Carl Hans Lody Carl Hans Lody , alias Charles A . Inglis , ( January 20 , 1877 – November 6 , 1914 ; name sometimes given as Karl Hans Lody ) was executed as a German spy by Great Britain at the Tower of London soon after the outbreak of World War I . Born in Berlin , Lody hailed from a family of soldiers and civil servants . As a child , Lody wished to become a seafarer , so he moved to Hamburg and became a cabin boy . In 1904 , he graduated from a maritime academy in Geestemünde , passing the exams to become a captain with flying colors . Becoming seriously ill soon thereafter , he was unable to actually become a captain , so he became a tourist guide for Hapag instead . After a state of imminent threat of war was declared in Germany on July 31 , 1914 , Lody volunteered as an " Oberleutnant zur See " , offering to go to the United Kingdom in order to report on the movements of the British fleet . At first he was turned down . He then got an American passport from the US consulate under the name Charles A . Inglis by claiming he had lost his old one . He was facilitated by the fact that he spoke English perfectly with an American accent , having been married to an American woman and lived in Omaha , Nebraska . This passport permitted Lody to travel all over Europe without any obstructions . This made him of great value to the German military and they accepted him . Lody received no more than a very basic preparation . Originally assigned to Southern France , he was then sent to Edinburgh , which was of great importance to the Royal Navy , travelling via the neutral Norway and then Newcastle and arriving on August 25 . He stayed at the North British Hotel and took the bus to the Firth of Forth every morning . Just five days into his mission he sent his first report back to Germany , a telegram transmitted via Sweden . It read : " must cancel . Johnson very ill . Lost four days . Shall eav [ sic ] shortly . Charles " , indicating that there were four ships being repaired at the dock and that there were several units about to head out to sea . The German submarine immediately received orders to attack in this area . The lead ship of the " Pathfinder " class scout cruiser s , HMS " Pathfinder " , then became the first ship ever sunk by a torpedo fired from a submarine . After this , Lody no longer felt safe staying at this hotel , especially as he had named his address in the telegram . He then claimed to depart to go to Liverpool . In reality he stayed in Edinburgh . He rented a bicycle in order to be able to move around more effectively . However , he started making mistakes : he now wrote his letters in German and stopped encrypting their content . The fact that they were written in German led the authorities to check their content . On October 20 , Lody moved to Killarney , Ireland staying at the Great Southern Hotel . He had since before leaving Britain been shadowed by a member of Sir Basil Thomson ' s corps of quick - witted young Irish Scotland Yard detectives , Jeremiah Lynch ( who would later co - found the original Flying Squad ) . While Lody was dining at the hotel , several police officers approached him . Although , Lody insisted that he was an American , he was arrested as a suspected German agent . The search of his room turned up more evidence against him : German coins , a notebook with the content of the first telegram , German addresses , drafts of his letters , and a bus ticket from Edinburgh to the Firth of Forth . The next day Lody ' s coat was found in Edinburgh , containing the name of a tailor ' s shop in Berlin and Lody ' s real name . Lody was then taken to London . He said he had not wanted to become a spy and had sought exemption from service . This claim would later be disproved by German documents . Detained at Wellington Barracks near Buckingham Palace , he was convicted of war treason on November 2 and sentenced to death . Unlike most spies , he received a public trial with his case being reported widely in the press . His refusal to name his superiors and his repeated declarations of patriotism led to his being admired in both Germany and Britain . Lody was executed in the miniature rifle range in the Tower of London at dawn on November 6 . The execution was carried out by an eight - man firing squad . He was buried within the precincts of the Tower . Lody was the first person since the Jacobite rebel Lord Lovat , who was beheaded there in 1747 , to be executed in the Tower of London . He was also the first German spy in World War I to be executed in the United Kingdom . Excerpts from the last letters Lody wrote were published soon after his death . One was written to a friend of his in Omaha , the other , the last letter he ever wrote , to his sister ; it was published in the " Frankfurter Zeitung " . Lieut . - Gen . Sir Robert Baden - Powell , later 1st Lord B - P , founder of the Scout Movement , referred to Lody thus : The plea put forward by the German spy , Lieut . Carl Lody , at his court - martial in London , was that " he would not cringe for mercy . He was not ashamed of anything that [ pg 45 ] he had done ; he was in honour bound not to give away the names of those who had employed him on this mission ; he was not paid for it , he did it for his country ' s good , and he knew that he carried his life in his hands in doing so . Many a Briton was probably doing the same for Britain . " He was even spoken of in our House of Commons as being " a patriot who had died for his country as much as any soldier who fell in the field . " A German destroyer , the " Hans Lody " , was named for him .