WWII Propaganda Poster (Irish) - Join An Irish Regiment, avenge the Lusitania - Framed Picture - 14"H x 11"W

WWII Propaganda Poster (Irish) - Join An Irish Regiment, avenge the Lusitania - Framed Picture - 14"H x 11"W

One of the many Propaganda to be issued by Ireland during World War I

RMS Lusitania was a British ocean liner that was sunk by a German submarine in World War I, causing a major diplomatic uproar. The ship was a holder of the Blue Riband, and briefly the world's largest passenger ship until the completion of her running mate Mauretania. 

German shipping lines were aggressive competitors in the transatlantic trade, and Cunard responded by trying to outdo them in speed, capacity and luxury.

When RMS Lusitania left New York for Britain on 1 May 1915, German submarine warfare was intensifying in the Atlantic. Germany had declared the seas around the United Kingdom a war zone, and the German embassy in the United States had placed a newspaper advertisement warning people of the dangers of sailing on Lusitania. On the afternoon of 7 May, Lusitania was torpedoed by a German U-Boat, 11 mi  off the southern coast of Ireland and inside the declared "zone of war", causing the deaths of 1,198 passengers and crew.

In firing on what was officially a non-military ship without warning, the Germans were accused of breaching international laws known as the Cruiser Rules. However it was not possible for submarines to give warning due to the British introduction of Q-ships with concealed deck guns. German justifications for treating Lusitania as a naval vessel centered on the fact that the ship was carrying hundreds of tons of war munitions, therefore making it a legitimate military target, and also that British merchant ships had violated the Cruiser Rules from the very beginning of the war.

The sinking caused a storm of protest in the United States, however, as 128 American citizens were among the dead. The sinking helped shift public opinion in the United States against Germany, and was a factor in the United States' declaration of war nearly two years later.