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THE GERMAN SPY IN AMERICA
The Secret Plotting of German Spies in the United States and the
Inside Story of the Sinking of the Lusitania
by
JOHN PRICE JONES
With a Foreword by
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
and an Introduction by
ROGER B. WOOD
Former U.S. Assistant Attorney in New York_
London: Hutchinson & Co.
Paternoster Row :: :: 1917
Copyright 1917
by
John Price Jones
Agnes C. Laut
432, Fourth Avenue, New York.
Office of
Theodore Roosevelt.
February 27, 1917.
MY DEAR MR. JONES,
I have read the galley proofs of your book, and I wish to say, with all
emphasis and heartiness, that you are doing this country a great service
in publishing it.
Your statements are evidently for the most part based on official
Government records, happening in the course of prosecuting the various
criminals, who by the direct instigation of the German Government, have
for the last two and one-half years been using this country as a base
for war against the Allies, and more than this, have in effect been
waging war on us within our own boundaries, no less than on the high
seas. Our people need to know certain of the facts that you set forth.
They need to understand that Germany has waged war upon us, and has
waged war against our property, and has waged war against the lives of
non-combatants, including women and children, and therefore a far more
evil war than one waged openly. Our people also need to understand what
you so clearly set forth that very much of the pacifist movement has
been directly instigated by German intrigues, and paid for by German
money, and that the entire pacifist movement in this country, during the
past two and a half years, has really been in the interest of German
militarism against the rights of small nations, and against our own
honour and vital national interests.
You have done a capital work, and I wish it could be put in the hands of
all good Americans.
Sincerely yours,
THEODORE ROOSEVELT.
Mr. John Price Jones,
_The Sun_, New York.
FOREWORD
There have been two kinds of German propaganda. One, devoted to setting
before the American people Germany’s side of the war, may be classed as
legitimate. The other has been illegal and criminal. While both are set
forth in this narrative, the greater space has been devoted to illegal
activities.
The author claims for this book no other distinction than a plain
unvarnished statement of facts—vital, dramatic, absorbing facts of the
manner in which secret agents of the Teutonic governments, acting under
orders of authorized directors, have attacked the very integrity of our
national life, commercial, social and politic. It contains facts
arranged from an American viewpoint by an American who considers it his
duty to present them to his fellow Americans.
These facts were obtained by the writer as a reporter on the _New York
Sun_ who devoted a year to no other work. _They were derived by a
painstaking investigation and where flat statements are made they are
based on knowledge obtained by the author from various authorities and
from the examination of documents some of which have never been
published._ They show how German agents sought to subvert the aims of
our government to the advantage of the Central Powers. They furnish a
glimpse of the manner in which these men and women sought to make
America the hinterland for the European War; how they planned and
executed bribery, arson, felonious assaults; how they plotted
destruction of property and even murder on American territory.
These facts emphasize the need of a new kind of preparedness. They prove
that not only does the nation need preparedness in arms on both land and
sea against a foreign foe but also defence against those within our
bounds, who are eager to betray us. No true American, whether he be
pro-Ally, pro-German, or strictly neutral, can read this book without
realizing the thoroughness and the perfection of the German espionage
system and being convinced of the way in which Germany’s spies have
overrun the entire country, nor can anyone doubt the necessity for
preparedness to cope with these men and this system in a different guise
in the event of still graver issues.
JOHN PRICE JONES.
INTRODUCTION
When the German note announcing that the Imperial German Government
intended to resume with greater vigour its ruthless submarine warfare
was handed to the Secretary of State of the United States, a crisis in
the affairs of this nation was abruptly precipitated. The President met
that crisis with courage, with promptness and in a way that merits, and
has, the unqualified support of every American who is proud of his
citizenship.
After the receipt of such an insulting note it was unthinkable that the
United States could longer remain on friendly terms with a nation that
deliberately returned to wanton murder of innocent non-combatants,
including women and helpless children.
The conduct of the Imperial German Government in striving to win a war
by means (which barbarians would hesitate to use) begun by that
Government without just cause and pursued by riding rough-shod over a
much smaller and much weaker nation, has been condemned by every
civilized country, and it will be many years before the German people
recover from the shame and degradation into which they have been
plunged.
