by Nigel West
Then a meeting was arranged to take place at the Hotel Cosmopolite in Brussels on the morning of 23 February. MO5 had of course followed the correspondence and the case was dealt with on novel lines that would effectually prevent the Germans from engaging Evans. Melville first saw Evans to assure himself of his identity. Then, posing as Soedermann, he interviewed the man at Brussels, in the Grand Marine Hotel, on the evening of the 22nd and again on the morning of the 23rd, and saw him off to England by the 1.16 train to Ostend.
Soedermann induced Evans to sign an application for employment in the German Secret Service, but warned him that should nothing come of the application it would be owing to the fact that Evans had left the Royal Navy seven years earlier. Meanwhile ‘F’, who was an MO5G agent, was impersonating Evans at the Cosmopolite and when the representative of Chernyakoff arrived, F professed absolute ignorance of anything to do with the affair. The German waited at Brussels till the evening of the 24th on the chance of the real Evans appearing.
Evans waited for about six weeks, then he wrote again to Soedermann on 13 May and at the same time made arrangements to sell his knowledge to the British Secret Service. When accused he gave a true account of his interview with William Melville, he was dealt with gently and warned of the danger of getting in touch with German agents. Evans had been on the SWL heading ‘Watch’, but the entry was cancelled on 29 July 1914. But he was a marked man and although the case was dropped, when he was again brought to the notice of MO5 they followed his movements with perhaps undeserved suspicion.
One more case of incitement to treason deserves mention. W. E. Robson, an electrician on HMS Cochrane, answered the advertisement. MO5 received the stock letter of 17 February and wrote accepting its suggestions. His letter was intercepted and the Home Office Warrant on his name produced a letter from Portsmouth dated 14 March with a passage referring guardedly, but in a tone of alarm, to the episode, and in a way that threw doubt on the loyalty both of Robson and the writer. The letter purported to be written by a woman and was signed ‘Rose’. A copy of the letter was sent to Sir Graham Greene but on the same day, Robson reported the matter to his Admiral Commanding. In February 1914 MO5 recalled the incident and asked for enquiry to be made by the police at Portsmouth, on the grounds that they were not satisfied that Robson had made a complete avowal or discontinued his correspondence.
The report furnished by the police showed that Robson’s wife and child occupied part of 59 Wadham Road, North End, Portsmouth with a pensioned naval engine-room artificer named Rose. It would seem that in this case the intervention of a navy man brought Robson to his senses.
*
Gosta Olai came to live with Reuben Salter at Vansittart Street in Harwich on about 9 September 1912. He gave out that he was a Swede studying the English language, and he received remittances in Swedish money which he changed at the consulate. About the first week in November he was planning to go to a London college.
Inspector Sandercock, who had been stationed at Harwich with a view to detecting cases of espionage, drew the attention of MO5 to Olai’s suspicious intercourse with Robert Burn Nichol, a torpedo coxswain of Torpedo-Boat 26. Nichol was known to have spoken disloyally and to have boasted of having documents stolen from HMS Vernon concealed in his bunk. Two days later, Sandercock reported that on 5 November, Nichol had awaited Olai’s return from London in a tavern, and at a late hour of the evening had produced documents from the lining of his cap and from his person. Olai had then noted down the contents.
A search warrant for Olai and his rooms was taken out at once and executed, but nothing was found. Olai, however, left Harwich suddenly either on the 12th or 13th and went to St Anthony’s at Torrington Square in London. Torpedo-Boat 26 had also left Harwich for Sheerness, and it was supposed that Olai intended to work with Nichol from London.
Meanwhile, Leading Torpedoman Alexander of Torpedo-Boat 26 had also become implicated with Nichol and Olai. Circumstances aiding, the commanding officer of Torpedo-Boat 26 obtained the information that Nichol and Alexander were engaged in business which they dare not discuss openly, involving the receipt of money and communication with a particular address. A search of Alexander’s effects produced one of Olai’s cards bearing an incitement to discontent and treason saying he was a fool to stay in the navy when there was money to be earned outside. Moreover, Nichol was spending his time stirring up strife on the mess-deck. By an ingenious combination of the commanding officer of Torpedo-Boat 26, Nichol and Alexander were separated and Nichol was discharged to the depot at Chatham.
