Adventures of a British Master Spy

by Sidney Reilly

  The interests of the average American are catholic and insatiable. His taste for lectures is inordinate. Both by public lectures and by articles in the press Sidney fought against the Bolshevik loan. And it is needless to state how by revelation after revelation, by discovery after discovery he won a complete victory, and the Soviet loan never materialised.

  The Bolsheviks on their side used every endeavour to convince America of their honesty and the humanity of their regime. I quote an article which appeared in the New York American of 16 February 1925.

  MOSCOW, FEBRUARY

  The Soviet government formally and officially set out to prove that the era of vengeance and of terror is a thing of the past in the history of the Russian Soviet by throwing open the chief GPU prison to inspection by foreign newspaper-men for the first time.

  Yagoda, chief of the GPU and successor of Dzerjinski, who directed the injurious methods of dealing with political opponents long popular in Russia, declared Russia had nothing to conceal. He said today: ‘Now that the counter-revolution is of the past, we have only about eighty political prisoners.

  ‘We pursue the most humane and liberal methods, giving the prisoners physical and moral comforts. We have parted definitely with the policy of vengeance. Our prison system is of the best, despite foreign lies. We are admitting foreign correspondents because we have nothing to hide. Let all doubters come and see for themselves.’

  The correspondents were conducted through the building, formerly a first-class hotel, in Loubianka Square. It still bears traces of its ancient comforts, in parquet floors and big, light rooms, well ventilated. Sanitary conditions prevail and the food is wholesome.

  The chief point of interest was the room where General Savinkoff is held. He has a very comfortable room and devotes his time to writing fiction.

  The General said he preferred prison to Polish or Czecho-Slovakian hospitality, as he likes to breathe the air of Russia, if only through the bars of a prison.

  The details about Savinkoff of course interested us vastly, and I was hugely amused to picture him there as great a poseur and attitudiniser as ever, mouthing to the world his patriotic platitudes from his prison.

  Meantime the lawsuit which had brought Sidney to America at last came on for hearing, and it is necessary at this stage for me to state exactly what the case was.

  Sidney Reilly, as has previously been mentioned, had been sent by the Imperial Russian government to New York to arrange ammunition contracts for the Russian Army. When the Russian monarchy fell these contracts were taken over by the British government, on the condition that no agreements for commission existed. At that time Sidney held an agreement for commission amounting to half a million dollars. An officer of the company asked Sidney to cancel the agreement in order that the company might accept the British contract. This officer, who was a personal friend of my husband’s, assured him that the commission would be paid in full even if he had to pay it out of his own pocket. Sidney took his word that his interests would be guarded even without the agreement, which he tore up.

  The official was a shrewd business man. When the time came he refused to pay and the lawsuit was started. The defence was admirable in its impudence. It was not denied that the agreement had existed, nor asserted that the company had given Sidney any compensation for its cancellation. The case put before the court was that Sidney destroyed a valuable contract without any consideration whatsoever.

  On the advice of his solicitor Sidney’s case was made a suit for damages for misrepresentation, and was accordingly tried before a jury. The jury consisted of artisans. Instead of confining himself to the relevant points at issue counsel for the defence dwelt at great length on Sidney’s anti-Bolshevik work, and the campaign against the Soviet which he was even then waging. The case was judged before it was heard, and Sidney was cast in his suit. Not another court in the world would have returned such a verdict.

  The Bolsheviks lost no opportunity of keeping themselves au courant with my husband’s activities. He had taken an office in Broadway, and in the next suite another firm established itself. It soon became obvious that there was a serious leakage. Photographic reproductions of papers were finding their way into the hands of the Bolsheviks. Sidney set a trap, as a result of which his Russian secretary, Mlle G., was found guilty of opening Sidney’s correspondence, photographing the contents and resealing the letters. Thereafter for almost a year all the papers which were accessible to Mlle G. were carefully prepared beforehand, and the information which found its way to Russia was in the highest degree misleading.

  All this of course entailed a great deal of extra work. All vitally important political matters, and the doctoring of the papers for the benefit of Mlle G. were attended to in our own rooms at night. And thus I became a sort of additional secretary to my husband, and learned more and more of the activities of the anti-Bolsheviks throughout the world.

  It is important to realise that by far the greater part of the active anti-Bolsheviks had themselves been revolutionaries, and many of them exiles from Tsarist Russia. The Bolsheviks themselves had very carefully kept their own necks out of danger, and only returned to Russia when the Social Revolutionaries had succeeded in overthrowing the monarchy. The chief Social Revolutionaries were themselves now in exile, and formed the backbone of the anti-Bolshevik cause. The émigrés proper played very little part in politics, and were generally quite content to exercise their talents in that profession to which the revolution had reduced them.

  Anti-Bolshevism received several accessions of strength from the ranks of the Soviets themselves, but these deserters came to be regarded with a great deal of suspicion. As often as not, after enjoying the hospitality and sharing the councils of the anti-Bolsheviks, they returned to their old allegiance with a great deal of valuable information gathered during their exile.