Germany will have to repent in sackcloth and ashes for a long, long time
before it is received again into the Family of Nations.
In prosecuting the war, Germany and her allies have proceeded from the
beginning upon the theory that “the end justifies the means” and acting
upon that theory have held in supreme contempt the rights of neutral
nations.
From the beginning of the war, subjects of Germany, resident in the
United States, have continuously violated our laws in the most
outrageous and flagrant manner.
At the very threshold, they sought to use the United States as a base
from which to supply the German raiders in the South Atlantic, and to
that end, by fraud, obtained from the collectors at various ports of the
United States legal clearances, thus subjecting every ship which
lawfully cleared from any United States port to seizure by the Allies.
Next, they sought and obtained, by fraud, and false swearing, passports
to be used by German reservists in returning to Germany, travelling
under the guise of American citizens; thus placing in danger the lives
and liberty of honest Americans travelling with legitimate passports and
entitled to the protection of this Government.
Because the Allies were able to purchase in the United States munitions
of war, foodstuffs and all other supplies they might need, and were able
to transport them, and because the United States did not at the behest
of the Imperial German Government, stop the sale and transportation of
the supplies, which its citizens had a perfect right to sell and
transport, German residents devised the inhuman scheme of making
chemical fire bombs and infernal machines to be placed on ships carrying
passengers and supplies, with the deliberate intent and purpose that the
ships should be crippled or sunk in mid-ocean—it mattered not to them
that all on board might find a watery grave.
Numerous attempts have been made to equip men of the most desperate
character with necessary explosives and other implements of death and
destruction and have them go from the United States into Canada, our
friendly and respected neighbour, to destroy railroads, canals, ships,
warehouses and factories without regard to human life.
Agents have been sent to the United States with unlimited money at their
command to engage gunmen and thugs to blow up our munition plants and
factories—many explosions have occurred—many lives have been lost—much
damage has been done—I cannot say who caused such wholesale murder to be
committed, but I have the right as you have, to suspect.
It is a matter of record that the German Military Attaché, Captain Franz
von Papen, and the German Naval Attaché, Captain Boy-Ed, knew of and
sanctioned some of the conspiracies above referred to—_perhaps_ the
German Ambassador did not know of them; but it will be hard to convince
a hard-headed, common-sense American citizen that he did not know what
his right hand and his left hand were doing in such a crucial period.
Murder has followed murder on the high seas, one crime came fast upon
another in the United States, and now we are told that this Government
must do as the Imperial German Government directs; or murder on a more
colossal scale will be the result. The people of the United States have
not taken orders from any Government since 1776, and the German
murderers ought to have known we would take none now, least of all from
a Government that had forfeited its right to the respect of any
civilized nation.
“The German Spy in America” will give you some small conception of what
the Germans in the United States have been doing since August 1, 1914.
Its author has followed their nefarious plots very closely and he has an
intimate knowledge of his subject.
Its purpose is to let the American people know the danger that lurks
within; to sound the alarm so that every man may be on his guard; to
show the grave necessity for preparedness against a foreign foe, and
particularly numerous alien enemies within our borders.
If it serves in a small measure to accomplish its high aim, its author
will be amply repaid because he will have rendered a great service to
humanity, and above all to our country, which we love more than all
else, save God.
