OCR Text |
Show AMERICAN STEAMSHIP JIBfSUlIl i Two on Owasco, Once German Ger-man Vessel, Die When Boat Goes Down, AN ATLANTIC PORT, Jan. 2-t. Tho American steamship Owasco, formerly the German steamer Allemannia and seized here when the United States entered the war, was sunk by a submarine the early part of December while in Mediterranean waters near the Spanish coast, according to survivors of the ship who arrived here today on a Spanish liner. It was said that two members uf the crew lost their lives. The Owasco went down fifteen minutes after being struck by the torpedo, "bluing "blu-ing like a torch." as one of the survivors put it, for the Owasco earned more than 50,000 cases of gasoline. The crew took to the boats and out of ninety-seven men on board all were saved except a Norwegian Nor-wegian seaman named Albert Jacobscn and a Spanish woman by the name of Garcia, who were believed to have gone down with the ship. The men sard they were "all ready to go over the side" when the torpedo hit. "We were a part of a convoy of four vpsscIs." one of the men said today. "We were preceded by an English and a Norwegian ship. Shortly before midnight the men on wath heard the explosion of the torpedo that sent the vpsspI ahead of us to the bottom and immediately sounded the alarm on til Owasco that brought everyone to the deck ready for any emergency. Wc were not kept long in doubt, for- lss than ten minutes after the first vessel was torpedoed the second sec-ond vessel and our own wero victims. "We were within easy reach of the shore and the light that served as an agency in our destruction by giving the submarine a. range guided us to a landing, land-ing, where we were warmly received and cured for by the people of a Spanish village. The crow of tho Norwegian ship landed shortly after we did, but we never did benr what became of the crew of the Hritisher. It is possible they were picked uj by the fourth member of I he convoy." con-voy." The submarine evident ly continued t o lurk in the vicinity, as on tho following morning the .-row of the Owasco witnessed wit-nessed from the shore a fight between a dest roycr and a mcreha ntman on one side a nd a I." -boat on the other. The ftchf took place less than five miles from the coast, the men asserted, and lasted about t wo hours, without apparent dn.ni-ace dn.ni-ace to any of the combatants. The Owasr-o was a steamship of 46.1ft tons gross register, built at. Belfast in 19 and formerly owned by the Hamhurg-A Hamhurg-A m or Iran line. She left hern No vein her 19 with a cargo for an Italian port under command of Captain A. C. Davison and carried a erfw of about seventy men in addition to a detail of navy runners. The loss of the Owasco makes t hree former 1 1 or man ships tha t have been victims nf German torpedoes. The others were tho Actaeon. formerly the Admas-t Admas-t urm, sunk No ember 27. a nd the Armenia. Ar-menia. The latter ship was leached and. it is understood, will soon be ready again for service. |