Meeting the Enemy Read online

  As the days passed that August, panic and fear gripped the small British community in Germany as soldiers were deployed along roads and railway lines. Hilda Pickard-Cambridge watched from her window as four sentries were posted near her hotel, all armed, stopping and levelling their rifles at any car that appeared. She heard that innocent people had been shot by overzealous officials and rumours proliferated of spies being caught and even executed.

  I could see four men kneeling in the street, pointing their rifles at a motor-car which was coming down the hill. An officer gave two sharp orders, and I waited breathlessly for the signal to fire, when there were cries of ‘Halt Halt!’ The car came to a standstill at the very point of the guns, and the soldiers pulled one of their own officers out of the car! Then there were more shrieks, and the sentries turned sharply round, and pointed their rifles down the road in the opposite direction. Another car was stopped, and this time a party of French people, two ladies and two little boys were dragged out, and taken to one of the other hotels. I watched their car being carefully searched and taken away.

  There was fury in Germany at Britain’s declaration of war: fury but also a profound and widespread sense of betrayal. Before the war, wrote the Reverend Williams, Britain had ‘continually bombarded Germany with assurances of good intentions and appeals for the improvement of friendly relations between the two countries’. This tended to create a strained and artificial atmosphere. ‘In Berlin we had visits from Lord Haldane and various delegates of societies for international peace and understanding . . .’ The attempt at understanding might have been misinterpreted by the Germans, ‘as implying friendship under all circumstances and peace at any cost’. Williams was not surprised when, as war broke out, Britain was accused of deliberately betraying Germany’s trust in her friendship, ‘and King George the Fifth was portrayed on a particularly scurrilous picture-postcard, on sale, as “Der Judas von England”’.

  War between France and Germany was long expected and much anticipated. Both countries had worked out detailed plans for the mobilisation and deployment of millions of men in the event of conflict. The French had their plan XVII, which envisaged an immediate attack on, and the recovery for France of, the disputed lands of Alsace and Lorraine. The Germans had their Schlieffen Plan, which anticipated the French strike. In response to this, a relatively small German force would be sent to engage and draw on the French forces, while a much larger force would be sent north through neutral Belgium in order to sweep south on Paris, simultaneously trapping French forces between German armies marching south-east and those already in action in Alsace and Lorraine. Given such a scenario, the French army would be quickly annihilated.

  The Schlieffen Plan did not take into account the rapid deployment of a British force on the left flank of the French Fifth Army, an army that was urgently transferred from the eastern frontier to hold back the Germans sweeping through Belgium. In the event, the British Army sent just four divisions of infantry and one division of cavalry to the continent, a paltry number in comparison with the huge conscript armies of France and Germany; two further British divisions would arrive within days. Nevertheless, the embarkation of 70,000 men, with all the required artillery and transport, was a triumph of planning and logistics and, although small in number, the professional soldiers of the BEF (British Expeditionary Force) were a far more forbidding force than their token numbers suggested.

  Although Germany had attacked France through neutral Belgium, most Germans believed that Britain, with problems of her own in Ireland, would stand aside. With Germany already at war with Russia and France, it appeared to Berlin that Britain had fallen on her ‘friend’ merely because it deemed the time propitious. It would not take much, or long, for this view to be transformed into a conviction that Britain had instigated the war all along. The Reverend Williams learnt on ‘unimpeachable authority’ that, so staggered was the Kaiser at the news of Britain’s declaration of war, he was kept from fainting by the quick appearance of a glass of champagne. Whatever the truth, the American ambassador in Berlin, James Gerard, witnessed the public reaction and it was of almost uncontained ‘rage’. A crowd attacked the British Embassy and almost every window was broken, with mounted police making scant effort to protect the legal sanctity of the building and grounds. Shouts of ‘May God punish England’ rang out.

  The German press gave vent to the public fury. Lady Harriet Jephson was trying to leave Altheim but, without money or a return ticket home, she was stuck. In her daily diary she recorded the war from the moment that a young clerk had ‘literally hissed’ at her that England had declared war and shop window signs declaring ‘English spoken here’ were removed.

  Next came the Press announcements, ‘England who poses as the guardian of morality and all the virtues, sides with Russia and assassins!’ Abuse of Sir Edward Grey, of our Government, and all things English, follows . . . The German press is full of the most virulent abuse of England, ‘treacherous,’ ‘Hypocritical,’ ‘lying,’ ‘cowardly,’ ‘boastful,’ there is no bad name they don’t call her! Russia and France and Belgium get no lashings of scorn and fury and hatred such as England does!

  Twenty-three-year-old Edward Sibbe was working in the manufacturing town of Chemnitz, when an elderly businessman, who had previously been friendly, stopped him in the street.

  He enquired whether the English had gone mad, and I told him that I had not observed any traces of insanity when I left home. He then asked me why we had declared war on Germany, and I explained to him that I personally had had very little to do with it. He then got excited, and informed me, that if he ever saw me walking down the street with Sir Edward Grey, he would hang the latter on the nearest lamp post. He then expressed a desire to hang various British statesmen, but as I did not express any fear for the safety of the British Cabinet Ministers, he gradually cooled down, and expressed the hope that whatever happened we might always be friends, which, as I observed, was the only sensible remark he made.

