BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Deckman
Date: 27 May 07 - 06:38 PM

I DIDN'T DO IT!!!

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Naemanson
Date: 27 May 07 - 06:53 PM

Deckman! Usually the first person to protest his innocence is the guilty party. So, I ask you. Where were you that day???

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Lanfranc
Date: 27 May 07 - 07:47 PM

An interesting and well acted depiction of the events - especially the scenes inside the U-boat.

Perhaps now someone will have the courage to accord the same sort of coverage to the sinking of the Lancastria off St Nazaire in 1940, where the loss of life was many times more than the Lusitania and the Titanic combined. News of that sinking was suppressed by a D-notice and has been pushed under the political carpet by successive governments ever since.

Oh, and yes, that was at the insistence of Churchill, too!

Alan

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Don Firth
Date: 27 May 07 - 07:55 PM

". . . And with his brace and auger, in her side he bored holes three. . . ."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: SINSULL
Date: 27 May 07 - 08:11 PM

Somewhere I have a really weird recording of a song "When The Lusitania Went Down" with a ragtime line "When the Lusitania went dow-ooooown". Really bad.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Ebbie
Date: 27 May 07 - 09:39 PM

Bad enough but perhaps not quite as bad as that. It appears that the number who died totaled twice as many, not "many times more".

Googled:

Lancastria: Estimates are that approximately 4500 or 5000 people died. (Thankfully around 2500 were rescued.)

Lusitania: One thousand one hundred nineteen

Titanic:1,503

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: kendall
Date: 28 May 07 - 07:20 AM

When the Germans torpedoed the destroyer "Reuben James" on October 30, 1940, the Germans apologized. The song said..500 men went down..but it was nearer 100. No destroyer ever had that many crew members.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Ron Davies
Date: 28 May 07 - 11:09 AM

Churchill would have said he was distracted by other issues. And there is something to that. It was also said that they were afraid to send another ship immediately to the Lusitania's rescue--since it would also be vulnerable.

It's certainly true it was carrying a lot of armaments.

It's also true there was a coverup.

I also have on tape "When the Lusitania Went Down". I think it's a great song--remarkably accurate and objective:


"Though they--(the US passengers)-- were warned/ The warning they scorned/ And now we must cry in despair."


"We've got to be stopping this warfare/ If women and children must drown.
Many brave hearts went to sleep in the deep/ When the Lusitania went down."

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: SINSULL
Date: 28 May 07 - 12:22 PM

Tune here:
http://www.pdmusic.org/1900s.html



"When the Lusitania Went Down" (1915)
by Charles McCarron and Nathaniel Vincent

New York: Leo. Feist, 231-235 W. 40th St.
[Source: 097/173@Levy]

1.
The nation is sad as can be,
A message came over the sea,
A thousand 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!

CHORUS 2 times
Some of us lost a true sweet-heart,
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 Lousitania went down.

2.
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,
Altho' there were warned,
The warning they scorned,
And now must cry in despair:

(CHORUS 2 times)

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Gulliver
Date: 28 May 07 - 02:27 PM

I don't have ITV so I didn't see this programme. What was the cover-up? How was Churchill involved (I know he was in the Admiralty)? There were rumours that she was carrying armaments, but in several articles I read on the sinking, this was never clarified. The suspicious behaviour of the captain was: he slowed down approaching the area where the U-boats were, steamed too close to shore, didn't zig-zag, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 28 May 07 - 03:09 PM

Churchill was First Sea Lord at the time so de facto commanding officer of the Admiralty. I believe that all details of this were classified under the Official Secrets Act, and remained secret for 75 years, which would mean that the facts were not available until 1990.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: catspaw49
Date: 28 May 07 - 05:21 PM

I think there must be some kind of force in the world that allows things to even out. If you look at the top sinkings resulting in loss of life, several of the very biggest happened right along the shoreline or on a river such as the General Slocum fire (over 1000), the Sultana explosion (1700+), and the Eastland (800+) which capsized while tied at the dock ferchrissakes......NONE of these have any real good songs written about them which is fair becasue the ones we do write about like Lusitania, Titanic, James, etc., all get some really cheesy material covering them. Better no song than some some of the crappy stuff!!!!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 May 07 - 07:23 PM

There was some German liner that was sunk too, while bringing back a huge number of refugees from the Eastern Front very late in the war. It was sunk by submarine attack in the Baltic (whose submarine I don't recall), and the loss of life was terrible.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: guitar
Date: 29 May 07 - 06:27 AM

I live in a town in Scotland called Saltcoats, and I found out that 4 of the people that died came from Saltcoats and three that survied came from the town next door Stevenston.

Tom

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: guitar
Date: 29 May 07 - 06:28 AM

Oh and My father had a cousin that Survied the Titanic.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Fiolar
Date: 29 May 07 - 08:16 AM

It definitely was a great programme. Incidentally it wasn't on ITV but on BBC1 from 8pm to 9.30pm.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Wolfgang
Date: 29 May 07 - 08:43 AM

Little Hawk,

The Wilhelm Gustloff was sunk in January 1945 by a Russian submarine and the estimate is that 9000 people (most of them women and children) have died. The submarine captain was awarded the "Hero of the Sowjet Union" title, also for sinking the "Steuben" (4000 killed).

The second largest single ship war disaster was the sinking of the "Goya" in 1945, killing 7000 mostly civilians, also earning the Russian captain the title "Hero of the Sowjet Union".

The third largest wartime sea disaster may have been the sinking of the "Cap Arcona" by the Royal Air Force. The Cap Arcona had up to 5000 concentration-camp-prisoners on board whom the Nazis most likely had planned to drown in the Baltic sea. But the British did that job for them. Only that they killed most of the guards as well which was not part of the original plan.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: GUEST,CrazyEddie
Date: 29 May 07 - 11:21 AM

Bob, I think you do Wolfgang an injustice when you say "no German Baddies on the above list"
He make it cleasr what was planned for the concentration camp prisoners; hardly the plans of a "goodie" in a white hat.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Greg B
Date: 29 May 07 - 03:35 PM

So what was the upshot with the Lusitania?

Did someone leave the through-hull open on the loo?

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Rapparee
Date: 29 May 07 - 04:02 PM

It was torpedoed off Kinsale while making for Queenstown (Cobh). The Admiralty knew there were U-boats in the area, recent findings on the wreck demonstrate that RMS Lusitania was carrying more war materiel than the manifest showed.

Subject: RE: BS: The Sinking of the Lusitania
From: Gulliver
Date: 29 May 07 - 08:25 PM

So who was responsible for that?