The Fate Op The “Matunga”

How a Burns, Philp Liner Vanished Completely, Near Rabaul

(Condensed From a Chapter in “The Cruise of the Raider Wolf" I

0N July 27* 1917, the Burns, Philp pas senger steamer “Matunga” left Sydney for Rabaul, with mails, stores, and general cargo. Her crew numbered about 50. and the passengers included troops for the garrison, and several milit ary officers —among them Colonel Strang man, former Acting-Administrator of New Guinea. She called at Brisbane, hav ing previously wirelessed, in plain langu age her time of arrival.

Leaving Brisbane on July 29. the “Matunga” was due at Rabaul on August 7. At 5 p.m. on August 5, she wirelessed Rabaul that she would arrive at 2 a.m.

From that moment, she vanished. Her dis appearance caused a nation-wide sensa tion.

The first theory was that time-bombs had been secreted in her cargo. No con nection was seen between her disappear ance and the similar disappearance of the steamer “Wairuna”, now many weeks overdue between New Zealand and San Francisco. Writers of letters to the news papers had a great time for months, ascribing her disappearance to causes ranging from sudden pestilence to non observance of the Jewish Sabbath.

Finally, all doubts appeared settled when it was discovered that an earth quake. estimated to have occurred off New Guinea, had been recorded on the seismo graph at the Sydney Observatory on August 6. Most people were convinced that

the ship and all aboard had been engulfed during a seismic disturbance.

What Really Happened

THE actual fate of the “Matunga” dif fered from all of these surmises. The first wireless message, sent from Burns, Philp and Co., Sydney, to the Rabaul agents, on July 27, had informed them— and, incidentally, the secret enemy raider “Wolf”, lurking almost coal-less and food less near the Solomon Islands—that the “Matunga” was carrying 500 tons of West port coal for a Government vessel at Rabaul, together with many hundreds of tons of general cargo, mostly stores, for Rabaul and outlying ports. Then there was the ship’s own bunker coal for the round voyage.

The “Matunga” was a prize worth wait ing for by the hungry raider, which kept an intense wireless watch, but never her self sent out a radio message, so that her presence in the Pacific was unsuspected.

On July 29 the second message (that sent to Brisbane) gave an idea of the ship’s progress, and when the “Wolf” might expect her.

For some days, the raider cruised slowly on the Brisbane-Rabaul direct route. Morning and evening the raider's seaplane swung out in wide circles (she was often out of sight from the “Wolf” for long periods) so that the oncoming “Matunga” could not hope to avoid cap

ture, even had she been well off the usual direct route.

The Japanese cruiser “Chikuma” was at least one warship known to be cruising in the vicinity. She had to be avoided at all costs, bubi the air patrols reduced the risk of an encounter. Then, it was necessary for the “Wolf” to get as close as possible to the “Matunga” before arousing sus picion, so that the wireless cabin could be shelled immediately and effectively should an attempt be made to send dis tress calls.

Further, it was necessary not to mis take the Sydney-bound “Morinda” for the “Matunga”. The former would be almost empty of stores and fuel, and it would be unwise to raise a hue and cry before the “Wolf” had got safely away with the well-laden “Matunga”.

ON August 5 the “Wolf” was 300 miles from Rabaul, between Papua and Bougainville. The raider was hove to while the seaplane went on her usual late-afternoon flight. She returned and taxied to the ship, Observer Stein shak ing his head to the officers on the bridge as a signal that nothing had been sighted.

Most of the crew looked a little doleful as the derrick swung out and the sea plane hauled aboard. It was time that the “Matunga” was showing up.

Suddenly there was a slight commotion forward, and orders came for the plane to be re-launched at once. The “Matunga” had just wirelessed Rabaul giving her approximate time of arrival on the follow ing night.

Liners Fate Is Sealed

IT was almost dark, and the plane was out of sight, when the observer picked up the lights of the “Matunga”. Then a white Very light trailed across the dark

sky far to the south . . . then a red light . . . another white one. The observer was marking out the course of the approach ing vessel. Darkness had fallen when the seaplane returned to the raider.

