The Twin Falls times. [volume] (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1905-1916, 1916-02-11
SWARNS WITH SPIES
Baltic Ports Crowded With
Agents Of Many Nations.
Heroes, Too, Smu9gIers, Exchange
Gamblers and FugitiVes Are There
MANY Women in Throngs
of Secret Workers.

the sea OF adventure. Normally il is |
a dull, insipid sea. After war be- |
gan the Baltic woke up a little. but |
its liveliness was limited by Grand |
Admiral Tirpitzs command of the sea.
Now about ten British submarines, |
backed by some Russian submarines. |
have awakened the ordinarily quiet |
waters. All Baltic ports are nests OF |
espionage. adventure. patriotic hero
ism and roguery, chiefly the last
named.
Stockholm ignores the war, but it
is full of Russian and German jobbers
who gamble in exchange Copenhagen
is the chief center of German espion-
age. The saloons and fourth-rate no.
tells are thronged with German agents
Libau, since Won Hindenburg cap
tured it last summer is the headquar-
ters of a German motorboat corps
which does scouting in Riga gulf
Hernosand, Oxelosund and other
small Swedish eastern ports are the
homes OF scores of marooned German
merchant captains whose ships have
been torpedoed or bottled up.
The liveliest places are Haparanda
and Tornea, frontier townlets on the
Tornea Elf river, which divides
Sweden from Russian Finland. These
townlets, 30 miles from tbs Arctic
circle, are crowded with spies, con-
traband smugglers and fugitive pris-
oners. The Russian gendarme Colonel
Abassoff discovered two German spies
in Tornea recently With six gen
darmes he pursued the suspects to
karungi further up the river. and be-
sieged them in house After two
hour battle the two Germans and
four Russians lay dead
In coming here from Copenhagen.
via Malmo, one has to cross the
sound. the entrance gate of the British
submarines. The sound is an inter-
national waterway, but it is also ter
ritorial. being less than three miles
across at the narrowest point. The
Swedes own the east side and the
Danes the west The other entrances,
the Great and Little Belt, which are
entirely owned by Denmark, were
mined against submarines in October,
1914
Danes and Swedes could not agree
about mining the sound. The Swedes
regret this. for the submarines have
disturbed the halcyon calm of the Bal
tic and injured Sweden's trade with
Germany.
After England had got at least four
submarines through, Germany mined
the sound. Mines were planted in a
big triangular patch in the south and
German patrol boats were set to watch
it. At least two English submarines
have got between or under the mines
and more may come any day
From the MalmO steamer could be
seen Germany's tremendous meas
ures against submarines. South of
the mine field, on the horizon, is a
forest of masts and tunnels belong.
ing to the big fiotilla of cruisers. gun
boats, armed trawlers and motor pa
troll boats Their business is to watch
for and destroy submarines that get
past the mines Ahead of the fotilla
flew hydroplane The Malmo steam
er captain said that when he had
sailed a boat south few days before
he had counted about fifty German
craft of different kinds all on the look
out From the sound down to the
broad water between Sweden anC
J Rugen island every mile of sea has ;
small German warship on the watch
At Copenhagen the police brough
aboard for transit to Russia an alleged
spy. In the Baltic ports are swarm
of purely military and naval spies wh'
serve belligerent governments. man.
trade spies, and large numbers o
spies of the neutral Baltic power
whose work is to spy on spies.
The trade spies, all British. haun
commercial ports. Their function i
to collect facts about Scandinavia
firms trade with Germany whic
firms trade, what they sell and t
whom. London takes care that ovel
sea goods consigned to Scandinavia
firms which trade with Germany d
80 not reach the firms. The trade spie
= pose as language teachers or drum
mers. Many have been expelled.
Mile. Assanovitch, a handsome
black-eyed Russian girl, who, posing q
governess, spied on a great scale wa
expelled recently. The spies who 81
on spies are mostly Swedish. The
watch all foreigners, particularly thos
who speak English. Two days aftt
an Englishman reached Stockholm
visited a dentist Half an hour late
an agent teiephoned to the dentist
ask who his patient was.
Copenhagen is the center Of IL
false passport business. Danes poll
to the Cosmopolite hotel and sa.
There can be had passports of al
nationality" The false passport bus
ness was staRted in order to save Ru
SLAMS from capture by German crui
ersa
Indians Full Citizens.
Pierre. S. DIT is reported fro