Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1918-08-14
HE SANK THE LUSITANIA
(From the York Times.J

(From the York Times.1
1t is reported from London that
the German Admiralty has admitted
the death, in September, 1917, of
Lieutenant Commander Schweiger,
captain of the submarine that sank
the Lusitania. In command of the
U-boat SIS, he is said to have run
into British mineield in the Blight
of Helgoland, and his boat to have
been blown up.
There is a certain plausibility of
poetic justice in his end, but if he
had been human and not a German
machine, he should have lived until
he made away with himself; or, his
mind broken with intolerable re-
membranes, he should have passed
long years in a madhouse. But he
was only d German. He only obeyed
orders. To do the arch-deed of pitt
less savagery was to win promotion.
With what a delirium of rejoicing,
shoehorn to what endless bumpers,
was that exploit celebrated by the
German tribes!
Schweiger being only a German,
we cannot hope that any doubt,
much less any remorse, ever inter-
fered with his elf-complacency. We
cannot imagine that, in the swift
surge of memories in the brain Of
drowning men, he saw his victims
struggling in the sea soon to be his
grave; that he heard the cries of
those babies. those. children, those
women; that, in the dark closing
around him, he feared the strangling
hands of those nigh eight hundred
ghosts. A tat score of murder his.
but what is it compared with the
millions that Germany has mur-
dered?
Yet this humble agent of the Ger
man Death merits a place conspicu-
Gus among all her innumerable de-
visers of destruction. The horror of
his act is unforgettable even in the
procession Of genuine German deeds.
1t was the pioneer of German ruin.
1t lay, breeding bitterness, in the
American consciousness. 1t was the
seed and prelude of American en-
trance into the war. There is a
ond officer to the captain that May
afternoon off the Old Head of Kin
sale. 1t did its work we'll. 1t did
an infinitely greater work. It was
the signal of German Downfall.
Schweiger should have lived to see
the sequel to see the drawers of the
sword perish by the sword. He
should have lived to see those 124
American dead of the Lusitania
avenged.
Well. he went to his place last
fall His old principal, Won TirpitZ,
knows. whatever pretenses he keeps
up, that the submarine dwindling
and futile as it is, was the fatal
bringer of disaster to Germany. As
for Lieutenant Commander Schei-
gers Kaiser, he is neurotic, with
an imagination. AS defeat thickens,
as ultimate ruin gathers visibly
around him, what ceaseless knawing
regrets, what sleepless fears for his
precious House, must beset him. He
is no fool. He can suffer. What
does he think of the Lusitania, of
his whole submarine fee-faw-fum?
What does he think of st. Helena as
an imperial all-the-year villa? Yes,
the Kaiser is neurotic. When doubts
of his divinity occur to the god, who
shall salve his vanity? When a
world -dominator finds the world
indomitable against him, how is he
to get out of the scrape? We may
assume that Schweiger was stolid.
The Kaiser, not from remorse, put
from disappointment, pride abased,
swollen ambitions pricked, some
thing like Hell on EARTH" Which
is lucky for him. The Prince of
Darkness, as a gentleman, has to
draw the line somewhere. Presum-
ably he has laid out a No Mans
Land for German shadows. After
to keep a respectable house.