Page:Victory at Sea - William Sowden Sims and Burton J. Hendrick.djvu/303

1918] the really extraordinary professional ability of civil engineers D. G. Copeland and A. W. K. Billings made such work possible, but only, I might add, with the hearty co-operation of Lieutenant-Commander Benjamin Briscoe and his small band of loyal and devoted co-workers. Another great adventure was the establishment of our Northern Bombing Group, under the command of Captain David C. Hanrahan, U.S.N.; here we had 112 planes, 305 officers, and more than 2,000 enlisted personnel, who devoted all of their attention to bombing German submarine bases at Zeebrugge and Ostend. This enterprise was a joint one with the marines under the command of Major A. A. Cunningham, an experienced pilot and an able administrator, who performed all of his various duties not only to my entire satisfaction but in a manner which reflected the greatest credit to him- self as well as to the Marine Corps of which he was a worthy representative. Due to the fact that the rapidity of our construction work had exceeded that with which airplanes were being built at home, we entered into an agreement with the Italian Government whereby we obtained a number of Caproni planes in exchange for raw materials. Several of these large bombing airplanes were successfully flown over the Alps to the fields of Flanders, under the direction of Lieutenant-Commander E. O. MacDonnell, who deserves the greatest credit for the energetic and resourceful manner in which he executed this difficult task.

In September, 1918, Captain Cone's duties took him to Ireland; the ship on which he sailed, the Leinster, was torpedoed in the Irish Sea; Captain Cone was picked up unconscious in the water, and, when taken to the hospital, it was discovered that both his legs were broken. It was therefore necessary to appoint another officer in his stead, and I selected Lieutenant W. A. Edwards, who had served with credit on the destroyer Cushing, and who, for some time, had been second in command to Captain Cone in the aviation section. It was almost unprecedented to put at the head of such an important branch a young lieutenant who had only been out of the naval academy for a few years; ordinarily the duties would have required a man of Admiral's rank. Lieutenant Edwards, however, was not only extremely capable, but he had the gift of getting along splendidly with our Allies, particularly the British, with whom our intercourse was necessarily extensive, and with