How part of the money was spent is shown by the following account of payments through the Hamburg-American Line:
| Steamer | Total Payment |
|---|---|
| Thor | $113,879.72 |
| Berwind | 73,221.85 |
| Lorenzo | 430,182.59 |
| Heina | 288,142.06 |
| Nepos | 119,037.60 |
| Mowinckel | 113,867.18 |
| Unita | 67,766.44 |
| Sommerstad | 45,826.75 |
| Fram | 55,053.23 |
| Graecia | 29,143.59 |
| Macedonia | 39,139.98 |
| Navarra | 44,133.50 |
| Total | $1,419,394.49 |
But Boy-Ed’s supervision of supplies to the raiders covered both the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. While the Hamburg-American took charge of handling the supplies in the North and South Atlantic, another German agency is accused of doing similar work on the Pacific. That accounts for Boy-Ed’s transfer of money to the West, where his cash also was used in the purchase of at least one ship. Boy-Ed’s funds, amounting to more than $600,000, have been traced to the Pacific. In following these payments it is important to observe how differently and more cleverly Boy-Ed handled his money than von Papen. Unlike the military attaché, he paid out little money by personal cheque; but he had accounts with various commercial firms to whom he gave orders for payments. Working with the ingenuity of an adept in covering up his tracks, he caused money in large amounts to be shifted from one bank to another, from one firm to another, through various cities until after myriad devious turnings and twisting it finally reached its destination. He used various commercial concerns as his bankers.
Out on the Pacific Coast, Boy-Ed employed members of the German consulate to distribute the money and supervise provisioning. Two indictments returned against Germans and others in San Francisco charge that an effort was made to employ that port as a “naval base” for provisioning the German raiders; that false manifests were filed for the succouring of merchantmen; that supplies were transferred to the German raiders. More than $150,000, it is specifically charged, was paid out for this purpose by the German consulate.
The outfitting of the steamships Sacramento, Olsen and Mahoney, Mazatlan and the barque Retriever are said to be charged to the defendants. One device employed in San Francisco Bay to outwit the Government officers watching for violations of the neutrality laws was to fill the Retriever with coal, and then announce that the vessel would be used for an expedition on the high seas to take cinema pictures of a stirring sea drama. But the officials were not hoodwinked. The steamer Sacramento, formerly the German-owned Alexandria, which, after the war started, was bought by the Northern and Southern Steamship Company and which flew the American flag, left port piled high with supplies of all sorts, including sauerkraut and beer, and reached Valparaiso, Chile, empty. All her supplies were transferred to German cruisers and a German supply ship at Masefuero Island, near the Chilean coast.
Captain Fred Jebsen, a lieutenant in the German naval reserve, took a cargo of coal south on his boat, the Mazatlan, for delivery at Guaymas, Sonora, Mexico. He transferred it to lighters, which carried it to the German cruiser Leipzig. Jebsen also is said to have planned to pilot a ship to India, and being frustrated, made his way in disguise to Germany, where he is reported to have been drowned by the sinking of a submarine. The Olsen and Mahoney, a steam schooner, was loaded with supplies, but after considerable controversy with customs officials, was unloaded. In the early days of the war, the cruisers Leipzig and Nürnberg lay off San Francisco. The Leipzig put to port for supplies which were granted in quantities permissible under international law. Efforts to supply still further quantities are alleged by the Government.
One of the picturesque incidents of the provisioning, which reveals how minutely Captain Boy-Ed looked after finances and sets forth other phases of his work on the high seas, as directed from No. 11, Broadway, is revealed in the piratical cruise of the good ship Gladstone, rechristened under German auspices Marina Quezada. Her owner, when she bobbed into the view of Captain Boy-Ed, was a Norwegian syndicate; but what money was behind that group it has not been possible to learn. Under the name of Gladstone, the ship had plied between Canada and Australia; but shortly after the outbreak of the war she put into Newport News. Then Captain Hans Suhren, a sturdy German formerly of the Pacific coast, appeared in New York, called upon Captain Boy-Ed, who took most kindly interest in him, and then departed for Newport News. Here he assumed charge of the Gladstone.
“I paid $280,000 in cash for her,” he told First Officer Bentzen. After making arrangements for his crew, he flitted back to New York, where he received messages in care of “Nordmann, Room 801, 11, Broadway, N. Y. C.” Meantime, in consultation with Captain Boy-Ed, the captain received instructions to erect a wireless plant on his ship—the equipment having already been shipped to the Marina Quezada—and to hire a wireless operator. Boy-Ed handed Suhren a German naval code book, gave him a map with routes marked out and sailing instructions that would take him to the South Seas, there to await German cruisers. Food supplies, ordered for a steamer which had been unable to sail, were waiting on the piers at Newport News and Captain Boy-Ed ordered them put on the Marina Quezada. Two cases of revolvers also were sent to the boat. In a like manner, it may be observed, ships on the Pacific had been equipped secretly with arms and wireless.
Again Suhren went back to his boat, kept the wireless operators busy, hurried the loading of the cargo, which was under the supervision of an employé of the North German Lloyd, and needing more money before sailing in December, 1914, he drew a draft for $1,000 on the Hamburg-American Line, wiring Hachmeister, the purchasing agent, to communicate with “Room 801, 11, Broadway,” the office of our friend Boy-Ed.
Prior to his departure, the skipper had difficulty with the registration of his ship. Though he insisted he owned her, a corporation in New York whose stockholders were Costa Ricans were laying claim to ownership, for they really christened her, and got provisional registration for her from the Costa Rican minister in Washington. It was necessary, however, in order for the ship to get permanent registration, to go to Port Limon, Costa Rica, and register there. So hauling down the Norwegian flag, that had fluttered over the ship as the Gladstone, Captain Suhren ran up the Costa Rican emblem. Then, having loaded his ship and having obtained false clearance papers stating his destination as Valparaiso, based upon a false manifest, sailed for Port Limon. But the Costa Rican authorities declined to give Suhren permanent papers, and, accordingly, being without authority to fly any flag and in such status not permitted under international law to leave port, Suhren was in a plight. He waited, however, until a heavy storm came up one night, then quietly slipping his anchor, he sped out into the high seas, a veritable pirate. Finally, as he neared Pernambuco, he ran up the Norwegian flag, put into port and got into such difficulties with the authorities that his ship was interned. His supplies never reached the raiders, and Boy-Ed, at No. 11, Broadway, learned from Suhren of another fiasco. Suhren is supposed to have been taken prisoner to Canada.