He said that all the officers were at their posts and
that earlier arrivals of the rescue craft would not have saved the
situation.
After physicians had testified that the victims had met death through
prolonged immersion and exhaustion the coroner summed up the case.
He said that the first torpedo fired by the German submarine did serious
damage to the Lusitania, but that, not satisfied with this, the Germans
had discharged another torpedo. The second torpedo, he said, must have
been more deadly, because it went right through the ship, hastening the
work of destruction.
The characteristic courage of the Irish and British people was
manifested at the time of this terrible disaster, the coroner continued,
and there was no panic. He charged that the responsibility "lay on the
German Government and the whole people of Germany, who collaborated in
the terrible crime."
"I propose to ask the jury," he continued, "to return the only verdict
possible for a self-respecting jury, that the men in charge of the
German submarine were guilty of wilful murder."
The jury then retired and after due deliberation prepared this verdict:
We find that the deceased met death from prolonged immersion and
exhaustion in the sea eight miles south-southeast of Old Head of
Kinsale, Friday, May 7, 1915, owing to the sinking of the Lusitania by
torpedoes fired by a German submarine.
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