The Lusitania disaster (1915)

Always loved that Enya tune.

Very dramatic.

Christ, I miss the 90s.

Sometimes already posted a thread on this subject…WTF? Is it Lusitania week or something?

Savage Kraut bastards!

R2, don't lose it, Enya.

Those civilian deaths are on the Brits, who essentially used them as human shields for illegally transporting weapons and munition.

From Wikipedia:

The German government justified treating Lusitania as a naval vessel because she was carrying 173 tons of war munitions and ammunition, making her a legitimate military target, and they argued that British merchant ships had violated the cruiser rules from the very beginning of the war.[7][8][9][10][11] The internationally recognized cruiser rules were obsolete by 1915; it had become more dangerous for submarines to surface and give warning with the introduction of Q-ships in 1915 by the Royal Navy, which were armed with concealed deck guns. The Germans argued that Lusitania was regularly transporting "war munitions"; she operated under the control of the Admiralty; she could be converted into an armed auxiliary cruiser to join the war; her identity had been disguised; and she flew no flags. They claimed that she was a non-neutral vessel in a declared war zone, with orders to evade capture and ram challenging submarines...

successive British governments maintained that there were no munitions on board Lusitania, and the Germans were not justified in treating the ship as a naval vessel. In 1982, the head of the Foreign Office's American department finally admitted that there is a large amount of ammunition in the wreck, some of which is highly dangerous and poses a safety risk to salvage teams.

So the British lied repeatedly to cover up their duplicity, and mined the disaster for anti-German propaganda.

Same old, same old.

Yes, the Germans couldn't help torpedoing passenger liners, just like they couldn't help being goaded into raping Belgium or declaring war in the first place. It was all a trick by the Allies to get the Kaiser to destroy himself.

Churchill dangled the Lusitania as bait and the Huns snapped. Winston was a master at it. But then his family was not onboard.

Has anyone read the Erik Larson Dead Wake on the subject? I got it for my Mom for her birthday, but do not think she has read it yet, but am planning on reading it at some point.

I listened to the audio book, R8. It was very descriptive. Disturbingly so, to me, but well written.

I've heard horror stories about a heavily pregnant woman giving birth in the water and both of them dying.

That story was in the book R8 asked about. The whole thing was absolutely gruesome.

Another book is Diana Preston's "Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy."

"The Track of the Lusitania" a recently rediscovered illustration done after the sinking depicting the aftermath.

R5 this is why I come to DL. No snark. I always learn something.

That montage with all the actors whose careers died on the ship is terrifying.

This is how Churchill got the USA into the European War 1914-18.

If that's what Churchill wanted, it didn't work; American opinion seems to have turned against the Germans, but the US didn't enter the war for almost two years.

Churchill played the long game R17. He was in correspondence with FDR, then the Assistant Secretary of the Navy. FDR hated the Germans, the largest ethnicity in the USA.

No doubt since you were a lil girl in 1915, fossil.

Churchill was a murderer. He’s also responsible for the Bengal Famine during WW 2, isn’t he?

A full sinking animation of the tragedy.

"When the Lusitania Went Down", recorded 13 days after the sinking, sung by Herbert Stuart.

Lyrics: "The nation is sad as can be; A message came over the sea. A thousand or more, who sailed from our shore, Have gone to eternity. The Statue of Liberty high Must now have a tear in her eye. I think it's a shame-- Some one is to blame, But all we can do is just sigh!

Some of us lost a true sweetheart; Some of us lost a dear dad; Some lost their mothers, sisters, and brothers; Some lost the best friends they had. It's time they were stopping this warfare If women and children must drown. Many brave hearts went to sleep in the deep When the Lusitania went down.

A lesson to all it should be When we feel like crossing the sea-- American ships that sail from our slips Are safer for you and me. A Yankee can go anywhere As long as Old Glory is there! Although they were warned, The warning they scorned, And now we must cry in despair."

One of the survivors on "This Is Your Life"

R8 I just finished “Dead Wake” this month. Fantastic book, the research is so astounding and the storytelling so absorbing it almost reads as a novel. Totally gripping from start to finish. Left me thinking the Lusitania disaster is actually much more fascinating than the comparatively tame Titanic disaster. “Dead Wake” deserves a movie or TV adaptation, there’s so much behind the scenes intrigue.

r24 they will never make a Lusitania movie because the amount of women and children who died was vast and it would be too upsetting to depict their deaths.

Germany published ads in prominent American newspapers warning Americans that ships of British registry were considered targets on the seas. As bad as this was, everyone was warned.

R25 I don’t think this is necessarily true, especially if it were predominantly a film or series about WWII, espionage, Churchill, Woodrow Wilson, German U-boats, etc with the disaster itself making up a small portion. Keep in mind, the Lusitania sank in less than 20 minutes.

Plus, if audiences have sat through big budget movies about the Holocaust, they can handle the Lusitania.

WWI *

Charles Cullen killed over 40 patients while under his care as an RN

The Lusitania monument in the town where many of the victims are buried, which was also the last port visited by the Titanic.

My great grandmother took the Lusitania to New York in 1908, which I discovered at Ellis Island.