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The Churchill Project - Hillsdale College > Articles > Truths and Heresies > Churchill in WWI > Sinking “Lusitania”: A Long-Lived Conspiracy Theory

Sinking “Lusitania”: A Long-Lived Conspiracy Theory

By THE CHURCHILL PROJECT
| September 24, 2020
Category: Churchill in WWI Truths and Heresies

5 Comments

Was Lusitania set up?

The first chapter of Nigel Hamilton’s book, The Mantle of Command, states that the Lusitania was an “ill-fated American liner.” He leaves the impression that Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, had played a role in the sinking in order to get the United States into World War I. Any comment? —C.C., Culpeper, Va.

Answer: bad judgment, not conspiracy

RMS Lusitania was British, not American, operated by the Cunard Line. On the fatal voyage she did carry 139 Americans, 128 of whom lost their lives, along with 1,070 others. On 7 May 1915 the liner, inbound from New York, was eleven miles off the Old Head of Kinsale, Ireland on 7 May 1915. The German submarine U-20. She sank in 18 minutes.

It was well known during the First World War that the British were shipping arms on passenger liners. The German government issued warnings that they were liable to be sunk. It is also known that Churchill hoped German attacks on merchant shipping would bring America into the war.

Contrary to conspiracy theorists, however, Churchill did nothing to cause the sinking. He was not even at the Admiralty in the days leading up to the event. Indeed the Lusitania had been warned of submarine activity in the area. Mistakes were certainly made by her captain, William Turner. But there was no conspiracy to put her in danger.

George Will correctly described the event in National Review. A highly detailed examination of the subject was written by the late Professor Harry Jaffa in the book Statesmanship: Essays in Honor of Sir Winston Churchill (Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press, 1981). A copy of his article is available from the Churchill Project by email.

Addendum, 2020

Readers may wish to refer to “Sinking the Lusi,” Chapter 13 of Winston Churchill, Myth and Reality: What He Actually Did and Said. It covers the prominent conspiracy theories, led by historian Colin Simpson in 1972. Simpson wrote of a supposed Admiralty meeting, with Churchill, two days before the sinking: “On the map were markers denoting the U-20, [the old cruiser HMS] Juno, and Lusitania.” (We are meant to believe British knew exactly where all three were, including the enemy submarine.)

The Admirals mentioned Juno‘s slow speed and recommended Churchill send destroyers instead to escort Lusitania. Here, Simpson writes, “the Admiralty War Diary stops short, perhaps understandably, as it was here the decision was made that was to be the direct cause of the disaster…. The Admiralty signaled Juno to abandon her escort mission and return to Queenstown…The Lusitania was not informed that she was now alone.”

* * *

Quoting from Myth and Reality:

The “Admiralty War Diary” in this melodramatic paragraph appears nowhere else in Simpson’s book, not even the bibliography. No historian has found it; nor a record of the Admiralty meeting. Nor was it Churchill’s role to make operational decisions.

The chief cause of Lusitania’s loss was Captain Turner’s decision, after sighting the Irish coast, to proceed northward at reduced speed to “make the tide” at Merseyside, as he would have in peacetime. At his normal cruising speed, chances of a successful torpedo attack would have been greatly reduced. Alternatively, since he had the time, he could have headed out to deeper waters, maintaining speed and further reducing the danger. There was no advantage and every danger in slowing down.

It might be argued that the Admiralty set up the liner by refusing a destroyer escort. But destroyers were the one class of warships in short supply. Lusitania historian David Ramsay noted that many destroyers, instead of guarding merchant shipping, were involved in the Dardanelles operations. Ramsay, writing in 2004, confirmed the findings of historians Thomas Bailey, Harry Jaffa, Stephen Roskill and David Stafford, “who are at one in rejecting any conspiracy, by Churchill or anyone else.”

5 Comments

CHRISTIAN

July 29, 2020 at 2:33 pm Reply

Churchill as First Lord of the Admiralty had to face the case of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania, which generated strong controversies. There are documents whose details have indicated, according to some historians, that the First Lord of the Admiralty could have been negligent in leaving the ship without an escort, which would have led to the sinking of this ship, in order to bring the United States into the war.
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True, conspiracy theorists have attempted to prove otherwise, but the preponderance of evidence is against them. Lusitania was much faster than any naval escort (and any U-boat); and the Navy didn’t have the resources to escort every liner. Speed was thus the preferred defense, but Captain Turner unfortunately reduced speed to “make the tide” at Merseyside—a fatal decision. We have added an addendum to the post above. —Editors
- Jonas Ljungberg
  
  September 20, 2020 at 9:25 pm Reply
  
  The idea that Winston Churchill planned top have the ship torpedoed by a German submarine is silly, considering he was trying to salvage the Gallipoli campaign and was fighting for his political career. Did he hope something like this would spur America to join the war? Probably, but he was not stupid. He knew the war would be hard to win and wanted allies, but to think he overtly put the ship in danger is a stretch.
Dr Cameron Hazlehurst

