March 28, 19 18 
Land & Water 
17 
in contact with an American, who for the purposes of this 
article may be called Mr. Carrots, because that is not his 
name, but is remotch' like it. Carrots seemed willing to go 
into the enterprise, and at a meeting in von Wcdell's room, 
von Wedell carefully unfolded the scheme, taking • papers 
from a steel cabinet in the corner to show a further reason 
wh\' the American passports he already had wottld soon be, 
useless. This reason was that the Government was about 
to issue an order requiring that a photograph of the bearer 
should be affixed to the passport, and that on this photo- 
graph should appear half of the embossing raised by the 
impression of the seal of the Department of State. He 
agreed to pay Carrots $20 apiece for all genuine passports 
he would supply' to him. Carrots accepted his proposal, 
and departed. 
Instead of going out to buy passports, he went at once to 
the Surveyor of the Port of New York, Mr. Thomas E. Rush, 
and told him what Wedell was doing. Mr. Rush promptly 
got in touch with his chief in the Treasury Department at 
Washington, who referreH the matter to the State Depart- 
ment, and they, in turn, to the Department of Justice. The 
result was that Carrots went back to Wedell about a week 
later and told him he would not be able to go on with the 
work, but would supply some one to take his place. This 
was satisfactory to Wedell. 
In the meantime, Wedell had introduced Carrots to a 
fellow-conspirator, Carl Rurocde, a clerk in the .ship for- 
warding department of Oelrichs & Company — a man of little 
position, but fired by the war with the ambition to make 
a name in German circles that would put him in a position 
to succeed Oelrichs & Company as the general agent of the 
North German I.loyd in New York. 
About this time Wedell lost his nerve. He was a lawyer, 
and realised some of the possible consequences of some of 
his acts. He had had occasion to forge names to two pass- 
ports ; and, also, he found out that he had reasons to suspect 
that he was under surveillance. These reasons were very 
good : he had arranged for the transportation to Italy of 
a German named Doctor Stark, using the passport of a 
friend of his in the newspaper business, named Charles Raoul 
Chatillon. Wedell got wind of the fact that Stark had been 
/ f. J/' /,/////'//, 
— Passports for the use of German Officers 
embossed imprcsiion of the State Department aeal, which is always rc*]uired to show, lie turned the photograph face 
down and placed over the back side of the seal a silk handkc-achief folded three or four times. Then with a blunt- 
cdgcd instrtim'-nt like a letter opener he traced the seal on to the photograph oi Sachsc by rubbing the yielding 
surface of the damp photograph into the indentations of the seal on the dry photograph of Wright. When Sachses 
picture dried, the seal showed on it much better than in the accompanying reproduction, for before this was taken 
the Sachse picture had been loosened again. But, for reasons explained in the article, Sachse got only half an hour 
toward Europe on the steamer with it before he was taken off the ship by men from the Department of Justice. 
taken off the steamer Duca de Aosla at Gibraltar, and was 
being detained while the British looked up his credentials. 
Wedell by this time was in a most unhappy plight. 
Bernstorff and von Papen had no use for him because he had 
been bragging about the great impression he was going to 
make upon the Foreign Office in Berlin by his work. If any 
impressions were to be made upon the Foreign Office in 
Berlin by anybody in America, Bernstorff and von Papen 
wanted to make them. Wedell was so dangerously under 
suspicion that von Papen, von Igel, and his Tammany-lawyer 
friend had all warned him he had better get out of the 
country. Wedell took their advice, and fled to Cuba. 
The substitute whom Carrots had promised now entered 
the case, in the person of a man who called himself Aucher, 
but who was in reality a special agent pf the Department 
of Justice. Aucher was not introduced to Ruroede, the 
now active German, and so, when he began his operations, 
he confronted the very difficult task of making his own 
connections with a naturally suspicious person. 
Carrots had been dealing with Ruroede after Wedell's 
disappearance ; and, by the time he was ready to quit, 
Ruroede had told him that "everything was ofi for the 
present," but that if he would drop around again to his 
office about January 7th, 1915, he might make use of him. 
Aucher. now on the case, did not wait for that date, but 
on December i8th called on Ruroede at his office at Roorri 
204 of the Maritime Building, at No. 8 Bridge Street, across 
the way from the Customs House. 
In this plainly furnished office, Aucher appeared in the 
guise of a Bowery tough. He succeeded admirably in this 
role — so well, indeed, that Ruroede afterwards declared that 
he "succeeded wonderfully in impressing -upon my mind 
that he was a gang man, and I had visions of slung-shots, 
pistol-shots, and hold-ups" when he saw him. Aucher 
opened the conversation by announcing : 
"I'm a friend of Carrots'." 
"That's interesting," was Ruroede's only acknowledg- 
ment. 
"He's the guy that's getting them passports for you," 
went on Aucher, "and all I wants to know is, did you give 
him any cush ? " 
"What do you mean?" asked 
Ruroede. 
" Ni.x on that ! " Aucher exclaimed. 
"You know what I mean. Did you . 
give that fellow any money ? " 
To which Ruroede replied: "I 
don't see whv I should tell you 
if I did." 
"WeU," retorted Aucher. "I'll 
tell you why. I'm the guy that 
delivers the goods, and he swears 
he never got a penny from you. 
Now, did he ? " 
It was at this point that Ruroede 
had his visions of" slijng-shots," sohe 
admitted he had paid Carrots one hun- 
dred dollars only a few days before. 
"Well," demanded Aucher, "ain't 
there going to be any more ? " 
"Nope. Not now," Ruroede 
replied. "Maj-be, pext month." 
"Now, see here," said Aucher. 
" Let's cut this guy out. He's just 
nothing but a booze-fighter, and 
he's been kidding you for money 
without -delivering the goods. 
What's the matter with just fixing 
it up between ourselves?" 
Ruroede now tried to put Aucher 
off till Christmas, having recalled 
meanwhile that the steamer Bergens- 
fjord was to sail on January 2nd, 
and that he might need passports 
for officers travelling on that ship. 
But Aucher protested that he was 
"broke," and further impressed on 
Rurocde 4hat he had received no 
money from Carrots or Wedell for 
his work for them. He also produced 
six letters written by the State 
Department in answer to appli- 
cants for passports, and ' finally 
convinced Ruroede of his good 
faith and that he ought to start 
him to work right away. They 
haggled over the price, and finally 
agreed on %20 apiece for passports 
77u person tc 
has declared 
ii fof use ir 
77/is fiOSSporL 
