William J. Flynn
William J. Flynn, chief of the United States Secret Serviceuntil 1918, who led the hunt of the German spy
In the lesser cities the German consulate servedas the nucleus for the organization. That in San Francisco is conspicuous for its activity, for it prosecuted its own warfare on the entire Pacific coast. Wherever it was necessary German sympathizers furnished accommodations for offices and storage room. Headquarters of every character dotted the country from salons to saloons, from skyscrapers to cellars, each an active control in the manipulation of Germany's almost innumerable enterprises.
Those enterprises may be best outlined perhaps, by recalling the three phases of warfare which Germany had to pursue. America had shipped foodstuffs and raw materials in enormous quantities for many years to Germany. Dr. Albert must see to it that she continue to do so. The Imperial funds were at his disposal. He had already the requisite contact with American business. But let him also exert his utmost influence upon America to stop supplying the Allies. If he could do it alone, so much the better; if not, he was at liberty to call upon the military and naval attachés. But in any case "food and arms for Germany and none for the Allies" was the economic war-cry.
American supplies must be purchased for Germany and shipped through the European neutral nations, running the blockade. If capital provedobstinate and the Allies covered the market, it would be well to remember that labor produced supplies; labor must therefore be prevented from producing or shipping to the Allies. If labor refused to be interfered with, the cargoes should be destroyed.
His enormous task would depend, of course, very much upon the turn of affairs diplomatic. The State Department must be kept amicable. The Glad Hand was to be extended to official America, while the Mailed Fist thrashed about in official America's constituencies. Thus also with Congress, through influential lobbying or the pressure of constituents. Count von Bernstorff knew that the shout raised in a far-off state by a few well-rehearsed pacifists, reinforced by a few newspaper comments, would carry loud and clear to Washington. Upon his shoulders rested the entire existence of the German plan, and he spent a highly active and trying thirty months in Washington in an attempt to avoid the inevitable diplomatic rupture.
The military problem quickly resolved itself into two enterprises: carrying war to the enemy, and giving aid and comfort to its own forces—in this case the German navy. As the war progressed, and the opportunity for strictly military operations became less likely, the two Captainsoccupied their time in injecting a quite military flavor into the enterprises Bernstorff and Albert had on foot. As a strategic measure Mexico must divert America's attention from Europe and remove to the border her available forces. Meanwhile, German reservists must be supplied to their home regiments. Failing that they must be mobilized for service against Germany's nearest enemy here—Canada. German raiders at sea must be supplied. German communication with her military forces abroad must be maintained uninterrupted.
Long after the departure of the principals for their native land the enterprises persisted. It may be well here to extend to the secret agents of the United States the tribute which is their due. To Chief Flynn, of the United States Secret Service of the Treasury Department, to A. Bruce Bielaski, head of the special agents of the Department of Justice, to W. M. Offley, former Superintendent of the New York Bureau of Special Agents, to Roger B. Wood, Assistant United States District Attorney, to his successor, John C. Knox, (now a Federal judge), to Raymond B. Sarfaty, Mr. Wood's assistant who developed the Rintelen case, to former Police Commissioner Arthur Woods of New York, his deputy, Guy Scull, his police captain, Thomas J. Tunney, andto the men who worked obscurely and tirelessly with them to avert disasters whose fiendish intention shook the faith if not the courage of a nation. Those men found Germany out in time.
Inspector Thomas J. Tunney
Inspector Thomas J. Tunney of the New York Police Depart-ment, head of the "Bomb Squad" and foremost inapprehending many important German agents
Germany was fluent in her denials. When the President in his message to Congress in December, 1915, bitterly attacked Germans and German-Americans for their activities in America, accusing the latter of treason, the German government authorized a statement to the Berlin correspondent of the New YorkSunon December 19, 1915, to the effect that it
"naturally has never knowingly accepted the support of any person, group of persons, society or organization seeking to promote the cause of Germany in the United States by illegal acts, by counsels of violence, by contravention of law, or by any means whatever that could offend the American people in the pride of their own authority. If it should be alleged that improper acts have been committed by representatives of the German Government they could be easily dealt with. To any complaints upon proof as may be submitted by the American Government suitable response will be duly made.... Apparently the enemies of Germany have succeeded in creating the impression that the German Government is in some way, morally or otherwise, responsible for what Mr. Wilson has characterized as anti-American activities, comprehending attacks upon property in violation of the rules which the American Government has seen fit to impose upon the course of neutral trade. Thisthe German Government absolutely denies. It cannot specifically repudiate acts committed by individuals over whom it has no control, and of whose movements it is neither officially nor unofficially informed."
"naturally has never knowingly accepted the support of any person, group of persons, society or organization seeking to promote the cause of Germany in the United States by illegal acts, by counsels of violence, by contravention of law, or by any means whatever that could offend the American people in the pride of their own authority. If it should be alleged that improper acts have been committed by representatives of the German Government they could be easily dealt with. To any complaints upon proof as may be submitted by the American Government suitable response will be duly made.... Apparently the enemies of Germany have succeeded in creating the impression that the German Government is in some way, morally or otherwise, responsible for what Mr. Wilson has characterized as anti-American activities, comprehending attacks upon property in violation of the rules which the American Government has seen fit to impose upon the course of neutral trade. Thisthe German Government absolutely denies. It cannot specifically repudiate acts committed by individuals over whom it has no control, and of whose movements it is neither officially nor unofficially informed."
