SM U-20 (Germany)
Postcard depicting U-20 sinking RMS Lusitania.
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| History | |
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 German Empire
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| Name: | U-20 |
| Ordered: | 25 November 1910 |
| Builder: | Kaiserliche Werft Danzig |
| Cost: | 2,450,000 Goldmark |
| Yard number: | 14 |
| Laid down: | 7 November 1911 |
| Launched: | 18 December 1912 |
| Commissioned: | 5 August 1913 |
| Fate: | Grounded 4 November 1916 and destroyed by her crew the next day. |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | German Type U 19 submarine |
| Displacement: |
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| Length: | 64.15 m (210 ft 6 in) |
| Beam: | 6.10 m (20 ft) |
| Height: | 7.30 m (23 ft 11 in) |
| Draught: | 3.58 m (11 ft 9 in) |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: |
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| Range: |
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| Test depth: | 50 m (164 ft 1 in) |
| Boats & landing craft carried: |
1 dinghy |
| Complement: | 4 officers, 31 men |
| Armament: |
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| Service record | |
| Part of: |
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| Commanders: |
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| Operations: | 7 patrols |
| Victories: | 36 merchant ships sunk (144,300 GRT), including RMS Lusitania. |
SM U-20 was a German Type U 19 U-boat built for service in the Imperial German Navy. She was launched on 18 December 1912, and commissioned on 5 August 1913. During World War I, she took part in operations around the British Isles. U-20 became infamous following her sinking of the British ocean liner RMS Lusitania on 7 May 1915, an act that dramatically reshaped the course of World War I.
On 7 May 1915, U-20 was patrolling off the southern coast of Ireland under the command of Kapitänleutnant Walther Schwieger. Three months earlier, on 4 February, the Germans had established a U-boat blockade around Great Britain and Ireland and had declared any vessel in it a legitimate target.
At about 13:40 Schwieger was at the periscope and saw a vessel approaching. From a distance of about 700 metres (770 yd) Schwieger noted she had four funnels and two masts, making her a liner of some sort. He recognised her as the Lusitania, a vessel in the British Fleet Reserve, and fired a single torpedo. It hit on the starboard side, almost directly below the bridge. Following the torpedo's explosion, the liner was shattered by a second explosion, possibly caused by either coal dust or a boiler explosion, so large Schwieger himself was surprised. In 18 minutes, Lusitania sank with 1,198 casualties. The wreck lies in 300 feet (91 m) of water.
Fifteen minutes after he had fired his torpedo, Schwieger noted in his war diary:
There was at the time and remains now a great controversy about the sinking, over whether Lusitania was smuggling contraband war material to England and over the number of torpedoes Schwieger fired.
Before he got back to the docks at Wilhelmshaven for refuelling and resupply, the United States had formally protested to Berlin against the brutality of his action.
Kaiser Wilhelm II wrote in the margins of the American note, "Utterly impertinent", "outrageous", and "this is the most insolent thing in tone and bearing that I have had to read since the Japanese note last August." Nevertheless, to keep America out of the war, in June the Kaiser was compelled to rescind unrestricted submarine warfare and require all passenger liners be left unmolested.
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Wikipedia