German Spies in England: An Exposure

by William Le Queux

The German spy system, as we know it to-day, is the creation of one Carl Stieber, and it dates back to about the year 1850.

Stieber, who was an obscure Saxon, began his career of espionage by betraying the revolutionary Socialists, with whom he pretended to sympathise, and so successful was he in this respect that he very soon obtained employment among the regular police, and was afterwards created head of a department which finally worked quite independently, and was beyond police control.

Stieber could never have achieved the success he did but for the luck or good management which, during his work among the revolutionaries, brought him to the notice of Frederick William, the King of Prussia. Under the royal patronage he was secure against counter-plotters among the military and the police, both of whom hated him beyond measure as an interloper who was seen to be dangerous to their interests. Up to this time, it should be remembered, the game of espionage, so far as military matters were concerned, had been a matter solely for the military authorities, and they did not fail to resent the new influence, which very speedily threatened to make itself all-powerful—as, indeed, it ultimately did—in this particular field of Prussian activity.

It must not be supposed that Stieber—upon whose model the Russian Secret Police was afterwards established—confined his activities to either the enemies or the criminals of Prussia. He established a close watch on persons even of high rank, and many a tit-bit of information went to regale the mind of his royal master. In a sense, Frederick William was, like the modern Kaiser, the master-spy, for without his confidence Stieber could never have achieved the success he did, against both the military and the police, influences which, even in those days, were almost, but not quite, all-powerful in Germany.

Stieber's greatest achievement in the field of actual spying was his work which led to the crushing of Austria at Sadowa in 1866. At this he laboured for years, and it is not too much to say that his work assured the success of the campaign. By the time the Prussian armies were on the move, Stieber had established such an army of spies and agents throughout Bohemia, that it was a matter of absolute impossibility for the unfortunate Austrians to make a single move without information being promptly carried to their enemies.

So successful was Stieber's method found, that it was only natural that it should be tried in other countries. France was the next victim, and the campaign of 1870-71 is so recent that it is hardly necessary to do more than remind the reader how thoroughly the Germans were served by their spy system.

As in the present war, the advancing Germans found, in every town and village, swarms of agents who were ready to provide them with information and guidance, and it was even said that the German invaders were better acquainted with the country they were attacking than were the officers entrusted with its defence. We have seen the same thing in the present war, when time after time the Germans have been led into towns and districts by men who have lived there for years and, in many cases, had even become naturalised Frenchmen the better to carry on their work. It speaks volumes for the perfection of the German military machine that, on the outbreak of hostilities, these men should have been able, without the slightest difficulty, to join the corps operating in the districts with which they had become perfectly familiar by years of residence.

And they were able, not merely to give topographical information, but even to indicate where stores of food and petrol could be found, and to point out to their comrades where the best prospects of loot and plunder existed.

All this was merely a natural development of the system which Carl Stieber established, and which his successors have developed to the highest pitch of unscrupulous perfection.

After the war of 1870-71, the system which Stieber invented found its place in German administration, and it has continued ever since as a separate and highly-organised department, spending vast sums of money—about £720,000 a year—and extending its ramifications to an incredible extent. It may be mentioned, incidentally, that its workings and methods have been copied by the German commercial world, and many a British employer has, during the past few years, paid dearly through his closest commercial secrets being given away to his keenest German rivals by the patient, diligent and hard-working German clerk, who was willing to work for a mere pittance for the advantage of "learning English" and studying British methods.