“I was told to make the voyage to England on the Lusitania,” continued Stegler. “My instructions were as follows: ‘Stop at Liverpool, examine the Mersey River, obtain the names, exact locations and all possible information concerning warships around Liverpool, ascertain the amount of munitions of war being unloaded on the Liverpool docks from the United States, ascertain their ultimate destination, and obtain a detailed list of all the maritime ships in the harbour.’”
NEW YORK, THE CENTRE FOR SPIES
“I was to make constant, though guarded inquiries, of the location of the Dreadnought squadron which the Germans in New York understand was anchored somewhere near St. George’s Channel. I was to appear as an American citizen soliciting trade. Captain Boy-Ed advised me to get letters of introduction to business firms. He made arrangements so that I received such letters and in one letter were enclosed some rare stamps which were to be a proof to certain persons in England that I was working for the Germans.
“After having studied Liverpool, I was to go to London and make an investigation of the Thames and its shipping. From there, I was to proceed to Holland and work my way to the German border. While my passport did not include Germany, I was to give the captain of the nearest regiment a secret number which would indicate to him that I was a reservist on spy duty. By that means, I was to hurry to Eisendal, head of the secret service in Berlin.”
Stegler did not make the trip because his wife learned of the enterprise and begged him not to go. He also had been detected by Federal Agent Adams and was placed under arrest in February, 1915, shortly after he decided to stay at home. In his possession were all the letters and telegrams exchanged between him and Boy-Ed, none of which, however, said anything about passports. There was one telegram from “Winko,” who was Captain Boy-Ed’s servant.
LODY SENT TO DEATH
Stegler also said that he had been told that Boy-Ed previously had sent to England Karl Hans Lody, the German who in November, 1915, had been put to death as a spy in the Tower of London. Lody also had been in the navy, had served on the Kaiser’s yacht and then had come to this country and worked as an agent for the Hamburg-American Line, going from one place to another.
Still another man who had a fraudulent German passport was a German naval reservist, who had shipped as a hand on the freighter Evelyn carrying horses to Bermuda. On one trip that he took, practically all of the horses were poisoned and were lost. He, however, was arrested by Federal authorities on the charge of using the name of a dead man in order to get an American passport.
In passport matters and the handling of spies, Captain Boy-Ed was more acute and more subtle than his colleague, von Papen. Nevertheless, the Government officials succeeded in getting a clear outline of his activities. It seems quite likely that after the arrest of Ruroede in December, 1914, when suspicion was directed to von Papen as the superintendent of the passport bureau, the management thereof was switched to Boy-Ed. The exposure of Boy-Ed’s connection with Stegler made it necessary for the German Government to change its system once more.
Boy-Ed, as has been shown, had supervision of naval affairs and matters pertaining to the sea. He issued information to the Press bearing on Germany’s conduct of her naval warfare. He made pleas for an embargo on the export of arms and ammunition. He received from Count von Bernstorff all information which the Ambassador obtained bearing on that question, and, on one occasion, the Count sent him a list of the countries which had forbidden the export of war supplies.