GERMAN SPIES

Cromwell Argus, Volume L, Issue 2646, 27 October 1919, Page 7

GERMAN SPIES

STORY OF VOX HORST AND LILIAN' TROY.

More interest was excited by the case of Laron Von Horst and Lilian Scott Troy than in thl.it of any other of iho shady characters employed by the Germans in this country before and during the war (says the London ‘Dispatch’), but the mysteries surrounding their activities have net been dispelled until now. In the following article, from an authoritative source, the full story of this extraordinary pair is first disclosed. Most people are firmly convinced that, besides the little army of humbly-paid spies who were set to ferret out naval and military secrets, the German Government was employing persons in high positions to foment political troubles; in England, with a view to paralysing the British Govormn eiVt on the arrival of “ The Day." They were not far wrong, though in one case only was there sufficient evidence to convert suspicion into certainty. This was the cine of Baron Louis Von Horst and Lilian .Scott Tiny. Louis Von TTcst was the son of a Prussian draper in a small way of business. Like many young Germans, he emigrated to America with his brothers, ’and engaged in the hop business. Business took him to Ooburg, where he married tho daughter of the American Vice-Consul. The marriage was not a happy one, and some years before the war Horst came to London without his wife, and founded the Horst Company, dealers in American and German hops, with offices in the city and a factory in Bermondsey.

During one of his visits to Coburg he was created a baron, for reasons that have never been explained. His brothers, who were American citizens, attributed his successful intrigue for a title to vanity, and ■asserted that he was really an American. He himself adopted the prefix of “ von,” and registered himself as «■ German.

OPENING! OF THE CAMPAIGN. About 1912 he made the acquaintance of Miss Troy, an American woman who had lived for some years in this cionntry as a journalist. During the London dock strike in 1912 lie was found to be supporting the strikers with money to an extent which was believed to be outside his means. Close on the heels of the strike came the suffragette disturbances. Horst and Troy at once opened up relations with the leaders, and Horst appeared to surety for one. of the women who was admitted to bail.

While the movement was at its height the landing of arms in Ulster took place, and almost immediately the pair betook themselves to the south of Ireland, partly, they said, to select a suitable localitv for growing hops, and partly to visit Ca-tle Tiny, which the lady declared to be the home of her ancestors. In Ireland Miss Troy was a. lady of wealth and position, who employed Horst as her secretary. Indeed, she was occasionally described as Lady de Troy and as “Miss Lilian Troy, of California, who in the near future will again become the possessor of Castlo Troy.” The pleasant fiction that her ancestors had been evicted from the property was circulated to account for the interest they took in this pact of Ireland. Hop growing was nut the only declared object of the visit In the ‘Limerick Echo’ of December 23, 1913, appeared a letter in which Miss Troy descants upon the advantage of making Queenstown a port of dell for the steamers of the Hamburg-American Line, slif says: “It will be interesting to observe bow easily the German captains navigate in a harbor which English captains assort ‘gives them nerves.’” While 1 Ireland Hmst presented _ a Manser rixie to the Volunteers of Baliysimon. and the presentation was made the occasion for a review and speechmaking, which was reported at length in the local Press. Certain facts about this rifle were not reported. About two months before the war Horst called upon a London dealer and asked fur quotations for Mauser cities in parcels of from 20 to 50, with ammunition and bavonots.

quotation was obtained for him. but when he next called he said lie would take two only at that time, adding by way of explanation. “ 1 am a Home Ruler. It was 1 who initiated the Irish Volunteers. 1 may want a lot of these.” ihe dealer showed him a diamond ring, and he said :‘‘Oh, no: that is of no use to me now. Where 1 am going that would melt.” He wanted the quotation urgently, as lie was shortly going to Germany. A CHANGE FROM BLUSTER.