To this statement there is one outstanding answer. It is an excerpt from the German book of instructions for officers:
"Bribery of the enemy's subjects with the object of obtaining military advantages, acceptances of offers of treachery, reception of deserters, utilization of the discontented elements in the population, support of the pretenders and the like are permissible; indeed international law is in no way opposed to the exploitation of the crimes of third parties (assassination, incendiarism, robbery and the like) to the prejudice of the enemy. Considerations of chivalry, generosity and honor may denounce in such cases a hasty and unsparing exploitation of such advantages as indecent and dishonorable, but law, which is less touchy, allows it. The ugly and inherently immoral aspect of such methods cannot affect the recognition of their lawfulness. The necessary aim of war gives the belligerent the right and imposes upon him, according to circumstances, the duty not to let slip the important, it may be decisive, advantages to be gained by such means."("The War Book of the German General Staff," translated by J. H. Morgan, M.A., pp. 113-114.)
"Bribery of the enemy's subjects with the object of obtaining military advantages, acceptances of offers of treachery, reception of deserters, utilization of the discontented elements in the population, support of the pretenders and the like are permissible; indeed international law is in no way opposed to the exploitation of the crimes of third parties (assassination, incendiarism, robbery and the like) to the prejudice of the enemy. Considerations of chivalry, generosity and honor may denounce in such cases a hasty and unsparing exploitation of such advantages as indecent and dishonorable, but law, which is less touchy, allows it. The ugly and inherently immoral aspect of such methods cannot affect the recognition of their lawfulness. The necessary aim of war gives the belligerent the right and imposes upon him, according to circumstances, the duty not to let slip the important, it may be decisive, advantages to be gained by such means."
("The War Book of the German General Staff," translated by J. H. Morgan, M.A., pp. 113-114.)
The outbreak of war—Mobilization of reservists—The Hamburg-American contract—TheBerwind—TheMarina Quezada—TheSacramento—Naval battles.
The outbreak of war—Mobilization of reservists—The Hamburg-American contract—TheBerwind—TheMarina Quezada—TheSacramento—Naval battles.
A fanatic student in the streets of Sarajevo, Bosnia, threw a bomb at a visiting dignitary, and the world went to war. That occurred on the sunny forenoon of June 28, 1914. The assassin was chased by the police, the newspaper men, and the photographers, who reached him almost simultaneously, and presently the world knew that the Archduke Francis Ferdinand, of Austria, was the victim, and that a plain frightened fellow, struggling in the shadow of a doorway, was his assailant.
Austria's resentment of the crime mounted during July and boiled over in the ultimatum of July 23. Five days later, with Germany's permission, Austria declared war on Servia. By this time continental tempers had been aroused, and the Central Empires knew that "Der Tag"had come. Austria, Russia, Germany, England, France and Belgium entered the lists within a fortnight.
By mid-July Germany had warned her agents in other lands of the imminence of war and a quiet mobilization had begun of the more important reservists in America. Captain von Papen, after dispatching his telegram from Mexico via El Paso to Captain Boy-Ed, hurried to Washington, arriving there on August 3. He began to weld together into a vast band the scientists, experts, secret agents and German army-reservists, who were under German military oaths, and were prepared to gather information or to execute a military enterprise "zu Befehl!" How rapidly he assembled his staff is shown in testimony given on the witness stand by "Horst von der Goltz," alias Bridgeman Taylor, alias Major Wachendorf, a German spy who had been a major in a Mexican army until July.
A German consul in El Paso had sounded out Goltz's willingness to return to German service. "A few days later, the 3rd of August, 1914, license was given by my commanding officer to separate myself from the service of my brigade for the term of six months. I left directly for El Paso, Texas, where I was told by Mr. Kueck, German Consul at Chihuahua, Mexico, whostayed there, to put myself at the disposition of Captain von Papen." This was two days before the final declaration of war.
All German and Austro-Hungarian consulates received orders to coördinate their own staffs for war service. Germany herself supplied the American front with men by wireless commands to all parts of the world. Captain Hans Tauscher, who enjoyed the double distinction of being agent in America for the Krupps and husband of a noted operatic singer, Mme. Johanna Gadski, chanced to be in Berlin when war broke out, reported for duty and was at once detailed to return to the United States and report to von Papen, as Wilhelmstrasse saw the usefulness of an ordnance expert in intimate touch with our Ordnance Department and our explosives plants. Two German officers detailed to topographical duty, who had spent years mapping Japan, and were engaged in the same work in British Columbia, jumped the border to the United States, taking with them their families, their information and their fine surveying and photographic instruments, and in the blocking out of the country which the wise men in the East were performing, were assigned to the White Mountains. Railroads and ships to the Atlantic seaboard bore every day new groups of reserve officers from theOrient and South America to New York for sailing orders.
They found von Papen already there. He established a consultation headquarters at once with Boy-Ed in a room which they rented in the offices of G. Amsinck & Co., at 6 Hanover Street. From that time forward, New York was to be his base of operations, and it was at that moment especially convenient to von Bernstorff's summer establishment at Newport.
The naval situation at once became active. In the western and southern Atlantic a scattered fleet of German cruisers was still at large. The British set out eagerly to the chase. Security lay in southern waters, and the German craft dodged back and forth through the Straits of Magellan. From time to time the quarry was forced by the remoteness of supply to show himself, and a battle followed; in the intervals, the Germans layperdu, dashing into port for supplies and out again to concealment, or wandering over seldom traveled ocean tracks to meet coal and provision ships sent out from America.
