No attention was paid to my suggestion in Berlin at the time. Admiral von Tirpitz had just resigned and the decision had been taken against the continuance of unrestricted submarine warfare. I do not know why the dispatch of an official Note was preferred to the oral negotiations I had suggested, but I think that the deciding factor was consideration for public opinion in Germany.
A few days later I cabled the following to Berlin:
"House gave me a very gloomy view of the position with regard to the _Sussex_. At the White House the situation is regarded as hopeless because the view is held that, in spite of Tirpitz's resignation, the German Government, with the best will in the world, cannot curb the submarine campaign. It has hitherto been merely due to good luck that no American has lost his life and any moment might precipitate a crisis which would be bound to lead to a break. The American Government are convinced that the Sussex was torpedoed by a German submarine. A repetition of such mistakes would be bound to drive the United States of America into war with us, which Wilson would greatly regret, as he is anxious--as I have already reported--to lay the foundations of peace in a few months. If the United States were drawn into the war all hope of an early peace would be at an end.
"I request to be furnished with instructions on the basis of which I can pacify the Government here, which now has doubts of our _bona fides_."
After Mr. Gerard, apart from other questions concerning doubtful cases of torpedoing, had also submitted a similar inquiry to the Foreign Office on the subject of the _Sussex_ incident, an official reply was handed to him on the 10th April which read in the following terms:
"A decision as to whether the Channel steamer _Sussex_ was damaged by a German submarine or not is made extraordinarily difficult owing to the fact that no exact information is known as to the place, time and accompanying circumstances of the sinking, and moreover a picture of this ship could not be obtained until the 6th April. Consequently the inquiry has had to be extended to all submarine enterprises which took place on the day in question, 24th March, in the Channel anywhere on the course between Folkestone and Dieppe.