The U.S.S. Goff, Destroyer 247, was one of the twelve ships of squadron fourteen that were despatched to the Near East in the emergency following the expulsion of the Greek Army from Asia Minor in the fall of 1922. In a previous article the writer has described the quick get-away of the squadron from the United States, the arrival in the Levant, a tour of the Black Sea and return to Constantinople at Christmas time.
The holidays passed quickly and on January 2, 1923, we found ourselves underway for a trip to the south. At that time, while he had twenty destroyers in his force, Admiral Bristol kept three in the Black Sea, one at Athens, one at Smyrna and two at points to the southward on the coast of Asia Minor or Syria.
We were pleased to learn that during our present trip we were to have a week at Alexandria, Egypt, as a sort of resting and sight-seeing period. We arrived at Smyrna early on the morning of January 3 and proceeded immediately for Alexandria, arriving late the following afternoon, having touched on three continents in three days.
Approaching Alexandria in the daytime the port is hard to make out. Ras-el-Tin lighthouse is a tall tower but there are other conspicuous things east and west of it, and we were not sure of our exact position until close enough to make out the town itself. The harbor is easily approachable through two dredged channels well marked with buoys and beacons. The port is artificial but ample for the enormous shipping which goes in and out. We moored bow and stern to buoys in the inner port. The Fox was in the berth next to ours and Lieutenant Commander Wellbrock, who was anxious to get out the same day, came aboard with all the information needed about the peculiarities of the port. After a few minutes the Fox cleared out for the Syrian coast. There was a boarding visit from the Khedivial yacht, Mahroosa, and as soon as we got straightened out I called on her captain, Streatfield Bey, a retired British naval officer, then in the employment of the Egyptian Government. He wore the uniform of the Egyptian navy and a fez, or tarboush, as the red hat is called in Egypt. The Englishmen who hold official positions in Egypt are quite keen on being addressed by their titles of Bey or Pasha as the case may be. I was prepared for such names as Hussein Pasha and Kemal Pasha but I was surprised on visiting the director of ports and lights to find a perfectly good Irishman wearing the title of Grogan Pasha.
Our chief pleasure here was the realization that we were snugly moored in a real port. For the first time since arriving in the Near Fast we found ourselves in a protected harbor where the coming of bad weather need not interfere with all arranged plans. We went ashore and found Alexandria to be a modern appearing city laid out in squares with pleasing architecture and beautiful shops. There was a distinct difference between this and Turkey. Most of the native women were veiled from the eyes down. The common women wear black veils of a sheer material supported in the center by a brass or gold cylinder a half inch in diameter which, lying flat and vertical on the forehead, seems to deepen and mystify the large black eyes beneath. The better dressed wear thin, white silk veils which adorn, rather than hide, the face. The men of the merchant class wear over their trousers a long skirt, or mother hubbard, in addition to a regular coat and vest.
The youngsters in our crew had come to take complacently the extraordinary variety of costumes that we had encountered since leaving home. A seaman was heard to refer in amusing terms to a local contractor who was waiting on deck to attend to some business: "Tell the commissary steward there's a guy with a dress on waiting to see him." On another occasion a dashing governor accompanied by his highly decorated suite visited one of our ships. His kavass, a brilliantly uniformed footman, who remained on deck while the officials went below, was tired and leaned on a windsail which gave way to his weight. The quartermaster, whose job was to see and report everything, calmly called to his assistant, “Messenger! Report to the officer-of-the-deck that one of them kings just fell down the hatch."
The trip to Alexandria had attached to it the duty of getting contact with the diplomatic and consular officers at Cairo and Alexandria. The visits of American men-of-war in foreign ports are, except in special cases, a great help to our consuls. Even in a country where the government is firm and well disposed toward our own the occasional visit of a warship tends to strengthen the consul's prestige with his colleagues and with the business men whom he meets in his daily affairs. The little ceremony that attends the formal exchange of visits between the naval commander and the consul, the boat with the consular flag, the side boys, etc., serve to demonstrate in part to the local public the respect which our government extends to its foreign service. It is not wished to stress unduly the benefits which the Navy extends to consuls. The destroyers must have proved a mixed blessing, indeed, to those gentlemen who had to guide and entertain us, shop for us, interpret for us and pay our public bills. The American consuls and their wives have been uniformly cordial and hospitable and they have no better friends nor greater admirers than the officers and men of the Navy.
Our next move was to Jaffa, a short motor ride from Jerusalem and Bethlehem. We had a brief visit to those Holy places but my principal reason for never forgetting Jaffa is the storm which came up while we were there. A small party had gone to Jerusalem and the bad weather prevented any communication with the shore for forty-eight hours. After stretching our anchor chain till its length was increased ten per cent we had to get underway and steam back and forth off the coast for thirty-six hours till we could send for our party.
