Snow (11 page)

This awkward incident could have had disastrous consequences for S
NOW
, and for a while his transmissions were closed down, but after a short period
of inactivity, contact was resumed. Meanwhile, the surveillance on Mathilde Krafft continued until she was later arrested and detained at Aylesbury prison.

In early December 1939 Owens moved into a new flat in Richmond and, after consultation with MI5, made arrangements for a further visit to
Brussels
. His instructions were to complain that he had only received £50 in the last two months, and as he was performing a dangerous job for the Germans he did not consider the pay adequate. Owens had been asked by the Abwehr to take his accounts with him on the trip so MI5 went through them, and the accountant reported ‘from what I can see he has done England for as much money as he can.’

S
NOW
was instructed that if anything went wrong on the mission he was to send a wire to Lily, signing himself as ‘Owen’. He was to ask for
instructions
concerning C
HARLIE
, and to query why things were moving so slowly.

When Owens arrived in Brussels, Dr Rantzau told him that he had been called to Berlin to explain why the weather reports had been so poor. Rantzau had made excuses for Owens by saying that his agent could not be expected to give accurate reports at night in the black-out, but it had been pointed out that the reports had not matched those transmitted from Ireland and Holland. As a result, Owens was instructed to gather his weather data between 12 noon and 2 p.m. Owens was also told that his signals had not been coming through well so his call sign was to be changed to OIK, with the German station using CTA. He was to start transmitting again at 7.15 p.m. on 26 December, and the weather code would also be altered to five letter groups where the first and last group were to start and end with the letter X. Finally, Owens was given ‘CHRISTMAS CAROL’ as the new codeword to indicate wind speed. Wind direction was to be indicated by A for North, B for South, C for East and D for West.

As instructed, Owens raised the issue of money and Rantzau explained that there had been trouble with his agents in Britain, and that they were making new arrangements for payment. He was given £215 as an advance, which had been collected in Holland as £1 notes and then changed into £5 notes at a bank in Antwerp. Referring to C
HARLIE
, Owens informed Rantzau that he had written to him and told him to get the apparatus he needed to make microphotographs.

In his subsequent report to MI5, S
NOW
stated that the Germans were keen to know about plans to lay mines in the Irish Sea as they wanted to disrupt traffic around Liverpool. As soon as C
HARLIE
was ready to
commence
operations, Owens was to inform Rantzau who would start putting his agents in touch with him. Owens was told that these agents would use the phrase ‘greetings from Auerbach’ as their recognition code.

Apparently the Germans had not been too impressed by Gwilym
Williams
, as they had found him to be too nervous. Owens said that he was satisfied with him, but if they wanted to carry on making use of Williams it would be best to contact him direct. Despite their concerns about Williams, the Germans still intended to send explosives by submarine to South Wales as arranged previously, but now they would wait until Owens had given them the go-ahead.

Owens was also to make arrangements to receive a new kind of explosive that had been designed to sabotage shipping. The bombs were to be concealed in electric accumulators which neatly fitted with Owens’ battery business. Each of the accumulators would contain a bomb but, although charged, in case they were checked by customs they would not contain any distilled water, which rendered them safe. Detonation would be controlled by a small timer which could be set to go off at any time from one hour to seventeen days. When he was ready to receive the bombs Owens was to write to the Societé de Consignation et Affrètement (SOCONAF), at 25–27 rue Jesus, Antwerp. He was also told about a new type of incendiary device which was to be packed in Swedish bread. When the bread was opened it would reveal a small ring which, when pulled, would ignite twenty seconds later.

MI5’s interest was caught by a further item reported by S
NOW
. Allegedly a man codenamed L
LANLOCH
was to stand as a candidate at the next
elections
. He was described as exceedingly influential, especially in high military circles and may already have passed on a good deal of information to the Germans. This man would write to J
OHNNY
and arrange to meet him at his club. After this meeting, Owens was to go to Antwerp to collect the names of other Members of Parliament who were alleged currently to be helping the Germans. If Owens’ information was true then the Nazi infiltration of British society had reached levels more worrying than MI5 had previously realised.

Rantzau also informed Owens that he might be needed in Canada as the Germans were very interested in war materiel produced there. In
particular
, they wanted to find out about the production of artillery shells by the
Canadian National Car Company of Hamilton, Ontario. The Germans were also keen to discover what they could about new aircraft manufacturing plants in Toronto and Montreal, and the names and particulars of the firm producing Bren guns. They also wanted to contact someone in Canada who would be prepared to put explosives on board cargo ships destined for Britain.

On his trip to Brussels Owens also met ‘the Commander’, but this time he was accompanied by a woman whom Owens described as being fairly tall, with medium hair, who spoke good English and was well dressed. She was about thirty-eight years old and wrote shorthand. Before the war she had lived in Farnborough and London, and had collected information from officials based at the Royal Aircraft Experimental Establishment. She also had contacts with important British fascists and was disappointed that she had not heard from her friends in the BUF. She had said that if she did not hear from them soon, she would give J
OHNNY
the names of some of them so that he could contact them. MI5 suspected his description of the
middle-aged
woman fitted Lisa Kryger, a German who had come to their attention in 1936 because of her frequent contact with Nazis and her association with the notorious William Joyce, aka Lord Haw-Haw.

Finally, Rantzau had returned to the subject of his proposed visit to
Britain
. Apparently the Germans thought it was easy to smuggle contraband in through England’s east coast so Owens had been instructed to find a reliable fisherman who was prepared to hire out his boat. Once he had found his man Owens would be sent a set of special signals to be used at night at a prearranged location to make contact with a submarine carrying a cargo of explosives. This would be the method Dr Rantzau would use to visit Britain.