  On 5 August, Reverend Williams entered the embassy to find a large hall filled with unshaven British journalists and correspondents who had been ordered by the German police to remain there overnight, ‘a strange sight’, Williams recalled. He quickly became aware of the prevailing atmosphere of fear and excitement. ‘I’m sure they mean to shoot us,’ one individual said. Williams watched as one of the embassy secretaries ‘who was afflicted with a stammer was doing his utmost to say something urgent on the telephone, but could only produce unintelligible sounds’.

  Their fears were unfounded. The embassy staff, along with the journalists and correspondents, departed by train very early on 6 August, leaving the American Embassy under Gerard to handle British interests. This included looking after scores of distressed British citizens who had become stranded in the capital, living with the threat of arrest and internment. British subjects had already been picked up on their way to the British Embassy and now they would be stopped as they went to the American Embassy. Gerard remonstrated with the Germans when he discovered that British subjects ‘without distinction as to age, or sex’ were being removed to the fortress of Spandau for questioning.

  After the death of Henry Hadley, Elizabeth Pratley had been whisked off for interrogation. Did Mr Hadley have picture postcards or portraits with him of any kind? Had Mr Hadley been seeing other gentlemen while in Berlin? Her replies were deemed evasive or hesitant enough for her to be taken to Münster and a ‘military prison’ for further questioning by an officer. ‘He hoped Mr Hadley had not been espionageing [sic] their ships. I said I was sure Mr Hadley had not. There was an interpreter there [and] he read a paper to me and said I was arrested as a spy.’

  Elizabeth protested her innocence. After extensive searches of her luggage, she was finally released: they had all the information they required, she was informed. Elizabeth was by now in such a weakened and nervous state that she was taken to a Roman Catholic hospital to recover.

  Not every Briton leaving Germany told stori
es of threat and harassment, of an enemy swelling with bellicose pride. Perhaps surprisingly The Times published readers’ letters praising the kindness individuals had received in Germany. One lady, Florence Phillips, took the newspaper to task over a report by a correspondent who described ‘ad nauseam’ and ‘in lurid terms the sufferings experienced by travellers in Germany in the last few days’. Travelling with a friend from Baden-Baden to Berlin, she maintained that that was not her experience.

  We met with much more than the ordinary courtesy extended to women travelling. I was very much impressed by the real kindness and chivalry shown to us on three different occasions by German men, who voluntarily gave up their places to save us from sitting on our bags in a crowded corridor, and who put themselves to much trouble to obtain food for us at the stations . . . I should like to put on record that during all those hours of intense excitement, with a nation newly called to arms, we did not meet with a single instance of rudeness in Germany.

  In another letter dated 8 August under the headline ‘German Kindness’, the exotically named Bampfylde Fuller contended that, throughout a motor tour of Germany in early August, ‘Our experiences have been wholly of kindness and helpfulness. We were stopped every few miles by armed patrols, our papers examined, our boxes sometimes opened, but on no occasion were we offered the least incivility.’ As interesting as these counterpoints are, they are less interesting historically than The Times’s decision to publish them. Britain had yet to become as incensed with Germany as Germany evidently was with Britain. That time would soon come.

  At her hotel in Schwalbach, Hilda Pickard-Cambridge was gradually feeling bolder. After a week she began to venture outside and was reassured by a somewhat perverse notice that English people should not be molested, just in case they turned out to be Americans. Hers was a strange existence. There were no guests at the hotel and so the maids were released and, with the exception of the proprietors, the building was deserted. Hilda waited, not knowing if she might be picked up by either her husband or the Germans. She looked out for war news but this was tainted by aggressive propaganda: it was said that Britain had declared war before Germany had invaded Belgium, that the British instigated the murder of the Austrian Archduke to pre-empt a war that would crush Germany. And then came the news from the front. The Germans were winning hands down, Paris would fall very soon and London shortly afterwards. It all made for dismal reading.

  As Britain went to war, MPs voted to pass the Defence of the Realm Act (DORA) to secure the safety of the nation. It was a broad-sweeping Act, frequently modified, giving the government wide-ranging powers over public and press, with rights to requisition property and land and to control the transport network, including railways, docks and harbours. Individuals contravening the Act were liable to court martial with fines, imprisonment and even death as options.

  Notably, DORA forbade communication that would endanger in any way ‘the success of the operations of His Majesty’s forces’. With Germans constituting the third highest immigrant population, it was self-evident that specific legislation was needed to control the movement and activities of foreign nationals and enemy aliens in particular, the perceived threat from whom the press would quickly and vociferously highlight.

  On 5 August, Reginald McKenna, the Liberal Home Secretary, presented legislation to the House of Commons restricting the movement of all foreigners (the Aliens Restriction Act), and was greeted with broad cross-bench support. Hansard recorders included in parentheses the cheers that met his speech. McKenna assured Members that arrangements had been made to cause as little disturbance to the daily lives of ‘alien friends’ as was possible under the circumstances (that is, the lives of foreigners who were not German, Austrian or Hungarian), while at the same time helping to root out dangerous spies (loud cheers and cries of ‘shoot them’). In another example of early calm, McKenna pointed out that there was ‘concern that Germans who were long resident in the country should be protected’. MPs responded with questions.

