Long Henry was a 375-ft.-talI marine crane, the towering pride of Kiel Harbor, when the victorious British appropriated him in 1945. For five years, Long Henry played his robust, uncomplaining part in cleaning up bomb-battered Kiel. This year, the British sold him to the French for 1,500,000 marks ($357,500).
When French engineers turned up at Kiel to collect the 5,000-ton crane, they decided to save the cost of dismantling Long Henry for transport by towing him by sea to France. German skippers who know the treacherous sea route around the Danish peninsula pronounced the scheme "suicidal," but the Frenchmen thought...