Captain Boy-Ed received from Berlin constant advices of the movements of his vessels. On July 31, Dr. Karl Buenz, the American head of the Hamburg-American Line, had a cable from Berlin which he read and then forwarded to theEmbassy in Washington for safekeeping. Until 1912 Buenz had had no steamship experience, having been successively a judge in Germany, a consul in Chicago and New York, and minister to Mexico. When at the age of 70 he was appointed Hamburg-American agent, one of the first matters which came to his attention was the consummation of a contract between the Admiralty Division of the German government and the steamship line, which provided for the provisioning, during war, of German ships at sea, using America as a base. This contract was jealously guarded by the Embassy.
Dr. Karl Buenz
Dr. Karl Buenz, managing director of theHamburg-American Line
The cablegram of July 31 called on Dr. Buenz to carry out this contract. There was consultation at once with Boy-Ed for the location of the vessels to be supplied, merchant ships were chartered or purchased, then loaded, and despatched. The first to leave New York harbor was theBerwind. There was hesitancy among the conspirators as to who should apply for her clearance papers—documents of which Dr. Buenz protested he knew nothing. They finally told G. B. Kulenkampff, a banker and exporter, that theBerwindwas loaded with coal, and directed him to get the clearance papers. He swore to a false manifest of her cargo and got them. TheBerwindcarried coal to be sure—but she also carriedfood for German warships, and she was not bound for Buenos Aires, as her clearance papers stated. Thus the United States, by innocently issuing false papers, made herself, on the third day of the war, a party to German naval operations.
The steamshipLorenzodropped down the harbor, ostensibly for Buenos Aires, on the following day, August 6, cleared by a false manifest, and bearing coal and food for German sailors. On these ships, and on theThor(from Newport News for Fray Bentos, Uruguay), on theHeine(from Philadelphia on August 6 for La Guayra), on theJ. S. Mowinckeland theNepos(out of Philadelphia for Monrovia) and others Boy-Ed and Buenz had placed supercargoes bearing secret instructions. These men had authority to give navigating orders to the captains once they were outside the three-mile limit—orders to keep a rendezvous with German battleships by wireless somewhere in the Atlantic wastes.
TheBerwindapproached the island of Trinidad and Herr Poeppinghaus, who was her supercargo, directed the captain to lie to. Five German ships, theKap Trafalgar,Pontus,Elinor Woerman,Santa LuciaandEber, approached and the transfer of supplies started. It was interrupted by the British converted cruiserCarmania. She engaged in a brisk two-hour duel with theKap Trafalgarwhich ended only when the latter sank into the tropical ocean. TheBerwindmeanwhile put the horizon between herself and theCarmania.
Few of the chartered ships carried out their intentions, although their adventures were various. Hear the story of theUnita: Her skipper was Eno Olsen, a Canadian citizen born in Norway. Urhitzler, the German spy placed aboard, made the mistake of assuming that Olsen was friendly to Germany. He gave him his "orders," and the skipper balked. "'Nothing doing,' I told the supercargo," Captain Olsen testified later, with a Norwegian twist to his pronunciation. "She's booked to Cadiz, and to Cadiz she goes! So the supercargo offered me $500 to change my course. 'Nothing doing—nothing doing for a million dollars,' I told him. The third day out he offered me $10,000. Nothing doing. So," announced Captain Olsen with finality, "I sailed theUnitato Cadiz and after we got there I sold the cargo and looked up the British consul."
One picturesque incident of the provisioning enterprise was the piratical cruise of the good shipGladstone, rechristened, with a German benediction,Marina Quezada. Under the name ofGladstone, the ship had flown the Norwegian flagon a route between Canada and Australia, but shortly after the outbreak of war she put into Newport News. Simultaneously a sea captain, Hans Suhren, a sturdy German formerly of the Pacific coast, appeared in New York, called upon Captain Boy-Ed, who took kindly interest in him, and then departed for Newport News. Here he assumed charge of theMarina Quezada.
"I paid $280,000 in cash for her," he told First Officer Bentzen. After hiring a crew, he hurried back to New York, where he received messages in care of "Nordmann, Room 801, 11 Broadway, N. Y. C."—Captain Boy-Ed's office. Captain Boy-Ed had already told him to erect a wireless plant on his ship—the equipment having been shipped to theMarina Quezada—and to hire a wireless operator. He then handed Suhren a German naval code book, a chart with routes drawn, and sailing instructions for the South Seas, there to await German cruisers. Food supplies, ordered for the steamerUnita(which at that time had been unable to sail) were wasting on the piers at Newport News and Captain Boy-Ed ordered them put in theMarina Quezada. Two cases of revolvers also were sent to the boat.
Again Suhren went back to the ship and kept his wireless operators busy and speeded up theloading of the cargo, which was under the supervision of an employee of the North German Lloyd. Needing more money before sailing in December, 1914, he drew a draft for $1,000 on the Hamburg-American Line, wiring Adolf Hachmeister, the purchasing agent, to communicate with "Room 801, 11 Broadway."
Then trouble arose over the ship's registry. Though Suhren insisted that he owned her, a corporation in New York whose stockholders were Costa Ricans were laying claim to ownership, for they had christened her and had secured provisional registration from the Costa Rican minister in Washington. Permanent registry, however, required application at Port Limon, Costa Rica. So hauling down the Norwegian ensign that had fluttered over the ship as theGladstone, Captain Suhren ran up the Costa Rican emblem. He had obtained false clearance papers stating his destination as Valparaiso. They were based upon a false manifest, and he sailed for Port Limon. The Costa Rican authorities declined to give Suhren permanent papers, and he found himself master of a ship without a flag, and in such status not permitted under international law to leave port. He waited for a heavy storm and darkness, then quietly slipping his anchor, he sped out into the high seas,a pirate. Off Pernambuco he ran up the Norwegian flag, put into port and got into such difficulties with the authorities that his ship and he were interned. His supplies never reached the raiders and Boy-Ed learned of another fiasco.
