Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1918-05-17
RAISER PLANNED To
Ann | ". ". IN j. S.
German Societies Were to Ioin in.
Revolt.
PLOT REVEALED IN GOTHAM
Ivan Norodny Testifies Ven Gersdorff,
Friend Of Crown Prince and Ger
man Agent in Mexico, Told
Him of Conspiracy.

New York. May 16.-Testimony that
in 1916 Germans in the United States
were planning to revolt against this
country was given at the state attor-
ney generals investigation of reports
of hidden munitions.
Ivan Nor0dny, vice president of the
Russian-American Asiatic corporation,
testified that Baron Won Gersdorff, a
friend of the German crown prince and
a German agent in Mexico, told him
that German societies in the United
States would be equipped with arms
from Germany to combine with /. W.
w. and Socialists against the govern
ment.
Norodny described a trip to New
Jersey storehouse with Capt. Hans
Tauscher and other Germans. He said
they inspected rifles which the Ger.
mans were trying to sell him to enable
Russian revolutionists to overthrow
the autocracy and make a separate,
peace with Germany.
Gersdorff Reveals Plot
Norodny described the talk with Won
Gersdorff, who was friend of Huerta..
Won Gersdorff told the witness, he
said, that in case the United States
should have trouble with Germany,
Schevtzenverein in the United States
would combine with the /. w. w. and
Socialists and revolt, using arms that
were already in the United States. Won
Gersdorff further suggested, the wit
ness said, that If the Russians would
revolt, Germany would supply arms
from the United States for the over,
throw of autocracy and a separate
peace with Germany. Norodny de-
clared he had been known as a Rus
sian revolutionist, but refused to en-
terrain the proposition, as he regarded
1t as traitorous.
Baron Won .Gersdorff was one of the
German agents in this country taken
into custody soon after the United
States entered the war He was ar
rested at Toledo, o., in July, 1917, on a
charge of espionage.
Offer Made to Mexico.
An offer to an agent of the depart
ment of Justice to smuggle arms into.
Mexico was described.
William r. Benham, an operative of
the department of justice, named Will
lard G. Stanton, New York lawyer,
who represented himself as former
congressman, as having volunteered to
assist in the smuggling.
Benham on the witness stand, said
he had conferred with Stanton at the
Hotel Ansonia, New York, in February,
1917. Benham represented himself as
one Perkins, who was seeking to buy
rifles for Mexicans. The deal fell
through, Benham said, because Stan,
ton wanted cash deposited in bank.
Rifle Trail Leads Toward Chicago.
Chicago, May 16.-The search for.
the 100000 Mauser rifles said to have
been smuggled into the United States
from the Krupp gun works in Essen,
Germany, in preparation for German
outbreak, has led to Chicago.
1t was admitted at the department
of justice that certain German-Ameri-
can residents of this city and Milwau-
kee are under suspicion as having been
connected with the plot exposed by the
state attorney generals office in New
York city.
Federal agents, although guarding
their activities, limited that important
Information had been received at the
local office of the department that had
thrown sinister shadow over several
Germans of wealth and position here
and in Milwaukee,.