MONDAY, MARCH 28, 1932.
SIDE-SHOW OF THE WAR · RECALLED
ADMIRALTY'S FAMOUS ROOM 40.
Where No Puzzle Was Too Difficult, No Cypher Too Cryptic.
The post-card from Turkey was blank-save for the postmark, Yozgad, and the address: "Sir Henry Jones, 184 King's Road, Tighnabrualch, Scotland."
Tighnabruaich. វាម Hayden Church tells us in the New York Times Magazine, "is a small village with no King's Road, and only a handful of houses." No such ex- plicit address was needed, and Sir Henry, who was professor of moral Glasgow, became philosophy in suspicious.
The card was from his son, Lieut. Harry Jones, who, with the fall of Kut during the World War, had been interned in a Turkish pri-
son camp.
was sure.
The young man was trying to get a message across, his father So he sent the card to **Room 40," that ruite in White- hall where Sir Alfred Ewing and his staff of cryptographers decod-
up
Nothing Too Much
cipher. Admiral Sir Henry Oliver, then director of naval intelligence, knowing that I was interested in methods of ciphering, handed me some wireless intercepts,' saying that there was no department for dealing with them, and inviting me to attempt the job.
"I got a few friends to come and help me; they worked hard and had remarkable luck.
+
SHADOWS BEFORE
COMING EVENTS ADVERTISED IN CHINA MAIL.
*
Theatre;
Social Functions. To-day Tea Dances at Hong Kong Hotel and King's Restaurant; Dinner Dances at Hong Kong. and Peninsula Hotels and King's Restaurant.
Entertainments. To-day King's "The Spider."
To-day Queen's Theatre; "Hook, Line and Sinker."
Today Central Theatret Around the World in 80 Minutes." To-day Majestic Theatre "Charley's Aunt."
Today Star "Whoopee."
Land Sale.
Offices,
THE CHINA“ MAIL.
THE LIVES OF THE GANGSTERS
AMAZING REVELATIONS OF RACKETEERING METHOD OF AMERICA
Death for the Word Coward.
After that, nothing that Mr.
and
the Не
"a ride." All Baba and his Forty Thieves, for
The "muscle in" were churchwardens compared with somehow.
No Witnesses. the modern American gangsters, if
Al Capone 19 these figures, estimated by Crime
King of Racketeers. He
prospers. Commissions, are to be believed:-
The annual racketeering toll in pays £6 for his silk shirts, £1 for Chicago amounts to £40,000,000, or his tics, £2,400 for each of his cars, £12 per head of the population; in from £240 to £400 a week for hotel, New York City, to between £40,000,- £10,000 for two Winter holidays in
Judge Lyle says Capone, 000 and £120,000,000; in Philadel- Florida, phia, to £20,000,000; in Detroit, to has an alderman in the City Coun £15,000,000; in Los Angeles, tocil completely under his dictation, £10,000,000; in Cleveland and Pitts- und has elected a congressman. On Theatro: burg. to £5,000,000. Altogether, the rare occasions when he can be court same attorney! the Invisible tax paid by citizens of coaxed into
the caso A Staff Of 50.
against the United States to the racketeers says: "I move
We have no "The deciphering office was soon
to the Cupone be dismissed. To-morrow-At P.W.D.
is approximately equal
Natural- established as a separate branch one lot of Carwn land, at Mount amount paid in taxes to the Federal witnesses against him."
y; they are afraid to speak. Government! of the Admiralty under my direc-Cameron, 3 p.m.
The racket receive you at tion; the staff of cryptographers
Meelings.
cradle and follows you was gradually increased until it! To-marrow-Hong Kong General F. D. Pasley has to say about the the numbered about fifty: numerous Chamber of Commerce, Chartered ramifications of the racket syndi-to the grave and the laugh
al Bank Bldg., 5 pm.
