Talking About Nazi Spies in the U.S.

From the April 8, 2020, MidWeek  "Looking Back."

1945, 75 Years Ago.

"Those attending the lecture last evening at the high school given by Dorothy Waring were high in the praise of the speaker who spoke on 'Factual Performances of Nazi Spies in the U.S.', a topic which all are interested in  but know little about.

"The speaker was able to give first-hand information as she was an investigator of subversive activities for a former congressional committee and her work as a secret agent brought her into contact with most of the  infamous and dangerous Nazi spies."

Spies Right Here In the Good Old U.S.A.?!!  --GreGen

D-Day + 75 Years-- Part 9: "D-Day Has Come"

The first report of what was taking place in Normandy came from Berlin.  But it said that the invaders landed farther up the French coast which vindicated the Allies' disinformation campaign.  To throw the Germans off scent, they flipped German spies who spoon-fed false information to Berlin and also dropped dummy parachutists on D-Day.

The first bulletin from London was terse:  "D-Day has come,"  a BBC announcer said.  It mirrored the mood of his audience:  hope mixed with trepidation.

In 1940, the French army had collapsed in the face of Hitler's invasion, and the British army barely escaped by being evacuated through the port of Dunkirk.  So it was natural to worry, lest British soldiers be headed to a similar disaster when they were mobilized for D-Day.

--GreGen

FBI Collecting Fingerprints During the War-- Part 1

In the last post, I wrote about the U.S. government wanting fingerprints of persons working in the milk industry in DeKalb County, Illinois.

From the July 8, 2015 History Daily   "FBI's Colossal Fingerprint Filing System During World War II" by John Titor.

A whole lot of photos of interest.  Out wartime government in big-time action.

During the war, the FBI collected over 23 million cards and 10 million fingerprint records and housed them in the Washington, D.C. Armory.  Every month around 400,000 cards were added to the collection.  It took huge resources to investigate potential defectors and spies in the United States.

--GreGen

A Long Forgotten Nazi Memorial Mystery-- Part 4: J. Edgar Hoover Took Credit for Stopping Them

Four days later, John Dasch took the $82,000 he'd been given for the operation -- more than $1 million in today's money --  and boarded a train for Washington.  There he met with FBI agents, whom he expected to welcome him as a hero.

They didn't.

J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the bureau, recognized the opportunity.  In late June, with all eight men captured, Hoover announced their capture in New York -- and claimed credit for the FBI.

He made no mention of Dasch.

A huge war scare rolled over the United States.  Francis Biddle, then attorney general, later wrote in a memoir, "The country went wild."

--GreGen

A Long Forgotten Nazi Memorial Mystery-- Part 3: Here's the Story

At the start of World War II, Adolf Hitler decided he wanted to show the world just how susceptible America was to a German attack so he ordered his military to devise a plan.

The high command recruited eight Germans for the mission.  In teams of four, the men were loaded onto a pair of U-boats, one destined for Jacksonville and the other for a beach near the tip of Long Island.

On June 13, 1942, the New York group reached shore -- and was discovered by an unarmed Coast Guardsman on foot patrol.  The Germans escaped, but by morning the Coast Guard had unearthed the Germans' buried supplies:  fuses, pre-made bombs and four crates of TNT.

Those supplies wouldn't have mattered as their leader, John Dasch, had no intention of setting off any of the bombs.  When the group reached New York City, he and a comrade decided to turn the others in to American authorities, so Dasch phoned the FBI.

--GreGen

A Long-Forgotten Nazi Memorial Mystery-- Part 2: All the Elements of a Great Mystery

Jim  Rosenstock works in resource management for the National Park service and was a big local history buff was curious and skeptical about this stone.  He got involved with finding out about the marker.

As he dug deeper, it had all the elements of a great mystery:  World War II espionage, nationwide panic, a mass electrocution, J. Edgar Hoover chicanery, white supremacists, federal bureaucracy and a U.S. Supreme Court case that played a significant role in America's modern war on terror.

For decades, few people in Washington, or elsewhere, knew of the stone's existence.  It wasn't a secret so much as something that just never got out.

--GreGen

A Long-Forgotten Nazi Memorial Mystery-- Part 1: Six Executed German Agents

From the July 2, 2017, Chicago Tribune "Nazi memorial a long forgotten mystery" by John Woodrow Cox.

This is one really interesting story.

Power company workers were walking  through a rarely visited thicket in Southwest Washington state when they spotted something, a rectangular slab of granite.  Upon closer inspection they saw it was a memorial to honor Nazi spies and it was on U.S. government property.

It said:  "In memory of agents of the German Abwehr executed August 8, 1942.".

Below that were the names of the six executed:

Herbert Hans Haupt
Heinrich Harm Heinck
Edward John Kerling
Hermann Otto Neubauer
Richard Quirin
Wener Thiel

And, at the bottom "Donated By the  N.S.W.P.P."

The whole endeavor had the code name Operation Pastorius.

And, It Thickens.  --GreGen

The Other Man Who Tried to Shoot JFK-- Part 1

From the November 22, 2013, Channel 4 NBC Southern California by Brian T. Brown.

Of special interest what with the recent 50th anniversary of JFK's assassination. Everyone knows of Lee Harvey Oswald, but few, including me, have ever heard of Biuku Gasa, a fisherman in the Solomon Islands, who, back during World War II was working undercover for the United States and saw John Kennedy from a great distance and thought he was Japanese.

He had a rifle that had been discarded in battle, but it had rotted and when he tried to fire it at Kennedy, it locked up and he was unable to do so.

Gasa fled from the scene and an unaware JFK returned to his crew who had arrived at the island after their PT-109 was sunk. Gasa was part of an Allied spy network headed by Reginald Evans.

--GreGen