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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (April 27, 1913)
THE SEMI-MONTHLY MAGAZINE SECTION game of cards to see winch of their collaborators they should deliwr he it to Germany, be it to Fiance. And so, as I say, these professional spies, who handle the espionage of Knrope - who have formed and perfected a clearing-house of treason in the fair citv of Mmsels arc the hlackost and bas est critninnis on this continent or on any other. Some of them 1 have named: and I shall name others. The Lady of Ostend ALWAYS in that perturbed month of January; fMienrge Charles Parrolt, a warrant olllcer in the Roynl Navy was convicted at the Old Mailey in Lon don of selling naval secrets to an "unknown man" nt Ostend. lie was sentenced to four years hard labor. There was a touch of romance in his story. At a musie-hall in London one evening lie had sat next to a pretty woman. She admired the represen tation of a scene on the deck of a battleship, but the Avarrant ollicer assured her it was not correct. So they fell into talk; and they supped together. She told him she was going to Ostend and asked if he could not run over there for a week-end with her. I'arrott said his holiday was almost due and he would go. That was the beginning. In Ostend be was brought into touch with a man who gave the name of "Richard." And the poor fool of a warrant of ficer, with twenty years of honorable service to his credit, was persuaded to betray his country; and he did it. of course, for money for the Lady of Os tend docs not lead the simple life and her tastes are expensive. Who this man was, I'arrott did not know. All he could tell the court was that his address was Monsieur Richard, Padre Herbert Carre, Weuk slradte Hclgimn. And of the Lady of Ostend he knew only that her name was Rose. What he did not know, you may if you will read here. In the blithest and most fashionable restaurant in I'russels, where a gypsy band plays waltzes and rag time, and girls chielly undesirables dance be tween the tables, 1 sat with the Lady of Ostend and ate little, coppery oysters that had also come from Ostend. It was over three years since I bad seen her. At that time she was under a cloud. Indeed, she had been in prison at Hheims, charged with at tempted treason. Her name at that time was Hose Hennequiii. "My name has always been Rose," she says smil jng. When Hose smiles, one understands, in part, her power over men. She is thirty now, or v it ! y near it; tall. slim, w 1 1 h a pretty feverish air of fascina tion about her; brown-eyed with abundant hair of a lighter dye ; with nice lips and teeth and animated, gestic ulating bauds. Today she is the most attract ie of the great in ternational Spies do haute lin age and with the ono excep tion to he noted, she is the clc cr est. First of all she is a lady by birth and educa tion. She was born (according to the police rec ords in Paris) in 1SS-1, near Orange. There Is no need of printing; h e r e li o r fat h e r's name. She was married v e r y young to a man in the French diplomatic serv ice. She was a w i 1 d, extrava gant girl. What she wanted was inouey and she found it. It was brought to her by that man who llgured so conspicuously in the Mrcy fus case, the man who called himself the Napoleon of Spies ami who was the (icrman agent in Mrusscls Richard de fucrs. She became one of his collaborator; and she was one of the most successful. She worked in France in conjunction with a man named llenne (tiiii, whose name she has since been known by. Richard de fuels became dissatislied with Hemic quill and sold him to the French poluc :i! Ann-. where he was imprisoned tor three years. Rose lneanw hile rose to high grades in the spy-seiicc of Germany. She was entrusted with the correspondence w Inch passed between the (ieriuan an thorities and their agents m France. Her zeal, her attiwtv and her Jiiicssr at traded the at tention of the great elmis Herman espionage and tlu e trusted her with an importa ' mission. There for the iirsi, a' d. I think, the only tune, she laded. This is the way it happened. Rose was summoned to Mrussels by the Napoleon of Spies and taken thence to Met, where she was presented to the chief of tin German spy-service. Major win Rock, of the Kighth Mawirian. who is known to the spies as Paul Leopoldus. It was under this name that all reports were sent to him, the address being simply "Metz." Von Rock is a stout, high-colored man, over fifty, with thick red mustaches. He is a free handed, jolly-appearing man and the spies all speak hnjih oi his generosity. His