sometimes against the rac- listening stations were set up,
cates in "Muscling In" (Faber. and is which the fleet signals and other To-morrow-Hong Kong Automo- Faber, 7s. Gd.) should surprise us. keteer. Here is a Press item- wireless messages of the
Gangster Goes To Grave in enemy bile Association, Messrs. Jardine They extend to practically every were systematically taken in, and Matheson's Board Room, 5.830 p.m. commondity from liquor to milk and
£10,000 Casket. from which they were telegraphed
But did he?--- artichokes March 30-Hong Kong Fire In- ginger als, from
spinach to millinery, laundries, Undertakers rented metal cases and neckwear, and include the which slipped over cheap cast-iron building industry, the handling coffins. Woen polished the cases of freight and express at the rail took on a lustrous sheen, reflecting road and steamship piers; and more the funeral tapers and the incandes than 250,0000 workers in shops and cents with dazzling transplendency factories, besides the window- ....The cast-iron affair, of which washers, night patrols, painters and the family, of course, was paperhangers, stationary engineers, suspecting, represented
drivers and
cost of and sale hod-carriers
and waggone and $50. chauffeurs of trucks used in conveying merchandise.
How They Do It. The racket, in fact, operates in bucketshops, in Wall Street, among the corporations which sell tallding machines, jewellery, asbestos, tex- tiles, soap, and glue; it collects in- Aurance by fake burglaries; it "It's Owney Madden," a girl Periodically, one whispered to her partner, a slender breaks strikes. racketeer will "muscle in" on an-jad of cat-like movements. other, exclaim, "You're out, we're in," and bump him off. His friends mouth, "he just got back from seein will say of the survivor: "Look, he's Bill Henshaw. Bill took Owney's a big shot; he got his name and pie-girl to the Amsterdam Opera House ture in the paper." Then business
last night."
to the Admiralty to be deciphered."[surance Co., Ltd., Messrs. Jarding's
In Room 40 at one time as many offices, noon.
on
ed ciphers so expertly and expedias 2,000 enemy messages were be- March 30-Society of St. George, tiously that they were always right ing deciphered every day with Messrs. Jardine, Matheson's Board
with the Germans, It is of never more than twenty-four hours' Room, 5.30 p.m. Sir Alfred and his exploits that Mr. delay. The Battle of Jutland was March 30-Union Waterboat Co., Church writes.
brought about by decoding wire-Ltd., Messrs. Dodwell & Co., Ltd. lesa messages which revealed the 3 p.m. The post-card from Yogad was Germans' plan to awoop down
March 31-Hong Kong & Wham- almost too much for Room 40, but the cast of England, which they poa Dock Company, Ltd., 2, Queen's not quite.
Building, 11 a.m. Finally we rend, "an believed to be unguarded. old Scottish Presbyterian minister
A graph at the Admiralty show-
March 31-Green Island Cement Aed day by day the number of Ger- Ca., Ltd., Exchange Building, Des suggested a Biblical solution. reference to verse iv, chapter 18 man submarines that failed to re-Vaux Road, noon,
base. When the April 6-Gande, Price & Co.. of the Book of Kings revealed tho turn to their following:
official German figures were avail- Ltd., 2, Ice House Street (St. "Obadiah took an hundred pro-able at the end of the war, Room George's Bldg.), noon,
40 was shown to be only one anit, phets and hid them by fity in a cave and fed them on bread and wrong in its calculations. water."
"This was interpreted as mean. ing to convey that the Kut officers were safe in Yozgad, but in need
the case."
the
Child's Play. Here is one of the problems, became "the solving of which child's play to Room 40": be of food. And this proved to Two messages from the United
Mr. Church's story of Sir Alfred States were intercepted on
same day. The first rend: -that "little. gray-haired, seventy-
Washington, D.C. year-old Scot, with bush eyebrows
Prealdent's embargo ruling and shrewd penetrating eyes"
immediate notice. should have reports his election to the pre- sidency of "that eminent seicnlific Grave situation affecting internn- confraternity, the Britist Associa- tion." We read:
To the British Association he is perhaps the greatest livhg expert on mechanical science.
But to the man in the street the new prefident is considenbly more thrilling as the genius rho, dur- ing the war. brought Vai Tirpitzi and the German Admiraly to the verge of frenzy by peeping through their key-holes and reading their minds almost as soon as bey knew them themselves.
Lional
law. shadows ruin
Statement fore- of many neutrals. Yellow journals unifying national excitement immensely.
Lammerts' Auctions, March 31-At Sales Room, post- age stamps, 5.15 p.m.
March 31-At 1, Torres Build- ings, Kowloon, household furniture,
10.80 a.m.
April 13-China Entertainment & Investment Co., Limited, Land extraordinary
King's meeting, Theatre Building, 5th floor, noan.
