The Codebreakers: The True Story of the Secret Intelligence Team That Changed the Course of the First World War by James Wyllie, Michael McKinley Page A
Authors: James Wyllie, Michael McKinley
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hands.’
Von Rintelen was elated by this news, as Gaunt’s intelligence, while essentially correct, was so misplayed by its conveyor that Rintelen believed he was actually safe. But he failed to register that the British had intercepted and read his wireless messages.
While von Rintelen was devising acts of sabotage and sipping cocktails at the seaside, Emanuel Voska’s team was busy trying to crack the German war machine in New York, feeding information to Gaunt, who would pass it on to Blinker Hall and Room 40. Voska had in his service clerks, messengers, waiters, maids, chauffeurs, and the assistant chief clerk in the Austrian embassy. One of his female agents, through money and charm, had convinced an employee in Karl Boy-Ed’s office to steal the ‘most secret’ code. Von Rintelen didn’t know it, but the British had him and his sabotage in their sights.
In the end, the Dark Invader was most likely brought down by a combination of von Papen’s carelessness when sending cables to Berlin, openly using Rintelen’s name and discussing his activities, and the extraordinary actions of a German-American. On Friday 2 July 1915, the beginning of the Independence Day long weekend, Erich Muenter planted a bomb in a place that should have been among the most secure in the land: the Senate wing of the Capitol Building in Washington DC. He had timed it to explode when the building was deserted. When the bomb detonated near a telephone switchboard, plaster was torn from the walls and ceilings, mirrors and chandeliers were shattered, doors were blown open – one of them a door into the vice president’s office – and the east reception room was destroyed.
The destruction caused by Erich Muenter’s bomb in the Senate wing of the US Capitol Building, July 1915
Muenter wrote a letter to a Washington newspaper protesting against munitions shipments to Germany from the USA, then took a night train to New York. There he transferred to a service taking him to Glen Cove, Long island, where J. P. Morgan Jr was breakfasting in his summer house with his esteemed guest Sir Cecil Spring Rice, British ambassador to the USA. Muenter burst in upon them brandishing a revolver and shot Morgan twice, seriously wounding him but not preventing the sturdy financier from tackling his smaller assailant and pinning him to the floor.
In jail, Muenter withdrew his alias of ‘Frank Holt’ and confessed to being the fugitive professor of German at Harvard University who was wanted in connection with the murder by poison of his wife in 1906. He had acted for the Fatherland, he said. Alarm bells rang for the military intelligence strategists in Berlin. They thought that if Rintelen was behind this dangerous act of sabotage at the highest level of the US government, as well as a spectacularly public assassination attempt on America’s leading banker (while in the company of the British ambassador), then he’d clearly forgotten the covert nature of his mission.
On the morning of 6 July, von Rintelen was enjoying breakfast at the New York Yacht Club when an attendant informed him there was a phone call for him. On the other end of the line was naval attaché Karl Boy-Ed, who told the Dark Invader to meet him on a street corner, where he handed over a terse telegram from HQ: von Rintelen was being recalled to Germany, effective immediately. Later that night, conveniently for everyone, Muenter walked out of his open jail cell and plunged head first to his death on a concrete floor below.
Rintelen departed for his Berlin debrief as he had arrived in New York: under the Swiss passport of Emile Gaché. On the first night of the voyage he went to the dining room and ordered a bottle of wine, to find solace in the grape. There he found that he was recognised by a German aristocrat whom he had seen often in Berlin society. The man, the Count of Limburg Stirum, worried about von Rintelen’s safe passage; ever brazen, von Rintelen assured the man that he
Von Rintelen was elated by this news, as Gaunt’s intelligence, while essentially correct, was so misplayed by its conveyor that Rintelen believed he was actually safe. But he failed to register that the British had intercepted and read his wireless messages.
While von Rintelen was devising acts of sabotage and sipping cocktails at the seaside, Emanuel Voska’s team was busy trying to crack the German war machine in New York, feeding information to Gaunt, who would pass it on to Blinker Hall and Room 40. Voska had in his service clerks, messengers, waiters, maids, chauffeurs, and the assistant chief clerk in the Austrian embassy. One of his female agents, through money and charm, had convinced an employee in Karl Boy-Ed’s office to steal the ‘most secret’ code. Von Rintelen didn’t know it, but the British had him and his sabotage in their sights.
In the end, the Dark Invader was most likely brought down by a combination of von Papen’s carelessness when sending cables to Berlin, openly using Rintelen’s name and discussing his activities, and the extraordinary actions of a German-American. On Friday 2 July 1915, the beginning of the Independence Day long weekend, Erich Muenter planted a bomb in a place that should have been among the most secure in the land: the Senate wing of the Capitol Building in Washington DC. He had timed it to explode when the building was deserted. When the bomb detonated near a telephone switchboard, plaster was torn from the walls and ceilings, mirrors and chandeliers were shattered, doors were blown open – one of them a door into the vice president’s office – and the east reception room was destroyed.
The destruction caused by Erich Muenter’s bomb in the Senate wing of the US Capitol Building, July 1915
Muenter wrote a letter to a Washington newspaper protesting against munitions shipments to Germany from the USA, then took a night train to New York. There he transferred to a service taking him to Glen Cove, Long island, where J. P. Morgan Jr was breakfasting in his summer house with his esteemed guest Sir Cecil Spring Rice, British ambassador to the USA. Muenter burst in upon them brandishing a revolver and shot Morgan twice, seriously wounding him but not preventing the sturdy financier from tackling his smaller assailant and pinning him to the floor.
In jail, Muenter withdrew his alias of ‘Frank Holt’ and confessed to being the fugitive professor of German at Harvard University who was wanted in connection with the murder by poison of his wife in 1906. He had acted for the Fatherland, he said. Alarm bells rang for the military intelligence strategists in Berlin. They thought that if Rintelen was behind this dangerous act of sabotage at the highest level of the US government, as well as a spectacularly public assassination attempt on America’s leading banker (while in the company of the British ambassador), then he’d clearly forgotten the covert nature of his mission.
On the morning of 6 July, von Rintelen was enjoying breakfast at the New York Yacht Club when an attendant informed him there was a phone call for him. On the other end of the line was naval attaché Karl Boy-Ed, who told the Dark Invader to meet him on a street corner, where he handed over a terse telegram from HQ: von Rintelen was being recalled to Germany, effective immediately. Later that night, conveniently for everyone, Muenter walked out of his open jail cell and plunged head first to his death on a concrete floor below.
Rintelen departed for his Berlin debrief as he had arrived in New York: under the Swiss passport of Emile Gaché. On the first night of the voyage he went to the dining room and ordered a bottle of wine, to find solace in the grape. There he found that he was recognised by a German aristocrat whom he had seen often in Berlin society. The man, the Count of Limburg Stirum, worried about von Rintelen’s safe passage; ever brazen, von Rintelen assured the man that he
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