The Web

CHAPTER IV
THE STORY OF NEWARK

Northern New Jersey was recognized as one of the riskiest regions of the United States. Time out of mind, American readers have noted, with the short-lived American anger, the many newspaper tales of Paterson and anarchy, of New Jersey and New Thought, of socialistic ranters hailing from this or that semi-foreign community, in one of the oldest states in the American union, whose battlefields in our first war for freedom are spread on many glorious pages of our country’s history. The battlefields of Jersey are different now, and are not so glorious. Still, a few men, as patriotic as those in Revolutionary days, have done their best during this war to keep their country safe. The work of the Northern New Jersey Division, which has been in charge of Mr. W. D. McDermid, as State Inspector, is reassuring.

It is proper to point out that the Northern New Jersey Division, being one of the first of the A. P. L. to be organized, operated on lines different from those of almost any other territory. Its district covers one-half of the state, including the vitally important Port of Embarkation. Under a single central office, it combined over one hundred municipalities, most of which would ordinarily have had a separate headquarters organization, but which for local reasons had all been consolidated in one division.

There was abundance to do, and there were plenty to be watched. There could, for example, be furnished several hundred instances of sabotage in this manufacturing district of Northern New Jersey—sabotage either detected in advance, or thoroughly investigated afterwards. This was so common in the hundreds of plants in that District that it became for the Northern Division, for the most part, a matter of routine. A great deal of the work of this character ultimately was handled by the Plant Protection Division of the War Department.

In upper New Jersey, as in the State of New York, the Governmental departments reached out and rather overshadowed, in glory at least, the patient and less known efforts of the A. P. L. Newark frankly complains that quite often sufficiently vigorous action was not to be had by the officers of the Department of Justice, even after full evidence had been handed to it by the A. P. L. Some A. P. L. men even go so far as to claim that D. J. would not only crab an act, but claim a glory! Our State Inspector voices this in occasional comment:

There was abundant fire behind some of these New Jersey smokes, be sure of that, and many rumors of the class commonly pooh-poohed at by M. I. D. and D. J. were made good. Three actual samples of powdered glass in food were found; two actual cases of Red Cross bandages containing deleterious substances also were found; there was one instance of insidious printed propaganda distributed by means of knitted work; and there was a very distinct trail of Sinn Feiners working in conjunction with the enemy. To these may be added such instances of investigation as are given below.

Mr. X, a minister of the gospel, was very offensive in his pacifism. He refused permission for the display of an American flag in his church, or even a service flag, and would not allow the church to be used for Red Cross work. He was forced to resign, his particular brand of piety not seeming to track with the creed of his congregation. The quality of his pacifism may be judged from the fact that he excused the Germans for their atrocities, saying that if France and Belgium had not resisted, there never would have been any atrocities! This man applied for a position to go to France in Government war work. His application was refused.

It is, of course, well known that the U. S. troops in large part sailed from the vicinity of the City of New York, or upper New Jersey. Of course, also, all the preparations for this war, all of the expense of it, all the time and trouble of it, focused exactly on the number of troops we actually could get on the way. The utmost secrecy was maintained by our Government as to the number of troops, the ships that carried them, and the time and place of sailing. The mother of a boy on his way to France did not know he had sailed until a curt card from the other side of the water told her that he was in France. Practically all the people of the United States, however, accepted this secrecy as a necessary war measure—that being obviously and permanently necessary in this war, where the risks of the sea included the danger of the German submarine.

Naturally, also, the German spies on this side of the water would do everything in their power to learn precisely the facts which our Government sought to conceal—the number of troops going over, the times of sailings of the transports, and so forth. Naturally also, our system of espionage—the divisions of Military Intelligence, Naval Intelligence, Department of Justice, and the auxiliary work of the American Protective League—would do all they could to prevent German espionage from attaining its own purpose in regard to this knowledge.

When the Government seized the Port of Embarkation at Hoboken, much interest was shown in the former Hamburg-American and North German Lloyd line steamers located there. There were numerous rumors that these boats were to be blown up by the Germans. Of these, the largest was the Vaterland, which was re-christened Leviathan.