The prospect of the head of the German intelligence service coming to Britain, or meeting a ship in the middle of the North Sea, presented MI5 with a golden opportunity to prove how valuable their system could be to the war effort, as it raised the possibility that they might destroy the submarine he was on or, even better, capture him. Once again, Arthur Owens would have to be integral to any plan and, as ever, this meant that MI5 had to try to predict all the possible outcomes. Accordingly, three options were
considered
. The first was to acquire a fishing-boat and man it with its own crew of trusted nominees. The advantage of this was that the crew would be reliable and the possibility of a leak was lessened. However, it was acknowledged that the unexpected arrival of a complete crew of strangers in a fishing port might itself arouse suspicions amongst the locals and cause loose talk.

The second option was to employ a trustworthy fisherman and his crew. However, this would have meant placing complete faith in an unknown quantity, but at least if this alternative was adopted there would be no
problem
about them fitting in, or causing the locals to become suspicious.

The third option was to get hold of a group of naval ratings who were from the area and perhaps had worked in the fishing industry before the war. This would mean finding an explanation for why these men were all suddenly discharged.

A final decision on this plan was delayed until MI5 had consulted the Admiralty which, it was hoped, might be able to provide a boat and crew without raising suspicion. As so many fishing trawlers were employed as auxiliary minesweepers in the area, this had appeared quite possible.

Owens reported that he had also been asked to recruit a lorry driver who regularly travelled to aerodromes and dockyards. Equipped with a
transmitter
in his vehicle, he could maintain touch with the German submarine when it brought over explosives or agents, and when he was not performing this function he could let the Germans know anything of interest. Owens believed he knew someone who fitted the bill, and so had recommended a friend of his named Phillip to MI5 instructed S
NOW
to warn Phillip that he might be contacted, and to await instructions before he took any action. MI5 was attracted to this scheme as it offered the chance of access to new radio frequencies, call signs, transmitters and possibly even a new code. Control of a large network of agents was one way that Owens could increase his importance to both MI5 and the Abwehr, and he seems to have had his friend Phillip ready and waiting for the role, so it may be that the original idea was his, and had not come from the Abwehr as he claimed.

Owens’ perceived status in the eyes of MI5 was important to him, as it was one way that he could gain control over his own affairs. Owens had given assurances to Dr Rantzau that he controlled a network of Welshmen ready to undertake sabotage missions, and he had convinced MI5 that this was a useful way to discover the Abwehr’s intentions. MI5 decided to earmark individuals in relevant factories who would stand up to any scrutiny that the Germans may put them through should Owens, J
OHNNY
to the Germans, be asked for their names. Once again, MI5 considered the options: working with a completely notional group, or employing reliable men and placing them as agents in the chosen factories. The MI5 report on the plan concluded: ‘It will naturally be necessary to have an actual explosion at each of these factories in order to instil confidence into the
enemy. These explosions should be followed by the necessary amount of publicity in the Press.’

Since the episode when Lily had been sent to Manchester in S
NOW
’s place, MI5 had increased its surveillance on him, and the move to a new flat in Richmond had given the organisation an opportunity to improve its
technical
coverage by installing a microphone in the dining-room. Unfortunately, Owens seemed to conduct most of his conversations in the kitchen, and since moving in Owens had purchased a radio which had been placed in the dining-room. The staff monitoring the microphone noted that the radio was turned up to full volume on almost every occasion there was a lengthy conversation. The officer supervising the operation reported that ‘I am unable to resist the conclusion that it is done with the purpose of drowning the conversation.’ It was also noted that Owens had begun to travel by taxi or car, which made the task of watching him more difficult. Although there was no firm evidence that Owens was doing anything that he should not, his behaviour did little to allay the concerns that MI5 had about him.

Although a question arose as to the extent MI5 was manipulating Owens, or vice-versa, MI5 now had several schemes in play designed to persuade the Abwehr to show its hand. However, it was also true that the organisation was under some pressure to obtain results at a time when information about the enemy was at a premium and S
NOW
represented a unique source of potentially valuable intelligence about espionage and sabotage. If S
NOW
was to be believed, he had adopted the role of a German master spy, in regular wireless contact with his controllers, in command of a network of saboteurs and enjoying Rantzau’s confidence.

In an attempt to make progress, Owens was instructed that in his next transmission to Germany, amongst the usual information about troop movements, he should inform the Abwehr that he had found a suitable lorry driver who was now ready to receive the new transmitter. He was also to say that he had not yet been contacted by L
LANLOCH
and would like instructions by return. In the case of the proposed Welsh network of saboteurs, Owens was asked to go over the arrangements that had been made, and he revealed that he was supposed to steal sticks of dynamite from friends of his working in the mines of South Wales, which he was to use with the detonators he had
brought back from Brussels, although he still had no instructions as to when this was to happen.

Another tactic employed by MI5 in the hope of forcing the Germans to disclose their intentions was through C
HARLIE
, but first he had to perfect the process of reducing photographs to a small enough size.

The intention was that C
HARLIE
could master the process in time for Owens to take the microdots with him on his next trip to see Rantzau. He used a Zeiss Super Ikonta camera which was placed at a distance of three feet from the object to be copied, and had experimented with exposures of one second, half a second, one fifth of a second and one tenth of a second. Through trial and error he had found that an exposure of one second had produced the best results. The lights used were 250-watt lamps placed twenty-five inches to either side of the camera, but slightly behind the lens so as not to cause any reflection. The background was a dull black surface which C
HARLIE
considered to be very important. He had also experimented with a pantatomic film, but found that autochrome film was best suited.