21 “I guarantee upon my word”: Tuchman, Zimmermann Telegram, 141; Birnbaum, Peace Moves, 277. Tuchman notes that Holtzendorff’s memorandum, which ran to two hundred pages, included such fine-grained details as the number of calories in a typical English breakfast and the amount of wool in skirts worn by Englishwomen.
Koerver reports another example of delusional thinking within the German navy. Adm. Edouard von Capelle said, on Feb. 1, 1917, “From a military point of view I rate the effect of America coming on the side of our enemies as nil.” Tuchman, Zimmermann Telegram, 139; Koerver, German Submarine Warfare, xxxiii.
22 “d’you want to bring America into the war?”: The dialogue in this chapter is as reported by Hall in ch. 25, “Draft D,” of his unpublished autobiography, Hall Papers.
23 “Make war together”: Ibid.; Boghardt, Zimmermann Telegram, 106–7; Link, Wilson: Campaigns, 343.
24 “This may be a very big thing”: Hall, “Draft D.,” ch. 25, Hall Papers.
25 “Only actual overt acts on their part”: Tuchman, Zimmermann Telegram, 151.
26 Hall realized the time for action had come: Boghardt, Zimmermann Telegram, 78, 101, 105. My account here is necessarily abbreviated, for one could write an entire volume just on the Zimmermann telegram—as indeed other authors have done. For further reading, turn first to Tuchman, mainly for the sheer panache with which she tells the story. For the most up-to-date scholarship, however, see Boghardt’s Zimmermann Telegram (2012) and Gannon’s Inside Room 40 (2010).
27 “By admitting the truth”: Beesly, Room 40, 223.
28 “All these papers had been ardently neutral”: Tuchman, Zimmermann Telegram, 185.
29 “The American people are at last ready”: Lansing, Private Memoranda, March 19, 1917, Lansing Papers.
30 “I must have spoken with vehemence”: Ibid., March 20, 1917.
31 “Germany is going to get Hell”: Link, Wilson: Campaigns, 421.
32 “stood in solemn splendor”: Sullivan, Our Time, 272–73.
33 “in effect nothing less than war”: The New York Times of April 3, 1917, published Wilson’s entire speech on the front page. See also Link, Wilson: Campaigns, 422–26.
34 “gravely, emphatically”: New York Times, April 3, 1917.
35 “What he did in April, 1917”: Churchill, World Crisis, 682–83. One early-twentieth-century British diarist, Lady Alice Thompson, did not think very highly of America’s restraint. On Feb. 27, 1917, after the sinking of a Cunard liner, the Laconia, she wrote, “The contemptible President of the U.S. may yet be ‘kicked’ into taking notice of this fresh German outrage. He is still masquerading at ‘considering the matter’—”
After another sinking she wrote, on March 24, 1917: “I suspect Wilson will write another note!! & then this new act of Barbarity will sink into oblivion. They are a wonderful nation of Big talk & little action—I leave them at that.” Diaries of Lady Alice Thompson, vols. 2 and 3, Doc. 15282, Imperial War Museum.
36 In Queenstown, U.S. consul Frost: Frost, German Submarine Warfare, 5.
37 “Briefly stated, I consider”: Sims, Victory at Sea, 43.
38 “Welcome to the American colors”: Ibid., 51.
39 On May 8, the destroyers: Halpern, Naval History, 359.
EPILOGUE: PERSONAL EFFECTS
1 “She looked so smeared and dirty”: Lawrence, When the Ships Came In, 131–32.
2 “horse storm”: Ibid., 132.
3 “His old blue uniform”: Ibid., 133.
4 “I told him there were no regrets”: New York Times, Nov. 21, 1915.
5 On January 1, 1917: Ramsay, Lusitania, 161; Hoehling and Hoehling, Last Voyage, 172.
6 “this great little man”: Letter, George Ball to Adolf Hoehling, July 22, 1955, Hoehling Papers.
7 “Capt. Turner felt the loss”: Letter, Mabel Every to Adolf Hoehling, May [4], 1955, Hoehling Papers; Ramsay, Lusitania, 161; letter, George Ball to Adolf Hoehling, July 22, 1955, Hoehling Papers.
8 “I grieve for all the poor innocent people”: Letter, William Thomas Turner to Miss Brayton, June 10, 1915, D42/PR13/29, Cunard Archive.
9 “He was far too strong a character”: Letter, George Ball to Adolf Hoehling, July 22, 1955, Hoehling Papers.
10 “I am satisfied that every precaution was taken”: New York Times, Nov. 21, 1915.
11 “Merriment and humor”: Letter, Geroge Ball to Adolf Hoehling, July 22, 1955, Hoehling Papers.
12 “He died as he had lived”: Ibid.
13 Room 40 recorded the loss: Ledger, Tactical Formation of Submarines: Summary of Submarine Cruises, Entry: Sept. 5, 1917, Admiralty Papers, ADM 137/4128, National Archives UK; Grant, U-Boat Intelligence, 73, 185.
14 They reside today: The museum is the Strandingsmuseum St. George, Thorsminde, Denmark, just a brief stroll from the North Sea. U-20’s conning tower stands on a lawn out front, stripped of all hatches and apparatus. Schwieger’s deck gun, once so accurate and deadly, stands inside the museum, opposite a cabinet that displays other pieces of the submarine. For more on the museum, see its website at www.?strandingsmuseet.?dk/?about-?us
15 “How simple is intelligence!”: “Rough Notes,” Hall 2/1, Hall Papers.
16 “All the young are in the net”: Letter, Hall to Percy Madeira, Oct. 6, 1934, Hall 1/6, Hall Papers.