Henderson Daily Dispatch

THE WORLD WAR DAY-BY-DAY

Oct. 30. 1914--In the morning five French torpedo-boat destroyers joined the British flotilla off Nieuport. The Germans. on the west side of the Yser. were in a trap, caught between fire and flood. Their only chance of escaping was to carry Nieuport and gain control of the sluice gates.

As the French ships joined him, Rear Admiral Hood hoisted his flag on the Intrepid and led his squadron into action off Lombartzyde, the approach to Nieuport while the French and British destroyers guarded the larger vessels from U-boats.

From the dunes German howitzers hurled huge shells. The Amazon was badly hit. The commander of the Falcon and eight seamen were killed and 18 disabled. The monitor Mersey. erstwhile Brazilian river gunboat was crippled. All day the battle raged

Somewhere in the inferno, near Lombartzyde, was perched a watcher marking where shells from the warships were falling. With him sat a telephonist. Each time a shell burst. or the enemy made a move visible to the watcher. he glanced at his map and gave a message to headquarters whence it was repeated again by telephone to the wireless station in the rear. From there it was flashed to the ships. Thus, a few seconds after he had fired his shot, the gunner at sea learned where his shell had fallen, regulated his aim, and fired again at the invisible foe.

The fleet's heavy artillery played havoc with the strategy of Falkenhayn. He had calculated that with Antwerp taken and Ostend captured there was opportunity to sweep down the coast past Calais and Boulogne; to seize Dunkirk. the last French fortress in the north: to take root on the eastern shore of the Straits of Dover: to bring by canal and river the submarines already so fatal to British warships. to threaten England with invasion as Napoleon had threatened it; to menace London by Zeppelins; by heavy artillery and mines to close the Straits of Dover and leave the port of London as dead as that of Hamburg.

Such were the Germans' grandiose plans when the first blow was struck along the seacoast south of Ostend, fell upon the shaken remnant of Belgian forces, led by their king standing behind the Yser River at Nieuport, where it enters the sea. There for days the Belgians, with some French support, maintained an unequal combat. At the critical moment the British fleet took station behind the dunes. Its heavy artillery beat down the German advance.

Halted here, the Germans moved inland and came on again about Dixmude. half way between Ypres and Nieuport. Here once more they made progress until the Belgians opened the sluices and the water turned the whole country into a lake, drowning the invaders in regiments, repeating the exploit of the Dutch in their fight against Alva.

Then the Germans turned eastward from Dixmude. toward Ypres.

The British fleet had saved England at the Yser. Now her army was to save it again at Ypres.