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Show f GERMAN ENVOY HOUNDS WIFE OF SPIISJIEE Captain Boy-Ed, Attache at Embassy in Washington, Accused of Sending Her Warning Letter. NEW YORK, Feb. 26. Charles H. Griffiths, attorney for Richard P. Stealer, Stea-ler, the German naval reservist arrested here Wednesday on the charge of fraudulently fraud-ulently obtaining an American passport, announced tonight that he would place in tho hands of tho federal authorities tomorrow an anonymous typewritten letter received by Mrs. Stegler, which would be compared with letters alleged to have been written to Stegler by Captain Cap-tain K. Boy-Ed, naval attache of the ' German embassy at Washington. Steg- er, according to Mr. Griffiths, has told ! the federal authorities that Captain Boy-Ed wanted him to go to England i as a spy. The letter which Captain Boy-Ed Boy-Ed today denied having written or knowing anything about, read as follows: fol-lows: t( Reading today's New York American, Ameri-can, allow me to tell '3-ou that it was your fault that your husband has been arrested and will have to go to jail for many years, and will be always a looked-at scoundrel. Accept the advice to keep your mouth shut and do not open it before you at first consult a law3fer. Besides you put your country in a bad position, because your case will only increase the ill feeling of the Germans against the Americans, and you know that a war with the Germans would be the greatest disaster for the Americans. ,; Letters Look Alike. Mr. Griffiths said that both Mrs. Stegler and Stegler himself, to whom ho showed tho letter today in the Tombs prison, had declared that certain characteristics of the typewriting and other peculiarities resembled the letters Stegler had received from Captain Boy-Ed, Boy-Ed, now in the possession of the United States district attorney. The letter was mailed in New York yesterday and was addressed to Mrs. Stegler at her home, 25 St. Nicholas terrace Air. Griffiths said that "Sr. Nicholas7' was spelled s "St. Nikolas," as in tho letters sent by Captain Boy-Ed, and that it bore the stamp of the same post office station. sta-tion. "This thing is too ridiculous to answer, an-swer, ' 1 Captain Boy-Ed said when asked today if ho wrote the letter. "All tho letters that have gone out of this office have been addressed by my stenographer, and I suppose there must be thousands of typewriters like the one she uses. I have been accused of so many things that I would not be surprised if they tried to fix the Rosenthal Ro-senthal murder on me or the responsibility responsi-bility for the next subway accident.3' Boy-Ed Angrily Denies. Captain Boy-Ed strongly reiterated his denial that he had had anything to do with Stegler other than to try to help him get a position. Stegler repeated today, Mr. Griffiths said, his declaration that Captain Boy-Ed Boy-Ed had wanted him to go to England as a spy, especially to get details of a report that the British admiralty was fitting out at Belfast a number of merchantmen mer-chantmen which were to bo sent, disguised dis-guised as German boats, to the mouths of the Elbe aud Weser rivers and sunk there in order to blockade Cuxhaven, Bremerhaven and other German ports. ' ' T was to get all the information about this latter," Stegler was quoted b v Mr. Griffiths as saying. "I was also to watch all shipping movements in the Mersey. I was to try to locate the strength of the English fleet supposed sup-posed to bo in St. George's channel. I was to make absolutely no notes, but to depend entirely on mv memory. 1 was then to go to Rotterdam and'then to the German 'border, where I was to meet German officers and give them a secret password. I was told to be very careful in regard to meeting these officers, of-ficers, as Captain Boy-Ed said there were English spies in the German lines who wore the uniforms of German officers of-ficers and even tho iron cross. I was to go to Berlin and deliver my information infor-mation to Herr Isendall, bead of the German intelligence bureau." Others Make Denial. That Stegler had sought the assistance assist-ance of George Sylvester Vierick, editor edi-tor of a German newspaper, in obtaining obtain-ing an American passport was asserted by Vierick today. Mr. Vierick said Stegler had come to him and represented repre-sented that he was engaged in very important confidential work for certain persons high in German official circles, and had mentioned Captain Boy-Ed's name. "I told him," said Mr. Yierick, "that I was an American citizen and would not lend myself to any such proposition pro-position 'as procuring a passport." Dr. K. A. Fnehr, who Stegler says i told him that Captain K. Bov-Ed was responsible for sending to " England Carl Hans Lody, the German spy who was phot in the Tower of London, denied de-nied today that he had ever made any statement to Stegler or knew anything whatever of the matter. He said Stegler Steg-ler came to him some time in January with a letter of introduction from Captain Cap-tain Boy-Ed, requesting a position in the German translation and publicity bureau, of which Dr. Euehr is the head. Having no position to offer him, Dr. Fuehr said he sent him. to Mr. Vierick. Another Spy Sent. Attorney Griffiths said that all of Stegler 's statements were corroborated by Mrs. Stegler, the young Georgia woman, at whose suggestion Stegler abandoned bis alleged plan to go abroad. Stegler was to have gone on I the steamer Franconia, according to the lawyer, and when he decided not to go, a young German-American, whom he knew by sight but not by name, was assigned to the perilous task and sailed on the steamer with a bogus passport in his pocket. The Franconia is due to arrive in Liverpool within a day or two. Stegler was quoted bv Mr. Griffiths as having said that his negotiations with Boy-Ed had progressed to the point where they had discussed money that was to be paid to Mrs. Stegler while her husband was in England. According to the lawyer. Captain Boy-Ed, in a talk with Stegler at the German club in this city, had agreed to pay Mrs. Stegler $150 a month while Stegler was in England, and had furthermore fur-thermore agreed, should the British discover his mission and he met the same fate as Lody, to pay Mrs. Stegler i $150 a month so long as she lived. |