Sir,—David Snook’s letter (HI 24.1, Jan./Feb. 2016) is further confirmation of the need for research to get to the truth about the sinking of the Lusitania. But this cannot start until the promise of cooperation by the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, made publicly by Minister Deenihan in Cork is 2012, is fulfilled. Incidentally, some people were astonished at the figure of $1 million in the Irish Times headline for what that department has already cost us in legal fees to prevent Mr Bemis from carrying out research into the wreck, which he owns. We know from a Dáil question that the state had to pay Bemis €450,000 for his legal costs in the cases which he won against it in both the High and Supreme Courts. The state’s own costs can hardly have been less, and any remaining difference is due to the dollar/euro exchange rate.—Yours etc.,
WILLIAM KINGSTON
Trinity College, Dublin