A second bomb missed the port quarter by a foot or so, and sent
another wave over the lower deck.
The biplane swung up into the wind, hung motionless for a second or so,
then came the third bomb, which just grazed the starboard rail and shot
into the sea.
The airship hung around for a few minutes, then headed toward the Dutch
coast. She was flying a white flag, with a black cross in the centre,
the pennant of the German air fleet.
CASE OF THE GULFLIGHT.
_Official confirmation of the attack on May 1, 1915, by a German
submarine on the American oil tank steamer Gulflight off the Scilly
Islands came to the State Department at Washington on May 3 in
dispatches from Joseph G. Stephens, the United States Consul at
Plymouth, England. Two members of the crew were drowned, the Captain
died of heart failure, and thirty-four members of the crew were saved.
Following is the sworn statement of Ralph E. Smith, late chief officer
and now master of the Gulflight, received from Ambassador Page and
published by the State Department at Washington on May 11:_
I am Ralph E. Smith, now master of the steamship Gulflight.
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