Nazi Bund Planning $2,000,000 Headquarters, House Hearing is Told

A $2,000,000 headquarters for the German-American Bund in or near New York City and a 2,000-acre site near the Canadian border for an old people’s home and hospital for bund members is planned by Bundesfuehrer fritz Kuhn, the house Committee Investigating Un-American Activities was told today by its investigator, John G. Metcalfe.

The investigator exhibited a package of Canadian, English, German and American anti Jewish pamphlets sent from Germany to an American citizen. A news bulletin of “The American Nationalist Confederation” in the package listed organizations worthy of a sympathizer’s support. The American Federation of Labor was among the organizations mentioned.

Metcalfe testified that Kuhn, who claimed an income of about $65 a week, spent as much as $50 for an evening’s entertainment. He called Kuhn an “habitue” of night clubs.

German Ambassador Hans Dieckhoff today visited the State Department and assured Under-secretary Sumner Welles that there was no understanding between the Bund and the German Embassy or consulates, and that German nationals were strictly forbidden to join the Bund. He said that the organization was “a purely American affair.”

Chairman Martin Dies challenged Kuhn to appear before the committee with “clean hands,” bringing Bund records, letters and financial statements. The challenge was in reply to charges by German Embassy counselor Hans Thomsen that Metcalfe, who had charged a link between the Embassy and the Bund, was not trustworthy and that Kuhn be called if valid information was desired.

Mr. Dies said that Kuhn did not have “clean hands” as he had ordered the Bund’s records destroyed when the house created the committee. Mr. Metcalfe defended his posing as a bund member on the ground that a true American could not get into an “un-American organization” without disguise.