Ten minutes
later the central German dreadnought turned out of line a mass of
seething fire. But, after five minutes more, the magnificent _Queen
Mary_, Beatty's champion shooting battle cruiser, was simply torn in
two by the explosion of her magazine. This left four all in battle
cruisers, with the four fast British battleships straining their last
turn of speed to come up.
[Illustration: BEATTY.]
Meanwhile fifteen German and twelve British destroyers charged out
together to try their torpedoes, met in the middle, and had a fierce
fight. Two Germans went down; but the British formation was broken,
and only three closed the German battle cruisers, which received them
with a perfect hurricane of shells from their quick-firing guns,
sinking one, disabling another, and forcing the third to retire.
Commander Bingham, who won the V.C. by leading this skilful and gallant
attack, had his destroyer, the _Nestor_, sunk under him. But he was
saved, as if by a miracle, and taken prisoner aboard a German
man-of-war.
_Second Round: Beatty luring Scheer and Hipper on towards Jellicoe:
4.
Pages:
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332