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Show SUSSEX ATTACK PREMEDITATED French Rear Admiral Makes Report of His Investigation of the Disaster. Washington, April 5. President Wilson discussed with Secretary Lansing Lan-sing tonight tho situation growing out of tho accumulation of evidence .Indicating .Indi-cating that German submarines were responsible for tho numerous recent marine disasters, In which the lives of American oltlzens have been lost or endangered. Washington, April 5. A graphic account ac-count of tho wreck of the British channel' steamer Sussex, with the assertion as-sertion that the vessel was deliberately deliberate-ly torpedoed, and without warning, by an enemy submarine, Is contained In a report by Rear Admiral Grassot to the French general staff, made public hero tonight by the French embassy. Tho report, dated at Boulogne, March 30, says: In conformity with your instructions, instruc-tions, I proceeded to Boulogne, where I conducted an Inquiry relative to the attack on the Sussex. On March 24, the Sussex, belonging to the State Railway company, and running the regular sonic between England and France, left Folkestone at 1:25 p. m. for Dieppe. This boat carried about 325 passengers of all nationalities, a great number of these being women and children, as well as tho Indian malls This approximate figure is given by the captain; according to the company there were 383 passengers. The officer in charge of the control of tickets was iseverely wounded and taken to Dover. He is not in a fit state to furnish particulars. Vessel Not Armed. She "was not possessed of any armament. arma-ment. The crew consisted of fifty-three fifty-three men From the start the speed was set at sixteen knots; after having passed one mile from Dungeness the captain headed south, three degrees east; the weather was very fine, the sea. almost calm, most of the passengers passen-gers wero on deck. Suddenly, without the slightest warning, th,e captain, who was on the bridge, saw before the port beam, some 150 meters away, the track of a torpedo. It was now 2:50 p. m.; the time of the disaster being exactly registered by the stopping of the clocks on board the vessel. The second sec-ond officer and deck officer who were on the bridge also distinctly saw the torpedo. With great presence of mind, the captain ordered the helm hard aport and stopped the starboard engine In order to avoid the torpedo by turning to starboard. These two orders were executed immediately, as is proved by the statement of the engineers of the watch. Torpedo Strikes. Tho ship was beginning to swing off. when, eight seconds after the torpedo had been seen, a terrific explosion took place, throwing up an enormous column of water. Calculating from the distance at which the torpedo first had been seen and the time which passed before the explosion, the speed of the torpedo must have been thirty-six thirty-six knots, the normal speed of a torpedo. tor-pedo. The ship was cut in two opposite the bridge; the after part, thanks to tho solidity of the bulkheads, continued to float. On deck, several passengers who happened to be on the port side saw the torpedo when quite close to the ship, one of them even tolling his neighbor to "Look at that great fish swimming toward the ship." Everybody who happened to be In the bows disappeared with that portion por-tion of the ship, which was engulfed; among others wero the passengers on the foredeck and in the first-class saloon. The men of the crew who were In tho forecastle, the lookout In the bows and (.he lookout In the crow's nest on the foremast also disappeared The captain, who had been knocked down by the column of water resulting result-ing from the explosion, ordered the crew to their emergency stations. The firemen and engineers went to their stations after having stopped the port engine and closed the draught plates of the furnaces. At tho same time the wireless operator tried to send out distress signals, but without with-out success, the antennae having fallen fall-en with the foremast. The crew , proceeded to their stations to launch the lifeboats and rafts (there were six lifeboats, capable of holding 184 persons, twenty-two rafts, capable of carrying 264 persons, and in addition 816 life belts. It appears from depositions depo-sitions made that these life belts were on the spar deck and that a number of them were in bad condition), but the crowding on deck at the lime made it very difficult to move about. A number of pieces of the torpedo were found on board tho Sussex. Some of them wero handed over to the 'American delegation, which proceeded pro-ceeded to Boulogne, the others will be forwarded to the ministry of marine ma-rine by tho maritime authorities. The submarine "which torpedoed the Sussex could not be ignorant of the fact that she was attacking the mail packet of the regular cross-channel service between England and France; not only are the outlines of these boats well known to all sailors, but the course of the Sussex and the time of her crossing were clearly indicative of her service. It Is therefore obviously obvious-ly a premeditated attack on an unarmed un-armed merchant ship, carried out without the slightest warning. One last fact shows up -still more clearly the premeditated and impllc-able impllc-able character of the submarine's operations. op-erations. A boat was dispatched at 8 p. m. to the Colbart lightship to announce the catastrophe. This boat arrived at the lightship at 11:45 p. m.; her crew was picked up by a British torpedo boat destroyed at 3 o'clock in the morning. During the transshipment a torpedo was fired at the destroyer, and passed a few meters astern of her. This fact has been confirmed by the British admiralty. ad-miralty. Judging by the course covered cov-ered by this boat, the lightship must have been at most six or seven miles from the Sussex. It follows that the submarine must have remained In the neighborhood of the Sussex, in order to torpedo any ship which might come to the rescue of her victim. |