aidr-di'-tralicxmi is Schull.. a cap tain in the engineers, who lives at No. S rue Sie. Ilelene in Treves, and to whom letters are sent ad dressed Fraulein Milon his wife's maiden name. In addition to these, Rose met Louis Koch and a French renegade. Schwartz who had once been a commis sary of police near Paris. What they wanted was a lot of important documents in the French military bureau of Longwy-Ilaiit. They knew that a French soldier of the name of Mariner had connaissaiice of them. He was, at that moment, in the J;t2ud Infantry stationed at Hheims. To him they sent the siren Pierre Tliietscn, first of con temporary ipies Rose. Maibicr fell in low with her. as many men lime fallen; hut He was honest and when she tried to pcisuadc linn to betray his country he untitled his colonel. And Rose, for a little while, knew lite ihnk side of the pi ison-hoiisc of Rheinis. She beliew'd that Richaul tie fuers for no one spy trusts another -had sold her to the French authorities. So she entered into a little colispnaix numnM i lull Napoleon of Spies, aided by the Finn h "sri ire ot itilormal ion." Richard de fuel's was keen on yetting some of the cartriducs of the Lehel rille. Rose had I hem sent to him, hut the cai indues had been "dosed" by French engineers and the purls ot the Lehel villi's sent him weie ciiially "fake." Then she de noiiuced de fliers to the Merlin am horities and that Napoleon ot Spies was sent otherwhere, tills successor was Pierre Thiesscn, of w hoin there is much to be said.) "And the Kiiglishnian .'" I asked. Rose laughed softly. iiiis alums fail Ic coup de Iit Imrd," she said. After all, Richard de fuers is the Napoleon of Spies and it was Ins historic method that brought the Knglish warrant ollicer to Os tend -and to dishonor. It was the same plan he used with Thics sen who was to succeed him as chief of the German spy system, with hcad-iiiartcrs in MrusscN. Thiesscn was a uou commissioned ollicer in I be Mclgian army, lie was stationed at Vcr- ters. Handsome, wiiu. n spendthrift, he borrowed money from de fuers. who urged him to go to Paris. jjiij "M ""VOf will send me." fuel's said, "newspaper cor respondence and clippings from the daily papers I am establishing a press bureau here." Soon the newspaper correspondence was trans formed into plans of fortresses and photographs of strategic railway lines; and Thiesscn was arrested and imprisoned for fhe years in France. He re lurncd to Melgiuin to take, dually, the place of fuers. lie is known as Midler and as .lean Lacosle, hut now and (hen for the sake of auhl lung syne he assumes the name of his former chief. And it was as Richard that be met the Knglish warrant ollicer, engaged him as a "newspaper correspondent" en tangled him in treason and, in the end, sold him with cynical unconcern to the Mritish govcruincnt. That is Richard's historic coup. When a spy has risen to the high rank attained by Rose lleiiiieiiiu, she receives her money and her in si ructions direct from the army bead of the spy system. Thus, at present she is "working" for Major win Rock. She sends him no letters from France, for instance. That would be too dangerous, for cwry Kuropcau po.stollice department has its "dark chain her" where suspicious letters aic examined. In case she has something of importance to communicate by post the letter is sent across the frontier and put in a German letter box. There is only one exception. When Rose, or any other spy in good standing, needs money word is sent by post-card. For example some morning Paul Leopoldus receives a picture post-card, representing the cathedral of Rouen. On the card there is not a word, not a signature, not an initial, not a mark; nothing. Hut Leopoldus under stands. He steams the card for a moment and takes off the postage stamp. Underneath is written in lead-pencil: H. H. fill fi()() At dcuert ihe Announced gaily thai ihr had a iurpriie for them all It is as clear as day, Rose Ilciiucquiti, whose num ber in the spy register is fi!f, requests that five hun dred francs be sent her at Rouen; anil the next day she receives a dve-liiiiidred-franc note in a plain en velope. Hose is "working" to use her own eiipbimislic phrase for Germany at the present time. And she works indifferently in Kngland or France. It is her business to get in touch with men so placed that they can betray naval or military secrets. "1 have never worked except in France and Kng land," she said. "They wanted me to go to Russia, but that did n't appeal to me. If anything had hap pened ! The Russians arc not chivalrous no, I won't work in Russia." (Cnulinucd on Page 12)