Lusitania A Target

[Trent Pheifer]

Hello all,

I just started reading Diane Preston's book about the Lusitania. I was just curious about something, it seems many of the people before the ship set sail, felt they knew for sure that the ship would sink on the upcoming voyage. My first question is, were the German even looking for the Lusitania to sink her...I had always thought they just happened apon her. And are the accounts of foreboding being exaggerated? It seems with every ship that goes down there is always tons of people who knew it would sink. Did these "premenitions" just happen whenever any ship set sail and every once in awhile these people with the "Premenitions" just happened to be right, b/c they say the ship will sink everytime it goes out of port? Sorry if this may be confusing, just trying to sort through all the information...I am new to learning about Lusitania. Thanks

-Trent

 

[Daniel Ehlers]

Well, I haven't read the book, Trent. But I do know that the Germans published a warning against all ships going to England next to the Cunard ad the day before she left. It was my believing that U-20 was patrolling the coast line, looking for any British ships to sink. But then, due to the fog, Lusitania had to lower her speed, and they decided to take the opportunity to fire a torpedo at the liner.

As for the premonitions, keep in mind that this was wartime, with many German U-boats patroling the coasts, and many British ships were sunk. I think you're correct; on any ship going out on the sea during WW1, especially one with a high profile like Lusitania, some people were bound to think that their ship would sink on that voyage. When the Lusitania did sink, they claimed that they "predicted" it. If they predicted it, why would they book passage on that ship in the first place? Also, don't forget Lusitania made a few voyages during the war before she sank, and I'm sure that there were passengers that "predicted" the sinking then as well.

Hope that helps.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>My first question is, were the German even looking for the Lusitania to sink her...I had always thought they just happened apon her. <<

That was my thought too. I don't think they were looking for her to the exclusion of all else, and a combat submarine has to do more then just put out to sea then just lie in wait somewhere for one specific ship...which may or may not come along...when there were so many other targets of opportunity available to deal with.

Overall, I think what happened is that the U-20 just got lucky.

 

[Peter Davies-Garner]

Surely the germans must have known that Lusitania left New York on May 1st. If Kapitänleutnant Schwieger knew, I cannot tell. The south coast of Ireland was a busy shipping lane but he was bound to run into some prize sooner or later and he knew it. Why was the Lusitania running at reduced speed? The fog had cleared by the time she was torpedoed. Why didn't she steer north around Ireland after the warning had been published in the New York papers? Why weren't they travelling zig-zag to avoid u-boats as they knew were in the area? Why were several other crossings cancelled in New York and passengers transferred onto the Lusitania (Simon Collins - The Lusitania)? In addition to this I find it very hard to believe that coal dust would have caused such a massive explosion. The coal bunkers were at the side of the ship. Their outer walls must have been running with condensation and the coal dust would have been thick mud on the bunker floor (This is my opinion - I may be mistaken). If someone was to blame then it was the first lord of the admiralty. He knew it was going to happen and he wanted it to happen so the americans would be drawn into the conflict. Something else caused the second explosion and some people knew what it was - and kept it for themselves.

 

[Trent Pheifer]

Daniel, Michael, and Peter:

Thank you all for your help and info...now I can continue the book lol. It is going to take forever lol. Thanks again!

-Trent

 

[Martin Owen Cahill]

Trent,
I have read this book and suggest you will find an answer in ch 32 The U-Boat Diary. the book is critiqued at some length elsewhere in this Lusitania section.

Martin

 

[Daniel Ehlers]

Peter:
My belief was that the Lusitania was running at a reduced speed to save Cunard cost of running expenses. After all, passenger levels were down, and most of their fleet had been called to service. Being the fastest liner still in service, even her reduced speed (about 21 knots) was just as fast as even the Olympic-class liners' cruising speed.

As for why she didn't steer north of Ireland because of the warning in the newspaper, my impression was that the warning was more of a general statement, than one geered directly at the Lusitania. I've posted the text below.

