OCR Text |
Show THOME French Cruiser Engaged in Transporting Troops to Saloniki When Sent to Bottom of Sea. GREATEST MODERN MARINE DISASTER Out of 4000 Men on Board the Vessel Only 870 Are Rescued, According to Latest Estimates. v LONDON, March 3. The admiralty ad-miralty announces that the minesweeper mine-sweeper Primula was torpedoed and sunk March 1 in the eastern Mediterranean Med-iterranean while performing her usual duties. All the officers and crew, except three men, were saved and landed at Port Said. : PARIS, March 3, 12:55 a. m, It was announced at the French ministry of marine today that there were nearly I 4000 men on board the French auxil- ! iary cruiser Provence wheu she was sunk in the Mediterranean on February Feb-ruary 26. It was stated that on board the Provence were the staff of the Third colonial infantry regiment, the Third battalion, the Second company of the First battalion, the Se.cond machine gun companv and one extra company, in all nearly 4000 men. As the ministry of marine on February Feb-ruary 29 announced that the number of survivors of the Provence disaster was estimated at 870, it is indicated by the foregoing dispatch that upwards up-wards of 3130 lives were lost. Greatest Modern Disaster. The loss of more than 3000 lives in the sinking of the French auxiliary cruiser Provence is the greatest ocean disaster of modern times. - Up to the present the largest number of lives ever lost in one wreck was when the White Star liner Titanic struck an iceberg ice-berg off the Newfoundland banks on April 14, 1912, and sank with a death loss of 1595. The rescued numbered 743. The French ministry of marine had previously issued no statement as to the number of persons on the Provence when she went down. The vessel, however, how-ever, when in the Transatlantic service, ser-vice, could carry 1960 persons, including includ-ing the crew, and it has been presumed that, as she was transporting troops between ports not far apart, she was carrying a number of men larger than her normal capacity. Other Marine Horrors. Among the other great sea disasters, in addition to the Titanic, already mentioned, were: The Cunard line steamship Lusitania, which was torpedoed by a German submarine sub-marine and sunk off the Head of Kin-sale, Kin-sale, Ireland, on May 7, 1915, with the loss of 1206 lives. The burning of the excursion steamship steam-ship General Sloeum in the East river, New York, June 15, 1904,. when nearly 1000 persons met their death. The French line steamship La Bour-goyne, Bour-goyne, sunk in collision with the steamship steam-ship Cromartyshire, July 4, 1S9S, with the loss of 580 lives. The Japanese liner Kioki Maru, sunk off the coast of Japan, September Septem-ber 2S, 1912, with the loss of 1000 lives. The Canadian Pacific steamship Empress Em-press of Ireland, sunk in collision with the Danish collier Storsfad in the St. Lawrence river, May 29, 1914, with the lo?s of more than 1000 lives. The burning of the Uranium line steamship Voltnrno in midocean on Oc- (Continued on Page Three.) 1 BOPP INDICTMENT HELD TO BE FAULTY i . . Federal Judge Dooling Sus- tains Demurrer of Ger man Consul General. SAX FRAXCISCO, Man-h 3. The federal indictment -hargine: Franz Bopp, German consul general here, and five others, -with conspiracy to pet on foot a military expedition to encompass destruction de-struction of British property, was virtually vir-tually dismissed today when Judge Maurice T. Dooling in the United States district court sustained the demurrer to the indictment filed by the consulate's lawyers. There is still another indictment indict-ment against the accused men on which the court did not rule. Tn addition to Bopp, those under in-: in-: dictment were: Baron E. H. von .Sehaek, German vice consul ; George Wilhelm ; von Brincken, attached to the consulate; consul-ate; Charles 0. Crowley, detective employed em-ployed by the consulate; Mrs. Margaret TV. Cornell, employed by Crowley, and J. H. Van Koolbergen, s-aid to" have "been hired to carry out certain alleged )mb plots in Canada. I i tie court sustained the demurrer on I the ground that the indictment con- tnined no matter upon which the issue rfVf ould be piesented to a jury. There was " nothing in the indictment, said Judge Dooling, apprising the defendants of what they were accused beyond the general statement that thev had conspired con-spired to set on foot a military expedition expe-dition tor the purpose cf destroying shins belonging to Germany's enemies and blowing up bridges, railroads and factories in Canada. It was further declared by the court that there was nothing in the indict-rneut indict-rneut to show that the activities responsible respon-sible for the alleged bombing of bridges and factories in Canada constituted what could be called a military expedition, expe-dition, and were not merely directed . against the individual owners of the property destroyed or threatened. The federal grand jury was not dismissed dis-missed tonight by Judge Dooling, as had been expected, and, according to the district attorney's office, new indictments indict-ments may be "brought, . in . which the charges would be made to conform with the court 's ruling. There is another indictment against the six defendants charging them with conspiracy to interfere . with and destroy de-stroy commerce between the United States and foreign countries. A demurrer de-murrer was filed in this indictment also, Imt was not considered today by Judge Dooling. IRE IH 3010 LIVES LOST ON PROVENCE (Continued from Page One.) tober 9. 1P13, with the loss of 136 lives. ' The official statement announcing the sinking of the Provence said: The French auxiliary cruiser Provence II (so designated to distinguish dis-tinguish her from the French battleship bat-tleship Provence), engaged in transporting troops to Saloniki, was sunk in the Mediterranean on February 2fi. Two hundred and . uincty-six survivors have been brought to Malta, and about 400 to Melos bv French and British patrol vessels summoned bv wireless. wire-less. No signs of a submarine were noticed no-ticed either before or after the sinking. La Provence was armed with five cannon of fourteen centimeters, centi-meters, two of fifty-seven millimeters milli-meters and four of forty-seven millimeters. |