ROGER B. WOOD.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I.—AMERICA: THE BACKGROUND OF THE WAR 13
II.—CAPTAIN FRANZ VON PAPEN, DIRECTOR OF GERMANY’S MILITARY
ENTERPRISES ON THE AMERICAN FRONT 27
III.—CAPTAIN VON PAPEN, BUYER OF PASSPORTS AND PROMOTER OF
SEDITION 70
IV.—VON IGEL AND KOENIG, TWO OF THE KAISER’S FAITHFUL WORKERS 88
V.—CAPTAIN KARL BOY-ED, THE EMPEROR’S SOCIAL DANDY AND VON
TIRPITZ’S TOOL 113
VI.—CAPTAIN FRANZ VON RINTELEN, GERMAN ARCH-PLOTTER 144
VII.—CAPTAIN FRANZ VON RINTELEN (concluded) 168
VIII.—THE STORY OF THE “LUSITANIA” 186
IX.—DR. HEINRICH F. ALBERT, GERMANY’S BAGMAN AND BLOCKADE
RUNNER 204
X.—AMBASSADOR DUMBA, GERMANY’S CO-CONSPIRATOR 229
XI.—GERMANY’S LOBBY IN CONGRESS 242
XII.—CHANGING THE SYSTEM 252
THE GERMAN SPY IN AMERICA
CHAPTER I
AMERICA: THE BACKGROUND OF THE WAR
America has been the great background of the European War. Though far
removed from the trenches with the play of artillery and the heroic
charges, this country has been the scene of an equally dramatic, though
silent struggle—a battle not visible to the eye. It has been a conflict
of wits, of statesman pitted against statesman, of secret agent striving
to outdo his opponent of a belligerent nation; for in America, agents of
Germany have been striving for a two-fold aim. They have sought to
enmesh the United States in an international conspiracy and to use this
country as the means of a rear attack on the Entente Allies.
And New York has been the centre of it all. In several of the huge
office buildings that make the thoroughfares of the city seem like
canyons, Germany had, and still has, the headquarters of a vast
nerve-like system radiating throughout the country. The nerve coils are
composed of thousands of secret agents located in every city and town.
These men have worked under orders from Berlin in the execution of a
series of campaigns designed to be of service to the Teutonic Allies.
Against these men have been pitted agents of the American government,
all aiming to detect the schemes and frustrate any plans for the
violation of our neutrality laws.
A diplomat, famed for his finesse and grace of manner, was at a
reception given to distinguished statesmen, talented business men and
attractive women. The conversation was turned to the topic of spies. One
woman wished to know if the diplomat had encountered any spies.
“Well,” remarked the diplomat, “I used to stop at the Hotel Grandeur,
but Count ——” (mentioning the name of a diplomat of a nation with which
his country was at war) “persisted in having my baggage searched every
day. So I moved to the Hotel Excellency; but I found things no better
there.”
“Didn’t you complain to the management?”
“Ah, no,” answered he gravely, “but every time the Count stops at the
Hotel Elaborate, I have his baggage searched, too.”
Perhaps the diplomat was not serious, but in days when the destiny of
nations was at stake, it was likely that he was speaking none too
lightly of a game that had doubtless cost him many an hour of the
keenest anxiety.
Of all the secret service systems, the German is the most elaborate and
machine-like. It has been organized not merely to gather information,
but to trample upon the laws of the United States, in order to hinder
any project of the Entente Allies. Constructed in the hours of peace
with the utmost care and foresight, it was easily expanded in the United
States at the outbreak of the war into such a vast network that if a
representative of the Allies suddenly retraced his steps or halted
suddenly when around a corner, he was almost sure to bump the shins of a
German spy. Germany, always methodical and thorough, possessing a genius
for moulding a multitude of details into an effective whole, had
prepared her secret service system with the same efficiency with which
through scores of years she had equipped her military forces for battle;
indeed, her secret service was a part of her military forces.
The system is based on the principle of “Lass die linke Hand nicht
wissen was die rechte tut”—“let not the left hand know what the right is
doing.” _So thoroughly is this maxim followed that two German spies may
be working side by side and not be aware of the fact._ Though groups of
Germans may engage in some activity with a thorough understanding of the
aims of another, still the order of silence is rigorously enforced. The
agents hand their information to a superior, who in turn transmits it to
somebody higher up. _One spy knows only the person or group of persons
with whom he directly deals, sending information along devious and
hidden routes up to the final assembling point._
Germany’s spy system has been the sword hand of her statesmen and her
diplomats. When this war is over and the world learns of the moves,
counter-moves, and Machiavellian methods of German diplomats, with their
intrigues, secret understandings, and their daring attempts to force
this country into dangerous situations, people will realize more clearly
than to-day what a marvellous system has been behind many seemingly
casual developments in this country. It will be shown how German agents
have violated our laws in order to gain secret information for the
benefit of Germany; how her secret agents have committed crimes in order
to coerce diplomatic negotiations.