NOTICE!
Travellers intending to embark on the Atlantic voyage are reminded that a state of war exists between Germany and her allies and Great Britain and her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to the British Isles; that, in accordance with formal notice given by the Imperial German Government, vessels flying the flag of Great Britain, or any of her allies, are liable to destruction in those waters and that travellers sailing in the war zone on ships of Great Britain or her allies do so at their own risk.
IMPERIAL GERMAN EMBASSY WASHINGTON, D.C., APRIL 22, 1915.

Or, perhaps, since the Lusitania was flying the then-neutral American flag on her last trip, and had Americans onboard, they thought they would be exempt from the warning. (Notice that it does specify vessels flying the British flag)

As for the other voyages cancelled, I believe that that would have resulted from the U-boats. The fastest liners- Mauretania, Olympic, Britannic, Imperator, and Vaterland, were all out of service, with the exception of Lusitania. Why would Cunard send out a few partially filled slower liners, which were easier prey for U-boats, rather than send out their greyhound, who supposedly could avoid U-boats, nearly full than other ships.

For your next question, I don't feel that Winston Churchill, then first lord of the Admiralty, put the Lusitania in harm's way. Don't forget that just a decade before, the government put forward millions to be able to use Lusitania for war. If they purposely wanted to gain American influence, they would've used a more expendable ship; Lusitania could've had served well in the war for Britain. There's no proof to suppose that the sinking was Britain's intentional attemp to get the Americans involved.

And, there is no proof to support the illegal munition smuggling theory. In fact, there is proof against it. I believe that on a recent expedition to the wreck, they concluded there was no room to store these munitions. The second explosion was, in my belief, cause partially from the igniting coal dust, and partially because the water rapidly flooded the empty boilers, causing them to explode (think about Titanic, where the boilers flooded slowly)...

Just my two cents...

 

[Geoff Whitfield]

Daniel,

I agree with the majority of your comments save for the fact that there was no room to store munitions. I thought it had been accepted that at least some munitions were stored with the general cargo - a supposition substantiated by the hides and furs washed ashore in minute fragments, suggesting that munitions were stored somewhere very close to them.

I'm also puzzled why certain files from the Lusitania Archives are still not available for public perusal. These are Governmental files and have been re-date stamped not for access for however many more years. Why? What is in them that we shouldn't be allowed to see? I recall this happening with the Jack the Ripper/Royal Family connections some years ago - which only added fuel to the fire.

Geoff

 

[Peter Davies-Garner]

Daniel & Geoff,

If a large ocean-liner and more than one thousand lives is the price to pay to bring a much needed ally into the war then I'm sure that the british war cabinet could have lived with that. If the result would be winning the war even better.

We all know Churchill's letter to Jackie Fisher (I think it was) stating" ... we need the traffic; the more the better. And if some of it gets into trouble - better still!..."

I don't believe that anyone could have said in advance that Lusitania was going to be sunk on that particular voyage. If it hadn't happened on this crossing; perhaps she would have been sunk on the following, or the following crossing.

I don't think that the warning issued in american papers was directed towards the Lusitania, though the fact that the warning was placed right next to Lusitania's departure announcement is very suspicious. But as it was said in a previous posting: could a lone u-boat, in hostile waters, hunt down one particular ship that it has been looking for? I find that very difficult and very doubtfull.
I think for Churchill it was maybe like a game of chess: it could work! And in this case it did.
I think a more expendable ship wouldn't have caused the horror that the sinking of the Lusitania did on both sides of the Atlantic (look at the Carpathia for instance). But I agree with Daniel: There's no proof to suppose that the sinking was Britain's intentional attemp to get the Americans involved.
I just think that the whole thing stinks!

 

[laurent Gontier-Versailles]

Hi Peter ,
If I good remember , the U-20 captain didn't know at which ship he was sending a torpedo when he did it.
He just saw a four stacker , period...
It seems that there was a merchant navy officer on board each german submarine , embarked to help the U-boot captain to tell him at what he was sending a torpedo.
That Officer on board U-20 was frightened as he recognized immediately the Lusitania , what Schwieger ignored at that very moment.

Laurent

 

[Geoff Whitfield]

Hi Peter, Good to hear from you. I've always thought that the receipt of warning telegrams by certain well connected passengers presented a clue that at least somebody knew what was to happen. These warning messages didn't seem to have been received by passengers on any other vessels.