The two days lost at Jaffa cut our stay at Beirut down to a few hours. Beirut was the headquarters of the French occupation of Syria. With a half dozen of their naval ships in the port and a considerable number of troops in the town the place had the air of being a part of France. We had a Consulate General at Beirut but the shortness of our stay prevented my getting acquainted with the personnel in charge there. We picked up a passenger at Beirut, an American business man who lived at Mersine and wished to return there. He could not have got commercial transportation for a week over the 200 miles involved, while with us it was only an overnight run. Whenever we carried passengers the admiral required a report of the circumstances, including a statement of the amount charged by the officers' mess for meals. Remembering the strong wind and high following sea on the trip to Mersine, I was amused to see in the report, " . . . Charge for subsistence, None. (Passenger did not eat) . . . “
The Fox was at Mersine and moved on to the westward when we relieved her. There was never any inclination to remain in this port beyond the allotted time. At Mersine there were two American agents of the Standard Oil Company, and a group of American missionaries engaged ordinarily in school and church work among the Christians. At the time we first went there the leader of the missionaries, the Reverend R. E. Wilson, was caring for about 2,000 refugees, who were awaiting a ship for Greece. Mr. Wilson spent much time supervising the baking and distribution of bread for the refugees. He had to watch the bakers closely to prevent them from submitting their own dirty sweepings for the good flour furnished by the Americans. Among the refugees themselves it was difficult to get honest cooperation in the distribution of the bread. Many of the so-called Christians, selected to deliver the portions to their brothers in religion and, perhaps, in blood, would cheat the system by short-rationing their friends and selling the surplus. Mr. Wilson, a good, devoted, American preacher, gave up his life in this work, dying of typhus a few weeks after we saw him. I wonder if all the unfortunates, to whom he so kindly ministered, with all their merits combined, would be worth that one life expended in their service. And his was not the only one.
Bruce Wilson, his twelve-year old son, was the only English speaking boy in the town and I admired him for the way he maintained his nationalism. His habitual costume included an American army hat and the block letters "U. S." as worn on the army uniform. He spent a day and a night on the ship with us and added a sailor hat to his wardrobe. He could speak the Syrian tongue fluently but spoke English as an American boy at home would speak it. It must have been a great comfort for this real boy to feel the support that the Navy gave to his lonely but faithful persistence in carrying the emblem, "U. S.," in this out-of-the-way corner of the world.
Mersine, another of Turkey's ports open to the sea, lies at the head of an indentation too obtuse, or wide open, to be called a harbor. The city is small but is the principal port of Cilicia and has a railway with daily trains to Adana. The Lloyd-Triestino and Paquet steamers stop there regularly, as do several Levantine English steamships. Always four or five ships were discharging or loading at the anchorage, and the business seemed as great as that of Samsun and Trebizond combined.
The following despatch, sent from Mersine in January, 1923, is an example of similar messages that the Navy was continually handling:
To Station Ship Smyrna. 1023 Refugee situation at Mersine as follows fifteen hundred without funds being fed by missionary with Near East funds period Of this number fifty are ill twenty-five of whom are seriously ill period No communicable diseases period Five hundred with funds Who are supporting themselves period Total two thousand period All have permission to leave period Missionary has two thousand lire of Near East funds of which he spends about ninety daily period Request you give me as definite information as possible about eventual evacuation of these people 1220 Goff
Two days later we got the following answer from the American destroyer at Smyrna, which was in touch with the American relief organizations and with the Greek authorities striving to evacuate the Christian refugees from Turkey:
Goff 1026 Greek authorities state they expect to work further policy concerning evacuation by Friday twenty six January No information yet stop When relieved proceed Smyrna stop About one February you will proceed Constantinople via Mitylene and Salonica with Colonel Haskell on board 1230 Edsall
The Litchfield arrived on January 26 and the Goff sailed for Smyrna, a two days' trip at economical speed. About 300 miles west of Mersine we passed through the straits between the ancient city of Rhodes and the mainland of Asia Minor; then up through the islands, leaving Piscopi, Kandelusa and Levitha to port and Nikaria to starboard; and then through Khios Strait into the Gulf of Smyrna. At that time the Turks were in constant readiness for hostilities, no ships being permitted to approach their ports during the night. The approaches to Smyrna were announced to be mined and all ships wishing to enter the port must arrive at the entrance to the safety route by eight A. M., and follow in behind a pilot ship which was under the direction of the captain of the port. Smyrna harbor lends itself readily to mine protection. The city is in the southeast, or toe end, of a boot-shaped bay, of which the leg is north and south and the foot is east and west. Just under the arch, five miles from the toe, the navigable channel narrows to 200 yards under the guns of a fort less than a mile to the southward. The pilot ship would lead us to this narrow part from three miles to the westward and then leave us. The remaining five miles to the city was clear of mines. The commercial port of Smyrna is behind an artificial breakwater and is large enough to permit merchant ships to enter and moor with stern to the seawall. Men-of-war anchored outside of and to the northeastward of the commercial port. At the time warships of the United States, Great Britain, France, Italy and the Netherlands were at Smyrna. Each of these nations had consulates in the city and these "Europeans," which included the Americans, made up a very pleasant little social colony. I never saw Smyrna before the fire, but from the looks of the ruins of the splendid buildings it must have been a very pleasant place in the old days. The heart of the city was then, four months after the disaster, in utter ruin. No steps had been taken to clear up the wreckage and one could hardly pick a pathway through the streets in the burned section.
