Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 161, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 July 1919 — Second Dead Sea Off English Coast. [ARTICLE]

Second Dead Sea Off English Coast.

J London. —A sea In which nothing may live has come into being off the southeast coast of England. It is a second Dead sea.. Formerly this sea abounded in life. It was the home of the succulent shrimp, the_merry mussel, the winsome whelk and the coy cockle. Now the natural home of those domestic dainties has fallen under a blight, and they have been obliged to pack up their shells and silently steal away. Pegwell bay is where the Dead sea lies. It was once the most famous of the shell-fish areas. Its downfall Is traced to the sinking of an oil tank steamer early in the war. The vessel was torpedoed one night and thousands of gallons of crude oil flooded over the Downs. The oil swamped the haunts of shrimp, mussel, whelk and cockle. They w’ere lubricated to death. Further sinkings caused more poison to invade the shellfish beds, the shrimps’ breeding waters, and now the whole area is dead.