On March 2, 1918, A. P. L. ran down another one of those cruel rumors against the Red Cross which have been started by pro-German women for the most part. This rumor was first circulated by a young woman, and is of a nature which can not be put into print. The girl, when found, confessed that she was guilty. She also confessed that she was hitting the high spots in the city, having left a country home to get acquainted with the bright lights. The A. P. L. did not kick this woman down and out, either, but gave her a hand-up. Two weeks later she came to the Division Office with tears in her eyes, apologized for the false rumors which she had set going, and implored that she might be allowed to do something for the office of the division.
A war plant making aeroplane parts kept turning out defective work. The A. P. L. put a woman operative in the factory. She chanced to be a young woman of a wealthy family, accustomed to the luxury of a beautiful home, but she took to the overalls and dirty work as a duck does to water. She was in the factory three weeks, located the trouble, and it was adjusted.
A telephone call reported that a house was being burglarized. An A. P. L. man at the phone remembered that a deserter had been sought for at that number. In thirty minutes the house was surrounded. They did not catch the deserter, but they did get the burglar.
A dangerous type of service was the raiding of I. W. W. headquarters. Sometimes these were boarding houses where thirty or forty of these people would be gathered together. When such a place was surrounded, the suspects would pour out of the windows into the arms of the operatives. This meant occasional fights, and there was danger in the work, but there was no case where loss of life was experienced.
An interesting fact of Cleveland war work was that developed by examination of the draughting rooms in the large plants. In some of these plants the entire draughting force was not only German by descent but pro-German in sentiment. It has often been said that part of German propaganda was to get men in factories where they could get blue-prints of all of our machinery. In November, 1917, the League was advised that a draughtsman of a ship-building company was very pro-German, and it was said that the foreman in charge would hire only Germans. Constant surveillance was ordered, but it was as late as June, 1918, before this man was found making derogatory remarks about our Army. He was found to have been an officer in the German Reserves. He was jailed. Many letters were found on him sufficient to warrant his internment.
As though I. W. W.’s were not sufficiently dangerous, operatives were once asked to arrest a colored slacker who worked for a lion-tamer. The latter, a woman, gave the operatives a tip that her assistant ought to be looked into. He was finally caught at the time when he was transferring the lions from the performing ring to their traveling cages, but that did not stop the operatives. After he got the doors locked he was taken to the Federal Building and inducted into the Service, where his courage will be put to good service.
Here are some familiar pro-German statements, this time uttered by one A. C——, who was running an advertising agency. At one time he said that “the war would be ended by January 1, because German training was better than ours—that we should not believe the lies about Germans killing babies—everyone knows that America is going to lose the war—that this is no war for Democracy—that there is no Democracy in America.” Indicted. Guilty. Interned. A. P. L.
Cleveland had its own troubles with evaders and slackers, and it took many cleverly laid plans to catch some of them. These are some of the methods. After locating where a suspect lived who was hard to find, a man would appear next day as one of the solicitors of the City Directory whose business it was to get the name of every man in each house. The solicitor was usually a very old looking man. This usually worked. If it did not, a messenger boy would show up with a message saying that it must be delivered at once. If this failed, there would come a letter from some prominent institution, sent in an unsealed envelope, addressed to the man offering him a job at an unusually high wage. One or the other of these devices would usually establish touch with the man wanted. It was like changing baits in a trap.
An interesting case was that of Harry W——, who was brother of another Mr. W—— sentenced to the workhouse for violation of the Espionage Act. Harry did not register, but was picked up in the City Council Chamber. He desperately tried to convince the A. P. L. men that he was too old, but the operatives got his birth record and proved that he had wilfully evaded registration. Indicted and sentenced to one year in the workhouse.
A deserter from Camp Sherman, in December, 1917, was located wearing civilian clothes as late as September, 1918. He was hidden by a certain woman, who had secreted his uniform and who had supplied him with liquor repeatedly. We learned that this was an illicit relation. The woman had furnished the man with money from time to time. The A. P. L. took her case up with the District Attorney. The woman is awaiting indictment of a charge of furnishing liquor to a soldier and harboring a deserter. Her lover is back in camp.