-
4. The Flag under Fire: From Leelanaw to Chemung
- University Press of Florida
- Chapter
- Additional Information
4 The Flag under Fire From Leelanaw to Chemung Leelanaw Another of the ships owned by the Harriss-Irby-Voss Company, the oilburning steamer Leelanaw, ran into trouble off the Orkney Islands, north of Scotland, immediately after the capture of the Pass of Balmaha. The Leelanaw , under the command of Captain Eugene Delk, had left New York on May 17, 1915, carrying a cargo of cotton consigned to Russia via Gothenburg, Sweden. After being detained for four weeks by the British at Kirkwall, the ship was released June 26 to proceed via Sweden to Russia. After delivering the cotton cargo, the steamer left July 8 from Archangel in Russia, bound for Belfast, with a cargo of flax. The submarine accosting Leelanaw was U-41, the same that had torpedoed but not sunk the Nebraskan. U-41 hailed the Leelanaw on July 25, 1915, and on examining the ship’s papers, Claus Hansen of U-41 determined that the flax was contraband. He ordered the steamer crew to take to their boats, bringing their personal belongings with them, and come aboard the submarine. When they were all aboard, the sub fired about five shots from the deck gun, a torpedo, and two more gunshots, finally sinking the steamer.1 With the crew of Leelanaw on deck of U-41, the submarine motored on the surface until in sight of land in the Orkneys. Hansen ordered the crew into their boats, and then towed the boats shoreward. The crew all made it safely to Kirkwall. American consul E. H. Dennison ordered the crew sent on to Dundee, where he was stationed, so that he could obtain further details .2 Recognizing the significance of the fact that the crew of the ship was largely made up of Americans, the New York Times carried a list of names and hometowns. Even resident aliens in the United States were identified, with hometowns ranging across the United States from Maine through New The Flag under Fire: From Leelanaw to Chemung / 49 York, New Jersey, and Delaware, to Texas and California. With this notice, the Times began the practice of identifying crew members by name, town, and later, even by street address. In addition to making identification of survivors easier for friends and relatives, the hometown listing had the effect of stressing the “Americanness” of some of the ships destroyed.3 George Hoyer, a representative of the Harriss-Irby-Vose cotton exporting company, pointed out that the sinking differed from the case of the William P. Frye in that the cargo of flax belonged to a citizen of a country that was an enemy of Germany. Even though the ship was American, the ship had been chartered to carry flax to Belfast, Ireland. The company had anticipated that the ship would unload in Belfast and refuel with oil for the return trip to the United States. Hoyer explained that on the outward-bound trip from the United States, the ship had been detained in Kirkwall by the British on suspicion that the original cotton cargo was destined for Germany, via Sweden, rather than for Russia. The British had only released Leelanaw on condition that the cotton would not be offloaded in Gothenburg, but would be carried all the way to Archangel.4 Figure 7. Leelanaw. This stubby 1,924-ton U.S. flag freighter was sunk by the Germans in 1915. Woodrow Wilson did not treat the episode as a casus belli, because the crew was warned and safely evacuated and because the ship was indeed carrying a contraband cargo. (Reprinted with permission from Mariners’Museum, Newport News, Va.) [3.133.79.70] Project MUSE (2024-04-17 22:20 GMT) 50 / Sovereignty at Sea First reactions from the State Department indicated a degree of bristling at the fact that the Leelanaw crew had not been given a chance to surrender the cargo to the German submarine, and that they had been forced to take to their lifeboats. The parallels and differences between the Leelanaw case and the Frye case were explored with the press, and “high officials,” probably State Department spokesmen acting on Secretary of State Robert Lansing’s authority, “were inclined” to look on the Leelanaw incident as a “serious aggravation of the situation.” By contrast with the somewhat milder protests over the Frye case, the Leelanaw episode was seen as exhibiting “contemptuous ” disregard for the treaties of 1785, 1799, and 1828 between Prussia and the United States. The Times speculated that, depending on the...