Agent of the Iron Cross: The Race to Capture German Saboteur-Assassin Lothar Witzke During World War I

Historian Mills (The Estrada Plot) tracks Imperial Germany’s clandestine operations across the U.S. during WWI in this gripping saga. When war broke out in Europe, the Germans deployed spies to sabotage U.S. cargo ships carrying armaments and supplies to Allied nations. Two such agents were ex-U.S. marine Kurt Jahnke and former German sea cadet Lothar Witzke, who led “the most deadly sabotage team in history,” according to Mills. In 1914, the saboteurs nearly sank the world’s largest cargo ship, the SS Minnesota, by tampering with the boilers. The two plotters also carried out the 1916 nighttime explosion of the munitions depot on Black Tom Island in New York harbor (shrapnel from which pummeled the Statue of Liberty). Once the U.S. joined the war, Jahnke took charge of all German espionage operations on the American continent, which included assassination plots and a planned insurrection. Jahnke remained free at war’s end; Witzke had been caught and remained jailed until 1923 when he was released as “the last prisoner of war” being held by the Americans. Both were active German intelligence agents during WWII. Drawing from a painstakingly gathered collection of government records (including Witzke’s court-martial trial transcript, discovered by chance at a used bookshop), Mills documents these events with extensive detail. Devotees of cloak-and-dagger intrigue will revel in this thrilling and complex account. (Oct.)