VACCINATION.
St. John Ambulance Brigade Work.
WEEKLY RETURN.
The number vaccinated, free of charge, by members of the Brigade,
If the first letter of each word is taken, there is revealed the im- portant announcement: "Pershing sails form New York; June 1,"
The other message, giving prep to and including Thursday
March 24, was as under:~~ if cisely the same announcement
Chinese YJL.C.A. (H.K.) the second letter of each word is
Division taken, reads:
King's College (Old) Divi-
"Apparently
New York. neutrals' protest and Sir Alfred until May, 917, was is thoroughly discounted director of the famous loom 40, ignored. 1sman hard hit. Blockado the department of the Bitish Ad-issue affects pretext for embargo; miralty where the cafidential on by-products, ejecting suets and orders dispatches, and polition! vegetable oils."
Aion
King's College (Present)
Division
Railway Division Indian Division Kowloon Division Mongkok Division
ciphers of the enemy wee collect The deciphering of the code used Shaukiwan Division
ed and decoded with unerring by Bernstorff, the German Am-Chinese Y.M.C.A. (K.) Divi- precision, and whose exstence re-bassador to the United States, took sion mained a secret to the nd.
of
nearly six months and involved the Chinese Athletic Association To-day, in the acadere calm of piecing together of thousanda
Division Cambridge, in 4 laboratory scrapa of paper resembling an im-
Un Long Division equipped with the appratus of a mense jig-saw puzzle.. In this superphysiciat, and a sudy which code the name given to the German boasts not single suvenir of Foreign Office.was "Arthur Fox-
the sug well." Room 40, he laughs
But,
gestion that there was anything uncanny in the results re achieved triumph of in Whitehall.
perhaps, the greatest Room 40 was the elucidation of a message conveyed by entwining cotton thread in the
Total
|
Koos on as usual.
Д
un-
wholes between $25 After the services
the at the cemetery and
de- parture of the mourners, the under- taker's assistants would drop four hooks in the grave, recover the shiny metal case and return it to the owner with a cheque for $10
缪
rent.
Their loves----
"Yeb," out of the corner of his
"What happened?" breathed the Take the girl. How do they do it? Chicago milk trade. The bulk of "Bill's in the morgue."
Terse! the milk was conveyed to the
Their
Well, wholesalers' creumeries by trucks.
také pleasure? The
launched gangsters
Cooney's gangster haunt in Chicago, campaign of systematic
ter where it is an unwritten law that rorization against the drivers, patrons leave their revolvers in the applying the technique developed in cloakroom on entering writes Trevor rum-running... They hijacked the Allen In John O'London's Weekly. trucks and emptied the contents of Policemen, detectives, aldermen, city the cans in ditches by the roadside. officials make whoopee at tables ad With the campaign at its height a joining those of safe-blowers, stick: the up gangster emissary
men, pickpockets, shoplifters, wholesalers he was, prepared to "sell demi-mondaines and their panders,
a cut of 2 them protection" for
paroled ex-convicts. The waiters cents a quart. After much pro are toughs who can sail into any tecting the wholesalers agreed and scrum with the precision of a first- thereafter paid 4 cents & quart class Rugby team. The farmer, however, continued to receive but 2 cents.
notified
6,35+
1,637
10,139 3,157 1,715 8,945
Take the Labour Union business. 29,621
2,750 The gangsters will shoot the secre- tary, then march into his meeting 12,723 with their guns and formally take the chair; or, at an election of 12,498 officers, they will admit only those 267 with votea for themselves; or they will ask the agent to pay for "pro- 84,906 tection" and if he refuses take him
RICH FATHER'S DILEMMA
teeth of a comb. An inspiration DAUGHTER'S HONOUR suggested that each space between the teeth represented a letter; by OR SON'S LIFE? unwinding the thread and follow- late Lording its course tooth by tooth a message was puzzled out that led to the discovery of a nest of naval spies.
SHOT LOVER.
Their tempers? There was a ro- mantic sort of fellow in a speakeasy who recited one of Robert Service'a "Rhymes of a Red Cross Man," the one ending:-
And I sez, "You coward! you 'ad no right
To take on the job of a man this night" Reilly, a gangster standing by, did not like the expression he put those last two lines. Reilly leaned over to Vercoe and
put his left arm around his neck. As Vercoe uttered "You coward'." Reilly's gun spoke. Vercoe slumped to the floor with a bullet in his brain.
