Page:Victory at Sea - William Sowden Sims and Burton J. Hendrick.djvu/89

1917] man over to the civil authorities for trial, and a jury, composed entirely of Irishmen, acquitted him. The action of this jury in itself indicated that there was no sympathy among the decent Irish element, which constituted the great majority, with this sort of tactics, but naturally it did not improve relations between our men and the Sinn Fein. The importance of another incident which took place at the cathedral has been much exaggerated. It is true that a priest in his Sunday sermon denounced the American sailors as vandals and betrayers of Irish womanhood, but it is also true that the Roman Catholics of that section were themselves the most enraged at this absurd proceeding. A number of Roman Catholic officers who were present left the church in a body ; the Catholic Bishop of the Diocese called upon Admiral Bayly and apologized for the insult, and he also punished the offending priest by assigning him to new duties at a considerable distance from the American ships.

But even more serious trouble was brewing, for our officers discovered that the American sailors were making elaborate plans to protect themselves. Had this discovery not been made in time, something like an international incident might have resulted. Much to our regret, therefore, it was found necessary to issue an order that no naval men, British or American, under the rank of Commander, should be permitted to go to Cork. Ultimately we had nearly 8,000 American men at this station; Queenstown itself is a small place of 6,000 or 7,000, so it is apparent that it did not possess the facilities for giving such a large number of men those relaxations which were necessary to their efficiency. We established a club in Queenstown, provided moving pictures and other entertainments, and did the best we could to keep our sailors contented. The citizens of Cork also keenly regretted our action. The great majority had formed a real fondness for our boys ; and they regarded it as a great humiliation that the rowdy element had made it necessary to keep our men out of their city. Many letters were printed in the Cork newspapers apologizing to the Americans and calling upon the people to take action that would justify us in rescinding our order. The loss to Cork tradesmen was great ; our men received not far from $200,000 to $300,000 a month in pay ; they were free spenders, and their pre-