SPAIN: A Long War

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Off Almeria the British destroyer Hunter, on patrol duty, hit or was hit by something that pushed in her bow, killed eight British seamen, wounded 14. Was it a mine, or was it, as Almeria fishermen are said to have insisted, a torpedo from a German submarine whose periscope had been observed? International complications from this might be so grave that British admiralty officials "suggested," even before a committee of inquiry was constituted, that the Hunter had hit a mine. With great secrecy the Hunter, bow awash, was towed stern foremost into Gibraltar, locked in a closely-guarded drydock, where gold-visored staff officers prepared to go over her plate by plate.