TheLorenzo,ThorandHeinewere seized at sea. TheBangorwas captured in the Straits of Magellan. Out of twelve shiploads of supplies, only some $20,000 worth were ever transshipped to German war vessels. This involved a considerable loss, as the following statement of expenditures for those vessels made by the Hamburg-American Line will show:
Where did the money come from? TheHamburg-American Line, under the ante-bellum contract, placed at Captain Boy-Ed's disposal three payments of $500,000 each from the Deutsches Bank, Berlin; the Deutsches Bank forwarded through Wessells, Kulenkampff & Co., credit for $750,000 more. "I followed the instructions of Captain Boy-Ed," Kulenkampff testified. "He instructed me at different times to pay over certain amounts either to banks or firms. I transferred $350,000 to the Wells-Fargo Nevada National Bank in San Francisco, $150,000 to the North German Lloyd, then $63,000 to the North German Lloyd. The balance of $160,000 I placed to the credit of the Deutsches Bank with Gontard & Co., successors to my former firm. That was reduced to about $57,000 by payments drawn at Captain Boy-Ed's request to the order of the Hamburg-American Line."
The North German Lloyd was serving as the Captain's Pacific operative, which accounts for the transfer of the funds to the West. (The same line, through its Baltimore agent, Paul Hilken, was also coöperating at this time, but not to an extent which brought the busy Hilken into prominence as did his later connection with the merchant submarine,Deutschland.) Following the course of the funds, federal agents eventually uncovered the operations of Germans on thePacific coast, and secured the arrest and convictions of no less personages than the consular staff in San Francisco.
The steamshipSacramentoleft San Francisco with a water-line cargo of supplies. A firm of customs brokers in San Francisco was given a fund of $46,000 by the German consulate to purchase supplies for her; a fictitious steamship company was organized to satisfy the customs officials; on September 23 an additional $100,000 was paid by the Germans for her cargo; a false valuation was placed on her cargo, and she was cleared on October 3. Two days later Benno Klocke and Gustav Traub, members of the crew, broke the wireless seals and got into communication with theDresden. Klocke usurped the position of master of the vessel, and steered her to a rendezvous on November 8 with theScharnhorst, off Masafueros Island, in the South Pacific; six days later she provisioned and coaled the German steamshipBaden. She reached Valparaiso empty. Captain Anderson said he could not help the fact that her supplies were swung outboard and into theScharnhorstandDresden.
Captain Fred Jebsen, who was a lieutenant in the German Naval Reserve, took out a cargo of coal, properly bonded in his ship, theMazatlan, for Guaymas, Sonora, Mexico. Off the mouthof Magdalena Bay theMazatlanmet theLeipzig, a German cruiser, and the cargo of coal was transferred to the battleship. One of Jebsen's men, who had signed on as a cook, was an expert wireless operator, and he went to theLeipzigwith three cases of "preserved fruits"—wireless apparatus forwarded by German agents in California. Jebsen, after an attempt to smuggle arms into India, which will be discussed later, made his way to Germany in disguise, and was reported to have been drowned in a submarine. TheNurnbergandLeipziglay off San Francisco for days in August, the former finally entering the Golden Gate for the amount of coal allowed her under international law. TheOlsonandMahoney, a steam schooner, was laden with supplies for the German vessels and prepared to sail, but after a considerable controversy with the customs officials, was unloaded.
Perhaps the most bizarre attempt to spirit supplies to the Imperial navy was that in which the little barkentineRetrieverfigured as heroine. Wide publicity was given the announcement that she was to be sailed out to sea and used as the locale of a motion picture drama. The Government found out, however, that her hull was well down with coal, which did not seem vital to the scenario, and she was not permitted to leave port.
The major portion of Germany's naval strength lay corked in the Kiel Canal, where, except for a few indecisive sorties, Germany's visible fleet was destined to remain for more than three years. At the outbreak of war, theEmden,Dresden,Scharnhorst,GneisenauandNurnbergwere at large in the southern oceans. On November 1 the German cruisers met the BritishMonmouth,Good Hope,GlasgowandOtrantooff Coronel, the Chilean coast. TheMonmouthandGood Hopewere struck a mortal blow and sunk. TheGlasgowandOtrantobarely escaped. In a battle off the Falkland Islands on December 7, as the German army was being thrown back from Ypres, theScharnhorst,Leipzig,GneisenauandNurnbergwere sunk by a reinforced British fleet. (Walter Peters, one of the crew of theLeipzig, floated about for six hours after the engagement, was picked up, made his way to Mexico, and for more than three years was employed by a German vice-consul in Mexico in espionage in the United States. Peters was arrested as a dangerous enemy alien in Crockett, California, in April, 1918.) TheDresdenandKarlsruheescaped, and the former hid for two months in the fjords of the Straits of Magellan. On February 26, 1915, an American tourist vessel, theKroonland, passed east through the Straits and into Punta Arenasharbor, while out of the harbor sneaked the littleGlasgow, westward bound. TheDresden, after the American had passed, had run for the open Pacific; theGlasgow, hot on her trail, engaged her off the Chilean coast five days later and sank her, leaving only theEmdenandKarlsruheat large. TheKarlsruhedisappeared.
