. Of course it is impossible to designate here the exact localities where or the dates when the Prussian pirates did their cowardly work. But their purpose is plain to all the world—to cut off part of Ireland’s and England’s food supply, for mackerel teem in these waters. The submarines were busy many miles outside from Kenmare in Kerry to Howth on Dublin bay. Many fishing craft are at the bottom of the sea, arid the men who owned them and the fishermen who worked on them are ruined financially. Affixed Bombs on Boats. On a certain evening about seven o’clock the fishing fleet put out from Baltimore, on Baltimore bay, near 1 Skibbereen. The first numbered about eighty boats of all classes and embraced- several boats from Ark low. County Wicklow. A few hours after the flqet set out a German U-boat of the latest pattern, about 300 feet in length, appeared. The submarine did hot waste torpedoes or shells on the defenseless fishing- boats; the cretf simply placed bombs on 13 of them and so destroyed them. Only three minutes were allowed the hapless fishermen to get into their small boats; then all their belongings, wfoch in many cases included considerable sums of money, were sent to the bottom. Had it not been for the appearance of a British patrol, which caused the submarine to submerge at once, it is certain that all the fleet would have been destroyed. Those that escaped returned to port with an abundance of fish, but are not venturing out again, so that in one night the fishing fieet of Baltimore has been put out of action by the Germans, which means a loss of many thousands

of pounds to the poor fishermen and their families. Among the fishing boats sunk were two fine motorboats belonging to the Baltimore Piscatorial schools, a motorboat the property of John Beamish, Sklbbereen, and two motorboats owned by Mr. Cottrell, Baltimore, worth several hundred pounds each. The pirates did not spare even the smallest craft, for they bombed two open boats.' With a great hammer they smashed to bits the engine of a little boat belonging to John Donovan of Castletownshend and left It to drift about. No lives were lost, but for that the Huns deserve no thanks, for they refused the fishermen permission to take oars into their punts. One Cape Clear man, resenting this refusal, ventured to remark to the captain of the submarine: "I thought ye Germans would do nothing to the Irish—that ye liked us?” “Ah, my dear fellow, you don’t know tf?e Germans yet,” was the commander’s curt reply. , The Germans intimated that they had sunk all the Kinsale fishing boats as they had come along to Baltimore, and that off Dunmore they had destroyed the Waterford fishing fleet. They made no secret of the fact, but on the contrary boasted about it and declared that they would have every Irish fishing boat at the bottom of the sea before, a month. Furthermore one of the submarine crew said they intended shelling villages on this coast shortly. “It’s All Up Now." Consternation and despair have seized our unfortunate fisherfolk. “It is all up now, sir,” said a Baltimore skipper, “when they are sinking our fishing boats.” When. I told him I would expose the Huns’ deviltry he joyously exclaimed: “Oh, then, do, sir! Tell all America the Germans, are - the worst savages on earth, and that this is their most cowardly blow and that we hope and trust that with the aid of our kith and kin over there the archfiends will soon be swept from the face of the earth.” \

The Investment in the electrical Industries of this is equal to the assessed valuation of real property and improvement in Greater New York.