Volume 17 , Issue 13

100 Years Ago, Tuesday, 4 May 1915

One hundred years ago, Tuesday, 4 May 1915, the Guthrie Daily Leader, out of Guthrie, Oklahoma, was reporting on their front page headlines: "French Cruiser Gambetta Sunk With 500 Loss." Other headlines included: "Why Prices Of Oil Were Whittled" and "Protected By A Terrific Fire The Allies Land."

The French armored cruiser Leon Gambetta was torpedoed by an Austrian submarine at midnight, Monday, April 26, Twenty miles off Santa de Leuca, in the Adriatic. The latest reports said that 100 members of the crew of over 700 were rescued by Italian torpedo boats and by tugs from Brindisi and Otranto. The cruiser was grounded on the coast and was leaking badly.

The French cruiser was steaming slowly when the hostile submarine launched the torpedo, which struck her amidships on the starboard side. The crew was summoned to quarters and the disabled warship headed for the Italian coast.

The Leon Gambetta was built at Brest in 1904. She was 476 feet long and had a draught of 25.9 feet. She carried crew of about 725 men. Her speed as 23 knots an hour. Her largest guns were four of 7.6 inch calibre. She also had sixteen 6.4 inch guns, twenty-four 3-pounders and two submerged torpedo tubes. Her displacement was 12,352.
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