![]() He added that the cases of cartridges had been stowed well forward in the ship, 50 yards from where the German torpedo had struck.Īn urgent Whitehall search of the records was ordered. (Your Republic of Ireland desk is of the opinion is of the opinion that the Irish would seek to create as much uproar as possible.)"īut Coombes added that a 1918 New York court case had established the Lusitania had not been armed or carrying explosives but did have 4,200 cases of small arms ammunition aboard. If it were now to come to light that there was after all some justification, however slight, for torpedoing, HMG's relations with America could well suffer. He said: "It cannot be denied that the sinking of the Lusitania did much to sway American opinion in favour of entering the war. He also reveals that Treasury solicitors had even gone so far as to consider whether the relatives of American victims of the sinking could still sue the British government if it was shown the German claims were well-founded.Ī senior government lawyer, Jim Coombes at Treasury Chambers, told Marshall that the Admiralty had always denied that the Lusitania was armed or carrying war munitions but that there had always been persistent rumours about the latter. Marshall said the disclosure of the true nature of the Lusitania's cargo was likely to spark a public, academic and journalistic debate. Although there have been rumours in the press that the previous denial of the presence of munitions was untrue, this would be the first acknowledgement of the facts by HMG." The Treasury have decided that they must inform the salvage company of this fact in the interests of the safety of all concerned. "The facts are that there is a large amount of ammunition in the wreck, some of which is highly dangerous. "Successive British governments have always maintained that there was no munitions on board the Lusitania (and that the Germans were therefore in the wrong to claim to the contrary as an excuse for sinking the ship)," wrote Noel Marshall, the head of the Foreign Office's North America department, on 30 July 1982. The Foreign Office files released by the National Archives at Kew on Thursday show that news of the imminent salvage operation in 1982 sparked alarm across Whitehall. The Cunard liner was nearing the end of her voyage from New York to Liverpool and her sinking was to feature as a major theme in British propaganda and enlistment campaigns: "Take up the sword of justice – avenge the Lusitania" read one famous poster. The liner went down in just 18 minutes and the loss of civilian life enraged US public opinion and hastened American's entry into the first world war. The RMS Lusitania was sunk on by a torpedo fired without warning from a German submarine just off the Irish coast with the loss of 1,198 lives, including 128 American civilians. ![]() Foreign Office officials also voiced serious concerns that a final British admission that there were high explosives on the Lusitania could still trigger serious political repercussions with America even though it was nearly 70 years after the event. ![]()
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