Page:The web (1919).djvu/134

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A third operative prefaced his statement with the remark that he was a warm personal friend of S—— and did not want to do him an injustice. He did say that S——, before the entry of the United States into the war, was intensely pro-German. On being asked if he would like to be a private in a company commanded by S—— and pressed for an answer, he said: "Well, I would like to know my captain hated the Germans a whole lot more than S—— does." He further said that if S—— were to be captured, he would very soon be on friendly terms with his captors.

Follows a statement of an operative who had known S—— for twenty-five or thirty years, and had been on the terms of the best friendship for several years past:


Prior to the entry of the United States into the war, S—— was rabidly pro-German and expressed himself freely on any and all occasions. He thought that Germany was all-powerful and had nothing to fear from the Unted States. He favored the German U-Boat policy, and said: "I am damn glad of it!" when he read the newspaper notice of the sinking of the Lusitania. He said furthermore that the people on the ship got just what was coming to them, and they had no business being on it. S—— seemed to be thoroughly imbued with the idea that the Germans are supermen, and that they could do anything. He regarded the Kaiser as the greatest man on earth. He took all the German papers in the country, and received German propaganda from some source unknown. When he went to the Officer's Training Camp in Atlanta, he wrote a card to one of his friends here asking him to forward his mail but not to forward any newspapers. He was a constant reader of papers of German tendencies. He stated in conversation that the United States had no Navy, and that the safest place for its ships was in our harbors; that there was more danger to our sailors from our own ships than from anything else. He seemed to have a great deal of information concerning the armament and equipment of the United States as regards cannon, small arms and vessels, together with the number of men in our Army and Navy. Mr. R—— did not know where he got the information nor what he did with it. S—— knew all the local anarchists and wild-eyed citizens of German and Russian nationality. One day S—— was talking on the street with a friend when a rough, unkempt, hobo-like man passed them. S—— asked his friend to ex-