On January 31, after two days at Smyrna, Colonel Haskell, an army officer, in charge of the Red Cross work in Greece and the American Relief Administration in Russia, came aboard and we set out for Constantinople by way of Salonica, Greece. The passenger-carrying facilities of a destroyer are limited. The ship's officers occupy all the staterooms and are protected by both regulation and precedent against giving up their quarters to passengers. There are two comfortable sofas in the wardroom and if there are more than two extras the excess must sleep on cots in the wardroom and passageways. Colonel Haskell occupied my cabin, but as there were six other passengers this trip was rather trying to our guests. To make matters worse just outside Smyrna harbor we ran into one of those nasty, sudden blows that spring up from any direction in the Ægean and have no regularity of duration. I slept on the bridge and did not have to visit the wardroom until arrival at Salonica at eight o'clock the next morning. We had gone through a very nasty night and those who had tried to sleep in the wardroom had sampled the miseries of the unsteady ocean in sliding cots and over-peopled air. We arrived with seven red-eyed passengers, every one of whom would have taken an oath that the Goff was the most uncomfortable ship afloat.
I went ashore with Colonel Haskell and visited one of the camps containing about 6,000 refugees recently evacuated from Asia Minor. There were 200,000 Greeks and Armenians in various camps around the city. The Red Cross man in charge told us that most of these people were sorry they had left Turkey and would swim back if they thought they could. Very few could speak any language but Turkish and those chosen as petty officials in the camp had to speak both Greek and Turkish to be useful. This was a well kept camp with clean buildings, sterilizers, and latrines where the basic laws of sanitation were well observed. A man in charge of each barracks was responsible for its cleanliness and he also drew the rations for his gang. Each day he must present a certificate from the inspecting officer that his barracks was clean before he could draw the food for his housemates. That system worked.
Our consul at Salonica thought these people would soon be absorbed by the country. "There are some of them who have been here in the status of refugees for two years," he told me, "but Greece has been at war and has not had time to think of them, but now that peace has been established the government will be able to look out for these refugees." His optimism was not shared by the Red Cross men nor has my subsequent experience borne it out. At Patras, six months later, American business men stated that the local Greeks called these Anatolian cousins "Damned Turks," and that the native laborers interfered with clubs when the newcomers attempted to engage in work. However this situation may adjust itself, the fact cannot be overlooked that the induction into Greece of several hundred thousand new citizens must have a serious economic effect.
We had a smooth trip from Salonica to Constantinople. The steward had stocked up with some fresh things at the Greek port and he and the cook seemed to try to make up to our passengers on this trip for the food that most of them had missed between Smyrna and Salonica. Very few travelers have been served fried chicken, candied sweet potatoes and apple pie in the Dardanelles, but the Goff had to do something to counteract the bad weather of the previous day. Thanks to our excellent cook, the passengers were well pleased and left the ship at Constantinople expressing a hope that they might "ride" with us again.
After a short stay in Constantinople we sailed about the middle of February for the Black Sea. Our orders were to go to Varna, Bulgaria, and take up the duties of "Radio Relay Ship" at that port. The Embassy and the Navy at Constantinople depended chiefly on radio for communication with Washington. Cable service was limited and expensive. The Navy had a contract with the owners of the big radio station at Vienna to allow U. S. Naval operators to handle American business. The Vienna station worked with Paris which, in turn, worked with the big navy stations in the United States. Ships at Constantinople had difficulty in sending to Vienna and, due to phenomena well known to radio men, sometimes called "radio shadow," there was great difficulty at Constantinople in getting signals through to ships on the south coast of the Black Sea. This problem was solved by having a ship at Varna, 150 miles north northwest from Constantinople. The relay ship could work Vienna with little difficulty and had no trouble at all communicating with ships anywhere in the Black Sea.
We were delayed two hours in approaching Varna by the heavy fog which is common in the Black Sea. This coast has not been accurately surveyed and there is a notation on the chart that one should not go within two miles of the indicated shore line. At Varna we relieved the Fox. The captain of the port gave us a convenient berth alongside the mole and for the first time since leaving home we were in a position to "walk ashore."
The following is from my diary written at the time:
Varna is the principal seaport of Bulgaria and even in these winter months has shown marked commercial activity. Every day there were five or six large ships loading and unloading. There are several hundred plows on the pier near the customhouse. They seem to be from Germany. There are thousands of Russians, both kinds, in the city. Varna seems to be a distributing point of Russian Soviet propaganda. The British steamer Belgravian, said to be chartered by the League of Nations, left here for Novorossisk with about 1,000 of Wrangel's men who have decided to go back to Russia.
