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.
CHAPTER II
CAPTAIN FRANZ VON PAPEN, DIRECTOR OF GERMANY’S MILITARY ENTERPRISES ON THE AMERICAN FRONT
“I always say to these idiotic Yankees they had better hold their tongues.”
So wrote Captain Franz von Papen, German military attaché in America, to his wife in Germany—a letter which he entrusted to Captain James F. J. Archibald, American newspaper correspondent and bearer of secret and confidential messages from Teutonic representatives. The German word which the Captain used was “bloedsinnig,” meaning silly, stupid, idiotic. It has a sneering ring, truly typical of the Prussian warrior’s contempt for Americans. It suggests the disdainful feeling which the military attaché had for the loyalty of Americans. One can imagine his sly laugh as he handed to an American that letter and code messages to the War Staff. With a similar feeling of contempt for the British, when dismissed from this country and assured of safe conduct as to person, he carried on board the steamer Noordam a portfolio of papers from friends reflecting the same disgust for America and outlining his own unlawful and criminal acts in America. But in both instances his arrogant self-confidence brought exposure.
This attitude of arrogance was Captain von Papen’s chief characteristic. Joined to it was the brother trait, bluntness. He believed that the American people were not only stupid but also weak-sighted and that he could do anything he wanted without detection. So he put his heart and soul into military and criminal enterprises upon American soil. The Captain apparently thought that the American authorities would not suspect his machinations, for, unlike Captain Boy-Ed, he made comparatively few efforts to cover up the trails of his activities. That carelessness proved his scorn for American detective methods, for with all his haughtiness and bravado he had been trained in a school of craft. He had been drilled under instructors who placed a prize on cunning, deceit, intrigue, reckless disregard of the rights of others, and the destiny of Prussia as a conqueror. The Captain presumably believed that craft and cunning were not necessary in America.