Philadelphis has been discussing Death was instantaneous.
for weeks whether the father would instruct counsel for the defence to cross-examine his daughter with the object of proving that she had been guilty of improper relations with Donaldson.
"Nobody can call me a coward," said Reilly, pocketing his gun
"I was nothing mce than an official eavesdropper." he says: adding, with a depreatory smile, "Not a very noble caing, was it?"
The Three Willies. Room 4
Some of them come to violent Perhaps not, but ne Balfour, who was Fist Lord of the
ends, like the Three Willies in a shoot-up with Sergeant O'Connell Admiralty during th most eritical
Should a father attack the re-
and bis, men. Only one was left period of the war, leclared: "To
"Through amazing pieces of good putation of his own daughter to
Judge's Rebuke.
alive. His gun was empty, so were Room 40, where S Alfred Ewing was the leading sprit, the country fortune," said Sir Alfred Ewing, save his son the risk of being con.. Speculation has been just as keen the guns of the police officers. Said owes an immense ebt of gratitude certain of the enemy's code books demned to the electric chair? whether the girl would sacrifice the the gangster;
To take
"Give us a break. My gatis a debt which, at the time at came into British hande.
That was the question which the memory of her dead sweetheart to least, could nevon paid. Secrecy advantage of them, however, there heart-broken father of a tragically help her brother, in his extremity, empty." was the very estice of the work, had to be a constant discovery divided family had to decide at At an earlier stage of the trial "Give you hell," O'Connell shouted and never was ecrecy more, suc- of keying processes, which were
"I'm reloading." sensational murder trial at
for declaring in an interview that And O'Connell reloaded first. cessfully obser:d."
Behind the of doors of the suite fact, often changed. In 1916 the
The man who faced this dilemma her love for Donaldson would never Wilson was just levelling his weapon when O'Connell let him have the in Whitehall tit was officially de-Germans contracted signated Roor 40, and that the changing the key of their principal was Mr. Robert Allen, the wealthy
Her evidence was damaging to full clip and Wilson fell on Quan's] Admiralty mesengers nicknamed naval signal book every night at father of Edward Allen, who is on the blinkin lugout," Sir Alfred twelve o'clock; but the deciphering trial on a charge of murdering his her brother's case. She said Eddle body, which was the end of The
le counter-espionage staff of Room 40 had by that time sister's sweetheart, Francis Donald- had threatened to blow off Donald- Three Willies.
son's head if he came,to their took up
What a pity those Three Willies duties as afAdmiralty man. Of become so expert that the changes son.
were not the last of the gangsters! bis activity we are told:... caused the night watch no serious Donaldson was shot dead at Mr. home d
The girl told the court the story. But the United States is the United He was that time director of embarrassment. They were read-Allen's home, and when his son was naval educion and incidentally, ing messages in the now key two arrested, Mr. Allen publicly declar of Donaldson's courtship and their States, and the racketeers wax fat a. member the explosives com or three hours later, wed that the shots were fired in intended engagements and multiply. It is a tribute to "The Zeppelins were remarkably revenge for his daughter's die Counsel for the defence held a Mr. Pasley's snappy, factual style mittee, hang been transferred to
consultation with Rose's father be that he succeeds in making them that post rom Cambridge Univer loquacious, especially in telling of honour.
Rose Allen, the pretty, eighteen-fore the cross-examination. When just credible. His matter-of-fart alty, who ho had been professor of mechilam and applied me home. So, too, the submarines year-old sister of the young man the qucationing began every one in sangeter sagas are wilder than the would detail their bag. In May, whose fate is hanging in the the crowded court listened with wildest fiction. He can write a chanics.
the expected thriller sony Press-cuttings, a melo "On day the war began, he 1915, for instanco, U-20 exultantly balance, went into the witness-haxtenso, interest put
ne of cross-examination was not drama on said, "yas asked to undertake reported by wireless cipher her and gave evidence for the prosecu The ta of dealing with enemy sinking of the Lusitania,
the girl was rebuked by the judge back. A liable to be changed, and were, in Philadelphia,
a habit of
the exploits when on their way
Bad HonnG RAVNE
die.
Crime
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