Fighting Germany's spies

Foreword

"Fighting Germany's Spies" is published to bring home to the public in a detailed and convincing manner the character of the German activities in the United States. By courtesy of the Bureau of Investigation of the Department of Justice the facts and documents of this narrative have been verified.

Contents

PAGE

Foreword v

Introduction xi

Introduction

Espionage has always been to Americans one of the hateful relics of an outworn political system of Europe from which America was fortunately free. We lived in an atmosphere not tainted with dynastic ambitions or internal oppression. We had no secret agents spying and plotting in other countries and were slow to suspect other countries of doing such things here.

The war, however, disillusioned us. We found our soil to be infested with representatives of an unscrupulous Power which did not hesitate to violate our hospitality and break its most sacred pledges in using this country as a base for unneutral plots against France and Great Britain. We soon learned that these plots were directed against us as well. They were only another manifestation of the spirit which led to the open hostility of Germany which forced us into war.

For a time we were at a great disadvantage in meeting the situation. We had no secret police; we had no laws adequate to deal with these novel offenses.

XI

4 INTRODUCTION

The Department of Justice met the situation, so far as it could under existing law, by a great enlargement of its Bureau of Investigation, and by the creation of a legal division devoted entirely to problems arising out of the war. Congress substantially supplied the deficiency in the laws by the passage of appropriate statutes. Under the powers obtained in these two directions the Department proceeded vigorously to the suppression of sedition, the internment of enemy aliens, and the prosecution of German agents. Its success is, I feel, attested by the absence of disorder in this country under war-time conditions. Open German activities have long since ceased here and the more subtle operations have been driven so far under cover as to be ineffective. In this work the Department of Justice has had the efficient and loyal aid of private citizens, who have responded generously to a patriotic impulse, through the agency of the American Protective League and similar organizations.

Mr. Strother's narrative covers some of the more outstanding cases of the period when German plotting was at its height. The failure of these plots and the retribution visited upon the evil-doers are evidences, not merely of governmental efficiency, but of that of old, age-old, substantive laws of morality, which

xii

INTRODUCTION

Germany as a nation has undertaken to floutas we now know, in vain — both here and elsewhere.

T. W. Gregory Attorney-General.

Washington, D. C.

August 14, 1918.

Xlll

CHAPTER I The Inside Story of the Passport Frauds

and The First Glimpse of Werner Horn

WHEN Carl Ruroede, the "genius" of the German passport frauds, came suddenly to earth in the hands of agents of the Department of Justice and unbosomed himself to the United States Assistant District Attorney in New York, he said sadly:

"I thought I was going to get an Iron Cross; but what they ought to do is to pin a little tin stove on me."

The cold, strong hand of American justice wrung that very human cry from Ruroede, who was the central figure (though far from the most sinister or the most powerful) in this earliest drama of Germany's bad faith with neutral America — a drama that dealt in forgery, blackmail, and lies that revealed in action the motives of greed and jealousy and ambition, and that ended with three diplomats disgraced, one plotter in the penitentiary, and another sent to a watery grave in the Atlantic by a torpedo from a U-boat of the very country he had tried to serve. This is the story:

Twenty-five days after the Kaiser touched the button which publicly notified the world that Germany at last had decided that "The Day" had come — to be exact, on Augustus, 1914 — Ambassador Bernstorff wrote a letter effusively addressed to "My very honoured Mr. Von Wedell." (Ruroede had not yet appeared on the scene.) The letter? itself was more restrained than the address, but in it Bernstorff condescended to accept tentatively an offer of Wedell's to make a nameless voyage. The voyage was soon made, for on September 24th Wedell left Rotterdam, bearing a letter from the German Consul-General there, asking all German authorities to speed him on his way to Berlin, because he was bearing dispatches to the Foreign Office. Arrived in Berlin, Wedell executed his commission and then called upon his uncle, Count Botho von Wedell, a high functionary of the Foreign Office. He was aflame with a great idea, which he unfolded to his uncle. The idea was approved, and right after the elections in November he was back in New York to put it into execution, incidentally bearing with him some letters handed him byorder of Mr. Ballin, head of the Hamburg American Steamship Company, and another letter "for a young lady who goes to America in the interest of Germany." If unhappy Wedell had let this be his last voyage — but that belongs later in the story.

Wedell's scheme was this: He learned in Berlin that Germany had at home all the common soldiers she expected to need, but that more officers were wanted. He was told that Germany cared not at all whether the 100,000 reservists in America got home or not, but that she cared very much indeed to get the 800 or 1,000 officers in North and South America back to the Fatherland. Nothing but the ocean and the British fleet stood in their way. The ocean might be overcome. But the British

fleet ? Wedell proposed the answer: He would

buy passports from longshoremen in New York — careless Swedes or Swiss or Spaniards to whom $20 was of infinitely more concern than a mere lie — and send the officers to Europe, armed with these documents, as neutrals travelling on business. Once in Norway or Spain or Italy, to get on into Germany would be easy.

