The German Secret Service in America 1914-1918Jones, John Price
History
The German Secret Service in America 1914-1918
Jones, John Price
World War, 1914-1918 -- Secret service -- Germany
The picturesque renegade German spy commonly known as Horst von der
Goltz is responsible for the generally accepted version of incidents
which followed his first interview with von Papen on August 22 at
the German Consulate in New York. He was sent to Baltimore under the
assumed name of Bridgeman H. Taylor, with a letter to the German Consul
there, Karl Luederitz, calling for whatever coöperation Goltz might
need. He was to recruit accomplices from the crew of a German ship then
lying at the North German Lloyd docks in the Patapsco River. With a man
whom he had hired in New York, Charles Tucker, alias "Tuchhaendler," he
visited the ship and selected his men. He then returned to New York,
where Papen placed three more men at his disposal, one of them being
A. A. Fritzen, of Brooklyn, a discharged purser on a Russian liner;
another Frederick Busse, an "importer," with offices in the World
Building, New York; and the third man Constantine Covani, a private
detective, of New York. After a few days the sailors from Baltimore
reported for duty, but were sent back, as Goltz noticed that his
movements were being watched.
Papen sent Goltz to Captain Tauscher's office at 320 Broadway for
explosives. On September 5, Captain Tauscher ordered 300 pounds of 60
per cent. dynamite to be delivered by the E. I. du Pont de Nemours
Company to Mr. Bridgeman Taylor. In a motor-boat Goltz applied at a du
Pont barge near Black Tom Island and the Statue of Liberty and took
away his three hundred pounds of dynamite in suitcases. The little
craft made its way up the river to 146th Street. The conspirators then
carried their burden to the German Club in Central Park South and later
in a taxicab to Goltz's home, where it was stored with a supply of
revolvers and electrical apparatus for exploding the charges.
[Illustration: Passport given to Horst von der Goltz under the _alias_
of Bridgeman H. Taylor]
A passport for facile entrance into Canada had been applied for by one
of Luederitz's henchmen in Baltimore in the name of "Bridgeman Taylor,"
and had been forwarded in care of Karl W. Buck, who lived at 843 West
End Avenue, New York. With this guerdon of American protection Goltz
set out for Buffalo about September 10--the last day of the Battle of
the Marne--Busse and Fritzen carrying the dynamite and apparatus, and
Covani, as Goltz naïvely related, "attending to me." He found rooms
at 198 Delaware Avenue, in the heart of Buffalo. He learned of the
terrain for the enterprise from a German of mysterious occupation,
who had lived in Buffalo for several years. Within a few days Goltz
and his companions moved on to Niagara Falls--a move made easier by an
exchange of telegraphic communications between Papen and himself. It
is only necessary to quote, from the British Secret Service report to
Parliament, those messages which Goltz received from the attaché, or
"Steffens," as Papen chose to sign himself:
New York, N. Y. Sept. 15, 14
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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