  The great difficulty was then, and remains now, to get the anti-Bolsheviks to combine. There are many mutual jealousies and mutual suspicions. Organisations are mutually exclusive. The greater number of them were quite content to adopt the Micawber attitude of waiting for something to turn up. Others were active only in endeavouring to secure the intervention of foreign powers. After Savinkoff’s betrayal and the subsequent dispersal of the ‘Greens’ – the organisation with which he had been connected – we were in touch with no organisation operating in Russia itself.

  Sidney very rightly saw that the counter-revolution must start in Russia, and that all his work from the outside world would only result in creating a passive foreign hostility to the Soviet. He was approached several times on behalf of organisations in Moscow, as he had been approached by Drebkoff in London, but he proceeded very warily, and inevitably found these organisations to be controlled by Bolsheviks, whose apostasy was more than doubtful.

  Meanwhile he received several anonymous letters warning him to discontinue his anti-Bolshevik work, and the Soviet spies in New York continued to keep him under close observation. Our rooms were ransacked more than once, and of course it was out of the question to inform the police. But the honours of the duel were very easily with Sidney. He bluffed his enemies continually and managed to surprise from them a considerable amount of valuable information of which he knew how to make use.

  It is well known that the Bolsheviks have spent a great deal of money in order to foment revolution in other countries. Papers and revolutionary bodies were subsidised by them, but as a result of my husband’s espionage work foreign chancelleries were kept posted with intelligence of this side of Bolshevik work. At every turn he was impeding the operations of the Bolsheviks. The Soviet recognised in him their most dangerous and courageous enemy and sighed to be able to put into execution the death sentence which they had passed on him in his absence seven years before.

  In the meantime, however, his business affairs did not prosper. Things gradually grew worse and worse. At last he could justifiably dispense with the services of Mlle G. – but only after she had been of great, if unwitti
ng use to him.

  About this time we received a call from Mme Schovalovsky. Until now she had not been near us owing to her intense fear of the Tcheka and the revenge she was sure the Bolsheviks were preparing for her. This woman was the daughter of a professor of languages at Moscow. She had been attached for a time to the Soviet embassy in Paris, and her father, a convert to Communism, had remained in the Russian capital. Following her flight from Paris he had been arrested on a charge of complicity and imprisoned in the Loubianka, and Mme Schovalovsky was greatly perturbed about his fate. Now, however, she had received a letter from him saying that he was seriously ill and imploring to see her again before his death. The letter hinted at many things, and suggested that he had been wounded while effecting his escape, and that he was lying in a dangerous condition at the house of a friend in Moscow. It was unlikely that he would live long, or that he would be able to travel far, otherwise he would make some attempt to come to America and see his daughter before he died.

  Mme Schovalovsky was distraught. What was she to do? She waited anxiously for further news. When it came it brought her round to Sidney for advice. The old man wrote imploring her to return to Europe. He might be able to escape from Russia and meet her in Paris or Berlin. ‘Shall my old eyes never behold you again?’ he wrote. ‘I fancy you near me sometimes, and that I can see your dear mother’s head, as she dozes in her chair. Am I never to see my child before I die? God’s will be done.’ And this time he enclosed some money. It was enough for her passage.

  The thought of her old father lying untended in Moscow was altogether too much for Mme Schovalovsky. Yet she feared to return. What was she to do? Sidney was of opinion that she would be quite safe as long as she did not enter Russia itself. Berlin was nearer to the frontier indeed but not more dangerous than New York. Long and earnestly we discussed the question between us. And in the meantime another letter arrived from her father, asking When are you coming?

  Mme Schovalovsky’s mind was made up. She would return to Europe, and endeavour to get her father out of Russia. Sidney gave her letters of introduction to friends in Berlin, and instructed her to ask their advice, before admitting any change in the plans which we formulated together. She was to wait in Berlin, and make no attempt to see her father unless he could be brought to her there.

  So Mme Schovalovsky set sail, and in due course we heard from Sidney’s friends in Berlin of her arrival there. From there she proceeded to Warsaw, where she was to meet her father and herself conduct him to Berlin.

  We heard from Sidney’s friend in Berlin of her going to Warsaw and of the reasons for it. A message had reached her at Berlin that her father lay desperately ill, and that the friends who were hiding him could guarantee only to bring him as far as Warsaw. At Warsaw apparently it was the same story and Mme Schovalovsky proceeded to the frontier. She was never heard of again.

  Several possibilities present themselves with regard to the fate of Mme Schovalovsky, all of which are consistent with what we know of the Bolshevik methods.

  (1) Her own father might have acted as a provocation agent and used her affection for him to lure her back to the vengeance which awaited her.

  (2) The friends, who hid him, might have done so only as part of the scheme by which the Soviet was to achieve its revenge.

  (3) The correspondence which passed between them might have been opened and read from the start by the Tcheka.

  The circumstances of her disappearance and the fact that her ‘friends’ played into the Bolsheviks’ hands render the two former possibilities more likely.

  Sidney had a complete list of those who were secretly working for the Bolshevik cause in America. In obtaining it I played my part for the first time in espionage work. Mlle G. was our unknowing ally.

