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Show TWENTY-NiNE SHIPS SUNK INJMfl SEA GERMANS ARE VICTORS IN GREATEST NAVAL BATTLE OF WORLD'S HISTORY. Teuton's High Sea Fleet Engages Part of England's Fleet In North Sea In Furious Battle Which Cost Many Lives. Ixmdon. In one of the world's greatest sea fights the German battle licet was victorious over the English battle cruiser squadron. The encounter encoun-ter took place in the North sea, Wednesday Wed-nesday afternoon. In a later engage-nieiil. engage-nieiil. .with the main part of the British Brit-ish fleet, the mighty dreadnaught Heel, the Germans made for their home ports. Tlin latest reports from the Brit-, ish fleet, from neutral vessels which witnessed parts of the great naval buttle In the North pea and from survivors sur-vivors cause the British public to be' lievc the engagement was not so near a defeat as at first reported. The British losses with all the craft engaged en-gaged accounted for, were three battle bat-tle cruisers, three cruisers and eight destroyers. ' The German losses are believed tc have been about the same number ol ships, although of a much less aggregate aggre-gate of tonnage. If the revised British reports - are accepted, the losses in ships were approximately ap-proximately as follows: British: Throe battle cruisers (Queen Mary, Indefatigable and Invincible) ; three armored cruisers (Defence, Black Prince and Warrior), about a dozen destroyers and one submarine. German : Two battleships (Westfalen and l'ommern); two battle cruisers (Unnamed (Un-named ; four light cruisers (including the Wiesbaden, Elbiug and Frauen-lob); Frauen-lob); six destroyers and a submarine. The British admiralty, in addition, has admitted that the battleship Marlborough Marl-borough was struk by a torpedo, but declares she was towed safely to port. It denies the German claim that the dreadnaught Warspite was sunk, although al-though conceding that she was dam-uged dam-uged by gun fire. British naval experts maintain that Great Britain continues to hold the supreme command of the sea by a safe margin and that her enormous navy could better afford the losses it suffered than could the smaller Ger man establishment. The first reports of the heavy loss of life unhappily have not been revised. Great Britain mourns for more than 4,000 of her best seamen and the whole nation is oppressed with sadness, which is reflected re-flected in the faces of all the people of London. There were some 6,000 men on the ships which sank, and only a few hundred hun-dred have been saved. The horrors of modern naval warfare, far exceeding exceed-ing those when wooden ships fought and continued to float even when they ceased to be fighting units, wero realized to their utmost. From five of the largest ships which went under with a complement of more than 4,000 men, only seven junior officers and a laew seamen were rescued. The two squadrons, steaming at full speed, came within range ot each other somewhere between the Skagerak and Horn Riff. Both fleets immediately brought their big guns into action and a long-range battle of extreme violence ensued. It is believed be-lieved that most of the heavy ships lost were sunk fr fatally disabled during this daylight battle. At least two Zeppelins appeared over the battle area during the late afternoon and are reported to have taken an important part in the action. AVhether they sank any of the British ships is not known. Darkness found the fleets still maneuvering man-euvering and firing. Night brought a lull in the long-range duel and shifted shift-ed the brunt of the battle to the bmaller -vessels. The. German cruiser Frauenlob was destroyed by a torpedo, tor-pedo, probably fired under the cover of darkness. Though no mention is made of the proximity of the great British high seas fleet, it is conjectured that another an-other battle squadron raced to the scene of the combat at the first report re-port of fighting. The arrival of this force is believed be-lieved to have caused the Germans to dash back to their base. What part submarines took in the action is not known, further than the British admiralty report that a German Ger-man submarine is believed to have been rammed and sunk. The British makes no mention of probable loss of life. The German official of-ficial report mentions two men rescued res-cued from the Indefatigable and ine picking up of members of the Marlborough's Marl-borough's crew. A thousand men probably have been lost. The loss as a result of the sinking of the vessels will total at least $115,000,000. |