For a few weeks Wedell got along famously.

He bought passports and papers showing nativity from Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, and Swiss longshoremen and sailors. Meantime, he got in touch with German reserve officers and passed them on to Europe on these passports.

*N

♦Stftl

A GERMAN ATTACHE REMINDS BERNSTORFF OF WEDELL This telegram is from Haniel von Haimhausen, the counsellor of the German Embassy in Washington, and was sent in response to an inquiry from Bernstorff for the name of the man who had offered to act as a messenger to Germany for him. The message reads:

Count Bernstorff, care Ritz Carlton. Hans Adam von Wedell attorney fifteen William Street, New York he has been introduced by consul Hossenfelder, Haniel.

But he was not content with these foreign passports. In the case of a few exceptionally valuable German officers he wished to have credentials that would be above all suspicion. Consequently, he set about to gather a few American passports. Here his troubles began, and here he added the gravest burden to his already great load of culpabilities. For Von Wedell was an American citizen, and proud of it. But he was prouder still of his German origin and his high German connections, and in his eagerness to serve them he threw overboard his loyalty to the land of his adoption. Von Wedell applied to a friend of his, a certain Tammany lawyer of pro-German sympathies, who had supplied him with a room belonging to a well-known fraternal organization as a safe base from which to handle his work in passports. What he wanted was an agent who was an American and who had political acquaintanceship that would : enable him to work with less suspicion and with wider organization in gathering American passports. Through the lawyer he came in contact with' an American, who for the [purposes of this story may be called Mr. Carrots, because that is not his name but is remotely like it. Carrots seemed willing to go into the enterprise and at a meeting in Von Wedell's room Von Wedell carefully unfolded the scheme, taking papers from a steel cabinet in the corner to show a further reason why the American passports he already had would soon be useless. This reason was that the Government was about to issue an order requiring that a photograph of the bearer should be affixed to the passport and that on this photograph should appear half of the embossing raised by the impression of the seal of the Department of State. He agreed to pay Carrots $20 apiece for all genuine passports he would supply to him. Carrots accepted his proposal and departed.

Instead of going out to buy passports, he went at once to the Surveyor of the Port of New York, Mr. Thomas E. Rush, and told him what Wedell was doing. Mr. Rush promptly got in touch with his chief in the Treasury Department at Washington, who referred the matter to the State Department, and they, in turn, to the Department of Justice. The result was that Carrots went back to Wedell about a week later and told him he would not be able to go on with the work but would supply someone to take his place. This was satisfactory to Wedell.

In the meantime, Wedell had introduced Carrots to a fellow-conspirator, Carl Ruroede, a clerk in the ship forwarding department of Oelrichs & Company — a man of little position, but fired by the war with the ambition to make a name in German circles that would put him in a position to succeed Oelrichs & Company as the general agent of the North German Lloyd in New York.

About this time Wedell lost his nerve. He was a lawyer and realized some of the possible consequences of certain of his acts. He had had occasion to forge names to two passports; and also he found out that he had reasons to suspect that he was under surveillance. These reasons were very good: he had arranged for the transportation to Italy of a German named Doctor Stark, using the passport of a friend of his in the newspaper business named Charles Raoul Chatillon. Wedell got wind of the fact that Stark had been taken off the steamer Duca de Aosta at Gibraltar, and was being detained while the British looked up his credentials.

Wedell by this time was in a most unhappy plight. Bernstorff and Von Papen had no use for him because he had been bragging about the great impression he was going to make upon the Foreign Office in Berlin by his work. If any impressions were to be made upon the Foreign Office in Berlin by anybody in America, Bernstorff and Von Papen wanted to make them. Wedell was so dangerously under suspicion that Von Papen, Von Igel, and his Tammany lawyer friend had all warned him he had better get out of the country. Wedell took their advice and fled to Cuba.

The substitute whom Carrots had promised now entered the case, in the person of a man who called himself Aucher, but who was in reality a special agent of the Department of Justice. Aucher was not introduced to Ruroede, the now active German, and so, when he began his operations, he confronted the very difficult task of making his own connections with a naturally suspicious person.