  As soon as Sidney knew that Mlle G. was forwarding copies of his letters to her employers, he wrote a letter to a friend, in which he stated that he was meeting a wealthy American, whom he designated by an initial, at such and such a café at such and such a time. He went on to say that the American was prepared to finance a great anti-Bolshevik scheme, on which Sidney was engaged. Needless to say, this American had no real existence, but Sidney knew that the Bolsheviks would be exceedingly anxious to find out the identity of this supposed ally of my husband’s. In the circumstances he would be closely watched in the café, and by the exercise of a little care should be able to pick out whoever was spying on him.

  Accordingly at the time fixed Sidney took up his position at a table where he could command the whole of the room. I was to join him at the end of half an hour, when he had made his observations.

  At the end of the half hour I came and sat at his table and Sidney gave me a minute description of the man who was watching him. Meantime my husband kept on consulting his watch, and finally gave me a note, with which I ostensibly departed.

  Just outside the entrance to the café I took up my position in hiding, and closely watched the door. After a little Sidney came out, called a taxi and drove away. Immediately afterwards there emerged the man whom Sidney had described to me, called another taxi and went in pursuit of him. In a third cab I followed him. Sidney drove straight back to the place where we lived, and the spy, seeing no advantage in further pursuit, left him there. Shortly afterwards I lost my quarry in the traffic.

  For the next two or three weeks Sidney hunted high and low for this man. At the end of that time my husband and I were dining in a famous New York restaurant. Just before we sat down a friend came up to Sidney, and they went out together. In excusing himself to me Sidney said that he would not be away more than five minutes.

  But five minutes passed and he had not come. A quarter of an hour went by, and still he was absent. At the end of half an hour I was thoroughly alarmed. I went outside and asked the doorkeeper if my husband had gone out. The doorkeeper, who knew Sidney, did not remember having seen him.

  At the end of an hour I went back to our home. Sidney was not there. I will make no attempt to describe my feelings as hour followed hour and still he did not return. I did not know what to do nor what steps to take.

  What had happened in the meantime was this. Sidney parted with his friend at the door of the restaurant and was just about to return to me, when who should pass but the man for whom he had been searching high and low during the last few weeks? Sidney wasted no time. Just as he was, in evening dress, without coat or hat, he went in pursuit, and this time the chase was rewarded. He followed the man to a house, where his quarry knocked in a peculiar manner. The door was half opened and the man slipped in. Sidney kept the house under observation for some time. Several other men arrived, one or two of whom he knew to be Bolsheviks, knocked in the same manner and were admitted. And in this way was discovered the great haunt of the Bolsheviks in New York.

  From this place the Soviet was financing the cause of revolution in America, distributing propaganda, and incidentally trying to raise loans in America. From here too Sidney’s own movements were being watched.

  In a short time we had a complete list of the names and descriptions of the people from whom we might fear danger in New York. About half of them were American citizens, but there was not one who was not Russian by birth.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  BEFORE ME AS I write I have the mass of correspondence which passed between my husband and Commander E. The Commander was an old friend of Sidney’s and had served with him in the Intelligence Department during the War. He was now attached to the British consular service at a town very close to the Russian frontier.

  On a superficial reading these letters, which passed between E. in the Baltic and Sidney in New York, might seem to deal entirely with a commercial enterprise in which the correspondents were interested. Some of them indeed had no deeper significance. Others, to whosoever had eyes to see, were carrying backwards and forwards information of the gravest political and international importance.

  One of these dated from Reval, 24 January 1925, I will quote at length:


  Dear Sidney,

  There may call on you in Paris from me two persons named Krasnoshtanov, man and wife. They will say they have a communication from California and hand you a note consisting of a verse from Omar Kahyam which you will remember. If you wish to go further into their business you must ask them to remain. If the business is of no interest you will say ‘Thank you very much, Good Day.’

  Now as to their business. They are representatives of a concern which will in all probability have a big influence in the future on the European and American Markets. They do not anticipate that their business will fully develop for two years, but circumstances may arise which will give them the desired impetus in the near future. It is a very big business and one which it does not do to talk about, as others, who have a suspicion that the concession is obtainable, would give their ears to know all about who is at the back of it and why they themselves cannot make any headway. There are especially two parties very much interested. One, a strong International group, would like to upset the whole concern as they fear their own financial interest in the event of the enterprise being brought to a satisfactory conclusion. The other, a German group, would like very much to come in, but the originators, represented by the two persons mentioned above, through whom it is important that arrangements for future communication be made, and who have worked hard on the preliminary work ever since they left Russia, will have nothing to do with them as they fear this particular group would want to take too much into their own hands. They have therefore connected up with a smaller French group consisting of less ambitious persons. The undertaking is so large, however, that they fear this group will not be able to handle it alone. They are therefore wanting to enter into negotiations with an English group who would be willing to work in with the French group. It is to be thoroughly understood, however, by anyone coming in that when the enterprise is firmly established the board will be composed from those who have done the spade work. They refuse at present to disclose to anyone the name of the man at the back of the enterprise. I can tell you this much – that some of the chief persons interested are members of the opposition groups. You can therefore fully understand the necessity for secrecy.