All this section, along the Jersey Palisades, near Hoboken, is strong in sympathy for Germany. Nearly all of the population is from Germany or of German parentage and here was this steamer, the biggest of all the boats, and long the pride of the Germans. It was not to be expected that the New Jersey Germans would feel pleasant about its present status. These local Germans boasted that they had been through these boats after our Government took them over. They told stories of what the Government was doing with them and what they were going to do themselves so that the boats would never sail or never get across. The history of other ships which took fire in mid-ocean, or were blown up by concealed explosives is referred to elsewhere. It always was sufficient to make the sailing of any transport a matter of great uneasiness.

An A. P. L. operative wanted to know what these Germans were doing regarding the Leviathan. Of course, the boat was supposed to be absolutely guarded against entry by any stranger. This man, however, went to the gate and asked for the Commandant by nickname. The guard supposed he must be a friend of the Commandant, because of his familiarity, and naïvely let him through. The operative walked up and down the pier wondering how he could get on board, for he saw guards at the gangway. There was a pile of mailbags on the dock, so the operative stole over that way, picked up a mail sack and threw it over his shoulder. Near the gangway there was a group of soldiers and sailors engaged in an argument. As the operative approached, they separated, and he went through. He was dressed in civilian clothes, and had on a derby hat, but these did not seem to be suspicious facts. The operative walked on up the gangplank unmolested, and roamed all over the boat from top to bottom, still carrying the mailbag. Having done what any German could have done in the same circumstances, he started out, but near the gangway was stopped by a man who wore a watchman’s badge, and who spoke with a noticeable German accent. This man stopped the operative, who, upon being asked where he was going, replied that he was going off the boat. The watchman told him to get off in a hurry. He was still carrying his U. S. mail sack, which he replaced on the pile where he had got it. After that, he strolled out to the street again, satisfied that the guard around the Leviathan might have been a trifle more airtight.

As a matter of fact, while the sailing dates of the Leviathan were jealously guarded, bets were made by the Germans on her sailing time out and back. Word came to an A. P. L. man that the Leviathan was going to sail at 12:15 the next day. As this came from German sources, it seemed a useful thing to have the Government alter the sailing hour. The operative in this case strolled around in the vicinity of the Leviathan’s pier and talked with sailors, who freely told him the sailing hour. Then, in order to mystify the Government officers, the operative called up a certain Department and said over the ’phone that he was an Intelligence official of the Imperial German Navy, and wanted to know if it was true that the Leviathan was to sail at 12:15 the next day. This caused some excitement. The operative then told whom he was, explaining that he had got that knowledge himself the previous evening. As a result, the sailing hour was changed several hours, and the Leviathan got off safely.

Again, there were a great many rumors regarding the numbers of troops carried by this big transport. We did not want Germany to know how many men we really were shipping, and we rather thought that no one ever could know. An A. P. L. operative was able to make a very close guess under rather singular circumstances. Since he could have done so, perhaps a German spy might have done as much had he an equally sharp wit.

This instance really started in a practical joke. The jokers suggested to a certain young husband, who had to sit up late several nights with a crying baby, that he might pass the time counting the cars of troop trains which passed in front of his house. In all seriousness, the young man did do this, checking each car by the bumps it made on the railroad frogs. He really counted in this way with very fair accuracy the number of cars carrying troops for the Leviathan’s sailing. As everyone knew about how many troops were in each car, this operative figured that there would be about 12,000 troops. This was reported to the Government, but was never checked out, so that A. P. L. still wants to know whether they were good detectives or not.

There was a member of the Division who sold automobile tires. A Naval officer came to him to buy a tire, and wanted to know if the tire could not get to the boat that afternoon. This salesman suggested the next morning at noon. The officer innocently said that he would have sailed by that time. He also named his boat, the Leviathan. This salesman asked how it would do to have the tire ready when the ship came back, and asked how long it would be. The officer said sixteen and a half days—which tallied with the former Leviathan record of seventeen days. The salesman also learned that the stop at Bordeaux was from forty to seventy-two hours. Incidentally, he also learned that the boat carried 12,000 troops, had five hundred officers and a crew of fifteen hundred.

