J Kent Layton: 5 books

Great disasters always attract conspiracy theories and this is just as true of disasters at sea as it is of those on land or in the air. The sinkings of the Titanic and the Lusitania, two of the great maritime disasters of the twentieth century, have attracted more than their share of these theories....

Since the end of the nineteenth century there has been a stunning succession of transatlantic liners, from the White Star Line's Oceanic of 1899 to the Cunard Line's Queen Mary 2 of 2004. These floating palaces often contained luxurious staterooms, ballrooms and lounges for the rich, and noticeably...

On the night of 14/15 April 1912, a brandnew, supposedly unsinkable ship, the largest and most luxurious vessel in the world at the time, collided with an iceberg and sank on her maiden voyage. Of the 2,208 people on board, only 712 were saved. The rest either drowned or froze to death in the icy-cold...

It is now just over a century since Lusitania made her maiden crossing of the North Atlantic. For seven and a half years, she crossed that rugged ocean with punctuality and dependability. She fast became a living legend, the ship of choice for many of the transatlantic travellers. Since her sinking...

As the twentieth century got underway, the competition between the three greatest passenger lines in the history of the North Atlantic produced three trios of wonder ships. From the Cunard Line came the Lusitania, Mauretania and Aquitania. From the White Star Line came the Olympic, the infamous Titanic,...