I find here from the authorities and from the people the most generous welcome I have encountered on the station. The mayor, Mr. Angeloff, is a type worth describing. He is a Bulgarian of about fifty-five years. He has lived in England and speaks the language very well. Of the well known politician type, he is extremely courteous and very vain. The chief decoration in the mayor's office was an enormous portrait of himself. Mr. Angeloff refers to himself, in English, as the "Lord Mayor." I noticed that now and then having used the plain word "Mayor,' he would immediately correct himself and say "Lord Mayor." He told us of a scheme of his to make Varna a second Monte Carlo. His idea is to interest foreign capital and to give to some organization a concession to build street railways in Varna and a large casino and hotel in the gardens near the city and to allow the organizers to operate these utilities and a gambling hall for fifteen or twenty years at the end of which time the whole accrued estate would revert to the city of Varna.
His proposition was interesting; his picture was vivid and fascinating. One could hear the click of the ivory ball, the Rien ne va plus of the croupier, and through the windows, the pistol shots of the suicides. Not being in a position to aid the "Lord Mayor," I could only express the polite hope that his dreams might come true.
Washington's birthday came while we were at Varna. The officials had been informed of the holiday and of our method of celebrating it. It was pleasing to see the Bulgarian patrol boats and a little English salvage ship follow our motions in full-dressing ship on the holiday morning. During the forenoon the "Lord Mayor" and other officials very kindly called and wished us well on our "Feast Day," as they called it. "Washington, oh yes, we all know Washington. He was the father of your wonderful country," said one. "We are proud to salute the great American nation on the birthday of the illustrious George Washington," said another. One high hatted politician, however, who must have been a sort of local dumb-bell, fumbled the ball when his turn came; "So this is the feast of Washington, what a beautiful city it must be!"
In the meantime the crew was holding a field day of sports on the pier a few hundred yards from the ship. Their games were new to the Varna waterfront and the word had apparently gotten about town that the American sailors were behaving in a most extraordinary fashion. Several hundred perplexed Bulgarians gazed in astonishment at the "mad Americans," who fought in pairs astride a greasy pole, who rushed strangely back and forth with potatoes in spoons, ran races with their legs in flour sacks and ate pie and whistled with their hands tied behind them.
From Varna we went to Constanza, Roumania, which will be discussed later, and then repeated our previous round of Trebizond, Samsun and back to Constantinople.
In March, 1923, we went into the Armstrong-Vickers dry dock at Constantinople to clean and paint the ship's bottom preparatory to holding a full power steaming trial. To reach this dock one must go up the Golden Horn through two bridges and after the second bridge make a 150° turn to the right in a space of about two ship lengths. The lower Bosphorus, where the Golden Horn joins it, is as thick with ships as Fifth Avenue and Forty-second Street is with motor cars. Some are at anchor, others are approaching and leaving their anchorages. The little shirkets, or ferry steamers, are continually going back and forth at fifteen knots. There is one particular bane of the Bosphorus, the low powered tugs with fifteen or twenty miscellaneous barges and sailing craft in tow, trailing out at all angles, and these always seem to be under the bow when one is ready to turn. The first bridge is open for only one hour and everything that needs to go through during the day must be on its side ready to rush through during this time. The opening through the lower bridge is not more than twenty feet wider than the beam of our destroyers. There are three different currents within the approach to this opening and, in addition to our other troubles, just as we were pointed fair to go through, a heavy fog set in. The pilot was a great comfort, but a pilot is only an adviser and his presence does not lessen the captain's responsibility. We eased through the bridge without touching, only to find an impatient schooner, which could not wait her turn, bearing down from one side in such a way as to menace our stern, her bowsprit missing our flagpole by a few inches. In the thick fog we heard violent whistling ahead and a passing caique-jee informed the pilot that a large steamer above the second bridge had lost control and had been swept down across the opening of the bridge by the current. Here we were between two bridges, in a narrow, moving stream, in a thick fog with hundreds of schooners and boats around us. We kept just enough speed to counteract the current and give steerageway. We could neither go ahead nor astern. I felt like the enterprising water tender who once said, "I never stand up, I never sit down; I keep going all the time." After an hour the steamer got clear and we advanced another notch. The remainder of the task was comparatively simple and after another half hour we crossed the sill of the dry dock and the fog lifted. The Turks scrubbed the side with brooms made of bundles of firewood and worked all night putting on two coats of paint so that the ship was ready to go out when the bridge was opened the next morning.
The discipline of the crew ran along about the same as at home. With a crew of a hundred odd excellent men we might go several weeks at a time with no delinquencies or, when at Constantinople after pay day, we might have in one day six or eight men on report. Perfecto, mess attendant, third class, came up to the mast one time for having returned to the ship fourteen hours overleave. Upon being questioned he stated that he had gotten married the day before to a Greek girl at Constantinople and her family had prevailed against his will to make him take the night off from his duties. He also stated that his wife spoke only Greek and that what talking he did was confined to a few words of Greek learned during his courtship.
