The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-03-06
LETTER BRINGS BERNSTORFF IN PASSPORT FRAUD Document Written by Hans Adam von Wedell to Am
 bassador Found. GERMAN TELLS WHY
 HE LEFT THE U. $. Department of Justice In Action Against Germany
 In 1914.

 Wedell to Ambassador von Bernstorff to justify his action in abandoning the work of gathering passports for fraud ulent use, is shown in facsimile in the Worlds Work for March. The full text follows, in English. It is an in- teresting document, not only because it reveals a lot of weak human na- ture in the agents of German eff ciency' but also because it definitely ! revealed Won Papen and Albert as principals in the German plots as early as three months after the war started:
 Hotel St. George, Felix Fieger Pro- prietor, Nyack-on-Hudson, December l 26, 1914. His ExceIlency The Imper- ial German Ambassador Count von | Bernstcvff, Washington, D. c. Your Excellency: Allow me most obediently | to put before you the following facts: | It seems that an attempt has been | made to produce the impression upon | you that I prematurely abandoned my | post in New York. That is not true. | l. My work was done., At my de- | parture I left the service, well organ | ized and worked out to it's minutest | details, in the hands of my successor, MT. Carl Ruroede, picked out by my l self, and, despite many warnings, stIIl | tarried for several days in New York ! in order to give him the necessary 1 final directions and in order to hold T iii check the blackmailers thrown on my hands by the German officers until after the passage. of my travellers i through Gibraltar, in which I suc- ceeded. MT. .Ruroede will testify to you that without my suitable pre- | liminary labors in which I left no | conceivable means -unrrieU ana Tn which I took not the slightest consid- eration of my personal veal or woe, it would be impossible for him, as well as for MT. Won Papen, to forward off cers and "aspirants'' in any number whatever, to Europe. This merit I lay claim to and the occurrences of ! the last days have unfortunately con- pelled me, out of sheer self-respect, to emphasize this to Your Excellency.
 II. The motives which induced n,e to leave New York and which, to my astonishment, were not communicated to you, are the following:
 1. I knew that the State #Depart- ment had, for three weeks withheld a passport application forged py me. Why?
 2. Ten days before my departure I learnt from a telegram sent me by Mr. Von Papen, which stirred me up very much, and further through the omis- sion of cable, that Doctor Stark had fallen into the hands of the English. That gentleman's forged papers were liable to come back anyf-day and could owing. to his lack of caution easily be traced back to me. f>..F~s-
 8. Officers and aspirants of the class which 1 had to forward over, namely the people, saddled me with a. Flot of criminals and blackmailers, whose eventual revelations were liable to bring about any day the explosion of the bomb.
 4. MT. Von Papen had repeatedly urgently ordered me to hide myself. 5. MT. Ige1 had told me I was talk ing the matter altogether too lightly and ought to-for Gods sake-disap- pear.
 $. My counsel, had advised me to hastily quit New York, inasmuch as a local detective agency was order ed to go after the passport forgeries. 7. It. had become clear to me that
 eventual arrest might yet .injure the , worthy undertaking and that my dis 2 appearance, would probably stop all
 investigation in this direction.
 How urgent it was for me to go
 away is shown by the fact that, two
 days after my departure, detectives,
 who had followed up my telephone
 calls, hunted up my wife's harmless
 and unsuspecting cousin in Brooklyn
 and subjected her to an interrogatory. Mir. Won Papen and MT. Albert have ' told my wife that I forced myself for |. ward to do this work That is not
 true. When I, in Berlin, for the first
 time heard of this commission, ob- - jected to going and represented to the e gentleman that my entire livelihood s which I had created for myself in l. America by six years of labor was at e stake therein. I have no other means e and although MT. Albert told my wife J. my practice was not worth talking e about, it sufficed. nevertheless, to de- ,- gently support myself and wife and tc If build my future on. I have finally
 at the suasion of Count Wedelf under. d taken it, ready to sacrifice my future d and that of my wife. I have, in ordel l. to reach my goal, despite infinite diff d faculties, destroyed everything that Iy built up here for myself and my wife d have perhaps sometimes been awk 1t ward, but always full of good will ant
 I now travel back to Germany witt " the consciousness of having done m! ,e duty as well as I understood it, an, h. having accomplished my task. ,v With expressions of the most ex
 quisite consideration, am, your Ex 10 cellency,
 to Very respectfully,
 n- (Signed) Hans Adam Won Wede Id