The lights of the “Matunga” appeared about 10 p.m. The “Wolf” then gradually closed in on the ship. At daylight the “Wolf” stopped again to launch the sea plane, which took off so as to be well out of sight until the “Matunga” was within range of the raider’s guns. The presence of the plane—either on the deck or in flight—would have made the “Wolf’s” dis guise useless. No prisoners were on deck, of course.

All the crew were at action stations, with the gunners and torpedo crews hid den behind the hinged sides of the ship, the raider still outwardly a harmless merchantman.

She showed her colours about 7 a.m. A scurry of feet on deck, then the hinged sides of the raider collapsed against the hull, as the guns swung out. A gun was fired somewhere forward ... no further shots . . . the “Matunga” was captured.

“We prisoners were allowed on deck soon after the ‘Matunga’ prisoners had been searched the ships being hove to within 200 yards of each other”, says Mr.

Alexander. “All navigation officers, male passengers, the wireless operator, certain others of the crew, and all military men other than two medical officers had been brought aboard the ‘Wolf’, A German prize crew was aboard the ‘Matunga’, with most of the stewards and certain other ratings still on the ship. A couple of hours after the capture, the two vessels steamed off in company, on a northerly course which would take them to the coast of New Britain and close to Rabaul, “Sitting on deck, with the ‘Matunga’ steaming along on our beam, we had the story of her capture as seen by those on board. The ‘Wolf’ had been sighted about 6 a.m., the raider appearing to be merely a large cargo vessel. She was much closer by 7 a.m.

“In the tropics it is customary to rise early to enjoy the cool morning hours, and a number of passengers were having tea on deck and discussing the strange vessel. Those on the bridge of the ‘Matunga’ gave no indication that they realised that a war was in progress. Big ships of the class to which the ‘Wolf’ outwardly belonged, were rarely, if ever, seen in those waters.

“The passengers lounging on deck — some of them joking about raiders —had no need to speculate further on the ident ity of the big black ship on the ‘Matunga’s’ beam. The German ensign flew up, the raider’s sides collapsed, her guns swung out, a warning shot was fired, and the seaplane appeared flying low over the Australian ship.

“This sudden quick-change act of the ‘Wolf’, this spectacle of a merchantman transforming into a cruiser with hundreds of men on her decks, all in a few seconds, was always effective. It was now effective enough to deter the ‘Matunga’s’ captain from attempting to send any wireless calls. The ‘Matunga’ thereupon obeyed the raider’s instructions, and stopped her engines.”

The two vessels presently turned away westward; entered the landlocked, al most unknown harbour of Waigen, Dutch New Guinea; and there the “Matunga’ was stripped of everything, and sunk. Her passengers and crew were taken as prisoners on the already over-crowded

“Wolf”. Their wanderings and adventures, before they reached Germany and a p?i£m camp, make a very thrilling story.

“Intelligence”

HERE is an extract from the book which any civilian population, faced with war and surrounded by spies, should remember. The “Wolf” is now approaching Singapore: — “For the Wolf’ to push her nose into this area looked like deliberate suicide; particularly considering that the raider was making only ten at the

outside. But Captain Nerger was not steaming blindly into this deathtrap. He possessed fairly recent information of naval movements at Singapore, and was well aware of the risks he ran. His souvenirs from the ‘Wairuna’ had in cluded fourteen bags of mail for America, from New Zealand. This mail had given the raider’s intelligence officer an excel lent idea of general conditions in the Pacific. The mailbags from the ‘Matunga’ had been even more informative. She had been carrying the garrison mail and Gov ernment dispatches to Rabaul. And the private mail, uncensored in Australia,

gave many details of the movements of cruisers in the East.

“Australia is closely linked with Singa pore. Some Australians were serving aboard ships attached to the Singapore base (H.M.S. Psyche as one instance) and the writers of these letters had sent long, gossipy screeds to people in Rabaul, de tailing the movements of mutual friends in the Eastern port. The writers had not imagined that they would fall into Ger man hands, but they gave Captain Nerger valuable information of the renewed naval activities at this base.” (From “Cruise of the Raider Wolf”, by Roy Alexander, just published by Angus and Robertson, Sydney, at 7/6.)