DEAD WAKE

The British luxury liner Lusitania’s last crossing (5/01/1915) of the Atlantic Ocean is documented by Erik Larson, but in his narrative nonfiction way. What I mean by that is Mr. Larson has turned a history book story into a tear-jerking, cliff-hanging saga that seems to read like fiction, but is not. How did he do that? I read Diana Preston’s Lusitania (see my review of 6/30/2012) previously, but her version, although an excellent book, contained so much factual information that I was never able to warm up to the individual victims she highlighted. By the way, the authors mostly focused on different passengers aboard the Lusitania (which I will call Lucy for the rest of the review).
 
What almost brought tears to my eyes was how the British Admiralty (headed by Winston Churchill) seemed to want a tragedy to happen involving Americans traveling on British luxury liners to England. On page 190, Churchill says, “For our part, we want the traffic-the more the better; and if some of it gets into trouble, better still.” And King George V said to Colonel House, acting as President Wilson’s emissary, “Suppose they (the Germans) should sink the Lusitania with American passengers aboard?” (implying that the USA would finally be forced to enter WWI).

Meanwhile President Wilson, a recent widower, was spending his time romancing Edith Galt. Is this outrageous behavior, or what? But the most puzzling fact of the European war against Germany was the supposed success of the British in establishing Room 40 in order to decode all German submarine chatter. And they did. So why didn’t they use this advantage to warn Lucy of the ship’s impending doom? Because, they couldn’t warn every ship of the German sub activity since the Germans would then know that the British had broken their code. What! Maybe they did warn Lucy, but the information was too late in getting there. And where was the promised British naval escort when Lucy got close to port?

Before Lucy started for England, the Germans put ads in NYC papers warning passengers of possible impending destruction of the ship. Basically the ads said, “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…” If you saw the ad (a lot of passengers did not), it would take a great deal of courage to board any ship heading to Great Britain. Larson’s early chapters set the tone for the intense chroniclization (is that a word?) of Lucy’s voyage yet to come.

Some of the passengers were famous, such as: Charles Frohman, a theater impresario; George Kessler, a wealthy wine importer; Alfred Vanderbilt, son of Cornelius; Elbert Hubbard, author; Charles Lauriat, a book dealer carrying Charles Dickens’s original A Christmas Carol and original drawings from William Makepeace Thackeray’s Vanity Fair;  and, Theodate Pope, a wealthy female architect and suffragist. The passengers and crew totaled 1,959, including a record number of children and infants. The American passengers were well into the multiple of hundreds. By the time Lucy left for England, Room 40 decoded German transmissions and knew that Unterseeboot-20, captained by Walther Schwieger was heading out to sea towards Liverpool looking to sink as much tonnage as possible (Lucy was their main objective), but Room 40 was focusing on another ship they thought was more valuable to Great Britain.

What kind of a man was Kapitanleutnant Schwieger? Well, once out to sea he spotted a Danish passenger liner out of Copenhagen, bound for Montreal. He couldn’t attack because the ship was too far away and moving fast. But in his log, he wrote, “An attack on this ship impossible.” But, “The entry revealed as well that he had no misgivings about torpedoing a liner full of civilians.” Germany’s Chancellor Bethmann wanted U-boat attacks on neutrals stopped before these attacks caused the neutrals to join the war against Germany. But he was overruled by Kaiser Wilhelm II (King George V’s cousin, believe it or not).

So what kind of man was the captain of Lucy, fifty eight year old Thomas Turner? He was a man determined to spend all his time running the ship. He was so focused on the management of the ship that the Cunard Line had to make Jack Anderson the Staff Captain (a new classification). The Staff Captain mingled amongst the high paying customers and had dinner with them at the Captain’s Table. Turner was a veteran sailor that worked his way up the ranks. He was highly capable of bringing the ship safely to England. He maneuvered the ship safely within 11-15 miles off the coast of Ireland while under the cover of heavy fog (a good thing).

Simultaneously, Walther Schwieger’s U-boat was running low on fuel and torpedoes so he decides to head home in the heavy fog. Luckily for him in the fog, a British armored cruiser passes directly over him undetected. Suddenly the fog lifted. “Schwieger trained his binoculars-his Zeiss ‘godseyes’-on a smudge at the horizon and was startled to see ‘a forest of masts and stacks.” This is trouble for Lucy. “Then I saw it was a great steamer coming over the horizon. It was coming our way. I dived at once, hoping to get a shot at it.” Okay, you know what’s coming next, but you will have to buy your own copy of this nonfiction thriller to find out exactly what happened, although it’s in the history books.

RATING: 5 out of 5 stars

Comment: So what kind of man was Herr Schwieger? A woman in Germany, who said she was Schwieger’s fiancee, stated that he was devastated about the sinking of the liner. He was never to torpedo another ship...he was a shattered man over what he saw in the periscope. Right! As it turns out, he continued to sink ships of all kinds in record numbers. He was even awarded Germany’s highest award, the Blue Max. He was finally killed near the end of the war when his sub was chased into a British minefield.

And what about Lucy’s Captain Turner? He was ravaged by what happened but felt that he didn’t do anything wrong. In an attempt to deflect the blame, the British Admiralty accused the captain of wrongdoing, even though the captain stayed on the bridge and went down with the ship. Somehow, he popped up and was rescued by a lifeboat. The Admiralty took Turner to court, but a judge found him innocent of any misdoings. He continued to work for the Cunard Line as a captain (although mostly on minor ships). Captain Turner died at the age of 76 from colon cancer.

Madly in love with his new wife, President Wilson played golf almost every day after Lucy’s sinking (even in the winter snow, playing with his wife using red golf balls). He spent two years writing letters back and forth with Germany and Great Britain. With the pressure of the German subs going on the rampage, sinking every ship they could find, he finally asked Congress to declare a state of war against Germany. What took you so long Mr. President?

Cunard Lines gave the 764 (out of 1,959) souls that survived the sinking of the Lusitania...a lifetime 25% discount on future sailings. Wow, thanks a lot.