Constantinople was overcrowded with people of various nationalities who were eager to improve their lot by getting away from there. Anywhere to the westward they would be better off. America was heaven in their imagination. If a family could marry a member to an American bluejacket a strong lever would be thereby produced. A foothold would be gained in the land of promise and the sailor's wife, once established as an American citizen, would be in a position to help her relatives get to the United States. The American bluejackets were by no means easy marks and many of them made good matches with worthy women who had no ulterior motives. But the fact remains that marriage with our sailors was the aim of many women whose real object was thus to obtain a visa and transportation to the United States. Perfecto had gotten himself into a peck of trouble. He, a Filipino, was not an American citizen and, even if he had been, under the United States laws a foreign woman does not automatically become an American citizen when she marries an American. She must come in under the quota allowed to the country of her birth although she is given precedence over ordinary immigrants. Perfecto was not punished for being overleave, and unfortunately my wish to punish his family-in-law could not be gratified. While naval discipline includes no jurisdiction over the right of an enlisted man to marry, it was Admiral Bristol's policy to place all reasonable obstacles in the way of sudden and ill-advised marriages between our men and foreign women. There are many bluejackets today who are thankful to the admiral that his wisdom has kept them from a life of incompatible marriage or worse.
The full power trials finished, we were ordered to Athens for ten days to afford radio communication to the legation, the relief organizations and business men there. Just as we were leaving Constantinople a dispatch was received directing us to go to Mudania on the south coast of the Marmora, pick up Colonel Haskell and take him to Athens, stopping at Cavalla enroute.
We moored in the inner harbor of Piraeus, the port of Athens. The American business men of the city took turns at furnishing a motor car to carry radio messages, which the destroyer handled on the regular commercial basis, to and from the city eight miles away. I took the first opportunity to do a little sight-seeing in Athens and to call on the Chargé d'Affaires and the Consul General. Mr. Caffery, our diplomatic representative, lived in the legation on University Street and both he and his successor, Ray Atherton, were very hospitable, and all in our mess were made to feel peculiarly at home in the legation. At that time our government did not recognize the Greek Government but maintained a diplomatic secretary in charge of American interests. The Greeks were cordial and professed to admire us as a nation, and relations, though unofficial, were not difficult.
In the interests of one of the relief organizations we made a quick trip through the Corinth Canal to the Island of Cephalonia. The Goff was the first American war ship to visit Argostoli, the port of that island. There is a land locked bay capable of sheltering a modern fleet. Vine clad mountains surround the large bay and the unusually clean and pretty town of Argostoli sits in a little indentation on the eastern side just wide enough to afford an ideal anchorage for a destroyer. After the many exposed anchorages in that part of the world there was a wonderful feeling of comfort in this little haven. On the run back to Athens we stopped over night at Patras, the second sea port in importance of Greece. The American Consul there told us of a hard fight he had recently won to improve the methods of handling currants in their selection and packing. This fruit is a small grape and its treatment is in general the same as that of raisins. The best currants come from Patras and Corinth and from the latter city the famous little grape got its name. It had been the custom for years to lay the currants out on the ground in whatever filth might be present, there to be picked over and assorted by dirty workers accompanied by swarms of flies. This unsanitary handling had roused the official ire of our consul and he, representing the nation which was the greatest purchaser, had after long effort been able to bring about an embargo which forced the local packers to provide proper floors in screened warehouses and sanitary handling by those engaged in assorting and packing.
The Goff relieved another destroyer at Smyrna on April 17. A few days before this, two Greek prisoners of war, who had escaped from their Turkish captors and thrown themselves into the harbor, had ultimately arrived in an exhausted and drowning condition alongside the American destroyer. If these men had been in a boat they would not have been allowed to come aboard, but in the darkness of night when they were frantically calling for help, to rescue them from the water was the most natural thing in the world. Once aboard, however, and revived, they made known their status to the captain, who realized that he had a situation on his hands.
In boarding an American warship these prisoners of war had gained neutral ground and, according to international law and usage, were immune from return to their captors. After the matter had been threshed out it developed that the American Navy must hold them interned until they could be exchanged and sent back to Greece. The Turkish military authorities in the meantime, although realizing what the international practice must be in such a case, were very anxious to get back these prisoners and, while not making any formal demands in the premises, had attempted to persuade the destroyer captain to turn them back. That officer informed the Turkish general of the peculiar status of the escaped prisoners and retained them. When I relieved him a few days later he turned over the prisoners to us.
The following is quoted from my diary of April 18, 1923.
Called on the Vali, on the general commanding the fortifications and on Izzadeen Pasha who is the general commanding the troops. He is the general interested in the prisoners. When I went with the interpreter from the consulate to call on the general, his aide, after we had announced ourselves, came back and asked what was the purpose of the visit. The interpreter did not repeat this question to me until after we had completed our visit. He said that he had told the aide that I was making an ordinary call of courtesy on the general. Izzadeen Pasha received me with a cold and unpleasant look on his face and sat for an appreciable time without saying anything after I had shaken hands with him. I do not know if this is his natural manner or whether he is showing annoyance because we are harboring his escaped prisoners. I informed him that the two prisoners had been left on the Goff. The following conversation then took place:
General: "Why are these prisoners being kept on the American ship?"