MO5 kept Olai under observation and he left the boarding house in Torrington Square penniless on 25 November, but in the course of the following weeks he received two remittances and departed for Sweden on 16 December. He had been very silent at the boarding-house and had had no visible occupation. Moreover, a letter received by him from his landlady at Harwich had shown that he was acting in collusion with someone else. In November, he had written to Nichol asking for news of the Italian accident and showing that he given money both to Nichol and Alexander. In January 1913 Alexander wrote congratulating Nichol on having obtained the other book, and asking for Olai’s address.
The prompt action of the commanding officer of TB-26 merely postponed further treachery: the men remained scoundrels. On the other hand, the value of the power to search on suspicion is here apparent. It seems to have frightened Olai and interfered with his efficiency. Probably his worst achievement was the legacy of discontent which he left behind him. Robert Burn Nichol (who had been on the Watch List) and Gosta Olai were put on the SWL under heading ‘Wanted if in Great Britain’. There is no record of what happened. Nichol was transferred from the Watch to the Arrest List on 2 July 1914.
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In October 1913 22-year-old Dorothy Chalmers despatched letters from her home at 69 Leyland Road in Southport, couched in almost precisely similar terms to an officer of HMS Suffolk and of HMS Lancaster whose names she had seen in the Naval and Military Record of which she was an assiduous reader. She expressed great interest in naval matters and asked each officer to become her naval correspondent. The letters were supposed to emanate from an agent of a foreign power and were forwarded to the Admiralty in accordance with the order of July 1913. On 16 December Major Kell wrote to the Chief Constable of Southport explaining the circumstances and asking for enquiry about the lady. The Chief Constable forwarded particulars stating that he saw no cause to suspect her.
In March the case was revived by the action of the officer commanding the Royal Naval Barracks Devonport. He wrote direct to the Chief Constable asking for enquiry and the Chief Constable reported the matter to Major Kell. Investigation showed that Miss Chalmers had written in much the same terms as stated above to a young officer who had brought the letter to Commander Pilcher and by the letter’s instructions answered it in suitable terms. The correspondence continued and in all about six letters were exchanged between 19 and 28 February.
The terms of the girl’s letters were foolish, but it was not quite clear whether her intentions were innocent from the point of view of the Service. Her correspondence was watched from the 17 March to 30 April and eventually it was decided that she was merely foolish. Her mother was warned of her daughter’s behaviour and of the suspicions attaching to it and she undertook to put a stop to it. Commander Pilcher was rebuked for taking action before reporting the matter to the authorities and so running risk of impeding the action of the department properly constituted to deal with such matters.
CHAPTER II
1914
EARLY in February 1914 letters were intercepted which showed that the German Secret Service was transferring its very determined attack upon the loyalty of the navy from the personnel afloat to the personnel of the dockyards. The first group of agents to come under investigation consisted of Peter Gregory, Lina Heine, Celso Rodriguez, Sam Maddick, Francis Bubenheim and his employee, E. J. Knight.
Under the guise of collecting articles and materia
ls for a Russian paper which was to keep track of all the navies of all the world, A. Kutusow, giving the address: c/o Mme Muller, Pachecostrasse 81, Brussels, was carrying on the work begun by Soedermann and continued under the names of Chernyakoff and Lindstrom. How he gained touch with Gregory, a ship-fitter of Portsmouth Dockyard, was never ascertained, but most likely it was by the distribution of a typed circular through the Inland Post.
On 7 February Edwin J. Gregory wrote from 23 Copnor Road, Portsmouth, to A. Kutusow, chez Mme Muller, Pachecostrasse 81, Brussels, enclosing an article on the recruiting and training of naval men, and suggesting for his next subject the training and differences of the engineering branch of the British Navy. He asked to be paid at a flat rate of £2 for every article, long or short, and once more protested that he would supply no information prohibited by the law of ‘this England’.
