Note 1 — Chapter XIV · THE WAR BETWEEN THE BALKAN STATES AND TURKEY

In this connection, it would be forgetting to pay tribute to a remarkable exploit to omit mention of the raid of the Hamidieh during the late winter. One Ottoman officer at least chafed under the disgrace of the inaction of the Ottoman navy. With daring and skill, Captain Reouf bey slipped out into the Ægean Sea on the American-built cruiser, the Hamidieh. He evaded the Greek blockaders, bombarded some outposts on one of the islands, and sank the auxiliary cruiser, the Makedonia, in a Greek port. The Hamidieh next appeared in the Adriatic, where she sank several transports, and bombarded Greek positions on the coast of Albania. The cruiser was next heard of at Port Said. She passed through the Suez Canal into the Red Sea for a couple of weeks, and then returned boldly into the Mediterranean, although Greek torpedo-boats were lying in wait. Captain Reouf bey ran again the gauntlet of the Greek fleet, and got back to the Dardanelles without mishap. This venture, undertaken without permission from the Turkish admiral, had no effect upon the war. For it came too late. But it showed what a little enterprise and courage might have done to prevent the Turkish débâcle, if undertaken at the beginning of the war.