The last lone member of the pack was hunted over the seas for months, and finally was beached, but long before her activities became public the necessity for supplying the German ships expired, from the simple elimination of German ships to supply. Captain Boy-Ed's first enterprise had been frustrated by the British navy and he turned to other and more sinister occupations. Buenz, Koetter and Hachmeister were sentenced to eighteen months in Atlanta, and Poeppinghaus to a year and a day—terms which they did not begin to serve until 1918.[1]
FOOTNOTE:[1]Dr Buenz' case is an enlightening example of the use made by German agents in America of the law's delays. He was sentenced in December, 1915, for an offence committed in September, 1914. He at once appealed his case to the higher courts, going freely about meanwhile on bail furnished by the Hamburg American Line. In March, 1918, the Supreme Court of the United States, to which his case had finally been pressed, denied his appeal. His attorneys at once placed before President Wilson, through Attorney-General Gregory, a request for a respite, or commutation of his sentence, which the President, on April 23, 1918, denied. Buenz pleaded the frailty of his 79 years—which had not prevented him from keeping his social engagements while his appeal was pending.
[1]Dr Buenz' case is an enlightening example of the use made by German agents in America of the law's delays. He was sentenced in December, 1915, for an offence committed in September, 1914. He at once appealed his case to the higher courts, going freely about meanwhile on bail furnished by the Hamburg American Line. In March, 1918, the Supreme Court of the United States, to which his case had finally been pressed, denied his appeal. His attorneys at once placed before President Wilson, through Attorney-General Gregory, a request for a respite, or commutation of his sentence, which the President, on April 23, 1918, denied. Buenz pleaded the frailty of his 79 years—which had not prevented him from keeping his social engagements while his appeal was pending.
[1]Dr Buenz' case is an enlightening example of the use made by German agents in America of the law's delays. He was sentenced in December, 1915, for an offence committed in September, 1914. He at once appealed his case to the higher courts, going freely about meanwhile on bail furnished by the Hamburg American Line. In March, 1918, the Supreme Court of the United States, to which his case had finally been pressed, denied his appeal. His attorneys at once placed before President Wilson, through Attorney-General Gregory, a request for a respite, or commutation of his sentence, which the President, on April 23, 1918, denied. Buenz pleaded the frailty of his 79 years—which had not prevented him from keeping his social engagements while his appeal was pending.
The German Embassy a clearing house—Sayville—Germany's knowledge of U. S. wireless—Subsidized electrical companies—Aid to the raiders—TheEmden—TheGeier—Charles E. Apgar—The German code.
The German Embassy a clearing house—Sayville—Germany's knowledge of U. S. wireless—Subsidized electrical companies—Aid to the raiders—TheEmden—TheGeier—Charles E. Apgar—The German code.
The coördination of a nation's fighting forces depends upon that nation's system of communication. In no previous war in the world's history has a general staff known more of the enemy's plans. We look back almost patronizingly across a century to the semaphore which transmitted Napoleon's orders from Paris to the Rhine in three hours; we can scarcely realize that if the report of a scout had ever got through to General Hooker, warning him that a suspicious wagon train had been actually sighted a few miles away, Stonewall Jackson's flanking march at Chancellorsville would have been checked in its first stages. In this greatest of all wars a British battery silences a German gun within two minutes after the allied airman has "spotted" the Boche. The air is "Any Man's Land." Whatlies beyond the hill is no longer the great hazard, for the wireless is flashing.
If the Allied general staffs had been provided with X-ray field-glasses, and had trained those glasses on a certain brownstone house in Massachusetts Avenue, between Fourteenth and Fifteenth Streets, in Washington, they would have been interested in the perfection of the German system of communication. They would have observed the secretarial force of the Imperial Embassy opening and sorting letters from confederates throughout the country, many so phrased as to be quite harmless, others apparently meaningless. The Embassy served as a clearing-house for all German and Allied air messages.
Long before the war broke out the German government had seen the military necessity for a complete wireless system. Subsidies were secretly granted to the largest of the German electrical manufacturers to establish stations all over the globe. Companies were formed in America, ostensibly financed with American funds, but on plans submitted to German capitalists and through them to the German Foreign Office for approval. Thus was the Sayville station erected. As early as 1909 a German captain, Otto von Fossberg, had been sent to America to select a site on Long Island for the station. "TheGerman government is backing the scheme," he told a friend, although the venture was publicly supposed to be under the auspices of the "Atlantic Communication Company," in which certain prominent German-Americans held stock and office. In 1911 an expert, Fritz von der Woude, paid Sayville a visit long enough to install the apparatus; he came under strict injunctions not to let his mission become generally known.
Boy-Ed watched the progress of the Sayville station with close interest and considerable authority, and his familiarity with wireless threw him into frequent and cordial relationship with the United States naval wireless men and the Department of Commerce. On one occasion the Department requested a confidential report from a radio inspector of the progress made by foreign interests in wireless; the report prepared went to Germany before it came to the hands of the United States government. Again: the German government was informed in 1914 by Boy-Ed in Washington that the United States intended to erect a wireless station at a certain point in the Philippines; full details, as the Navy Department had developed them, were forwarded, and the German government immediately directed a large electrical manufacturer in Berlin to bid for the work. The site the United States had selectedwas not altogether satisfactory to Germany, for some reason, so the German government added this delicious touch: a confidential map of the Philippines was turned over to the electrical house, with orders to submit a plan for the construction of the American station on a site which had been chosen by the German General War Staff!