I: "They are being kept under guard on an American ship until their ultimate disposition is decided by proper authority."
General: "Whom do you consider proper authority?"
I: "The American and Turkish authorities at Constantinople."
The subject was then changed. Izzadeen's manner continued cold. The other officials whom I visited were very courteous, indeed. I believe that Izzadeen's manner was his normal manner. His looks convinced me that whatever pleasures he gets from life are not hilarious.
The two Greeks were transferred to the Edsall when that ship relieved us as Station Ship at Smyrna. They needed no guards. They could not have been driven away from the American ship with rifles. After about six weeks of high life and big rations in the United States Navy they were finally sent to Greece and the question was regarded by all parties as settled satisfactorily.
It was a pleasure to vary the monotony of the Turkish ports with an occasional visit to Roumania. The natives of this country do not take their troubles too seriously. Their money has a very low relative value and is apparently not improving, but the people seem to be happy, well dressed and free from care. We visited Constanza several times in winter and summer and always found the shops wide open, plenty of commerce in the harbor, lots of amusement places and everybody working hard and playing hard. We arrived at Constanza in June with authority to spend four days visiting Roumanian ports. The Goff had been there twice before and we were on very good terms with the officials. Admiral Schodra, the naval commandant, was a fine looking old seaman with a tremendous beard, and was a graduate of the Italian Naval Academy at Leghorn. Nicolas Negulescu, the prefect, was very courteous to us. Three of the Goff's men got into an unfortunate scrape in the city and their conduct was entirely out of keeping with the traditional excellent behavior of our bluejackets. Anticipating a letter from the prefect on the subject a formal note in French deploring the bad behavior of these individuals was hurriedly sent him, assuring him that the men concerned would be punished, and inviting his attention to the model conduct of the great majority of our sailors. The prefect replied immediately in pleasing language, finishing his letter with the statement that "the admiration of the Roumanian people for the great United States is too great to be stirred by such trivial incidents." The day of our arrival at Constanza, Peter Augustus Jay, the American minister at Bucharest, was informed by telephone that the Goff was going to visit Sulina and then go up the Danube as far as Galatz. In the name of Admiral Bristol, an invitation was extended him to join us for the trip. Fortunately for us, Mr. Jay was able to accept and we set out early one morning with the intention of stopping for the night at Sulina, at the mouth of tire Danube. It became stormy during the day and I decided not to try to cross the bar at Sulina with the sea that was running and anchored overnight at the Portici anchorage, south of the Saint George mouth of the Danube. We passed through the Sulina mouth early the next morning and entered the river. At Tulcea, about fifty miles from the sea, the Danube breaks into a trident and flows outward in three courses. The main entrance is the Sulina branch which consists of a canal cut straight from the sea for thirty-four miles inland, by-passing, for that distance, the narrow and serpentine bed of the original river. There was a depth of only nineteen feet at the dredged entrance and ships drawing more had to anchor outside and tranship their river cargoes.
Sulina seems to exist chiefly as the home of the European Danube Commission which was brought into being incident to the Treaty of Paris of 1856. Its first organization consisted of a member each from Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, Sardinia, Russia and Turkey, and its mission was "to designate and cause to be executed the works necessary below Isaktcha to clear the mouths of the Danube as well as the neighboring parts of the sea, from the sands and other impediments which obstructed them, in order to put that part of the river and the said parts of the sea in the best possible state for navigation." It was intended that this commission should exist for two years, after which its functions should be handled by a commission of the countries contiguous to the river, but the body has been continually renewed and its powers extended up the river as far as Braila, and in 1878 a Roumanian delegate was added to the commission. The present commission has one member each from France, Great Britain, Italy and Roumania.
To the northward of the Danube, limited by the Pruth River on the west and by the Dniester on the northeast, is the much-talked-of Bessarabia, formerly of the Russian Empire but now a part of Roumania. To the southward, between the Danube and the Bulgarian border is the section known as Dobrogia. The canal from Sulina inland has from twenty-five to forty feet of water and, except for one section of three miles, is wide enough for two large ships to pass abreast. From the junction of the canal and the main river to Braila, a hundred miles from the sea, the channel is deep and wide.
The shameless exercise of poetic license by a writer of waltzes had filled the romantic heart of my boyhood with a desire to see this wonderful river which I pictured as a stream of clearest sapphire, gentle as a melody, flowing to the sea. My mind has been disabused. The waltz is lovely but the river is not blue. The sight might better have been the inspiration of "Waitin' for the Robert E. Lee"! We anchored in the stream off the city of Galatz in the afternoon, ninety miles from the river's mouth. Roumanian officers informed us that the destroyer could have gone as far up as Giurgiu, just south of Bucharest and 100 miles further inland. We spent one day at Galatz. It was most active as a commercial port. Dozens of steamers were loading and unloading. Large barges were taking on cargoes of lumber for the steamers which had to wait outside at Sulina. There was a very respectable navy yard where gun boats and destroyers were being repaired.