This figure of 12,000 troops checks perfectly with the A. P. L. estimate made by the baby-carrying member. This tire-hunting officer of the boat also told a great many things which he ought not to have told anyone. He told the means used to protect the Leviathan against U-boats, saying that the ship depended mostly on her speed. He said the ship drew only forty-two feet of water, so it had not been necessary to dredge the channel at Bordeaux. The operative then asked the officer how late he could receive the tire, and was told about two hours before sailing. “You can refer to your local newspapers and figure on fifteen minutes after the tide begins to go out,” he said. This, of course, was so that the boat could get the benefit of the ebb tide in warping out.

From these facts, both the Military and Naval Intelligence were able to stop such leaks of information, and stiffened up the guarding of ships and cargo, besides giving, in many ways, a far greater degree of protection to the task of embarkation. It is thought that the League investigations caused recommendation to be made regarding more secrecy in regard to embarkation. The Armistice cut off these matters. Sufficient has been shown here, however, to indicate how an enemy might sometimes get information.

There did not seem to be much to start with in this case which originated in Northern New Jersey, nor indeed was there much left of the case by the time it was finished. Yet the case itself had the makings of quite a big affair. A report came in that Otto B——, starter for the X. Y. Z. Transit Company, was pro-German. Such reports came in all the time, so that there were usually fifty or sixty cases in the zone. Two days later came in more facts from operative C-123. He had gotten pretty thick with Herr B—— by saying that Germany seemed to be gaining, and that this news would please his wife, who was German herself. Herr B—— was much pleased to learn this, and went on to unbosom himself. Several such meetings enabled C-123 to learn pretty much everything he desired.

Herr B—— wanted to do something for the Fatherland and the Kaiser. He was sure he could do something if he had some help. The one danger was that, in talking to almost anybody, Herr B—— might be talking not to a representative of the Kaiser but to some one who would report him to the United States Secret Service. Operative C-123 agreed with him as to this, and gravely told him he ought to be very careful. But he said he knew a man that could be trusted, and he would bring him around so that they could talk it over, and perhaps the two of them could do something for the Kaiser.

The name of this new man was Schultz. He had been in Mexico organizing the United States Germans who had fled to Mexico. He had been a member of the Dantzig Dragoons, and had traveled all through Germany, and his experiences in the Army there had gotten him his place as German propagandist of Mexico. He was a member of the Imperial German Espionage System—and he had his Wilhelmstrasse card to show it. He always carried it pinned to his underclothing. It was a great day for Otto, the train dispatcher. At last he had some trusted fellow-Germans in whom he could confide! He and Schultz talked bombs and that sort of thing until midnight. Herr B—— told Schultz: “You can depend on me—I am the real stuff—I can get a thousand men back of me since I know I have got a man from the German Government here.”

Talks between these three gentlemen were going on in fine shape at the time the Armistice was signed. As a matter of fact, Otto B—— is still flagging trains at the old railroad crossing, and the League is recommending his prosecution and the revocation of his citizenship, because it certainly had proof of his unfitness to live in the United States. It hardly seems necessary to add that “Schultz” was an A. P. L. operative also. His “credentials” were made in the United States and not in Germany, having been copied from those captured on a real agent of the Kaiser.

There was another near-case, one which almost became a real one, in Northern New Jersey Division, which, at the first, looked like scores that had preceded it and scores that followed it. It had to do with one K——, reported rabid against America, although employed in doing essential Government work. This might have been a spite case, or a case of remarks made before we went into the war, or still more possibly something said before the amended Espionage Act was passed. However, member C-891 went out on the case to see what he could find about K——.

The latter had a factory of his own, and when found, seemed to be disposed to talk. The operative speaks a perfect German, and has a German look. The two got on handsomely. The operative was surprised to find that K—— talked so freely and to a stranger. Another member of the League, C-1378, also of German parentage, went with C-891 a few days later to visit K—— again. That gentleman was more bitter than ever against America. He said, among other things, that if he heard that President Wilson had been shot, he would be so glad that he would celebrate it by getting too drunk to see. And there was very much more talk of that nature.

A few days later, K—— had cause to regret his disposition to talk. He was brought before a United States Commissioner on a warrant, and spent a good night in jail before he could find bail. The next day, he being a man of means, he engaged a lawyer. The Armistice ended these activities, as it did so many others. The hearing was held on the morning of November 7—the first news of the Armistice, later confirmed. Since that time, A. P. L. of Northern New Jersey has heard nothing about Mr. K——. With a couple million others, he has been allowed to sink back to our citizenship—just as poisonous, just as unregenerate, just as little fit to remain in this country. It was understood that D. J. laid down a rule that testimony secured in conversations such as the foregoing was not a basis of prosecution. Perhaps it would have been better to wait until Mr. K—— had really shot somebody or blown up a ship or so.