TheProvidence Journalclaims to have discovered an interesting German document—probably genuine—which reveals the scope of the Teutonic wireless project. It was a chart, bearing a rectangle labeled in German with the title of the German Foreign Office. From this "trunk" radiated three "branches," each bearing a name, and each terminating in the words. "Telefunken Co." The first branch was labeled "Gesellschaft für Drahtlose Telegraphie, Berlin"; the second, "Siemens & Halske, Siemens-Schuckert-Werke, Berlin"; the third, "Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft, Berlin."
From each branch grew still further subdivisions, labeled with the names of electrical firms or agents all over the world, and all subject to the direction of the German government. These names follow:
From No. 1: Atlantic Communication Co. (Sayville), New York; Australasian WirelessCo., Ltd., Sydney (Australia); Telefunken East Asiatic Wireless Telegraph Co., Ltd., Shanghai; Maintz & Co. (of Amsterdam, Holland), Batavia (Java); Germann & Co. (of Hamburg), Manila; B. Grimm & Co., Bangkok; Paetzold & Eppinger, Havana; Spiegelthal, La Guayra; Kruger & Co., Guayaquil; Brahm & Co., Lima; E. Quicke, Montevideo; R. Schulbach, Thiemer & Co. (of Hamburg), Central America; Sesto Sesti, Rome; A. D. Zacharion & Cie., Athens; J. K. Dimitrijievic, Belgrade.
From No. 2: Siemens Bros. & Co., Ltd., London; Siemens & Halske, Vienna; Siemens & Halske, Petrograd; Siemens & Halske (K. G. Frank), New York; Siemens-Schuckert-Werke, Sofia; Siemens-Schuckert-Werke, Constantinople; Siemens-Schuckert-Werke (Dansk Aktsielskab), Copenhagen; Siemens-Schuckert-Werke (Denki Kabushiki Kaishe), Tokio; Siemens-Schuckert-Werke (Companhia Brazileira de Electricidade), Rio de Janeiro; Siemens-Schuckert, Ltd., Buenos Ayres; Siemens-Schuckert, Ltd., Valparaiso.
From No. 3: A. E. G. Union Electrique, Brussels; Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft, Basel; A. E. G. Elecktriska Aktiebolaget, Stockholm; A. E. G. Electricitats Aktieselskabet, Christiania; A. E. G. Thomson-Houston Iberica,Madrid; A. E. G. Compania Mexicana, Mexico; A. E. G. Electrical Company of South Africa, Johannesburg.
The German manufacturers evinced a keen interest in the project of a wireless plant in Nicaragua, laying special stress on the point that "permanent stations in this neighborhood" would be valuable "if the Panama Canal is fortified." From Sayville station the German plan projected powerful wireless plants in Mexico, at Para, Brazil; at Paramaribo, Dutch Guiana; at Cartagena, Colombia, and at Lima, Peru. A point in which Captain H. Retzmann, the German naval attaché in 1911, was at one time interested was whether signals could be sent to the German fleet in the English Channel from America without England's interference. German naval wireless experts supervised the construction, and although the stations were nominally civilian-manned, and purely commercial, in reality the operators were often men of unusual scientific intellect, whose talents were sadly underpaid if they received no more than operators' salaries.
Gradually and quietly, Germany year by year spread her system of wireless communication over Central and South America, preparing her machinery for war. Over her staff of operators and mechanics she appointed an expert in the fullconfidence of the Embassy at Washington, and in close contact with Captain Boy-Ed. To the system of German-owned commercial plants in the United States he added amateur stations of more or less restricted radius, as auxiliary apparatus.
When the war broke out, and scores of German merchantmen were confined to American ports by the omnipresence of the British fleet at sea, the wireless of the interned ships was added to the system. Thus in every port lay a source of information for the Embassy. The United States presently ordered the closing of all private wireless stations, and those amateurs who had been listening out of sheer curiosity to the air conversation cheerfully took down their antennae. Not so, however, a prominent woman in whose residence on Fifth Avenue lay concealed a powerful receiving apparatus. Nor did the interned ships obey the order: apparatus apparently removed was often rigged in the shelter of a funnel, and operated by current supplied from an apparently innocent source. And the secret service discovered stations also in the residences of wealthy Hoboken Germans, and in a German-American "mansion" in Hartford, Connecticut.
The operators of these stations made their reports regularly through various channels to theEmbassy. There the messages were sorted, and it is safe to say that Count von Bernstorff was cognizant of the position of every ship on the oceans. He was in possession of both the French and British secret admiralty codes. In the light of that fact, the manœuvres of the British and German fleets in the South Atlantic and Pacific became simply a game of chess, Germany following every move of the British fleet under Admiral Cradock, knowing the identity of his ships, their gun-power, and their speed. When she located theGood Hope,Monmouth,GlasgowandOtrantooff Coronel, Berlin, through von Bernstorff, gave Admiral von Spee the word to strike, with the results which we have observed: the sinking of theMonmouthandGood Hope, and the crippling of theGlasgowandOtranto.
Throughout August, September and October, 1914, the system operated perfectly. Bernstorff and Boy-Ed were confronted with the problem of keeping the German fleet alive as long as possible, and inflicting as much damage as possible on enemy shipping. Allied merchantmen left port almost with impunity, and were gathered in by German raiders who had been informed from Washington of the location of their prey. But the defeat off Chile apparently was conclusive proof to England that Germany knew her naval code,and the events of November and December indicate that England changed her code.