Kutusow replied that the information received was neither accurate nor according to promise and he enclosed a list of questions about the manpower in certain ships and in the barracks, about the fitting of wireless on submarines, and the storage and supplies of fuel oil. He also enclosed £2 for the next report.
To this Gregory answered indignantly that he was not a spy and would not give the required information, not even for £30, much less for so paltry a sum as £2; but if Kutusow really were an editor, he would be glad to discuss matters in a personal interview. And Gregory returned the questions but kept the £2.
Kutusow expressed great surprise; he alone as editor could write the articles for his paper; the information asked for was not for publication but for his own use, he was writing about all the navies of the world and must be able to judge of the whole. And he was only asking for such details as anyone living in Portsmouth could easily get to know. Besides, the more detailed the answers the better the pay.
With this explanation Gregory was satisfied; he wrote that he would answer the questions but he required an advance. He even became very anxious when the answer to his letter was delayed and wrote a second and a third time. This third letter was not seen by MO5. Eventually Kutusow returned the list of questions, and after an interval sent £2, and finally explained the various delays by his having been obliged to send to England for more postal orders. At each stage of this correspondence, action was taken with the objects of identifying the writer, collecting proofs which could be produced against him in open court, and rendering his action harmless.
Major Kell wrote to Sir Frederick Wodehouse, Assistant Commissioner, New Scotland Yard, asking that the officers at the dockyard should ascertain who and what Edwin J. Gregory was. Through Mr Fetherston of the Investigation Branch of the GPO application was made for the production of the postal orders sent from Berlin. These were forwarded to MO5 on 5 March. On 28 February the dockyard police reported that it was Peter, not Edwin J. Gregory, who lived at Copnor Road. Edwin was a bricklayer employed in the dockyard, ‘but Peter Gregory, who was supposed to be the father of Edwin, was a pensioner artificer engineer of the Royal Navy and at that time employed as a ship-fitter in the manager-construction department of the dockyard. Edwin J. Gregory had been kept under observation for some days but without result.
When Gregory proposed a meeting with the foreign agent Scotland Yard was informed in order that it might watch proceedings. On 20 March, Major Kell wrote to the police suggesting that Peter Gregory was using his son’s name, or the son was using his father’s address, as cover for dealings with foreign agents and he asked for specimens of the handwriting of each, but the police now discovered there was probably no connection between Edwin and Peter, for the only son of Peter Gregory was said to be Frederick Charles William, a draughtsman employed in the Mould Loft, and had recently left his father’s house after quarrelling with him. They enclosed specimens of the handwriting of each of the three Gregorys. None of these being recognised as that of Kutusow’s correspondent, recourse was had to a ruse. Mr Melville wrote under the name of Morgan to enquire about an Edward Gregory who died intestate, and, in the required handwriting, there came a reply, signed either E. Gregory or Gregory, for the signature might be read either way, acknowledging the relationship and asking for the enquirer’s credentials. Morgan then pointed out the strange circumstance that whereas he had addressed his letter to P. Gregory, he had received a reply signed E. Gregory. Gregory bluffed, declared he had signed with his surname only and threatened to place the matter in the hands of a solicitor. And there the affair ended.
Having thus made sure of his man, Major Kell wrote begging the central authorities to inform the dockyard police that Peter Gregory was in touch with a foreign power and using the name Edwin J. Gregory as cover. He also brought the case before the Admiral Commander-in-Chief, suggesting that if Gregory were able to obtain confidential information at his post he should be quietly transferred to other work. The Secretary replied stating that Peter Gregory was not in a position to learn much and that when his job was finished he should be transferred to the tool-shop but Frederick Charles, the son, was employed in a place so secret that even the writer himself was not admitted to it and he might be giving valuable information to his father. Captain Drake’s answer exonerated the son.
