Sinking of RMS Lusitania, 1915

On 7 May 1915, the German submarine U-20 torpedoed the British liner RMS Lusitania off the southern coast of Ireland. The ship sank rapidly while travelling from New York to Liverpool, and nearly 1,200 passengers and crew died. The presence of civilians, including American citizens, made the disaster an international political issue.

The sinking became a powerful Allied propaganda symbol and intensified debate in the United States about Germany’s submarine campaign, although American entry into the war came nearly two years later. Questions concerning warning notices, munitions in the cargo and responsibility for civilian safety continued long after the event.

In fiction the Lusitania offers a setting for lost identities, secret documents and lives abruptly divided by war. The opening of Agatha Christie’s The Secret Adversary places a young woman carrying treaty papers aboard the doomed liner, making the historical disaster the origin of a post-war espionage mystery.