A warrant for the arrest of Heinz Spanknoebel was issued Friday night by U. S. Commissioner O’Neill at the request of U. S. Attorney Medalie.
While spokesmen at the office of the Friends of New Germany at 152 East 83rd Street yesterday declared that Heinz Spanknoebel was still in the United States, federal investigators were inquiring into operations of Hitlerite representatives in this country.
From the Friends of New Germany it was reported that Spanknoebel had not fled to Berlin aboard the Hamburg-American liner, Deutschland, Wednesday midnight. It was declared that Spanknoebel, Wiegand, and other propagandists would continue to remain in the United States indefinitely and pursue their occupation of “bringing into line” all German societies and as much American support as they could muster under the Swastika banner.
An extended investigation by the Jewish Daily Bulletin into Nazi affairs discloses an amazing network of intrigue which has undermined the entire German-American community of New York and other large cities throughout the United States.
KIDNAPPING AND EXTORTION
Beneath the surface of propaganda delivered through the mediums of press and rostrum, Nazi operations have been reported to embrace measures from threatened kidnapping of Jewish children to outright extortion of money from Germans living in this country.
Jewish employers of German household servants report a growing arrogance of their workers, which has been compared to that of Nazis in Germany prior to the ascendancy of Hitler to power.
“They are waiting for the great day, when the American Nazi revolution will upset our present state of affairs and they shall become our masters,” is the consensus of opinion of many interviewed during the investigation. “Just as Hitler rose through suppression in Germany and responded with persecution of all his political opponents—so do many Germans in this country expect ##me champion to arise in the United States, put the poor but faithful radicals in positions of power, and levy on the rest of the country a reign of terror.”
NURSEMAID’S REVENGE
Filed with federal investigators is an anonymous letter threatening a New York Jew with Nazi vengeance. It is one of many similar complaints being made by Jewish residents. In this particular case a German servant girl was called to task for having held this citizen’s baby from the parents for some hours. “That’s nothing to what will happen once the Nazis come into power,” she told her employers. She was dismissed, and a few days later came the threatening letter.
Germans in the United States reveal that they are being coerced into making contributions toward the German labor front. They contend that the Nazi organization in the United States is not able only to maintain itself financially but that thousands of dollars are shipped monthly to Berlin for the relief of the unemployed under Hitler.
Sums extorted from various individuals vary in accordance with their ability to pay. The minimum exaction, German workers say, is $1.50 per month. The demands may vary from month to month according to the disposition of Nazi collectors. “One month I paid $1.50; the next $5,” one worker related.
KEPT IN STATE OF TERROR
Members of the New York German community state that they are kept in a continual state of terror which makes protest impossible. Threats of wreaking vengeance on their relatives in Germany are frequently made in cases where victims of Nazi extortion threaten protest to the authorities.
The inability of official investigators to uncover these activities of the Nazi group in the United States is due to the fear of reprisal against those who may give anti-Nazi evidence. For the reason that they cannot afford to endanger the safety of their relatives in Germany, thousands of Germans who would willingly give information to the United States government are withheld from protest.
The argument set forward by Nazi collectors of doles from Germans employed in this country which has most effect in filling Berlin Arbeitfront coffers is that non-contributors are declared ineligible for employment on their return to Germany.
“If the Jews succeed in their boycott of German goods and services in the United States, you will have to return to Germany,” Nazi agents tell German employees here, “Only those who contribute to the Arbeitfront can hope to gain employment in the fatherland.”
NAZI USE OF THE BOYCOTT
Under such persuasion, Germans here are not only sandbagged into contributing to the Hitler Arbeitfront but they are also forced into taking an active part in the American Nazi movementz. They are made to feel that if American Jewry succeeds in the anti-German boycott, Germans will be forced out of work in this country and made to return to Germany where industrial and employment conditions are inestimably worse.
“To protect themselves from the anti-German boycott” Germans in all parts of the United States are rapidly being brought into line with the American Hitlerite movement. All channels of propaganda are being utilized in their fight against the Jews.
In Yorkville theatres German pictures made under Hitlerite direction are being shown. Action is being taken by Representative Samuel Dickstein, chairman of the Immigration Committee of the House, who is investigating the activities of Friedrich Heiss, the editor of the Amerikas Deutsche Post, New York Nazi newspaper, and those of W. R. Reuman, president of WWRL, a Long Island radio station, allegedly broadcasting Nazi propaganda.
NAZI INVASION OF SCHOOLS
Allegations that American schools and universities have been impregnated with the seed of Hitlerism, which is being put in a favorable light by instructors, are also under federal investigation. Dr. Franz Boas, Professor of Anthropology at Columbia University, has declared in a letter to Dickstein that exchange students from Germany are propagandizing Hitlerite policies in various American educational institutions. He exempted Columbia from his charge, stating that he had no evidence that the university had received students of this category.
According to Dr. Boas, who yesterday presented the document to Representative Dickstein, the following order appeared in the Voelkischer Beobachter on August 19, 1933: “Official Announcement of the Supreme Command of the Nazi Party. The Chief of the National Socialist German Students’ Association issues the following decree:
“All members of the National Socialist German Students Association who during the coming Winter semester will study at a foreign university must communicate immediately with Dr. Von Leers, Berlin-Steglitz, Hohenzollern Strasse 6.
“As soon as they have arrived at the foreign university they must send immediately their foreign address to the head of the foreign office of the National Socialist German Students’ Association. The purpose of this measure is to enable these German students to inform their foreign fellow students about German conditions and to instruct them in spreading information.
“All members of the association who are already abroad have to write in their addresses for the same purposes.
“With Heil Hitler,(Signed) Dr. Staebel.”
From authentic sources of information within the city’s educational ranks the Jewish Daily Bulletin letrns that Nazi organizations have already been established on the campi of city universities and colleges.
Editorial comment in the Staats-Zeitung, New York publication edited by Victor and Bernard Ridder, who were ousted from the United German Societies when they protested Nazi influence of the organization, on Friday expressed relief at the disapparance of Heinz Spanknoebel, Nazi agent, and declared the German community well rid of radical agitators, who are disowned by their own government and unwanted by the American and German-American people.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