It was while engaged in escort duty to the first transport fleet of the Australian Expeditionary Force that the Australian cruiserSydneyreceived wireless signals from Cocos Island shrieking that theEmdenwas near by. TheEmden, having been deprived for some time of news of enemy ships, had gone there to destroy the wireless station, having in the past three months sunk some $12,500,000 of British shipping. Even while the island's distress signals were crashing out, theEmdenhad her own wireless busy in an effort to drown the call for help, or "jam" the air. On the following morning, November 9, theSydneycame up with the enemy. A sharp action followed. TheSydney'sgunfire was accurate enough to cause the death of 7 officers and 108 men; her own losses were 4 killed and 12 wounded; theEmdenfled, ran aground on North Keeling Island, one of the Cocos group, and ultimately became a total wreck.
In the same month the cruiserGeierfled the approach of the British and found refuge in Honolulu harbor. Her commander, Captain Karl Grasshof, made the mistake of keeping a diary. That document, which later fell into the hands of the Navy Intelligence Service, revealeda complete disrespect for the hospitality which the American government afforded the refugees. TheGeier'sband used to strike up for an afternoon concert, and under cover of the music, the wireless apparatus sent out messages to raiders at sea or messages in English so phrased as to start rumors of trouble between Japan and the United States. TheGeierwas the source of a rumor to the effect that Japanese troops had landed in Mexico; theGeiergave what circulation she could to a report that Germans in the United States were planning an invasion of Canada and was ably assisted in this effort by George Rodiek, German consul at Honolulu; theGeiercaught all trans-Pacific wireless messages, and intercepted numerous United States government despatches. Captain Grasshof also spread a report quoting an American submarine commander as saying he would "like to do something to those Japs outside" (referring to the Japanese Pacific patrol) provided he (the American commander) and the German could reach an agreement. This report Grasshof attributed to von Papen, and later retracted, admitting that it was a lie. Grasshof's courier to the consulate in San Francisco was A. V. Kircheisen, a quartermaster on the linerChina, a German secret service agent bearing the number K-17. Kircheisen frequentlyused theChina'swireless to send German messages.
On December 8 occurred the engagement off the Falklands, which resulted in the defeat of the German fleet. TheKarlsruhewithin a short time gave up her aimless wanderings and disappeared. In February theGlasgowavenged herself on theDresden, and thePrinz Eitel Friedrichand theKronprinz Wilhelmfled into the security of Hampton Roads for the duration of war.
The United States' suspicions had been aroused by the activity of the German wireless plants, but the arm of the law did not remove at once the German operators at certain commercial stations. They were the men who despatched communications to Berlin and to the raiders. Interspersed in commercial messages they sprinkled code phrases, words, numbers, a meaningless and innocent jargon. The daily press bulletin issued to all ships at sea was an especially adaptable vehicle for this practice, as any traveler who has been forced to glean his news from one of these bulletins will readily appreciate. There were Americans shrewd enough, however, to become exceedingly suspicious of this superficially careless sending, and their suspicions were confirmed through the invention of another shrewd American,Charles E. Apgar. He combined the principles of the phonograph and the wireless in such a way as to record on a wax disc the dots and dashes of the message, precisely as it came through the receiver. The records could be studied and analyzed at leisure. And the United States government has studied them.
At three o'clock every morning, the great wireless station at Nauen, near Berlin, uttered a hash of language into the ether. It was apparently not directed to any one in particular, nor did it contain any known coherence. Unless the operator in America wore a DeForest audian detector, which picks up waves from a great distance, he could not have heard it, and certainly during the early part of the war he paid no attention to it. The United States decided, however, that it might be well to eavesdrop, and so for over two years every utterance from Nauen was transcribed and filed away, or run off on the phonograph, in the hope that repetition might reveal the code. Until the code was discovered elsewhere, the phonographic records told no tales, but then the State Department found that it had a priceless library of Prussian impudence.
The diplomatic code was a dictionary, its pages designated by serial letters, its words by serial numbers. Thus the message
"12-B-15-C-7"
signified the twelfth and fifteenth words on the second page, and the seventh word on the third page. This particular dictionary was one of a rare edition.
To complement the diplomatic code the Deutches Bank, the German Foreign Office, and their commercial representatives, Hugo Schmidt and Dr. Albert, had agreed upon an arbitrary code which proved one of the most difficult which the American authorities have ever had to decipher. Solution would have been impossible without some of the straight English or German confirmations which followed by mail, but as most of these documents were lost or destroyed, the deciphering had to be done by astute construction of testimony taken from Schmidt as late as the fall of 1917. He had made the work doubly difficult by burning the cipher key and most of his important papers in the furnace of the German Club.
Simple phrases, such as might readily pass any censor without arousing suspicion, passed frequently through Sayville station. The message "Expect father to-morrow" meant "The political situation between America and Germany grows worse. It is imperative that you take care ofyour New York affairs." "Depot" meant "Securities"; "Depot Pritchard" meant "Securities to be held in Germany"; "Depot Cooper" meant "Securities to be forwarded to some neutral country in Europe." Schmidt himself had the following aliases: "John Maley," "Roy Woolen," "Sidney Pickford," "George Brewster," "175 Congress Street, Brooklyn," "James Frasier," or "Andrew Brodie." Dr. Albert was mentioned as "John Herbinsen," "Howard Ackley," "Leonard Hadden," or "Donald Yerkes." James W. Gerard, the American ambassador at Berlin, was "Wilbur McDonald"; America was "Fremessi" or "Alfred Lipton." To throw any suspicion off the scent, the phrase "Hughes recovered" was translatable simply as "agreed," whereas "Percy died" meant "disagreed." Amounts of money were to be multiplied by one thousand.
