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Description: On May 7th 1915 at 2.28p.m. the great Cunarder Lusitania sank off the Old Head of Kinsale eighteen minutes after being torpedoed by the German submarine U-20; 1201 men, women and children died – many of them United States citizens. These are facts. The inquest at Kinsale brought an indictment of ‘wilful and wholesale murder’ against the Kaiser. The official versions of the sinking said that this innocent passenger liner had been wantonly sunk by two or more German torpedoes in contravention of international agreements. The disaster was among the chief of many factors which brought America onto the course of war.
The author was intrigued by the mystery which still surrounded much of the Lusitania story and began his enquiry. What he discovered – about the Lusitania’s stated purpose in the event of war, about the real nature of her cargo and equipment, about British secret service operations in the U.S., about the use and non-use of evidence at the subsequent British and American official enquiries – led to the writing of this book. It tells in detail the story of the Lusitania’s construction, her last voyage, sinking, and the aftermath viewed against a background of British naval policy, U.S. diplomacy, and backstage governmental activities. For more than 50 years the sinking of the Lusitania has been proclaimed as an act of naked and brutal aggression against an innocent ship carrying citizens of a neutral country; this book shows beyond doubt that the true facts were deliberately concealed and shockingly different. |