  Mr [Joseph] King (Somerset, North) – As one acquainted with many German subjects, some of whom have been resident in the country for many years and are much more British in sentiment than German (hear, hear), I should like some assuring words from the Home Secretary that some regard will be had for these persons. There is a very great deal of apprehension among such persons at the present time. (Cries of ‘Agreed’)

  Mr McKenna (Monmouth, North) – Alien enemies against whom there is no reason whatever to suppose that they are secretly engaged in operations against this country will be subjected to nothing further than registration and the provision that they may not live in the prohibited areas.

  In those first days of war there was no uniform, headlong rush to condemn everything German or Austrian. Newspapers such as the influential East London Observer still took on the mantle of guiding as opposed to being buffeted or swayed by public sentiment. On 8 August, the same day that The Times had published letters from Florence Phillips and Bampfylde Fuller, the East London Observer spoke to its readers in a tone that was both considered and measured.

  The East London German Colony is one which is an advantage and credit to possess. Its members have formed in varying degrees lifelong business and personal ties of mutual respect with the English natives, and we should regard it as more than deplorable if, by word, deed or implication any manifestation of personal sentiment against friends and neighbours, who hate and deplore the present war as much as anyone, should occur to wound their feelings . . . To the German Colony of East London we bear emphatic testimony of their virtues of sobriety, industry and honesty; that we should find the two great nations at deadly war is a bitter grief, but in the indignation of the moment one must not forget to behave oneself justly, and like a gentleman and a friend.

  The country’s pre-war liberal tradition that might have opposed such measures as alien registration was conspicuous by its absence, with little or no protest from the left. Instead, it was the radical right that made the running, accusing the government through Fleet Street newspapers of not doing enough to minimise the threat from Britain’s enemies. Public opinion, fearful of complacency, was won over by those championing tougher laws, and the relative tranquillity inside the House was to be disrupted by the irresistible force of popular will. McKenna’s and King’s calmer sentiments went the way of most things in war once the shooting started, and newspapers pressed for greater restrictions on enemy aliens.

  McKenna’s desire to ‘root out dangerous spies’ was hardly required. Before the war, the Germans had run an almost laughably ineffective espionage network through a British-born subject of German ancestry. His name was Karl Ernst and he owned a barber’s shop in London’s Caledonian Road through which all communication between Germany and its twenty-two spies was passed. Unfortunately for Ernst, he was known to the equally small number of officers who at that time formed Britain’s pre-war intelligence and, according to a former officer named Dunlop, his activities were closely monitored.

  His job was merely to drop all letters received into the nearest letterbox. His salary was quite small, about £12 a year. All letters were opened, read and forwarded on with as little delay as possible. In this way the names and addresses of all German spies were compiled and arrangements were so complete that on the day of the declaration of war only one of the German agents escaped.

  Britain’s counter-espionage services burgeoned during the war and, on the whole, maintained the initiative over the numerically small number of spies sent to Britain. The fact that not one proven act of foreign sabotage took place on British soil underlines the extent to which Britain’s security had enemy espionage under restraint.

  Quick and efficient arrests of Germany’s pre-war spies contrasted with the charges of espionage levelled against others for whom the evidence was flimsy at best. On the first full day of war, the press reported charges against Germans or German sympathisers in coastal towns as far apart as Sheerness, Portsmouth, Falmouth, Penart
h, Swansea and Barrow-in-Furness. Arrests were a precursor of what would develop into a frenzy of anti-German paranoia. Public fear of spies was inflamed by vocal backbench politicians and journalists working for daily newspapers and weekly journals. The power of the press to stoke ‘spy-fever’ pushed the government into introducing ever more stringent controls on enemy aliens, controls that seemed vastly disproportionate to the actual rather than the perceived threat. ‘It is extraordinary how many people were infested with “spy-fever”,’ wrote Dunlop. ‘Nobody who showed a naked light or used a typewriter which made a noise like a wireless transmitter was safe. None of these denunciations, no matter how foolish, could be disregarded as the nerves of the public were on edge . . .’

  All along the British coast, Boy Scouts and well-meaning if often overzealous members of the public acted as volunteer coastguards, patrolling seaside paths and tracks on the lookout for the enemy at sea and spies on land.

  Harry Siepmann, the son of Otto Siepmann and Grace Baker, was in Cornwall enjoying the August bank holiday weekend as a chance to have a break from his work in London. One evening, as he was about to make his way back to his cottage, a thick fog descended and he took a lantern to help light his way. It was only after he had gone some distance that a shadowy figure emerged from the gloom. Levelling a doubled-barrelled shotgun at Harry’s chest, the figure asked him what he was doing.

  I swallowed my resentment and introduced myself.

  ‘I see,’ he said, apparently satisfied. ‘I had better take your name and address to put in my report.’

  That was unfortunate. In 1914, names of Germanic origin did not inspire confidence. In the glow of the lantern I could see the man’s expression change, and the gun was once more levelled in my direction.