On This Day
On This Day, 6 June 1916
On 06, Jun 2016 | In On This Day | By Nicola Gauld
Birmingham Mail
Tuesday 6 June 1916
LORD KITCHENER.
DROWNED OFF THE ORKNEYS.
SHIP TORPEDOED OR MINED.
ON HIS WAY TO RUSSIA.
NEWS IN BIRMINGHAM.
“MAIL” NEWSBOYS MOBBED.
A special edition of the “Mail” was issued as soon as the news was received, and was the first intimation to the outside public of the serious disaster. The dinner-hour crowd had just returned to work, but there were sufficient people still about to mob the newsboys as they emerged into New Street and Corporation Street and to buy up the papers as quickly as they could be published. Vehicular traffic was considerably impeded for some time in New Street, and the boys with difficulty got further than the foot of Cannon Street.
The news flew through the streets in London like wildfire, and created the utmost consternation. In Fleet Street and Ludgate Hill anxiety to learn the facts of the disaster was so great that newsboys were thrown down by the weight of the surging crowds, the papers being torn from their hands. Expressions of the deepest sorrow were heard on every hand. The blinds at the War Office and Admiralty were drawn and the flag hoisted half-mast.
