The Titanic and the Lusitania: The Controversial History of the 20th Century’s Most Famous Maritime Disasters

*Includes pictures
*Includes accounts of the disasters
*Includes a bibliography for further reading

“The appearance of safety was mistaken for safety itself.” – Walter Lord, author of A Night to Remember

Just before midnight on April 14, 1912, the RMS Titanic, the largest ship in the world, hit an iceberg, starting a chain of events that would ultimately make it history’s most famous, and notorious, ship. In the over 100 years since it sank on its maiden voyage, the Titanic has been the subject of endless fascination, as evidenced by the efforts to find its final resting spot, the museums full of its objects, and the countless books, documentaries, and movies made about the doomed ocean liner. Thanks to the dramatization of the Titanic’s sinking and the undying interest in the story, millions of people are familiar with various aspects of the ship’s demise, and the nearly 1,500 people who died in the North Atlantic in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912. The sinking of the ship is still nearly as controversial now as it was over 100 years ago, and the drama is just as compelling.

The Titanic was neither the first nor last big ship to sink, so it’s clear that much of its appeal stems from the nature of ship itself. Indeed, the Titanic stands out not just for its end but for its beginning, specifically the fact that it was the most luxurious passenger ship ever built at the time. In addition to the time it took to come up with the design, the giant ship took a full three years to build, and no effort or cost was spared to outfit the Titanic in the most lavish ways. Given that the Titanic was over 100 feet tall, nearly 900 feet long, and over 90 feet wide, it’s obvious that those who built her and provided all of its famous amenities had plenty of work to do. The massive ship was carrying thousands of passengers and crew members, each with their own experiences on board, and the various amenities offered among the different classes of passengers ensured that life on some decks of the ship was quite different than life on others.

The Lusitania and the Titanic would become the two most famous ships of the early 20th century for tragic reasons, but the circumstances could not have been more different. While the Titanic is still notorious for being the world’s best ocean liner at the time of its collision with an iceberg in 1912, the Lusitania’s role as a popular ocean liner has been almost completely obscured by the nature of its sinking by a German U-boat in 1915. The Germans aimed to disrupt trade by the Allied forces, but they did not have the naval forces capable of seizing merchant ships and detaining them. Furthermore, the Germans rightly suspected that the British and Americans were using passenger liners and merchant ships to smuggle weaponry across the Atlantic, but since their sole edge in the Atlantic was their fleet of submarines, the Germans had no way of confirming their suspicions, short of sinking a ship and seeing if a detonation onboard suggested the presence of munitions and gunpowder.

The sinking of the Lusitania in 1915 was the first major event that shifted public opinion in the United States, and support for joining the war began to rise across the country. Many Americans joined the “Preparedness Movement,” which advocated at least preparing for war if not entering the war outright, and though the country would not declare war against Germany for two more years, the sinking of the Lusitania is still cited as a key event that set America on the path toward joining the war.

The Titanic and the Lusitania: The Controversial History of the 20th Century’s Most Famous Maritime Disasters chronicles the construction and destruction of two of the most famous ships in history. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the sinking of both like never before.