RAMIFICATIONS OF UNDERGROUND PLOTS
So perfectly organized and so responsive to the slightest suggestion
from Berlin is the American branch of the Kaiser’s secret service that
vast undertakings—some legitimate, many in violation of American
laws—were carried out.
The magician, who invented the wireless, enabled the German General War
Staff to move to New York. The splash and splutter of electricity over
oceans and continents virtually transported Germany’s leading statesmen,
tacticians, and scientists at will to hold sessions in Manhattan on
matters arising in America and bearing on the battle-front in the many
theatres of actual warfare. For instance, how many people know that the
secretary to one of the generals on the Western Line was a brother to
one of the most notorious woman plotters in America? Germany had
foreseen the possibilities of the wireless in war and had developed
secret methods of sending code messages by radiogram, when apparently
only ordinary messages were being transmitted, and she had also, some
way or other, got possession of the code ciphers of other nations. Every
night messages have been sent out from Germany, apparently blindly,
addressed to no one and have been picked up by hidden receiving stations
in America and other countries.
While Germany calls her spy system “a bureau of intelligence,” its
purpose is confined not merely to the gathering of information, but to
the carrying out of any campaign that will be harmful to her enemies. In
the United States, Germans—reservists, army officers, representatives of
the German Government—have been indicted for crimes against Federal
laws. These violations were committed without doubt in a
self-sacrificing spirit with the aim of helping the Fatherland. Germans,
or German influences, have been behind schemes in violation of
neutrality laws and restraint of trade. _They have attempted arson,
bribery, forgery, engaged in military enterprises, caused explosions in
ships and factories, resulting in many deaths, and have set fires in
ships and factories._
They have participated in plots against Canada, Ireland and India, all
developed in the United States under the supervision of the German
representatives of Berlin, though often ostensibly carried out by
anarchist tools. _The activities of the German agents_, multitudinous in
detail and variety, _all have been designed to hinder the Allies_ in
their prosecution of the war, _to cause a breach between the Allies and
the United States, to embroil this country in a war and to accomplish
other secret aims of the General War Staff_. In all the propaganda,
German secret agents and official representatives of the German
Government have not only worked with utter disregard to American laws,
but have endeavoured to place the United States in a position of being
secretly unneutral.
But the German Government has officially denied that she ordered any of
her subjects to undertake any act in violation of American laws. Shortly
after President Wilson in his message to Congress bitterly attacked the
activities of Germans and German-Americans in America, accusing the
latter of treason, the German Government authorized the statement 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. This the German Government absolutely denies. It cannot
specifically repudiate acts committed by individuals over whom it has no
control, and of whose movements and intentions it is neither officially
or unofficially informed._”[1]
* * * * *
Footnote 1:
Berlin despatch in the New York _Sun_, Dec. 19, 1915.
To this official disavowal of German propaganda in America, there are
two answers that stand out with dramatic force. First, the extent to
which the subjects of Germany are expected to go in war time is shown by
excerpts from Germany’s War Book of instructions to officers, which says
in part:
* * * * *
“_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 honour may
denounce in such cases a hasty and unsparing exploitation of such
advantages as indecent and dishonourable, 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 aims of war
give 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._”[2]
* * * * *
Footnote 2:
The War Book of the German General Staff, translated by J. H. Morgan,
M.A., pp. 113–114.
Secondly, since Germany sent out that semi-official proclamation from
Berlin concerning propagandists, many steps have been taken by the
American Government, both administrative and judicial. Captains von
Papen and Boy-Ed, military and naval attachés respectively, have been
dismissed from this country for “improper activities in military and
naval affairs.”
There was no favouritism in the German secret service. Every German,
high or low, was open to assignment, disagreeable and dishonourable, in
getting information, and to orders to commit crimes—for Germany stops at
no crime—that may be necessary to circumvent the enemy.
