GERMANY'S NEFARIOUS PLOTS

Evening Star, Issue 16051, 1 March 1916, Page 7

GERMANY'S NEFARIOUS PLOTS

SIFTING THE VC-INT PAPEN ENTANGLEMENTS. ' [Specially Written for the 'Star.'] The loud-monthed efforts of German Embassy officials, at Washington to re- '■ pudiate all knowledge of Walter Horn • until after .the' latter had been arrested > and charged with blowing up* the Canadian ; Pacific railway , bridge at Vanceboro, Maine, are not being taken seriously by ; the United States Government, in view of the seizure of papers from Captain Von Papen, the recalled military attache, who was searched by British authorities whilst' on his way back to the Fatherland. London despatches stated that stubs in Von Papen's cheque book taken from him at Falmouth showed a cheque for 700dol drawn to Horn's credit the day after the attache had received 2,000d0l from the German Embassy. According to the Embassy accounts, it was said, 2,000d0l was paid to Von Papen within a few days after the explosion at Vanceboro to defray expenses in connection with the defence of Horn, a German citizen. Tin's explanation is regarded as simply a subterfuge to shuffle out of a complicated situation by the German officials in the East. Officials of the State Department'of Uncle Sam have indicated that it was important to know whether the payment to Horn was made before or after the explosion. German officials had denied repeatedly responsibility for the action of Horn, saying they never heard of him until after his arrest. This is strongly" doubted. In official and diplomatic circles much interest is being shown in additional details regarding the documents taken from Von Papen, which purported to show that payments were made to Paul Koenig, the Hamburg-American lane official tried in New York for conspiracy, and to Von Wedill. In Teutonic diplomatic circles no attempt was made to deny that such payments had been made to Koenig. It was pointed out he was "engaged in detective work," and it was to be expected that he would be paid, all of which shows how cunningly the German intriguers have laid their lines in America in pursuance of their schemes. Hans Adam Von Wedill, it will be recalled, was recently indicted in New York for an alleged passport fraud, and the Germans plead that any money paid by them on his account was for legal defence. As soon as Wedill learned the United States Federal authorities were searching for him he disappeared, and has not yet been run to earth. The army of Teutonic bomb plotters and strike foment-ars who are employed by Bernstorff and Co', to curb the export from this country of supplies of ammunition to the Allies are being relentlessly dogged by both- American and British agents here and in Canada, with the result that another dangerous suspect has been laid ' by the heels. Details are "just to hand of the seizure by the British cruiser Vindictive of Conrad Muchenstein, an alleged German spy, from the British steamship Vauban, of the Lamport, and Holt Line, on tile latter's arrival in New York on January 17 from Brazil. Muchenstein is suspected by the British of having been concerned in munition plots at San Francisco. Muchenstein was taken off on the Vauban's last trip to Rio do Janeiro. Tha Vindictive halted the Vauban dfi the Brazilian coast on November 30, and two officers boarded the merchantman. Muchenstein was called to the quarters of Captain Byrne, where a hearing was held, and he was directly accused of being a German naval officer. He denied that" he was a German, and displayed what purported to be a passport, which, however, proved to be a Swiss birth certificate. The naval officers took him to the Vindictive. The story among passengers was that Muchenstein was once captured in Cliina by the Japanese, but escaped, and made his way to San Francisco, and finally sought to get back to Germany through vSotrth America. Mr John W. Preston, United States District Attorney, at San Francisco, said that Conrad Much-' enstein had not been mentioned in connection with the San Francisco investigation of bomb plots. In Federal circles it was stated that Muchenstein attempted to stir up trouble among Austrian and German longshoremen (dock laborers) in San Francisco and Seattle, and devoted ( his energies to fomenting strikes among Germans and Austrians in; ammunition plants on the Pacific Coast and throughout the country. —A German Baron in the Toils.— Two or-more indictments charging complicity in neutrality violations will be returned against Baron E. H. Von Schack, German Vice-Consul in San Francisco, by the Federal Grand Jury, according tp authentic reports in United States Government circles announced on January 18. It is understood that the Federal inquisitorial body called Upon Prosecutor Preston to draw up true bills accusing Baron Von Schack of participation in a plot to load the steamer Sacramento at the port of San Francisco in 1914 with supplies on a filibustering expedition for German warships in the Pacific, where the Teutons badly heeded the great cargo of provisions which left San Francisco. Baron Schack is further charged with being a principal in conspiracies to destroy supply ships of the Allies sailing from Pacific Coast ports. Presecutor Preston, on January 17, submitted to the grand jury all the evidence in the cases against Von Brincken, Crowley, and Mrs Cornell. In "all these matters the name of Baron Von Schack is j frequently mentioned. During the absence in Europe of Franz Bopp, Consul-General of Germany in San Francisco, Von Schack handled the Case of the Sacramento, and : first employed Crowley as a secret agent I of the Kaiser's San Francisco Consulate. That Consul Bopp ultimately will face indictment procedings because of his closa relationship with unneutral acts alleged to have been perpetrated by Baron "Von Brincken and Crowley is a report in general circulation in Federal circles. Compliance with innumerable legal formalities, the hearing of arguments, and lodging of technical objections on the part °of the array of Teutonic counsel, have caused considerable delay in the progress of the San Francisco cases, but Uncle Sam is determined to see the charges through to the bitter end, and there is no possibility of the German plotters eluding the American Federal officials, whose govermental law is based on sound British statutes. San Francisco, February 2.