Some officers of the Roumanian Navy and some foreigners gave their ideas about the European Danube Commission. Their remarks are summed up as given from two different points of view. The Roumanians said:
"When Bessarabia was part of Russia there was proper ground for having such a commission because the mouth of the river did not lie wholly in one country. Now, however, as Bessarabia is part of Roumania, there is no justification for the commission as the mouth of the river is entirely in Roumania and the control of the lower part of the river should be exercised entirely by Roumania. Before the commission took over the administration in 1856 there was always a depth of twenty-two feet at the Sulina entrance. Now, although the commission puts a heavy toll on all shipping, the overhead of the administration is so high that the receipts are not put into dredging and the money which should be used exclusively for river improvements goes largely to pay the salaries of the commissioners."
The foreigner gave another point of view:
"Bessarabia and Dobrogia are nominally Roumanian and belong to that country at the present time but neither tenure is certain. Bulgaria longs for Dobrogia and Russia threatens to take back Bessarabia. Roumania holds the latter section only by retaining in Bessarabia a large army. There are precedents for such a commission, for example that of the Rhine. Bulgaria, Jugoslavia and Hungary are adjacent to the navigable part of this river and their riverain rights must be guaranteed by international administration. The tax put on river shipping is necessary for the upkeep of the canal and the salaries of pilots. The Roumanian government could greatly reduce the individual cost of the toll by adopting a more liberal policy of export."
Before leaving Constanza leave was granted to a large party of the crew to visit Bucharest, with instructions that they should rejoin the ship at Galatz between certain hours. Mr. Jay remarked that he didn't see how these men could be turned loose on such a complicated trip in a totally strange country with any assurance that they would successfully find their way to the designated place at the expiration of their leave. "How can they," he asked, "when they don't speak the language?"
"I don't know what they speak," I answered, "The American sailor abroad has a general sort of language that he calls 'parley voo' and I've never heard of one ashore failing to get what he wanted." The minister was present when the officer of the deck reported that all of the leave party had returned on time. He thought this was extraordinary, but of course none of the officers had expected anything else. There is no better advertisement of American merit than a clean, intelligent, snappy crew of American bluejackets. We don't appreciate the superiority of our sailors so much at home as we do when we see them abroad and have an opportunity to compare them with the bluejackets of other navies. An American woman who had been living for years in Bucharest wrote, "When I met in the streets of Bucharest those strong, beautiful boys in the uniform of the American Navy, when I looked into their happy, intelligent faces I wanted to shout to them that I, too, was American; and I had the first pangs of homesickness that I had known since I was a little girl."
From Roumania we went again to Odessa with orders to extend the usual facilities to the American Relief Administration and particularly to meet Senator Smith W. Brookhart, who was coming out of Russia, and to give him transportation to Constantinople on our return trip. We found Odessa the same as six months before except that there were more stores with plenty of shoes, clothing and manufactured articles, whereas at the time of our earlier visit there had been little but second-hand goods. Senator Brookhart arrived in the afternoon of June 18 and we sailed next morning for Constantinople. The senator had been ten days in Russia and had talked with Trotzky and Tchicherin at Moscow, who had given him every freedom in his travels. The senator, whose greatest interest was the welfare of the farmer, had been traveling in Europe studying the systems of cooperative banking employed in various countries. He had observed with a trained eye the wonderful wheat crops in Russia and a note of melancholy was detected in his voice as he referred to the neglected possibilities of corn-raising in that country.
Most of Mr. Brookhart's interests were not mine, but we were on common ground when he discussed rifle shooting and marksmanship. At the time of the Spanish-American War he had been a lieutenant of the Iowa National Guard. His company had been allowed some ridiculously low number, thirty or fifty, of rounds of ammunition per man with which to teach the recruits how to shoot their rifles. This neglect galled the young officer and, after the war when he was appointed captain of a national guard company, he secured a large quantity of ammunition and made sharpshooters of ninety-five per cent of his company. In teaching his men to shoot he had become an expert himself and he was soon recognized as one of the best shots in the United States. From membership of a national team to the captaincy of a team which won international matches and then to the presidency of the National Rifle Association were his natural successive steps and the senator said he never allowed anything to keep him from attending the national matches.
As the situation in the Near East began to calm down it was realized that we did not need so large a force as our government had kept there throughout the last of 1922 and the early part of 1923. The squadron of twelve destroyers, to which the Goff belonged, was sent out during the excitement that followed the expulsion of the Greek Army from Asia Minor and the destruction of Smyrna. At that time it was necessary to have a large number of ships on the station ready to take adequate care of American residents. What had happened to Smyrna was not likely to happen to other places but active hostilities between the Turks and some European power were conceivably possible during a period of several months and such an eventuality would have called for the active employment of all of Admiral Bristol's twenty-four ships in extending protection and refuge to American citizens throughout the troubled area. As it became apparent that the Lausanne Treaty would preclude open trouble it was decided to send the greater part of the destroyers home. Six of the squadron went home in June and another six, including the Goff, left in July, stopping at Naples and Gibraltar on the way. The Goff was at Mersine when ordered to return to America. I was temporarily assigned to the Litchfield with orders to command the Parrott. The Litchfield met the Parrott at Smyrna. This ship made three more trips around the Black Sea, spent the month of September at gunnery exercises in the Sea of Marmora and in October went back to Athens to act as station ship.
