WAR SECRET REVEALED

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVII, Issue 4460, 21 October 1933, Page 2

WAR SECRET REVEALED

STORY OF ALEXANDER SZEK. One of the most remarkable mysteries of the war has been solved. It is the case of Alexander Szek, hero of one of the war’s greatest spy adventures. Szek, a youth in his’ teens, provided the Allies with secret information of momentous value —and then vanished. He disappeared in England. For 16 years he has been neither seen or heard of. To-day, however, it can be revealed that Alexander Szek is still alive. He is staying somewhere in Britain. Recently the mystery of Szek’s fate was deepened by a famous German book on war-time espionage, which said: “It is only logical that the young ma'n had to disappear. If he remained alive he might have given away his secret. The death of Alexander Szek did away with that danger.” It has been stated that Szek was got rid of because he knew too much, but in a letter to the Sunday Chronicle Mr. Joseph T. Szek, father of the young man, states that there is no truth in the suggestion that his son disappeared for that reason. “That story requires rectification. My son was not killed in Britain,” he says.

The secret of Szek was the secret of how the Allies were warned of the beginning of unrestricted submarine warfare, and how President Wilson was turned against Germany to support the bringing America into the war.

Szek’s father was a wealthy Austrian married to an English woman. The family lived in Brussels, where Alexander, while still in his early ’teens, had several ingenious radio inventions to his credit. The Szelcs stayed on in Brussels when, in 1914, the Germans swept in.' German staff officers were billeted on them. But young Alexander pursued his radio studies though with some difficulty.

When his secret experiments were discovered he was at first suspected, but later the Germans took advantage of his great knowledge and utilised him in their important military radio station in Brussels as an operator.

After some time he was even put in charge of it, and the young halfEnglishman acted as the vital link between Berlin and the German front. But unknown to Szek the very efficient British secret service in Brus-

sels was tapping his messages and conveying them to England. Baffled by the way in which plans leaked out the Germans invented a code for their Brussels station that completely defied the British secret service code experts. The only way to solve this puzzle was to get a British spy in Brussels. This was done, and then occurred one of the greatest pieces of luck in the war. The British agent got into touch, by chance, with young Alexander Szek, half-English radio operator, the only man who knew the code. The man from Britain won Szek over to the Allied cause. From then on every secret message from Berlin was deciphered and relayed to the Allies. One day Szek was handed a message that made him gasp, so important to the Allies was it. It announced the opening of the great world-wide U-boat campaign and an offer to Mexico of alliance with Germany against the U.S.A. So staggered was Szek at the full realisation of what this meant that he decided to bring the message personally to London. Helped by his secret service friend he was smuggled out of Belgium and into Britain. He delivered his message to high officials in London. Everybody was full of gratitude to him. For two days he stayed in London. Then he disappeared. Alexander Szek has never been seen or heard of since. But he is alive.