To the persons who doubt these varied, reckless and extensive activities of von Rintelen, it may be suggested that von Rintelen asserted frequently to his associates that he had come to America to take every step, including peaceful or violent measures, to stop the shipment of munitions.
The doubter must not overlook the supervision which von Rintelen exercised over the manufacturer of fire bombs which German reservists are accused of hiding on the Allies’ merchantmen, and the fact that von Rintelen’s aid visited a bomb man in his Hoboken laboratory frequently; that on one occasion he scored him roughly because the fire bombs were not proving effective. Furthermore, Fay, after his arrest, and long before the indictment of the bomb plotters, told Captain Tunney of a wealthy German, then a prisoner of war in England, who had paid $10,000 to a Hoboken chemist to make fire bombs.
Though von Rintelen, during the months of June and July, was exuberant over the reports—most of them false—which were carried to him concerning the progress of peace, the strikes and other schemes, and though he was kept drawing money from the bank until the $800,000 in the Trans-Atlantic Trust Company was reduced to $40,000, he began to have doubts about Lamar and about the effectiveness of the latter’s management of some of the projects. He knew that Lamar and his associates were planning for a second rousing meeting in Washington, but, becoming suspicious, he suddenly cut off the money. He had received estimates of activities that required more money. After deliberation he finally decided to slip away to Berlin, get away from Lamar entirely and after making a report to the War Office return to America to broaden his scope of work.
All told, von Rintelen had failed to perceive any falling off in the exports to the Allies. They were, in fact, rapidly increasing, and von Rintelen’s schemes thus far had proved ineffective, though he still was optimistic that eventually he would have all his forces working in unison and thus accomplish his aims.
He did not go to Washington when a second peace convention was in session, and the word had slipped out to some of the workers that von Rintelen was about to sail. Still, the meeting with the members claiming a representation of 8,000,000 voters, was more denunciatory and enthusiastic over its aims, than ever. There were attacks on President Wilson and demands for an embargo on war munitions. There was an intense pro-German feeling.
Differences, meantime, began to arise among the members of the executive board. One of the vice-presidents resigned just before the second session convened, saying emphatically that the financing of the organization was under suspicion. Another quietly quit, not making the fact public until weeks afterwards. Lamar flitted away to a magnificent country home which he had bought in Pittsfield, Mass. There was no money left. The propaganda died.
EXIT VON RINTELEN
Von Rintelen was on the high seas. He had left $40,000 in the bank in charge of his friends, and some of the plotters tried to get that on the strength of a promise to stop the Anglo-French bond sale of $500,000,000. Before sailing he had applied for a passport as an American citizen named Edward V. Gates, of Millersville, Pennsylvania. But whisperings concerning von Rintelen’s activities had reached the White House from society folk who had heard von Rintelen’s rash talk and who knew of some of the unscrupulous things he had attempted. The State Department ordered an investigation and finally sent his passport on to New York the day before the sailing of the Noordam, in care of Federal agents; but von Rintelen did not claim it. Though he had bought a ticket on the boat under the name of Gates, and had obtained drafts payable on that name, he did not occupy the Gates cabin but at the last minute engaged passage under the name of Emil V. Gasche, a Swiss citizen.
On board ship, he set to work preparing for the close scrutiny of British naval officers when the ship neared Falmouth. He handed over many of his documents to Andrew D. Meloy, his travelling companion, and Meloy’s secretary. He dictated a long document about financial conditions of Mexican railways purporting to be the report of himself as commissioner for a group of English bondholders. He sought to make it appear that he had been sent to the United States as a representative of the bondholders’ committee of Mexican railways. When the British officers came on board and searched him, von Rintelen put up a skilful bluff, but finally surrendered as a prisoner of war. Meloy, who had aided von Rintelen in his application for the American passport, was sent back to this country by the British authorities.