Lusitania

“ A German war vessel has sunk the Lusitania off the coast of Ireland. A mighty asset which lay on the enemy’s side of the scale is destroyed. Property to the value of many millions is annihilated, and an immeasurable store of moral power and self-confidence of a people whose whole life is centered in the prosperity of its shipping and commerce sank to the bottom with the proud vessel. ”

“ THE SOUL OF THE MAN WHO SANK THE LUSITANIA
The crowning horror of Germany's barbarities came with the sinking of the Lusitania. Perhaps nothing less shocking could have made us see how much less cruel Nature is at her worst than man in his madness may be. ”

“ The Lusitania children, lying in pitiful rows to await identification in Queenstown, little meek and sodden corpses buffeted out of comeliness by the waves, awoke in the hearts of the men who looked at them a passion of anger and hate which life is too short to appease. ”

“ About 1 P.M. we noticed that the Lusitania was steering a zigzag course. Land had been in sight for three hours, distinctly visible twelve miles away. Looking through my glasses, I could see on the port side of the Lusitania, between us and land, what appeared to be a black, oblong object, with four dome-like projections. ”

“ It may, however, be possible to find a formula that will skim over the points of contention, as was done in the Arabic case. In spite of all the outcry over here there is no doubt that the American Government and the greater part of public opinion would be only too delighted if we could find a graceful way of settling the Lusitania question without a conflict. What is required in the first place is:
"1. A. declaration on our side that the attack on the Lusitania should be regarded as an act of reprisal and, therefore, not within the scope of existing international law. ”

“ On the anniversary of the sinking of the Lusitania it is natural and fitting that Americans should review all that has happened since a wanton murder first brought to this side of the Atlantic a nascent realization of the issue that was being decided on a world battlefield.
There will be no anger and no passion in American minds. We have never asked, never desired, that the slaughter should be avenged. ”

“ And they talk with every other American in this Kingdom. It is often made unpleasant for Americans in the clubs and in the pursuit of their regular business and occupations; and it is always our inaction about the Lusitania. Our controversy with the British Government causes little feeling and that is a sort of echo of the Lusitania. They feel that we have not lived up to our promises and professions. ”

“ On the other side of a stone pier rose the huge Lusitania with her four funnels. Everyone on our tender moved expectantly forward. There was an official cry: “Britishers first!” The chosen of the Lord! But the horde of ignorant foreigners came surging ahead. Miscellaneously we crowded up the gangway. Another gangway sloped for us on to the Lusitania. Several British policemen and stewards faced us to keep us in line. At so many guardian angels we began to feel depressed.
Medical inspection. The instant we put foot on the deck of the Lusitania, this was our first business. ”

“ The Lusitania ought to have meant war between us and Germany. Every brutal Teutonic disregard of decency since then ought to have meant war—every unarmed ship sunk by their U-boats, every outrage in America perpetrated by their spies and agents ought to have meant war. ”

“ Atlee Pomerene, U. S. Senator from Ohio, member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said: “To Americans the sinking of the Lusitania is the most deplorable incident of the European war. Every man with the milk of human kindness in his breast condemns any policy by any nation that leads to the slaughter without warning of babes, women and non-combatants.”
Morris Sheppard, U. S. Senator from Texas, said: “The sinking of the Lusitania is an illustration of the unspeakable horror of modern warfare, and will be a tremendous argument for general disarmament when the war closes. ”

“ The Lusitania grows larger and larger in European memory and imagination. It looks as if it would become [pg II-49] the great type of war atrocities and barbarities. I have seen pictures of the drowned women and children used even on Christmas cards. And there is documentary proof in our hands that the warning, which was really an advance announcement, of that disaster was paid for by the German Ambassador and charged to his Government. It is the Lusitania that has caused European opinion to regard our foreign policy as weak. It is not the wish for us to go to war. No such general wish exists. ”

