History for Lunch: Enemy in Home Waters: How World War I Came Home to North Carolina

Tane Casserley, Research Coordinator, Monitor National Marine Sanctuary, will present the effect of World War I on North Carolina. When World War I began in 1914, neither the United States Navy nor American coastal shipping vessels were directly affected. By the end of the war in 1918, three German U-boats, U-151, U-140, and U-117, had sunk a total of 10 vessels off North Carolina alone. When the U-151 arrived off the U.S. East Coast in May 1918, it was the first foreign enemy naval vessel to invade U.S. waters since the War of 1812. World War I had come home to the United States. This is the story of the brave Americans that went up against Germany’s newest weapon, the U-boat, and NOAA's work to honor and document these national significant shipwrecks off North Carolina's coast.