Early in April it had been noted that although the address Stiller, Pachecostrasse 81, Brussels came out during the Gould trial, the incident seemed to have passed unnoticed by the German authorities and no fresh address had been given to Gregory. Still, one at least of his letters had slipped through the mesh, so the precaution was taken of sending specimens of his handwriting to the GPO with the request that they would watch for any fresh address to which he might be writing.
In spite of this however, on 4 May, Kutusow acknowledged receipt of a letter of which there is no trace in the file. It contained Gregory’s answers to some of the questions. Kutusow enclosed £2 but he was dissatisfied with the replies; he enclosed a fresh list and if satisfactory answers were received a regular weekly salary would be offered. The new questions required exact information about the fitting and number of tubes on ships of the Iron Duke class; the number, range and speed of torpedoes carried by them; the reliability of the gyro when the torpedo was used at its highest range; about the torpedo tubes, heavy guns and armour of the Queen Elizabeth and Royal Sovereign, then under construction; and the date on which the battleship of the year’s programme was to be laid down.
Moreover the omission noted above was silently made good, the envelope was endorsed: 10 rue des Longs Chariots, Brussels, but Gregory did not take the hint; he replied to the old address saying that he was anxious to answer these questions but it would be much more difficult and he would have to pay more for the answers.
A. Kutusow then forwarded £2 to cover the next set of questions and endorsed the envelope: Jaecker, 10 rue des Longs Chariots. About a month later Gregory wrote, still to the old address, that after making every effort and running great risks he could not get the information about the new ships, it was altogether too dangerous a job, but he could write articles. The correspondence ceased at this point.
When the second list of questions passed through the post, the police were informed that P. Gregory had already cashed postal orders at Southampton in the name of Edwin J. Gregory, that it was likely that he would soon be receiving others from abroad, and it was particularly desirable to connect him with these. General observation was asked for, for the next few days, but such that he should not suspect he was being watched.
Two receipts for registered packets from Brussels, dated 16 April 1914 and 5 May 1914 and signed E. Gregory, were submitted on 8 May but the police had to report that they had never seen him enter a post-office, though several letters had been delivered at his house.
Two other receipts seem to have been extracted for Mr Fetherston. Gregory was placed on the list of men to be kept under observation on the outbreak of war and in October the dockyard police pressed for some action to be taken. On 3 October, Gregory applied for leave so that he might volunteer as an artificer engineer and his appl
ication was forwarded to MO5 for consideration, but while they were consulting as to whether the authorities would be justified in dismissing the man without reason given, the police wrote again pressing for some definite information upon which to act: Gregory, then in the tool-shop, was constantly applying to be moved to some place of greater interest in the dockyard where he could see what was being carried out in the way of fresh construction and fittings.
MO5 replied that, although there was no doubt that Gregory had been for some six months engaged in correspondence with a foreign agent, there was no reason to believe that he had been able to give any important information, and, in view of certain difficulties about bringing a charge under the Official Secrets Act, they would submit the case for disciplinary action to the decision of the Admiralty. This would relieve the police of further responsibility.
A précis of the facts was forwarded to the Admiralty and the question was definitely raised as to whether Gregory should continue to be employed, and if so, whether he ought not to be removed from Portsmouth. His case was compared with that of Mott and an offer was made to draw up the necessary questionnaire should the Admiralty decide to mete out the same treatment to Gregory. There is no record of their Lordships’ decision.
The case offers a good instance of the graduated attack of the German chief spy. At first the information is to be supplied in articles of a general and innocent nature. Then definite questions, such as anyone living on the spot could easily answer by reference, apparently, to a navy list, follow. These questions have some relation to the subject on which the victim was willing to supply information and the fiction of writing for a newspaper is kept up. Money is sent and the cupidity of the informant aroused. Then, when he has accepted the money and is in the tills, the thrust goes home and the real question, which from his specialised knowledge he might be expected to answer, is put, together with the barely veiled offer to engage him as a paid spy.