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Show COMMANDER ECCLES GIVES PRAISE TO BRITISH NAVY Commander Henry E. Eccles, who has been decorated for his part in the Battle of the Java Sea, commanded an American destroyer destroy-er . which escaped destruction through the prompt and brave interference in-terference of another destroyer which was subsequently lost. Telling about the incident, Com- mander Eccles says his destroyer was caught in the searchlights of a heavy enemy mine-layer while i between two Japanese cruisers. Another American destroyer came up within 500 to 800 yards of the. i disengaged side of the mine-layer, and having no more torpedoes, put ' the Japanese searchlights out of commission with her four- and six- inch guns. This enabled Commander Comman-der Eccles to get away with his ship. Interesting, too, is the high praise that Commander Eccles gave to the fighting qualities of the British navy. He says, "The British naval officers, men and ships are swell. They know how to fight, they have everything it takes, and I know of nothing I'd rather have around me than those men with whom we were fighting out there. They not only really know how to fight, but they like to fight." In view of a rather widespread hallucination in this country that the British are poor fighters, the testimony of Commander Eccles is important. For some reason, many Americans have the idea that the British spend most of their time avoiding a conflict. They may represent the backwash of persistent enemy propaganda, but certainly the tenacity with which they cling to their prejudice, preju-dice, indicates that they are not familiar with the facts of this war. No nation has given a finer exhibition ex-hibition of courage than that staged by the British people nearly near-ly two years ago when France collapsed. col-lapsed. Virtually unarmed, and fighting a powerful coalition, the British, under the inspiring leadership lead-ership of Prime Minister Churchill, Church-ill, defied the Nazis and alone assumed as-sumed the guardianship of the liberties of the world. The record shows the amazing exploits of the R. A. F. which repulsed re-pulsed and destroyed Germany's efforts to defeat Great Britain by aerial attack. It depicts, for those who care to ascertain it, the ever-ready ever-ready willingness of the British navy to fight, even under adverse conditions. The fighting in Africa, Greece, Crete, Burma and Europe demonstrates the gameness of British Bri-tish troops, stubbornly resisting overwhelming odds in a fight that is temporarily hopeless. |