At this time, the so-called Revolutionist party was in power, having gained control of the government in September, 1922, soon after the defeat of the Greek Army in Asia Minor. The revolutionary movement was conceived and carried out by certain army and navy officers under influence of the recent military disaster for the purpose of dealing with the ministers and officers who had been responsible for the army's catastrophe in Asia Minor. They had brought about the abdication of King Constantine and had remained in power pending elections which were due to occur in December, 1923.
In the latter part of October planes flew over Athens and dropped placards announcing that a counter revolution had taken place, and that the armies of Epirus, Macedonia and the Peloponnesus, and the navy were combined in the new movement, the object of which was to take over the control of affairs and guarantee uninfluenced voting at the coming elections. A certain general and several other high army officers had gone to Corinth, on the Peloponnesian peninsula, and had gathered the troops there about them and announced the counter revolution. We visited Patras the day after the counter revolution was declared. As soon as we anchored, a boat came out from the shore with Mr. Donegan, the American Consul, and several Greek officers. The latter stated that Patras and all the Peloponnesus were in the hands of the counter revolutionists, that all the army was with them and that after a few days their forces would march peaceably on Athens to take over the government. "There will be no bloodshed," they said. "We will fight if necessary but when the opposition sees our force they will retire gracefully and we shall take charge without combat." They asked for news from Athens and of the Greek Navy. We told them that we knew nothing except that the Athens papers stated in effect that the counter revolution was weak and sporadic and would die of its own weight in a few days; and that the Navy would remain loyal to the old government. They did not believe this; the Navy was moved by the same noble spirit and must be on their side.
Miss Owens, of the Near East Relief, arrived at Patras that day on a military train from Corinth. She said that the Near East Relief orphanage at Corinth was in danger because the counter revolutionists had encamped all around it and, in case of attack, the orphanage would be right in the midst of the trouble. A wireless message was sent to the legation at Athens to acquaint our representative there with the situation at Corinth. He was assured by the government that the orphanage would not be harmed under any circumstances.
The second day at Patras we got word by radio that a Greek battleship would arrive at Patras that afternoon. The people ashore had heard this but did not know whether the ship was on their side or the other. The success or failure of the counter revolution depended on the ship's action, because all realized that the navy controlled the Corinth Canal and that no movement of troops from the Peloponnesus to the mainland could be accomplished if the navy were against them. The people had been led to believe, however, that the navy was with them against the government.
At about three in the afternoon we sighted a battleship standing in from the westward and the familiar old cage masts, as they gradually rose over the horizon, revealed to us our good old Idaho, which, before her sale to the Greeks in 1914, had known glorious days in our Navy where for one year she had flown the battle efficiency pennant as the champion of the fleet. The Lemnos, as she was now called, was observed from the city and the waterfront was packed with citizens ready to celebrate or take cover according to the action of the oncoming war ship. We knew that the navy was entirely with the government and the consul had been so advised. We were also confident that there would be no occasion for any firing on the town but were relieved, nevertheless, to see the large American flag flying over the consulate and another conspicuous ensign on the water front hotel where all the local Americans were gathered. As the Lemnos came nearer the citizens equipped with glasses began to make observations which caused movement in the crowd. By the time she was close enough for the naked eye to see her guns the crowd had gone. The entire battery of the battleship was trained on the town and the population recently so visible had thoroughly hidden themselves. The Lemnos continued to the eastward and fired one shot with a small gun when opposite the town to bring too a small merchant ship, which was required to tail in behind her. This was her only sound but the unsympathetic position of her guns had convinced the people of Patras that the navy was against the counter revolution. When we went ashore late that afternoon we did not find as many enemies of the government as we had observed before the passing of the Lemnos.
The Parrott made one more tour of inspection around the Greek islands. We made three stops on the island of Crete, visited Mitylene and Khios and spent a week-end at Vathi on the Island of Samos and then visited Mykonos, Delos, Syra, Tinos and Andres and returned to Athens. With the exception of Delos, all of these places were centers of refugees from Anatolia. We found that these people were being fairly well cared for. Some of them were becoming self-supporting and on the Island of Crete, farmers from Samsun and Smyrna had begun to raise crops of tobacco with a fair prospect of making that an important industry on the island.
I left the Parrott at Mudros Bay, Greece, on November 20, 1923, and came home in the U. S. S. Denebola. My thirteen months' cruising in the Black Sea and Eastern Mediterranean had been as interesting as any peace time naval duty can be. I had seen the Navy covering a wide range of usefulness beneficial to the American people as a whole. Services, diplomatic and economic, commercial and philanthropic, services performed according to the spirit which was summed up by Admiral Bristol as the keynote of our mission: "Remember that all Americans look alike to us out here. Rich and poor, pleasant and unpleasant, they all look alike to us and our duty here is to protect their lives and to guard their legitimate interests."