Of active sympathizers with the enemy, Northern New Jersey did not lack. A thousand cases could be given. One will serve. In July, 1918, the office learned of suspicious activities on the part of some of these sympathizers. A Mr. E—— was told by Miss G——, a young woman of foreign birth, that the people she lived with had active connections with the enemy. Especially was this true in the case of one S——, who had Central and South American relations. This latter man was found to be of American birth and German parentage—which, in a good many cases, would leave him German. He had been a traveler, and a son of his had been born in Kingston, Jamaica, although this son was at present in the U. S. Army. This Mr. S—— was found to be identified with a New York concern which had sent him to Jamaica to get the release there of a man jailed by the English authorities for alleged implication in the coaling of German raiders at sea. That did not look any too good for Mr. S—— of itself. He also had in his employ a stenographer whose husband, a Mr. W——, had been employed in an alleged poisoning of the reservoir at Kingston, Jamaica.

These things led up to the case of the subject, who will be called P——. This man had lived with S—— for a time. P—— came to this country from Germany in 1907, and applied for his first naturalization papers—please note the date—August 1, 1914. He was thirty-five years of age, well educated, unmarried, and without dependents. He had served in the German Army, but was not a reservist. In his alien enemy questionnaire, he left out the name of one of his previous employers, which was found to have been an importing concern with a German name, with connections in Kingston, Jamaica, doing business in Central and South America. This German concern had many different names. Some of its personnel were interned at Panama. A member of the concern had been interned in the United States for alleged provisioning of German raiders at sea. This made the stage set for a rather interesting investigation. Operatives discovered that the principal men of this concern were at large, and were doing business under yet another name. They also discovered that this Mr. S—— was affiliated with the work in a downtown office building in New York City.

During 1912, or earlier, Mr. S—— had introduced Mr. P—— to the President of an iron and steel concern, who took him into employ as Treasurer and gave him a block of shares. The alien enemy P—— seemed to get along pretty well for a time, but got in wrong with the firm through a transaction which they did not approve. The Secretary of the firm was very friendly to the alien enemy P——. This Secretary was found to be connected by marriage with one of the foremost electrical inventors of the age, who had been very active in the development of devices for our Army and Navy. Observe that this man was a particular confidant of the unnaturalized German P——, formerly of the German Army.

The original Mr. S——, who had acted as a voucher for P——, had stated that he could get money to the enemy, through the War Department. His father had stock in a concern which was taken over by our Alien Enemy Custodian. The not very mysterious Mr. P—— removed during June, 1918, leaving New York without notifying the Chief of Police, as is required. He was located doing business in an office in down-town New York City as a broker, although his name was not listed in the telephone directory. He was apparently trading under the name of L. P. & Company. The A. P. L. has found that his mother is living in Germany and is reported to be wealthy. P—— has pretended that he was a traveling salesman, which he was not. He endeavored to avoid meeting people whom he knew while residing in northern New Jersey. His residence was located in another state.

This case also shows how much sometimes may be discovered by way of a tangled skein, even if no one is shot at sunrise. Mr. S—— was visited at his office by an A. P. L. man, who did not make himself known. He was very much exercised over the fact that the place of his business was known. He requested that his personal and business relations should not be linked up together. Mr. P—— is still in business in New York, no doubt waiting for the next war.

Northern New Jersey was the field for many reports of mysterious signal lights along the seacoast. Most of these stories had small foundation, but at least one of these would have come to something had not the Armistice cut off the investigation. In this case, operators were sometimes out for hours watching for the flashlights, and once a squad of military reserves lay on watch practically all night around a suspect’s house. They discovered night signaling with a search-light and calcium-light at different places over the Northeastern part of Bergen County, and there seemed to be evidence of a system of signaling extending from the Hudson River in New Jersey, across Bergen County up into the Ramapo Mountains and the Greenwood Lake district in New York. The observers used surveying transits for spotting the lights, and by means of this instrument, were able to obtain the angles of the lights. These angles were then plotted, and the intersection points gave approximately the location of the light. This work resulted in the location of three individuals, but at about this time the Armistice ended the signals and the apparent necessity for watching them. There had been discovered, however, some real foundation for a signal light scare in this district.