Laurent makes the point that Schwieger didn't know that it was the Lusitania but we have only his word for that. I've not heard before about Merchant Navy Officers being assigned to subs, I would be interested to hear more.

As Peter says, "the whole thing stinks" and no doubt the official papers will continue to be supressed until long after anyone here's demise!

 

[Peter Davies-Garner]

According to my files ther was a "Lotse" (leadsman) assigned to U20, though I don't know his name and I don't know if he was a merchant navy officer. Schwieger described to him what he saw and the leadsman replied that the ship was "... either the Lusitania or the Mauretania, both armed merchant cruisers used as troop transports". There was no mention of the american flag.
Schwieger didn't have much faith in his torpedoes and this was fully justified. On the same tour some of them which had been fired at ships before didn't explode. He possibly didn't believe that he actually could sink the Lusitania with a single torpedo. Laurent is right that Schwieger was shocked by what he saw but this wasn't because of him sinking the Lusitania but more because he could see what was happening on deck.
Common sense might lead one to believe that every measure had been taken to give the passengers and crew the safest crossing possible even in times like these. Looking at the evidence that has come to light in the previous decades it appears to me that this was not the case. I have mentioned some of the known facts in a previous posting but I'll name them again: The ship was travelling through waters that were polluted with u-boats at reduced speed; she was not travelling in a zig-zag course to avoid u-boats, HMS Juno which was supposed to escort the Lusitania had been called away again shortly before the Lusitania arrived in that area.
Wouldn't it have been more sensible if they had travelled at a much reduced speed from the US to the coast of Ireland and then sped through these waters at high speed to get through safely? Is travelling through these waters at reduced speed justified by the fact that they were trying to save fuel? They were not on a pleasure cruise, they were travelling through the most dangerous waters on earth and they knew it.
Captain Turner later said that he travelled slowly to reach Liverpool at the high tide. Wouldn't he have reached Liverpool at the high tide if he had been travelling at high speed in a zig-zag course?
If travelling around the north of Ireland was good enough for the Olympic, why wasn't it for the Lusitania?

 

[Ren-Horng James Wang]

Hey all,

Intriguing discussion folks. I'd also like to toss in a few thoughts for your consideration or rejection.

About deliberately exposing the Lusitania to danger: would it have been possible that IF there were such a plan to embroil the US and Germany that the Brits only wanted a little bruhaha over the Lusitania getting torpedoed and limping to port but never dreamed that she'd explode (hence the ensuing cover up)?

Conversely, had the US declared war on Germany, couldn't that have worked to the German advantage? The US was not mobilized in 1915 as in 1917 and could not have been as big a help to the Allies for at least a year. Furthermore, a US declaration would have given the Germans free reign to torpedo any ship they wished without risking the wrath of a powerful neutral. Therefore, one could speculate that the Germans could have further *intensified* submarine warfare instead of easing off as in real history. Perhaps the "what-if" senario U-boat blockade could have led to a German victory in 1916 before the US could finish mobilizing to offer the necessary assistance? If so, the world would be very different place indeed.

Identity of the Lusitania: Although Schwieger may have said that he didn't know he had torpedoed the Lusitania, I'm almost sure Lanz would have known and told him. There were only a handful of British four-stackers and the Lusi would've been the only one still plying the North Atlantic on a regular basis.

As for the whole classified papers thing, I agree. It does "stink" and doesn't do anything to put the British Gov't in a better light.

Ren-Horng (James)
(who personally favors the exploding aluminum powder theory)

 

[laurent Gontier-Versailles]

Hi Peter , Geoff & James
"Lotse" in german means "Pilot"
In most western countries , to be a pilot , you have to have spent for about 10 years on board merchant vessels as a deck officer & have the highest grade in navigation ( Captain ) ...

Laurent

 

[cassie lacey]

Aright I'm new round here but i know a few things about the Lusitania. Yes I agree that the German's had sent out a warning to all ships traveling to allied countries that were participating in the war at the time(not just England).

I know from studying World War 1 that Ireland wasn't in the war at the time because we had enough trouble at home and the Lusitania at the time was in Irish waters and this is what brought the USA and Ireland into the war.

So can so can somebody explain to me WHY she was fired at and in turn sank????