October 18, 2020 at 9:27 am Reply

“It is also known that Churchill hoped German attacks on merchant shipping would bring America into the war.”
The first evidence that demonstrated Churchill’s hope was in a letter which I found when exploring the papers of his Cabinet contemporary Walter Runciman in 1968. Runciman as President of the Board of Trade was considering policy on new rates of insurance for neutral shipping. Churchill wrote three letters in five days urging that the rates should not be increased. The first of the letters, on 12 February 1915, was quoted in my book Politicians at War July 1914 to May 1915 (1971, 188-89):

It is most important to attract neutral shipping to our shores, in the hope especially of embroiling the U.S. with Germany. The German formal announcement of indiscriminate submarining has been made to the United States to produce a deterrent effect on traffic. For our part we want the traffic—the more the better & if some of it gets into trouble better still. Therefore do please furbish up at once your insurance offer to neutrals trading with us after February 18th. The more that come, the greater our safety & the German embarrassment.
- Richard Langworth
  
  October 18, 2020 at 10:51 am Reply
  
  Dr. Hazlehurst also wrote an excellent foreword to the new edition of Churchill’s The People’s Rights, which we recommend to readers. Churchill’s attitude toward U.S. shipping, Dr. Cameron also endorses this view by Dr. David Stafford in Churchill and Secret Service (1998, 72-73):
  
  Conspiracy theorists have identified this as the smoking gun that proves Churchill wished to provoke a war between the United States and Germany. The opportunity was allegedly provided by secret intelligence revealing that U-20 was in the Irish Sea and that the Lusitania was a major target. Churchill’s sudden departure for Paris two days before the U-20 attack compounds the allegations, implying that he set the conspiracy in motion and then absented himself to let matters take their course. Once the ship was sunk he supported a cover-up that pointed the finger of blame at Lusitania‘s captain. Little of this stands up to close examination. If the ship was packed with vital war supplies, it is extremely unlikely that Churchill would have arranged for it to be sent to the bottom of the ocean. It would have made far more sense if less important supplies had been on board rather than precious shells and cartridges. Second, when Churchill talked of “embroiling” the United States with Germany he did not mean war. On the contrary, it was in British interests not to have the United States enter the conflict at this time: as a belligerent, the U.S. would need to equip its own armed forces and supplies, and the transatlantic pipeline would diminish. What Churchill intended was a souring of Washington-Berlin relations that would benefit Britain by turning American opinion decisively against the Germans. For this he did not need the deaths of 1200 civilian passengers on a British ship, even if many of them were American.
Professor Kelley

January 6, 2021 at 11:59 am Reply

In my studies I learned that, eager to absolve the Admiralty of negligence in handling Lusitania‘s last days, Churchill and Fisher were quick to pin as much blame on Captain Turner as possible, backdating Admiralty orders, distorting geography, and hiring the best legal talent to prove Captain Turner guilty. The reputation of a man like Turner could hardly have mattered to Churchill and Fisher when the survival of Britain was at stake.
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Thank-you for your comment. Fisher was well known for fixing blame on others, most notably Churchill. Their reactions, which confirm your reading, are quoted by Professor David Stafford in his reliable book, Churchill and Secret Service:

Churchill was not the mainspring of a conspiracy to sink the Lusitania because none existed. Ironically, he himself thought there might be one. His immediate response was to initiate a damage control exercise to absolve himself and the Admiralty of blame. Five days after the tragedy the Admiralty’s Trade Division, responsible for merchant shipping, suggested that German spies or sympathizers might have penetrated Cunard’s New York office and learned of the Lusitania‘s route. The manager was an anti-British American and other officials were German nationals. The man in charge of the Cunard dock in New York was an Irishman and, according to Sir Cecil Spring-Rice, was “intimate with German agents.” The report also hinted that Captain Turner of the Lusitania was either utterly incompetent or, more sinister, had “been got at by the Germans.” The impetuous and increasingly unstable Fisher endorsed the suggestion with gusto, declared that Turner had obviously been bribed, and demanded that he be arrested whatever the result of the official inquiry. When these suggestions reached Churchill he seemed to grasp at the conspiracy notion. His own position at stake, he agreed that Turner should be pursued “without check.” He also embraced the suspicions that spies had been at work, ordered that security in New York should immediately be tightened up, and agreed that Room 40 intelligence should be concealed from any inquiry. This was not to cover up a conspiracy, but to safeguard the secret that Britain was reading German ciphers. In any case Churchill had far more pressing things on his mind than concocting some spurious conspiracy around the Lusitania.

There is no proof that Turner was a traitor, but the course and speed he prescribed for the ship were his, and mainly govern the judgment of history. RML