“ The sinking of the Lusitania, therefore, makes perfectly clear the nature of the problem with which the three Allies in Europe are now struggling. They are resisting with all the weapons of war a nation which declares that its promises are good only till it is, in its own judgment, under the military necessity of breaking them. ”

“ The action that Congress will take with regard to the Lusitania question is of primary importance for us. It is my opinion that President Wilson, when he asked for the recall of our two attachés, had the thought in the back of his mind that Congress would let the Lusitania question rest for a time, because relations with Germany are already sufficiently strained and only the rabid pro-English want war. One cannot, however, count on anything now, because the anti-German ring are seeking to terrorize all who do not agree with them. ”

“ It is well known that in Lusitania, in the vicinity of the town of Olisipo1921 and the river Tagus, the mares, by turning their faces towards the west wind as it blows, become impregnated by its breezes,1922 and that the foals which are conceived in this way are remarkable for their extreme fleetness; but they never live beyond three years. ”

“ At noon, May 7th, the Lusitania sighted the coast of Ireland, nearing the end of her journey.
Two hours later, while steaming at 18 knots, the Lusitania was struck almost directly under the Captain's bridge by the first of two torpedoes fired by the German Submarine U-39.
After the first torpedo which struck there were scenes of pitiful partings. 1150 persons perished—114 being Americans. ”

“ KREUZLAND, KREUZLAND ÜBER ALLES
Belgium, 1914: “Where are our fathers?”
48
The Ex-Convict Prussia in every war has betrayed that peculiar mark of barbarism consisting in using the intellectual weapons of a superior, but not knowing how to use them. It is still a matter of mystery to the directing Prussian mind why the sinking of the Lusitania should have shocked the world. A submarine cannot take a prize into port. The Lusitania happened to be importing goods available in war, therefore the Lusitania must be sunk. ”

“ In May, 1915, the great steamship Lusitania was due to sail from New York for England. A few days before her departure notices signed by the German ambassador were put into New York papers, warning people that Germany would not be responsible for what happened to them if they took passage on this boat. Very few people paid any attention to these warnings. With over a thousand persons on board the Lusitania sailed, on schedule time. ”

“ THE TRAGIC DESTRUCTION OF THE LUSITANIA AN UNPRECEDENTED CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY — THE LUSITANIA: BUILT FOR SAFETY—GERMANY’S ANNOUNCED INTENTION TO SINK THE VESSEL — LINER’S SPEED INCREASED AS DANGER NEARED — SUBMARINE’S PERISCOPE DIPS UNDER SURFACE — PASSENGERS OVERCOME BY POISONOUS FUMES — BOAT CAPSIZES WITH WOMEN AND CHILDREN — HUNDREDS JUMP INTO THE SEA — THE LUSITANIA GOES TO HER DOOM — INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN TURNER.
No thinking man—whether he believes or disbelieves in war—expects to have war without the horrors and atrocities which accompany it. ”

“ When the Lusitania was torpedoed, a man came up to me. I'd noticed him more than once—and I'd figured it out in my own mind that he was afraid of somebody or something. He asked me if I was a patriotic American, and told me he was carrying papers which were just life or death to the Allies. ”

“ The negotiations as to the still pending Lusitania case were carried on in Washington by Count Bernstorff and Secretary Lansing, and finally Germany offered to pay an indemnity for the death of the Americans on the Lusitania whose deaths Germany "greatly regretted," but refused to disavow the act of the submarine commander in sinking the Lusitania or to admit that such act was illegal. ”

“ Thus a great, blind, irresistible force, operating without malice or design, had in that case destroyed more than a thousand human lives. But when the Lusitania was sunk in broad daylight, and nearly as many persons perished, it was because our brother man, in the bitterness of his heart and the cruelty of his fear, had been bent on committing wilful murder. ”

“ All will remember the answer of Germany to the American Lusitania Note, which answer, delivered on May twenty-ninth, contained the charge that the Lusitania was armed and carried munitions, and had been used in the transport of Canadian troops. In the meantime, however, the American ship, Nebraskan, had been torpedoed off the coast of Ireland on the twenty-sixth; and, on May twenty-eighth, Germany stated that the American steamer, Gulfflight, had been torpedoed by mistake, and apologised for this act. ”

