Secret of the Lusitania

silverharp

probably not much of a secret, but interesting story all the same


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1098904/Secret-Lusitania-Arms-challenges-Allied-claims-solely-passenger-ship.html


Secret of the Lusitania: Arms find challenges Allied claims it was solely a passenger ship
By Sam Greenhill

Her sinking with the loss of almost 1,200 lives caused such outrage that it propelled the U.S. into the First World War.
But now divers have revealed a dark secret about the cargo carried by the Lusitania on its final journey in May 1915.
Munitions they found in the hold suggest that the Germans had been right all along in claiming the ship was carrying war materials and was a legitimate military target.
Doomed: A contemporary view of the sinking of the Lusitania off Ireland in May 1915

The Cunard vessel, steaming from New York to Liverpool, was sunk eight miles off the Irish coast by a U-boat.
Maintaining that the Lusitania was solely a passenger vessel, the British quickly accused the 'Pirate Hun' of
slaughtering civilians.

The disaster was used to whip up anti-German anger, especially in the U.S., where 128 of the 1,198 victims came from.

A hundred of the dead were children, many of them under two.
Robert Lansing, the U.S. secretary of state, later wrote that the sinking gave him the 'conviction we would ultimately become the ally of Britain'.
Americans were even told, falsely, that German children were given a day off school to celebrate the sinking of the Lusitania.
The disaster inspired a multitude of recruitment posters demanding vengeance for the victims.


One, famously showing a young mother slipping below the waves with her baby, carried the simple slogan 'Enlist'.
Two years later, the Americans joined the Allies as an associated power - a decision that turned the war decisively against Germany.
The diving team estimates that around four million rounds of U.S.-manufactured Remington .303 bullets lie in the Lusitania's hold at a depth of 300ft.
The Germans had insisted the Lusitania - the fastest liner in the North Atlantic - was being used as a weapons ship to break the blockade Berlin had been trying to impose around Britain since the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914.

Winston Churchill, who was first Lord of the Admiralty and has long been suspected of knowing more about the circumstances of the attack than he let on in public, wrote in a confidential letter shortly before the sinking that some German submarine attacks were to be welcomed.
He said: 'It is most important to attract neutral shipping to our shores, in the hope especially of embroiling the U.S. with Germany.
'For our part we want the traffic - the more the better and if some of it gets into trouble, better still.'
Hampton Sides, a writer with Men's Vogue in the U.S., witnessed the divers' discovery.
He said: 'They are bullets that were expressly manufactured to kill Germans in World War I - bullets that British officials in Whitehall, and American officials in Washington, have long denied were aboard the Lusitania.'
The discovery may help explain why the 787ft Lusitania sank within 18 minutes of a single German torpedo slamming into its hull.

Some of the 764 survivors reported a second explosion which might have been munitions going off.
Gregg Bemis, an American businessman who owns the rights to the wreck and is funding its exploration, said: 'Those four million rounds of .303s were not just some private hunter's stash.
'Now that we've found it, the British can't deny any more that there was ammunition on board. That raises the question of what else was on board.
'There were literally tons and tons of stuff stored in unrefrigerated cargo holds that were dubiously marked cheese, butter and oysters.
'I've always felt there were some significant high explosives in the holds - shells, powder, gun cotton - that were set off by the torpedo and the inflow of water. That's what sank the ship.'
Mr Bemis is planning to commission further dives next year in a full-scale forensic examination of the wreck off County Cork

Shutuplaura

Of course the British were blockading Germany also at the time - the german action was only retaliation - after fair notice was given. How many German civilians were killed by the blockade? Less dramatic than sinking an ocean liner but more lethal.

All propaganda, the realisation that they lost the propaganda battle in WW1 gave them the facsination with propaganda they had during the second war.

CDfm

No surprises here that the British lied.:eek:

Its kind of awesome that local Irish employees of the Cunard line kept quiet about it.Didnt some Irish Cunard employees get OBEs for their war work.

I wonder if there is an archive somewhere in Cobh or in Cunards describing the gun running and military use of civilian and post ships.

Alice Murphy

The British couldn't beat the Germans in the trenches, they needed more manpower. They had to get America involved or they would have been beaten. Churchill had to sacrifice the 1200 people on the Lusitania, while i do not condone what he did or think what he did was right, i can however see WHY he did it. What do you guys think??

Del.Monte

Serious zombie alert.

bobbyss

Anyone know why it was called Lusitania? Is there some place in Europe (Portugal?) called Lusitania? Some mythical place?

BowWow

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lusitania

Jesus.

silverharp wrote: »

Her sinking with the loss of almost 1,200 lives caused such outrage that it propelled the U.S. into the First World War.

Two years later, the Americans joined the Allies

Hardly propelled them if it took two years.

whisky_galore

bobbyss wrote: »

Anyone know why it was called Lusitania? Is there some place in Europe (Portugal?) called Lusitania? Some mythical place?

Cunard tended to name most of its vessels with names ending in '-ia' rather like White Star's ending in '-ic'.

tabbey

It took two years after the Lusitania sinking, for the Americans to enter the war.

They were petrified at the prospect of joining the carnage, and rightly so.

Months after the Lusitania, a relative was on a ship sunk by a German U boat south of the Cork coast. The New York Times was full of praise for the wonderful kind Germans who facilitated the rescue of all the humans on board. Avoid war at all costs, was the underlying message.

It is a terrible tragedy the European powers did not have the same idea in 1914, or at least before the war got out of hand in 1916.

Manach

My 2c is the the US entry was motivated by a number of factors - one such would be the Zimmerman Telegram which inflamed US public opinion, from my reading of the book of that name by Barbara Tuchman.

However, it might be worth taking an economic analysis of why this intervention happened. The German's use of such warfare threaten the trade of the US. A similar situation happened in the 1812 war (ref: Britain Against America in the Naval War of 1812 by Lambert) when the military operations began to prevent distruption to US shipping. Thus the loss of Lusitania represent a harbinger of economic loss and thus was a stepping stone to US involvement.

steamengine

The sinking of the Lusitania was really a case of being in the wrong location at the wrong time. Captain Turner had received advice from the Admiralty to stay well out to sea on the south-western approaches, but decided to come close to the coast to get a visual fix of his position. Captain Schwieger, the U-Boat skipper was apparently surprised to see such a large vessel coming into range of his torpedoes. Had Turner decided to stay well out to sea this tragic event would clearly have been avoided.

Stovepipe

what was also tragic was that it was so close to the coast yet it took ages for ships and boats to arrive despite the area being heavily patrolled by RN ships...rifle ammunition won't explode in any fashion that would sink a ship. It was probably a combination of the boilers exploding and a possible cargo of artillery shells, which would explode if struck by a torpedo.

whisky_galore

Stovepipe wrote: »

what was also tragic was that it was so close to the coast yet it took ages for ships and boats to arrive despite the area being heavily patrolled by RN ships...rifle ammunition won't explode in any fashion that would sink a ship. It was probably a combination of the boilers exploding and a possible cargo of artillery shells, which would explode if struck by a torpedo.

Could be an explosion of suspended coal dust in an empty or near empty coal bunker just as well. We'll probably never know now as the wreck is in such bad shape to be able to draw any conclusions.

LordSutch

Alice Murphy wrote: »

The British couldn't beat the Germans in the trenches, they needed more manpower. They had to get America involved or they would have been beaten. Churchill had to sacrifice the 1200 people on the Lusitania, while i do not condone what he did or think what he did was right, i can however see WHY he did it. What do you guys think??

I think that we lost fifty thousand Irish/British men fighting the German in the trenches.
...and a lot of men on the Lusitania too.