opening the seacocks. The U-53 then delivered the coup de grace with a single torpedo, and the Housatonic sank. Ensor persuaded Rose to take the lifeboats in tow toward the English coast. After two hours a vessel was sighted. Ensor was not convinced that they had been seen, so Rose fired his deck gun to attract her attention, then slipped away. The vessel turned out to be the trawler Salvator which took the crew of Housatonic to Penzance. Captain Ensor returned to the United States aboard the , with his crew following aboard the . Consequences of the sinking The sinking of Housatonic came at a particularly difficult time for U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, who had been narrowly re-elected the previous year on the platform of keeping the United States out of the war. Germany's announcement of unrestricted submarine warfare commencing on 1 February led to the breaking off of diplomatic relations between Germany and the United States on the same day that the Housatonic was sunk, and this was swiftly followed by the publication of the Zimmermann Telegram. The sinking of the ship provided further ammunition to the pro-war party, and was another step towards to the eventual declaration of war by the United States in April 1917. Post-war In 1926 the Housatonic Steamship Company, Inc. sought damages amounting to $839,600 from the German government for the sinking of the Housatonic. The case was heard by Edwin B. Parker on 14 May, who after a long argument as to the actual value of the ship, decided in favour of the Housatonic Steamship Company, but awarded them only $4,500 with 5% annual interest from the date of the sinking. References 1890 ships Ships built on the River Clyde Passenger ships of Germany Ships of the Hamburg America Line World War I merchant ships of the United States Ships sunk by German submarines in World War I World War I shipwrecks in the Atlantic Ocean