Within a month war was declared, and with consummate impudence the pair immediately went to the authorities with a proposal - that they should found and tonduct a society for the support of distressed Germans, who had been unable to return to their own country. Apparently they did not realise that many of their past activities were known, and, when the baron blustered into a certain public office to claim official recognition for his philanthropic efforts he found himself suddenly obliged to meet an offensive of questions. He acquitted himself very badly. His whole manner changed at once", and he became cringing and apologetic, after the manner of the German of his class.

It will seem strange to some that he was not put upon his trial ; probably it was one of the cases where the obvious inference on his conduct before the war fell short of legal proof. And so into an internment camp be wont, protesting volubly against the indignity. Then from the four corners of the earth Horst’s with strong GermanAmcrican accents began to flow into the country, ready to prove against the baron’s own admission that he was a German subject, that he was and always had been an American citizen. But interned the baron remained until the armistice, when lie was repatriated to Germany. The baron was a stoutly-built, blustering, red-faced person of about 50, growing a little bald, and rotund about the pa'uncli. the sort of man who could be convivial in bis cups and jovial in a. speech at a public dinner. Miss Troy was a florid, fair woman of about 40, broad-shouldered, and inclined to stoutness, very voluble and even strident in speech —in fact, one of those women who take root in a chair till they have bad their say, and never depart without leaving dicir listeners exhausted behind them. Y hence did this large-hearted man of business get his money, first for the hop business, then for Iroo meals to strikers children, for the Sult'ragcttes, for the excursions to Ireland, and the rifles? How was he remunerated for his loss of time ! What we do know is that To ll Kuhlinaini, of the German Embassy, had been paving verv particular attention to the political difficulties in England, and had sccrctlv reported to his Government that ihev wert* so acute that she was not to be seriously considered :n the event of a world war. MAKING HER WEIGHT FELT. '1 he future possessor of troy Castle now began to make her weight lelt. In association with the baron, she had founded a- picture palace at Croydon, j p inch now became a meeting-place for ! disgruntled policemen and revolutionaries who wore working to provoke soldiers to mutiny: and the liquidation of this property as an enemy concern made it diftiful ' for Ithe authorities to deport her while she was a party to the suit. A« might have been expected of such a. woman, site began to make reckless charges of corruption against the com-

mandant of the internment camp, the police, the civil authorities, and, indeed, everyone who had anything to do with the baron. What had really happened was this. In her customary disguise of lady of large property she iiad visited the baron at the internment camp, in order to gain a hold ever the commandant, which is the usual procedure of the blackmailer, she -had ►sent him a ease of magnums of champagne, which he returned to her with a sharp note.

ft must have shocked a lady of her varied experience that anyone should resent the offer of a bribe, and she was determined to have her revenge. After that little adventure no one who ventured to do his duty was sale from her malicious .and 1 lying tongue. She set herself to procure interviews with every official in turn. IT they consented to gee her she misrepresented what they said ; if they declined, as was generally the case, she accused them of being bribed by somebody else.

At last came the armistice, and with it the repatriation, of Baron Von Horst, protesting loudly to Germany. Her litigation was finished, and it became possible, to bundle her out of the country whose hospitality she had abused. The ship was chosen, the passage was booked, and on the day before the ship .sailed a police officer called at her house with a taxi to take her to the boat train. She had been out all jnoming, but she immediately feigned illness, and declared that she could not be moved. A doctor was called, and on his .■certificate that she was quite lit to travel oils was taken to the train and put on board. Then for a space there was peace. It was like the space between the lighting of the fuse and the explosion of tho cracker. There were the reporters who come on board in New York; the IrishAmcricans who make anti-British speeches ; the Ilearst newspapers, and she used them all.

The explosion lost a little of its impressiveness in its passage across the Atlantic, but that was no fault of hers, or of the compositor who set the headlines. She worked her sympathy for the “wrongs” of Ireland, the corruption and duplicity of the British officials, and the alleged American nationality of Von Horst for all they were worth, and she headed straight for California, leaving a trailing glory of newspaper paragraphs in her wake.