Carrots had been dealing with Ruroede after Wedell's disappearance; and, by the time he was ready to quit, Ruroede had told him that "everything was off for the present," but that if he would drop around again to his office about January 7, 1915, he might make use of him. Aucher, now on the case, did not wait for that date, but on December 18th called on Ruroede at his office at room 204 of the Maritime Building, at No. 8 Bridge Street, across the way from the Customs House.

In this plainly furnished office Aucher appeared in the guise of a Bowery tough. He succeeded admirably in this role — so well, indeed, that Ruroede afterward declared that he "succeeded wonderfully in impressing upon my mind that he was a gangman, and I had visions of slung shots, pistol shots, and holdups when he saw him. Aucher opened the conversation by announcing:

"I'm a friend of Carrots."

"That's interesting," was Ruroede's only acknowledgment.

"He's the guy that's getting them passports for you," went on Aucher, "and all I wants to know is, did you give him any cush?"

"What do you mean?" asked Ruroede.

"Nix on that!" Aucher exclaimed. "You know what I mean. Did you give that fellow any money?"

To which Ruroede replied : " I don't see why I should, tell you if I did."

"Well, " retorted Aucher, " I'll tell you why. I'm the guy that delivers the goods, and he swears he never got a penny from you. Now did he?"

It was at this point that Ruroede had his visions of slung shots, so he admitted he had paid Carrots #100 only a few days before.

"Well," demanded Aucher, "ain't there going to be any more ? "

"Nope. Not now,' Ruroede replied. "Maybe next month."

"Now see here," said Aucher. "Let's cut this guy out. He's just nothing but a booze fighter, and he's been kidding you for money without delivering the goods. What's the matter with just fixing it up between ourselves?"

Ruroede now tried to put Aucher off till Christmas, having recalled meanwhile that the steamer Bergensfjord was to sail on January 2d, and that he might need passports for officers travelling on that ship. But Aucner protested that he was "broke," and further impressed on Ruroede that he had gotten no money from Carrots or Wedell for his work for them. He also produced six letters written by the State Department in answer to applicants for passports, and finally convinced Ruroede of his good faith and that he ought to start him to work right away. They haggled over the price, and finally agreed on $20 apiece for passports for native-born Americans and #30 apiece for passports of naturalized citizens — the higher price for getting the latter because they involved more red-tape and hence more risk. Aucher was to come back on December 24th and bring the passports and get some money on account.

On that day Aucher called at Ruroede's office, and after further quarrelling about Carrots and his honesty, Ruroede declared that he was ready to do business. Aucher objected to the presence of a young man in the room with them, and Ruroede replied:

"Oh, he's all right. He's my son, and you needn't be afraid to talk with him around."

Aucher then produced an American passport, No. 45, 573, made out in the name of Howard Paul Wright, for use in Holland and Germany. It was a perfectly good passport, too, as it had been especially made out for the purpose by the Department of State at the request of the Department of Justice. It bore Mr. Bryan's genuine signature, and a photograph of "Wright," who was another agent of the Bureau of Investigation. Aucher also declared he was on the way toward getting the other five passports. Ruroede threw the Wright passport on his desk and said:

"I'll keep this. Go ahead and get the others."

"What about money?" demanded Aucher.

"I'll pay you #25 for it — no, I'll do better than that. To show you I mean business, take that," and he threw a #100 bill on the table. Ruroede also gave Aucher photographs of four German officers, and begged him to get passports right away to fit their descriptions, because he wanted to get these men off on the Norwegian Line steamer Bergensfjord, sailing January 2d. He added that the officers of the Norwegian Line had all been "smeared" (otherwise "fixed") and that they would "stand for anything." He also said that he would take at least forty more passports from Aucher, and that he would want them right along for six months or a year, depending on the length of the war.

Aucher delivered two more passports to

Ruroede in his office on the morning of December 30th. Ruroede was rather indifferent about getting them, because — alas for the glory of the "invincible" Prussian arms! — two of his German officers had gotten "cold feet" and had refused to go. Ruroede told Aucher to come back at two o'clock and he would give him $100. Aucher invited Ruroede to have luncheon with him, and as they left the building Ruroede explained with much pride that he had chosen his office here because the building had several entrances on different sides of the block, and he used one entrance only a few days at a time and then changed to another to avoid suspicion.

The Government's special agent complimented him highly on this bit of cleverness in the art of evasion. Five minutes later the two were sitting at a lunch counter with another special agent casually lounging in and taking the seat next to his fellow operative, where he could overhear and corroborate the account of Ruroede's conversation.

