Kommando S.M.H. _Hitachi Maru_,
C. ROSE,
_Lt. z. See & Kommandant_.


Lieutenant Rose very kindly told me that as I was leaving the East for
good and therefore somewhat differently situated from the other
passengers, he would allow me to take in the lifeboat, in addition to a
handbag, a cabin trunk packed with the articles from Siam I most wanted
to save.

It was evident from this that the Germans intended sinking the ship if
we came across a British or Allied war vessel. We were of course
unarmed, as the Germans had removed the _Hitachi_ gun to the _Wolf_, but
the German Captain anticipated no difficulty on this score, and assured
me that it was the intention of the Commander of the _Wolf_ that we
should be landed in a short time with all our baggage at a neutral port
with a stone pier. We took this to mean a port in either Sumatra or
Java, and we were buoyed up with this hope for quite a considerable
time. But, alas, like many more of the assurances given to us, it was
quite untrue.

There were now on board 131 souls, of whom twenty-nine were passengers.
On Saturday, October 6th, the seaplane returned in the afternoon and
remained about half an hour, when she again flew away. She brought a
message of evidently great importance, for whereas it had been the
intention of our Captain to sail away on the following afternoon, he
weighed anchor the next morning and left the atoll. He had considerable
trouble with the anchor before starting, and did not get away till
nearly eight o'clock, instead of at daybreak. Evidently something was