LIEUTENANT COMMANDER HUTCH. I. CONE, U. S. N., Commanding Second Torpedo
Flotilla, Care Postmaster, San Francisco, Cal.
There were various amusing features connected with the trip. Most of
the wealthy people and "leaders of opinion" in the Eastern cities
were panic-struck at the proposal to take the fleet away from Atlantic
waters. The great New York dailies issued frantic appeals to Congress
to stop the fleet from going. The head of the Senate Committee on Naval
Affairs announced that the fleet should not and could not go because
Congress would refuse to appropriate the money--he being from an Eastern
seaboard State. However, I announced in response that I had enough money
to take the fleet around to the Pacific anyhow, that the fleet would
certainly go, and that if Congress did not choose to appropriate enough
money to get the fleet back, why, it would stay in the Pacific. There
was no further difficulty about the money.
It was not originally my intention that the fleet should visit
Australia, but the Australian Government sent a most cordial invitation,
which I gladly accepted; for I have, as every American ought to have, a
hearty admiration for, and fellow feeling with, Australia, and I believe
that America should be ready to stand back of Australia in any serious
emergency.
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