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Updated: June 20, 2025
The same submarine sank the British steamer Ptarmigan only a few hours later. Among victims flying the flags of neutral nations the next ship was of American register. This was the tank steamship Gulflight, which was torpedoed off the Scilly Islands on the 29th of May, 1915. The hole made in her hull was not large enough to cause her to sink, and she was able to get to port.
Nor would it be possible to recount all the deeds of heroism which this new warfare occasioned. Belligerents and neutrals alike were affected. American ships suffered, perhaps, to a lesser degree, than those of other neutrals, partly because of the determined stand taken by the United States Government. On May 1, 1915, the first American steamer, the Gulflight, was sunk.
The American steamers Falaba and Gulflight were torpedoed without warning, in each case with the loss of one or two lives. Finally, the steamer Sussex, crossing the English Channel, was hit by a torpedo which killed many of the passengers. As several Americans lost their lives, once more the United States warned Germany that this must not be repeated.
The quality of Wilson's pacifism was about to be put to the test. In March a British steamer, the Falaba, was sunk and an American citizen drowned; some weeks later an American boat, the Cushing, was attacked by a German airplane; and on the 1st of May, another American steamer, the Gulflight, was sunk by a submarine with the loss of two American lives.
The first American ship to be struck by a torpedo in the war zone established by the German admiralty's proclamation of February 5, 1915, was the Gulflight. This tank steamer was hit by a torpedo fired by a German submarine off the Scilly Islands, on the 1st of May, 1915.
They were still in the stage where they freely applied to enemies and possible enemies the expression, "They are afraid of us." "The more enemies, the more glory," was the inane motto so popular early in the war that it was even printed on post cards. The Gulflight, flying the Stars and Stripes, was torpedoed in the reign of submarine anarchy immediately inaugurated.
According to the British Admiralty thirty-nine unarmed steamships and one trawler flying the Union Jack were sunk without warning by submarines up to the end of 1915. Thirteen neutral steamships and one sailing vessel were listed under the same heading. Of these, the Gulflight and Nebraskan were American.
"No explanation has appeared in the British press of our Government's inactivity or of any regret or promise of reparation by Germany for the sinking of the Lusitania, the Falaba, the Gulflight, the Nebraskan, the Arabic, or the Hesperian, nor any explanation of a week's silence about the Dumba letter; and the conclusion is drawn that, in the absence of action by us, all these acts have been practically condoned.
One of them was the American steamer Gulflight, torpedoed off Scilly islands on May 1, with the loss of three lives. There were three Norwegian, two Swedish, and one Danish merchant vessel sunk. The second week in May saw minor German successes on the western front, but these were immediately succeeded by determined efforts on the part of the Allies to retrieve lost ground.
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