Ridgewood had another strange case—a German who claimed to be so sick that he could not live long—who wanted to go back home in order to die in the dear old Fatherland. Medical examination showed that he probably would die sometime, but the A. P. L. examination led to the refusal of his passports, it being believed that he might carry something to Germany besides fatal disease.

Newark, the capital of Northern New Jersey Division, had a very baffling pro-German case where it was difficult to find anything on which a legal prosecution could be brought. The facts were such as resulted in the social ostracism of the family, so that their disloyalty, after all, had a certain punishment, although it did not fit the crime. H—— and his wife were members of a Presbyterian Church, and were so openly pro-German that everybody ceased to have anything to do with them. At a luncheon given at the H—— household the favors distributed to a dozen ladies consisted of nice pictures of Kaiser Wilhelm. One of the guests then suggested that it would be a nice thing to sing the Star Spangled Banner, which did not please Mrs. H—— at all. The head of this household was educated in Germany, and married a German woman whose relatives were high in the German army. They had a daughter who was engaged to an American, but the latter broke off the engagement on account of the pro-Germanism of the H—— family. The social ostracism really amounted to isolation, so that it was impossible to hear of any disloyal utterances which would warrant governmental action, nor indeed any utterances at all. The town was through with them.

Northern New Jersey probably has the laziest slacker in the world. His name is M——, and at one time he resided in New York. He had an Emergency Fleet classification card, but only worked two or three days out of the week and spent most of his time at home in bed. He thought he would rather go South where the climate was better. He was rated as so lazy that he was shifted from one government job to another—and that certainly is going some, in view of what is sometimes done in government service. He was so lazy that he used to go to bed with his shoes on, and would leave his light burning all night because he was too tired to put it out. This champion rester carried a registration card, but he had been given limited service on account of calloused feet. From the description of him, it is difficult to see how his feet got calloused; but at least that is what the report says.

New Jersey had a very blood-curdling citizen who dwelt in Newark under the name of H. B——. He carried an American name although he was born in Italy about forty-two years ago. He came to America thirty years ago, when he was a small boy, in order to escape punishment for having killed a priest. He never dared to return to Italy, but remained an alien in this country and an enemy to about everything going. He was a very ardent I. W. W. man, and declared that there were enough I. W. W. men in the Army and outside to blow up the country if they liked,—a very good example of the flourishing Bolshevik element in America. Mr. B—— claimed that he had stabbed a detective in Providence, R. I., a year or so ago during an I. W. W. celebration; hence he did not like to visit Providence either. He told how in another place he had cut out a man’s intestines, and when asked if the man died, remarked: “What in hell do you suppose I am here for?” This pleasant gentleman often went to Paterson and New York to attend I. W. W. meetings there. He hoped that “every —— —— soldier the U. S. sent over would be blown up by submarines and drowned like rats, and that if any did get across, he hoped the Germans would choke or shoot them to death.” He said he would like to get his fingers on President Wilson’s throat. It was his pleasant practice to tear American flags from the coats of persons wearing them. His home was searched, and some clock-works were found without any dials and hands, such as have been known to be used with bombs. It seems that nothing was done with the bloodthirsty Mr. B—— after all, and he is still at large.

In so complex an office as that of the Northern New Jersey Division, which much resembles that of New York City, Newark alone cleared over 9,013 cases, of which twenty-five per cent were for the War Department, forty-five per cent for the Department of Justice, other divisions of A. P. L. work fifteen per cent, and original cases with New Jersey A. P. L. fifteen per cent. Most of this work was for D. J., but there was much coöperation with officers from Naval and Military Intelligence, not to mention the local boards. This great division has a tangible record of 4,563 cases of the second class, those handled entirely in local units, making a total of 13,576 cases sufficiently definite in character to warrant a record. As to the actual investigations, recorded and unrecorded, they would without question bring up the total of northern New Jersey cases above 30,000. They were from every point of the compass and of every color of the rainbow.