The introduction and working of the convoy system is also dealt with.

Eventually, with great difficulty, a force of six destroyers was collected from various sources in the spring of 1917, and used in the Channel solely for hunting submarines; this number was really quite inadequate, and it was not long before they had to be taken for convoy work.

An essential feature of the system was the appointment of a convoy commodore.

The introduction of the convoy system for the Atlantic trade dates from the early days of May, 1917, when the prospectfor it was only then a prospectof increasing assistance from the U.S. Navy in regard to destroyers and other small craft for escort duty as well as convoy cruisers for ocean work, made the system possible.

These latter vessels were known as "convoy sloops" to distinguish them from the ordinary sloop.

This procedure was indeed adopted on all convoy routes as they were brought into being, the rule being for the decoy ship to drop behind the convoy in the guise of a straggler.

Owing to the overcrowding of Lerwick Harbour the system of changing convoy escorts without entering harbour had been introduced, and the delays due to bad weather were causing great difficulties in this respect.

No mean proportion of the officers were suffering from a breakdown in health, and since the whole of the work of the Devonport, Queenstown and North of Ireland flotillas consisted of convoy duty, whilst only a portion of the Grand Fleet destroyers was engaged in this work, the opinions expressed were very disquieting in their relation to the work of the southern flotillas.

Or does her convoy angel now Breathe heavenly music in her ear?

It was intended to absorb these sloops for convoy protection as soon as circumstances permitted.

This committee had before it the experience of an experimental convoy which arrived from Gibraltar shortly after the commencement of the committee's work, as well as the experience already gained in the Scandinavian and French coal trade convoys, and the evidence of officers such as Captain R.G. Henderson, R.N., who had made a close study of the convoy question.

His function was to make such arrangements as would ensure co-operation between the loading and discharging of cargoes and convoy requirements, and generally to coordinate shipping needs with convoy needs.

Convoy sailing was, as has been stated, the recognized method of trade protection in the old wars, and this was a strong argument in favour of its adoption in the late war.

So if we give convoy, and the convoy ship persists, we should come to blows.

Until the night of the convoy-sortie, however, the enemy had not had the ordinary common sense to grasp the fact that the hill was the key of the situation and to seize it.

They mix together on the convoy trains going up to the front, and all sing together, sharing each other's dangers and their joys.

In addition to the central Admiralty organization, an officer with the necessary staff was appointed to each convoy port of assembly at home and abroad.

It was then that down through the grim passes of the Himalayas, where now the British regiments convoy caravans and guard the outposts of Empire, a people of fair skin and strange speech migrated southward to the Land of the Five Rivers and the fat plains of the Ganges.

The convoy flotillas knew that their only chance of action was with a submarine submerged, a form of warfare in which the result was so very frequently unknown and therefore unsatisfactory.

The convoy home.

He went on: "You see, Doctor, I've had somethin' in the hold a good spell't I wanted to break bulk on, but I didn't know as I ever was goin' to see a shipmet agin; and now you've jined convoy jist in time, for Davy Jones's a'n't fur off.

They were mostly English and Welsh, with a few Frenchmen, and though I had little to say for their doings, they left British ships in the main unmolested, and were welcomed as a godsend by our coast dwellers, since they smuggled goods to them which would have been twice the cost if bought at the convoy markets.

His function was to make such arrangements as would ensure co-operation between the loading and discharging of cargoes and convoy requirements, and generally to coordinate shipping needs with convoy needs.

Decision as to the sea speed of convoys was taken by the convoy officer at the collecting port, and he based this on the result of an examination of the records in the different ships.