After a discussion of Wedell's forgeries and present whereabouts, and a further discussion of the buying of passports (in which Ruroede confided to Aucher that "there is a German fund that was sent over here for that purpose") the pair walked back toward Ruroede's office. At the Whitehall Street entrance Ruroede

H told " Aucher to come around to the Bridge Street entrance in about fifteen minutes to get the money, and that in the meantime he would send his son out to cash a check so that he could deliver it in bills. Aucher spent part of the fifteen minutes signalling to four other special agents who had reinforced him, and then went around to the Bridge Street entrance, with one of his confederates in sight.

In a few moments, Ruroede's son rushed out with a bank book in his hand. Aucher stopped him and told him he ought to have a coat on, a device to let Aucher's fellow operative see him talking to the boy so he could identify him. The boy then went on to the bank, followed by Aucher's confederate, who saw him cash the check and followed him back to the building.

When the boy returned, Aucher again spoke to him and said: "Tell your father I will be in the cafe at Whitehall and Bridge streets and that he is to meet me there. I don't think it is a good thing for anybody to see me hanging around the front entrance."

Aucher then went on into the cafe and signalled to the other three operatives to follow him. He took a seat in a bootblack's chair near the entrance and proceeded to have his shoes blacked. In about ten minutes Ruroede's son came out and was about to pass by

IS him when Aucher hailed him. Ruroede's son then took a sealed envelope from his inside pocket and handed it to Aucher.

"Where is your father ?" Aucher asked.

"Oh, he's got a man upstairs with him," said young Ruroede, "and he couldn't come down."

"Wait a minute," said Aucher, and tore open the envelope in the presence of Ruroede's son, and, so that the other special agents could see him do it, counted out ten $10 bills, $100 in all. As he was counting them, the operative who had followed Ruroede's son to the bank came in and shouldered the boy to one side and then stood right by him while the money was being counted. Aucher went on to impress on Ruroede's son that business was business and that the best of friends sometimes fell out over money matters; that his father might have unintentionally counted out #80 or #90 instead of the full $100 and it was safer to take some precautions than to take a chance of creating bad blood between them. He then invited Ruroede's son to have a drink with him, which he did, both of them taking the strongest Prussian drink — milk. When they were about to part on Whitehall Street Aucher told Ruroede's son to tell his father he would be down the next morning with the other two

GERMAN AGENTS WHO DEALT IN FRAUDULENT PASSPORTS H. A. Von Wedell Carl Ruroede

AMERICANS HIRED TO BLOW UP SHIPS AND FACTORIES C. C. Crowley Lewis J. Smith passports he had mentioned to him, and again impressed on the boy the importance of accuracy in money matters. Aucher then returned to headquarters with the other special agents and listed the distinguishing marks on the bills and marked them for future identification.

The next morning Aucher telephoned to Ruroede and told him he had been able to get only one of the two passports he wanted, giving as the excuse for his failure to get the other the story that it had been promised to him by a man working on a job in Long Island and that this man had met with an accident and was in the hospital; that it would take a day or two to go out there to get a written order from him to a brother who would turn the passport over to Aucher. Ruroede accepted an invitation to take luncheon with Aucher at Davidson's restaurant at the corner of Broad and Bridge streets.

Shortly after noon they met on the street and went into the restaurant together. A few minutes after they were seated two of the special agents came in and took a table about fifteen feet away. After Aucher had ordered lunch for himself and Ruroede, he took out of his pocket another of the series of genuine passports supplied by the State Department, to which he had attached one of the photographs

THE SUCCESSFUL USE OF A FRAUDULENT PASSPORT An English translation of the letter, the first and last pages of which are shown above, follows:

S. S. Kristianiafjord, Bordjen, Nov. 20, 1914. Most honoured Mr. Ruroede: As you see, my voyage across succeeded magnificently with your kind help. The weather until Sunday was fine — then three days' storm. The beginning was not of a nature to inspire confidence, for five hours after we had left New York we were stopped by a cruiser and for two hours the ship's papers were searched for contraband. We had also some copper on board, but that was for Norway, whereupon they let us go. Our Captain then ran straight North to the 63 latitude. We nearly touched Iceland in order to get out of the way of other cruisers. It was only while we were making for Bergen from a northerly direction yesterday that a cruiser overtook and stopped us, and for a short while six of your men were feeling pretty shaky, especially I, for among the 18 first-class passengers, more than half were Germans, also a former vice-consul from Japan (now captain of cavalry) of the Bonn Hussars, Naval Officer from China, and others. The incident lasted only a half hour. After searching for ship's papers, the gentlemen disappeared, and we breathed

more freely, and drank a cocktail to the and your prosperity. Once more many thanks

for your assistance. May you help many others as well. With best wishes, Yours, Edward Eaton, in Japan named Eichelbert.

Ruroede had given him for this purpose. He handed the passport to Ruroede, who opened only one end of it, just enough to glance at the photograph and seal.