Captain von Papen showed his feeling keenly one night at a dinner of a
few men where the wine flowed freely.
“My God, I would give everything in the world,” he exclaimed, “to be in
the trenches where I could do the work of a gentleman.” In his work,
there was no public reward for work well performed according to the war
code. That man’s sentiments were echoed by von Rintelen, who, when among
friends, fairly shook with emotion at the thought of the work in which
he was engaged.
“How loathsome I feel,” he said. “How this dirty work sticks to me! When
this war ends, I shall take a bath in carbolic acid.”
THREE EXECUTIVES IN THE UNITED STATES
Over all the thousands of reservists, trained agents, and other spies
were the men in charge of the centres of information to whom they made
their report; and the three or four chief lieutenants in charge of the
various and distinct line of activities into which these matters of war,
finance and commerce automatically were divided. There were practically,
outside of the Chief Spy, three important executives in this country,
supervising respectively the commercial, military and naval lines of
information and activity. Each one of these men was surrounded by a
group of experts who had charge of a sub-division of the work. All had
their legal advisers, their bankers, and every sort of an expert that
their special work required. Upon them fell the task of sifting and
analysing the mass of facts gathered by the spies and making reports to
Berlin. Upon each one of them also fell the duty of carrying out any
orders that might come from the General War Staff in Germany.
First and foremost of the three lieutenants was Dr. Heinrich F. Albert,
Privy Councillor to the German Embassy in America and Fiscal Agent of
the German Empire. He directed the gathering of a huge mass of
information of value to Germany concerning the financial, industrial and
commercial activities of this country, and was the chief instrument
through whom money reached the army of spies. Though he was the director
of many activities, nothing criminal, it must be asserted in justice to
him, has been traced to him.
The military agent was Captain Franz von Papen, the attaché of the
German Embassy. His work was confined specifically to the procuring of
information that would be of aid to the Imperial German army and to the
military tasks that might be peculiarly helpful to the army.
The naval expert was Captain Karl Boy-Ed, another attaché of the German
Embassy. He had under him experts who made a speciality of various lines
of naval matters, fortifications, coast defences and explosives.
The headquarters of the entire system were and are yet in New York. Dr.
Albert had his offices in the Hamburg-American Steamship Company’s
building, and he utilized at times a good part of the Hamburg-American
Company’s staff—a concern in which the Kaiser himself owns a large
percentage of the stock. In the same building was the office of Paul
Koenig, the business manager of part of Germany’s spy system in America,
though nominally the Superintendent of Police for the Hamburg-American
line. Captain Boy-Ed had his headquarters in Room 801 of 11, Broadway,
and Captain von Papen had his on the twenty-fifth floor of 60, Wall
Street.
This narrative seeks to show as definitely as possible the work of these
three agents of Germany in America and of others co-operating with them.
It sets forth the enterprises that they plotted and the ramifications of
their organization. It reveals how countless agents, unaware that they
were parts of a vast system and often innocent of any intentional
wrongdoing, acted their parts. It shows how that part of the machinery
engaged in legitimate propaganda was linked at places with the machinery
executing illegal acts.
While the conspiracy has been manipulated, the American Government has
been very active. To the skill of the United States secret service,
headed by Chief William J. Flynn, always alert and apparently unruffled
in the most trying crises, and to A. Bruce Bielaski, head of the special
agents of the Department of Justice, and William M. Offley,
Superintendent of the New York Bureau of the special agents, has fallen
the task of seeing that the representatives of the different countries
followed the American maxim, “Play fair; play according to the rules of
international law and the laws of this country.” Upon Police
Commissioner Woods, his deputy, Guy Scull, of New York, and his
enthusiastic and clever aid, Police Captain Thomas J. Tunney, has
devolved also the hazardous and difficult task of combating the schemes
of those spies. Those men, by courageous and skilful detective work have
unearthed and foiled some of the most daring bomb plots of the Germans.
To Messrs. Flynn and Bielaski, at times, have come secrets of intrigue
and conspiracy that must have made them, even as it has the President,
almost tremble with the import of impending events that had to be
forestalled.