“ The Lusitania atrocity removed from the minds of the American people the last possible doubt as to the essential barbarity of the German Government. No other Government pretending to be civilised has ever shocked the entire world by such a sickening crime against humanity. ”

“ All that there is in the German idea was expressed in the Lusitania Massacre, it was expressed in the killing of women and children, innocent of all offense, entitled to all protection as helpless, unoffending, as the children of a race not at war, at least entitled to immunity which hitherto was reckoned the right of women and children, neutral or belligerent.
The war that is being fought in Europe is a war for civilization. The battle of Great Britain, of France, of Russia, is our battle. ”

“ Formen, die unsere Feinde eingeführt und durch sie uns zur Gegenwehr gezwungen haben, kommt es auf den Tod von Nichtkämpfern nicht mehr an. Die Massstäbe, die unter zivilisierten Völkern im Frieden galten, sind zerstört worden, und wer uns mit den Opfern der “Lusitania” kommt, der soll sich erst legitimieren und uns die Frage beantworten, ob er gegeifert und gejammert hat, als russische Heere auf dem Boden Ostpreussens gebrannt, gemordet und geschändet haben, kaltblütig und bewusst gegen eine friedliche Bevölkerung, gegen Männer, Frauen und Kinder. ”

“ The whole peninsula, except its northern coast, was now subject to Rome. It was divided into three provinces—Hither and Farther Spain, and Lusitania—and became eventually the most prosperous and best governed part of the Roman foreign possessions. The Lusitanian mountains were still haunted by brigands, and isolated country houses in that region had to be built like fortresses; yet the country was rich in corn and cattle, and occupied by a thriving and industrious people. ”

“ I found myself opposite the stern of a boat, into which had climbed about thirty-five people, principally women and children. The for’ard davit was about a foot from the bow, and at the rate the Lusitania was going down it meant but a few moments before the bow of the boat would be caught by the davit, and this whole boatload would be taken down, or at least thrown violently into the water. ”

“ Other races will think of the Lusitania when they meet a German long after the Belgian atrocities are forgotten. It will endure to plague a people like the exile of the Acadians, the guillotining of innocents in the French Revolution, and the burning of the Salem witches. But he had nothing to do with it. A German admiral gave an order as a matter of policy to make an impression that his submarine campaign was succeeding and to interfere with the transport of munitions, and the Kaiser told this boy that it was right. One liked the boy, his loyalty and his courage; liked him as a human being. ”

“ For with two thousand six hundred men, whom for honor's sake he called Romans, combined with seven hundred Africans, who landed with him when he first entered Lusitania, together with four thousand targeteers, and seven hundred horse of the Lusitanians themselves, he made war against four Roman generals, who commanded a hundred and twenty thousand foot, six thousand horse, two thousand archers and slingers, and had cities innumerable in their power ”

“ Wish they could lay out the Turkish guns—especially "Asiatic Annie"—that keep warming us up in our dug-outs; we are getting tired of the beggars. Heard that the Lusitania had been submarined near the Irish coast. Poor devils!—it's a one-eyed kind of death to be drowned like rats in a trap. ”

“ When I bought my ticket at the Cunard Office in Boston I asked if we were to be convoyed through the war zone, and the reply made was, “Oh yes! every precaution will be taken.”
When we got into Queenstown I found the people furious through the act itself and disgusted that three torpedo-boat destroyers should have lain at anchor in Queenstown harbor all the time the Lusitania was coming up the Irish Coast. ”

“ Probably most Englishmen, in the early days of the war, preferred that the United States should not engage in hostilities; even after the Lusitania, the majority in all likelihood held this view. There are indications, however, that King George favoured American participation. A few days after the Lusitania sinking, Page had an audience for the purpose of presenting a medal sent by certain societies in New Orleans. ”