British Secret Service During the Great War

by Nicholas Everitt

Whilst prowling along the northern frontier of Germany in the early spring of 1915, with a companion whom I would have trusted with my life, we quite unwittingly got caught in a manner least expected.

I had been over the frontier more than once, but never far into the interior. I had neither occasion nor object in so doing. I was at the time on the lookout for some Danish workmen who I knew had been employed on some of the important and secret war material of Germany. If I could meet them on German soil, so much the better; they would then be much more likely to open out and talk more freely than they would do if met elsewhere. I had had experience of this and was at the time most anxious to get corroborative evidence of some rather startling rumours which I had recently heard regarding the (later on called) Paris Big Gun.

Whilst so prowling, as before mentioned, we heard speak of a certain harbour. The mysterious harbour, it was called, which no one might visit, which was jealously guarded, and which the Germans had every intention of occupying at an early date. Wild, speculative talk, perhaps, but it was enough to determine me to go and see for myself and so learn the truth and judge the possibilities from the facts gathered.

Not so many miles from the Island of Femern, where the German warship Gazelle was torpedoed by an English submarine in the spring of 1915, although the fact was never communicated to the English Press, it was said to be situated. A small, exceedingly convenient harbour, with at least eighteen feet depth of water at all tides, and it was said to be capable of great developments.

Its existence was not chronicled in ordinary guide-books nor on the maps in general circulation. Visitors were not welcomed and the local inhabitants were fearful lest their neighbourhood should be seized and overrun by undesirable foreigners.

During the period with which we are concerned frost at night was intense. All open marshland was frozen as solidly as if encased in iron, whilst the ice-bound ditches, canals, and drains were levelled to the headland with drifted snow. Storms, of varying magnitude, were of daily occurrence. Cruel winds swept the bleak area visited, cutting through the thickest of garments till the marrow in one's very bones seemed congealed. No one at the time, acting from his own free will, would have appreciated either a business or a pleasure trip to the harbour in question. Yet early one eventful morning, when the weather was at its worst and everyone else had sought shelter, we braved the elements and attempted to lay a course through the maze of marshland roads, dams and banks, which would not have been an easy task to many of the natives. Our struggle to win through these and other unseen difficulties seemed hopeless. But our minds were made up. We were both determined, obstinate, persistent. Many times we were blown flat by the violence of the storm. Many times we fell, sunk to our necks, in a snowdrift. Many times we lost our way and had to retrace our steps or correct our course. But all the while we proceeded forward, with lips compressed and faces set in grim determination, to accomplish the task we had in hand; to view, to inspect, and to survey roughly the harbour and its works.

Not a soul was observable upon all that vast flat area stretching away uninterruptedly to the horizon as far as the eye could command on either hand. The distant, dull, booming, angry roar of the sea upon the breakwaters and the shrieking wind made conversation impossible. No cover was available until the great embankment was attained. It guarded some tens of thousands of acres of reclaimed land. What a relief it was to us poor wayfarers to reach this comparative haven of peace, an oasis in the desert of howling storm! We had traversed many, many weary miles of most awful walking, under most exhausting circumstances, and a long rest was indeed welcome. Having reached the embankment unobserved, the remainder of the venture was, comparatively speaking, an easy matter.

With such a gale in progress no vessel was likely to brave the mines laid out under the Admiralty administration of several nations and to attempt a passage from the sea. On the land side, the temporary railway and all roads concentrated upon a point where a cluster of new houses had sprung up, which at the moment in question were full of individuals—refugees from the storm and others. The windows of these houses commanded every road within miles. Was it likely, the sentries undoubtedly argued within themselves, or to be suspected for a moment, that anyone in sane senses would attempt to avoid these solid paths and risk an approach to the harbour through the swamps (although they were frozen) and by way of the embankments thus reached, to the east and west? If there were such rash and foolish people about then they ran a good chance of being lost and frozen to death.

So it was that even the sentries were under cover, making life as pleasant as could be, drinking coffee heavily strengthened with brandy, and playing cards for small stakes.

Having rested and eaten and drunk from a thermos flask, we proceeded along the sea side of the embankment with as much caution as though travelling in an enemy's country. Somewhat to our surprise we encountered not a living being, not even a stray dog to exercise his lungs at strangers. On arrival at the harbour, which was concealed from view of the houses by the height of the embankment before mentioned, we quickly and dexterously got to work, free from observation or interruption. My companion kept watch on the main entrances whilst I overran the works, mapped and thoroughly investigated them, sounded and checked water depths, accommodation calculated, and the quay head-room, and roughly surveyed and noted to the minutest detail all the surroundings, in a very short space of time.