This cipher code, so far as it had any system at all, showed a skilful choice of arbitrary proper names, than which there is nothing less suggestive or significant when the name is backed up by no known or discoverable personality. These names met two requirements: they carefully avoided any names of personages, and they sounded English or American. Following is a table of the commoner symbols used:
The chief significance of the discovery of the two codes is their conclusive proof that while von Bernstorff was protesting to the American government that he could not get messages through to Berlin, nor replies from the foreign office, he was actually in daily, if not hourly,communication with his superiors. Messages were sent out by his confidential operators under the very eyes of the American naval censors. After the break of diplomatic relations with Berlin, in February, 1917, the authorities set to work decoding the messages, and the State Department from time to time issued for publication certain of the more brutal proofs of Germany's violation of American neutrality. The ambassador and his Washington establishment had served for two years and a half as the "central exchange" of German affairs in the western world. After his departure communication from German spies here was handicapped only by the time required to forward information to Mexico; from that point to Berlin air conversation continued uninterrupted.
The plan to raid Canadian ports—The first Welland Canal plot—Von Papen, von der Goltz and Tauscher—The project abandoned—Goltz's arrest—The Tauscher trial—Hidden arms—Louden's plan of invasion.
The plan to raid Canadian ports—The first Welland Canal plot—Von Papen, von der Goltz and Tauscher—The project abandoned—Goltz's arrest—The Tauscher trial—Hidden arms—Louden's plan of invasion.
Underneath the even surface of American life seethed a German volcano, eating at the upper crust, occasionally cracking it, and not infrequently bursting a great gap. When an eruption occurred, America stopped work for a moment, stared in surprise, sometimes in horror, at the external phenomena, discussed them for a few days, then hurried back to work. More often than not it saw nothing sinister even in the phenomena.
Less than ten hours from German headquarters in New York lay Canada, one of the richest possessions of Germany's bitter enemy England. Captain von Papen had not only full details of all points of military importance in the United States, but had made practical efforts to utilizethem. He knew where his reservists could be found in America. When the Government, shortly after the outbreak of war, forbade the recruiting of belligerents within its boundaries, and then refused to issue American passports for the protection of soldiers on the way to their commands, Captain von Papen planned to mobilize and employ a German army on American soil in no less pretentious an enterprise than a military invasion of the Dominion.
The first plan was attributed to a loyal German named Schumacher, whose ambiguous address was "Eden Bower Farm, Oregon." He outlined in detail to von Papen the feasibility of obtaining a number of powerful motor-boats, to be manned by German-American crews, and loaded with German-American rifles and machine guns. From the ports on the shores of the Great Lakes he considered it practicable to journey under cover of darkness to positions which would command the waterfronts of Toronto, Sarnia, Windsor and Kingston, Ontario, find the cities defenseless, and precipitate upon them a fair storm of bullets. A few Canadian lives might be lost, which did not matter; an enormous hue and cry would be raised to keep the Canadian troops at home to guard the back door.
Von Papen entertained the plan seriously, andsubmitted it to Count von Bernstorff, who for obvious diplomatic reasons did not care to sponsor open violence when its proponent's references were unreliable, its actual reward was at best doubtful, and when subtle violence was equally practicable. Von Papen then produced an alternative project.
Cutting through the promontory which separates Lake Erie from the western end of Lake Ontario runs the Welland Canal, through which all shipping must pass to avoid Niagara Falls. This waterway is one of Canada's dearest properties, and is no mean artery of supply from the great grain country of the Northwest.
Its economic importance, however, was secondary in the German mind to the psychological effect upon Canada which a dynamite calamity to the Canal would certainly cause. The first expeditionary force of Canadian troops was training frantically at Valcartier, Quebec. They must be kept at home. Whether or not the idea originated with Captain von Papen is of little consequence (it may be safely assumed that Berlin had long had plans for such an enterprise); the fact is that it devolved upon him as military commander to crystallize thought in action. The plot is ascribed to "two Irishmen, prominent members of Irish associations, who had bothfought during the Irish rebellion," and was to include destruction of the main railway junctions and the grain elevators in the vicinity of Toronto.
The picturesque renegade German spy commonly known as Horst von der Goltz is responsible for the generally accepted version of incidents which followed his first interview with von Papen on August 22 at the German Consulate in New York. He was sent to Baltimore under the assumed name of Bridgeman H. Taylor, with a letter to the German Consul there, Karl Luederitz, calling for whatever coöperation Goltz might need. He was to recruit accomplices from the crew of a German ship then lying at the North German Lloyd docks in the Patapsco River. With a man whom he had hired in New York, Charles Tucker, alias "Tuchhaendler," he visited the ship and selected his men. He then returned to New York, where Papen placed three more men at his disposal, one of them being A. A. Fritzen, of Brooklyn, a discharged purser on a Russian liner; another Frederick Busse, an "importer," with offices in the World Building, New York; and the third man Constantine Covani, a private detective, of New York. After a few days the sailors from Baltimore reported for duty, but were sent back, as Goltz noticed that his movements were being watched.
Papen sent Goltz to Captain Tauscher's office at 320 Broadway for explosives. On September 5, Captain Tauscher ordered 300 pounds of 60 per cent. dynamite to be delivered by the E. I. du Pont de Nemours Company to Mr. Bridgeman Taylor. In a motor-boat Goltz applied at a du Pont barge near Black Tom Island and the Statue of Liberty and took away his three hundred pounds of dynamite in suitcases. The little craft made its way up the river to 146th Street. The conspirators then carried their burden to the German Club in Central Park South and later in a taxicab to Goltz's home, where it was stored with a supply of revolvers and electrical apparatus for exploding the charges.