



Produced by R.G.P.M. van Giesen




[Illustration: cover art]

The Thick of the Fray
at Zeebrugge



BY
PERCY F. WESTERMAN
LIEUT. R.A.F.

No boy alive will be able to peruse Mr. Westerman's pages
without a quickening of his pulses."--Outlook.

  Winning his Wings: A Story of the R. A. F.
  The Thick of the Fray at Zeebrugge: April, 1918.
  With Beatty off Jutland: A Romance of the Great Sea
      Fight.
  The Submarine Hunters: A Story of Naval Patrol Work.
  A Lively Bit of the Front: A Tale of the New Zealand
      Rifles on the Western Front.
  A Sub and a Submarine: The Story of H.M. Submarine
      R19 in the Great War.
  Under the White Ensign: A Naval Story of the Great
      War.
  The Dispatch-Riders: The Adventures of Two British
      Motor-cyclists with the Belgian Forces.
  The Sea-girt Fortress: A Story of Heligoland.
  Rounding up the Raider: A Naval Story of the Great
      War.
  The Fight for Constantinople: A Tale of the Gallipoli
      Peninsula.
  Captured at Tripoli: A Tale of Adventure.
  The Quest of the "Golden Hope": A Seventeenth-
      century Story of Adventure.
  A Lad of Grit: A Story of Restoration Times.

LONDON: BLACKIE & SON, LTD.. 50 OLD BAILEY, E.C.



[Illustration: THE U-BOAT DIVED SO ABRUPTLY THAT HER RUDDERS AND
TWIN-SCREWS WERE CLEAR OF THE WATER (Frontispiece)]



The Thick of the Fray
at Zeebrugge
April, 1918


BY

PERCY F. WESTERMAN

Author of "Winning His Wings"
"With Beatty off Jutland"
"The Submarine Hunters"
&c. &c.



_Illustrated by W. Edward Wigfull_



BLACKIE AND SON LIMITED
LONDON GLASGOW AND BOMBAY



  Contents

  CHAP.

     I. BOUND NORTH
    II. STRAFED
   III. COUNT OTTO
    IV. TORPEDOED
     V. IN THE WHALER
    VI. A PRISONER OF WAR
   VII. M.-L. 4452
  VIII. ON PATROL
    IX. AT ZEEBRUGGE
     X. PREPARATIONS
    XI. THE LONE AIR-RAIDER
   XII. ST. GEORGE'S EVE
  XIII. THE ATTACK ON THE MOLE
   XIV. THE NIGHT OF NIGHTS
    XV. THE PASSING OF M.-L. 4452
   XVI. THE RETURN FROM ZEEBRUGGE
  XVII. "GOOD OLD 'VINDICTIVE'!"
 XVIII. OUT OF THE JAWS OF DEATH
   XIX. THE GREAT SURRENDER



  Illustrations


  THE U-BOAT DIVED SO ABRUPTLY THAT HER RUDDERS
  AND TWIN-SCREWS WERE CLEAR OF THE WATER
                                   Frontispiece

  "ENGLISCH OFFIZIER-PIG!" HE SHOUTED. "WE YOU
      TAKE PRISONER"

  THE BIPLANE HAD GOT INTO A SPINNING NOSE-DIVE

  THE PILOT THREW A BOMB FULL IN THE FACE OF A
      PRUSSIAN UNTER-LEUTNANT

  "SHE'S GOING, LADS!" SHOUTED BRANSCOMBE




THE THICK OF THE
FRAY AT ZEEBRUGGE




CHAPTER I

Bound North


"Wonder if she'll do it in time," thought Sub-lieutenant Alec Seton,
R.N., as he stolidly paced the stone-paved platform. For the
twentieth time in the last two hours he had consulted his wristlet
watch and compared it with the smoke-begrimed station clock. "A
proper lash-up if she doesn't."

It was 1.40 a.m. on a certain Monday in March of the year of grace
1918. Seton, warned by telegram to rejoin his ship, H.M. Torpedo-boat
Destroyer _Bolero_, had been handicapped by reason of the Sunday
train service. Due to report at Rosyth at 10 a.m. he found himself at
midnight held up at Leeds with the unpleasant prospect of having to
wait until 1.50 a.m. before the mail train took him on to Edinburgh.

Seton had been spending part of a well-earned spell of leave at his
parents' house in the Peak District. An