FRENCH SUBMARINE TREACHERY.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIX, Issue 148, 22 June 1918, Page 15

FRENCH SUBMARINE TREACHERY.

PLANS SOUS SO KRDPPS IN 1903. AR___2. OF A M-XSTEJRIOUS MAiRQUIS-EIfGINEER. The arrest of an engineer of uncertain nationality, the Marquis Laurent D'Ecquevilley -Montjustin, releases another remaraable story of treason and espionage. The marquis is accused of selling plans of French submarines to Krupp and other German firms, for -whom he worked formerly, and in whose pay he remained when he eventually returned to France. Cuban, Spanish, Austrian, or French— it is difficult to say exactly which —the Marquis D'Ecquevilley wa* admitted to the Ecole ties Mines in IS9I through the

recommendation of the Spanish Ambassador, aud two years later, having passed his examination, obtainee a post at the

Mediterranean shipyards, the forges, and chantiers. In 1896 he entered the employ of the Vulkan Company at Stettin, and In ISO 9he came back to France to work with Goubet, the submarine inventor.

Here must be placed the first significant fact in connection with his career. Two years after the beginning of the marquis' collaboration with Gonbet. Krupp launched a submarine identical to the Goubet model. In 3!»01 ITEcquevilley was employed in Paris and at Toulon, and, according to the version now published, was in the pay of Krupp's, who. two years later were in possession of the plans of the French submarine Aigrette, a copy of which was launched at Kiel in lflOs. Subsequently the marquis made frequent sojourns in Germany, working sometimes at Kiel, sometimes at Fiume. He is, indeed, declared to be the man who built tile German and Austro-Hungarian submarine fleets. lie returned to France at the outbreak' iof war, and, claiming to be the son of a Frenchman, although born in Vienna, ob ; tamed a certiHcate of FTench nationality' and was mobilised as a motor car driver in a regiment of artillery. I Sent on a special mission to England in lOin, D'Ecqnevilley found himself the object of suspicion, notwithstanding his assertion that his mother was English, and the British authorities expelled Mm. Nevertheless, it was not till quite recently that suspicion fell on him in 'France The circumstances of his arrest, -while supervising the building of concrete ships at Bordeaux, ar,e not yet clear, rmt It Is now recalled that, when in 190:5 the plans of the Aigrette were stolen from the offices of the celebrated naval engineer T-auhenf, D'Ecquevilley was suspected of the crime, and soon afterwards It tvas known that Krupp's poreessed the stolen plans, anS were paying the man -who communicated j them f.TOO a year and ten per cent on all i orders.

The traitor is said to have made a fortune of several millions.