Called from Cricket

At Dartmouth, pipe-smoking naval officers were sprawled on the Devon-green grass listening to the clear crack of willow bat on cricket ball, watching their more athletic colleagues play the youngsters of the Royal Naval College. The cadet eleven ginined happily in their spotless white flannels and played close. They had just caught a grizzled Lieutenant-Commander leg-before-wicket, and the present batsmen, for all their massive shin guards and bushy eyebrows, seemed easy. Suddenly at a whispered word from the sidelines the long-white-coated umpire stopped the game and announced:

"Officers from H. M. S. Rodney: leave cancelled. Report back aboard ship at once."

The Rodney's officers changed their cricket flannels quickly, motored 15 miles to Torbay where the Rodney, world's twin- largest battleship lay at anchor.-- Dartmouth cadets, thinking of Drake and his officers who were called from playing bowls to fight the Spanish Armada, buzzed with questions.

Tragedy loomed. Two squadrons of British submarines had been on maneuvers in the Irish Sea. Early that morning, plowing through a thick fog and a choppy sea, the semi-obsolete H-47 had been rammed by the large, modern L-12. The H-47 had rolled over, sunk almost instantly.

Only two of the sunken crew escaped, her commander, Lieutenant R. J. Gardner, and Telegraphist Sydney Cleburne, who happened to be in the conning tower. Three men were lost from the L-12, which was sucked down 40 feet after the collision but bobbed up again and made port without assistance.

Instantly despatched to the rescue, besides the ponderous Rodney, were the destroyers Tilbury, Vivian, Thanet, the tugs Resolve and Grappler. Lighters, submarine chasers, mine sweepers, hustled out from all the British coast. Aboard the Tilbury was Rear Admiral Henry Edgar Grace, commander of British submarines, taking a new diving apparatus which in tests oil the Firth of Forth had descended successfully to a depth of 300 feet. In London, King's Messenger routed from his bed Professor Leonard Hill, physiologist of the National Institute of Medical Research, authority on deep sea diving, and despatched him north to join the rescue fleet.

It was all in vain. The H-47 lay in 324 feet of water. A gale was rising. In the House of Commons Britain's new First Sea Lord, Albert Victor Alexander, onetime railway yardworker, had his first important task in breaking the news of the disaster. He was obliged to conclude: "Steps are being taken with all despatch to locate the H-47. ... No hope can be entertained of any of the remainder of the crew being alive."

At a depth of 324 feet, water pressure is 140 pounds to the square inch, enough to crush a man's lungs. Though seasoned divers in specially constructed suits have reached a depth of 300 ft. they can only work there ten minutes at a time before exhaustion sets in. Despite these difficulties, a grim circle of British warships and tenders lay to all week about the buoy that marked the grave of the #47. Boatloads of seasick reporters tossed on the grey waters of St. George's Channel waiting for news. Long after it was apparent that there would be no news, the Rodney, with half a gale still heaving her about and with seaplanes flying watch overhead, cast wreaths of white lilies on the sea, fired a salute, steamed away.

* The Rodney's twin: the British Nelson, 35,000 tons, 16-in. guns, 23 knots.