"That's fine," said Ruroede, and was about to slip it into his pocket when Aucher seized it and exclaimed :

"Fine? I should say," and opened the passport wide so that one of the other special agents could see the red seal on it. "Just look at that description. Eh? He is the fellow with the military bearing and I gave him a description I figured a man like him should answer to."

At this point, the special agent who had seen the seal left his seat at the table and walked to the cashier's desk. As he passed, Ruroede was holding the passport in his hands and Aucher was pointing out the description. Ruroede then put the passport into his pocket and said again: "That's fine."

Aucher then opened a discussion of Von Wedell's career and disappearance. Ruroede was very contemptuous of the missing man. "He was a plain fool," he said. "He paid $3,500 altogether and got very little in return. A fellow came to him one day and told him he could get him American passports and Von Wedell said: 'All right; go ahead.' The fellow returned later and said he would have to have some expense money and he gave him $10. A little while later a friend of the first man came to Von Wedell wanting expense money. When Von Wedell decided to put him off, he became threatening and Von Wedell, fearing he might tell the Government authorities, gave him some money. A few days later about twenty fellows came looking for Von Wedell. But quite aside from that sort of business Von WedelPs foolishness in forging names on two American passports is the thing that made him get away."

"Did I understand you to say," asked Aucher, "that he had gone to join his wife?"

"No," replied Ruroede, "she will be in Germany before him. She sailed last Tuesday. He went to Cuba first and there got a Mexican passport of some sort that will take him to Spain. He ought to be in Barcelona to-day and from there go to Italy, and then from there work his way into Germany."

"You say Von Wedell spent $3,500 of his own money ? " Aucher asked.

"No, no," exclaimed Ruroede, "he got it from the fund."

"Well, who puts up this money— who's back ofit?"

"The Government."

"The German Government ?"

"Yes," said Ruroede. "You see it is this way: There is a captain here who is attached to the German Embassy at Washington. He has a list of German reservists in this country and is in touch with the German consulates all through the country and in Peru, Mexico, Chile, etc. He gets in touch with them, and the consuls send reservists, who want to go to the front, on to New York. When they get here, this captain tells them: 'Well, I can't do anything for you, but you go down to see Ruroede/ Sometimes he gives them his personal card."

"Is this captain in reserve?" Aucher interrupted.

"Oh, no, he is active," Ruroede replied. : 'You see," he continued, "he draws on this fund for $200 or $300 or #1,000, whatever he may need, and the checks are made to read 'on account of reservists/ You see, they have to have food and clothing, also, so there is nothing to show that this money is paid out for passports or anything like that. I meet this captain once a week or so, and tell him what I am doing and he gives me whatever money I need. You see, there must be no connection between him and me; no letters, no accounts, nothing in writing. If I were caught and were to say what I have told you, this captain would swear that he never met me in his life before." >

Who this captain was became perfectly clear through an odd happening two days later. On that day, January 2, 1915, Aucher telephoned to Ruroede at his office and made an appointment to meet him at a quarter of one.

This meeting will doubtless remain forever memorable in Ruroede's experience.

At twelve-thirty a whole flock of special agents left the office of the Bureau of Investigation of the Department of Justice in the Park Row Building. There were nine representatives of the Department in the group. When they got near Ruroede's office they were joined by two others who had been shadowing Ruroede. They had located him at the Eastern Hotel, several blocks away, where he was at the moment with one of the German officers who planned to sail that day on the Norwegian Line steamer Bergensfjord with one of the false passports.

Shortly after one o'clock one of the special agents notified the group that Ruroede had returned to his office and then this operative, and one other, went to the Customs House and stationed themselves at a window opposite Ruroede's office to wait for a signal which Aucher was to give when he had delivered the passport to Ruroede.

When Aucher met Ruroede in the latter's office Ruroede's son was present, but in a few moments the younger man took his leave, and his departure was noted by one of the agents outside. After a few minutes' conversation Aucher handed Ruroede the missing passport and made his signal to the two men inside the Customs House window. These men reported to the main group on the street and thereupon the whole flock descended on Ruroede's office and placed both Ruroede and Aucher under arrest.

They seized all of Ruroede's papers before they took him away, including the passport which Aucher had just delivered to him. Aucher put up a fight against his brother officers, so as to make Ruroede believe that his arrest was genuine, but was quickly subdued and taken away. A few minutes later Ruroede also was taken from his office over to the offices of the Bureau of Investigation, but to another room than Aucher. Operatives were left behind in Ruroede's office, and in a little while Ruroede's son came in. He, too, was arrested and taken to still another part of the office of the Bureau.