Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 172, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 July 1913 — CLEVER WOMEN SPIES [ARTICLE]

CLEVER WOMEN SPIES

LINE OF WORK IN WHICH THEY EASILY OUTDO MEN.

To Unusual Powers of Trickery They Add the Charm of Femininity and Thus Win the Confidence They Seek.

Women from time immemorial have the greatest spies in history. Their charms and resources adapt them to every line of apprehensive endeavor, from tracking the erring New York husband to obtaining the plans and the specifications of the bat* tlesbips and: the forts of the great powers. To those who are acquainted, With the history of espionage, this statement comes as no surprise, for nearly aH the most sensational spying cases of recent years have been engineered by unscrupulous women. For when it comes to trickery there is no match for a clever woman, especially if, as is often the case, she has natural beauty allied to her powers of stealing confidences. Only a few years back an important German fortress had to be entirely rebuilt owing to France obtaining expensive andvaluable Information regarding its armaments and the geography of the important portion of German frontier that it guarded. And this act was made necessary owing to the ramifications of a French woman whose attractive personality enabled her to worm these secrets from important Berlin officials, in whose homes she was implicitly trusted and entertained.

Recently a charming woman who posed as a governess was sentenced to four years’ penal servitude for spying. She was employed by two European powers, and by acting as a governess to the children of naval officers in Paris and Berlin she paved the way to acquaintance with those holding responsible positions. With remarkable audacity she annexed charts and plans and sold them in the right quarters. This she found an easy task, having. In her position of governess, ample means of learning in what part of the house such documents were stored, and it was not until a bunch of duplicate keys of a number of admiralty safes were found in her possession that suspicion fell upon her. Every one remembers the sensation several years ao when most complete plans of the interior of the first British dreadnought were published in a German newspaper. About this time an attractive American woman of German descent disappeared from London’s society circles, where, by rear son of her charming personality and apparent wealth, she had been given a hearty welcome.

An inquiry was held on the affair, and it was suggested that this woman probably knew a good deal about the leakage of these important plans, and probably further proceedings would have been taken had not the honor of several officers of high standing in naval and society circles been involved.