Paul Koenig, the Atlas Line’s Man
One of the delectable agents of the Bernstorff-von Papen intrigues was a “bull-headed Westphalian” named Paul Koenig, who had been one of the Hamburg-American Line’s detectives in service with the subsidiary company, the Atlas Line. His duties brought him into close relations with sailors, tug-captains, wharf-rats, longshoremen and keepers of dives of the lowest sort. That experience, coupled with the fact that he was, as his apelike countenance suggests, crafty and brutal, made him an ideal man for von Papen’s more dastardly purposes, especially as Koenig had under him the company’s police force of ten or twelve men, obedient to his will. Here was a nice little organization ready to hand.
On von Papen’s request the Atlas Line put Koenig entirely at his disposal, and no time was lost in making use of his service. Under von Papen, Koenig became the chief of a majority of the German Secret Service groups in the eastern part of the country. Gradually his work extended to the execution of commissions for the higher-ups, Bernstorff, Dr. Albert, the curious Austrian Ambassador, Dr. Dumba, as well as the orders of von Papen. He was a sort of factotum to them on various occasions, guard, messenger, investigator, etc. But to preserve the air of unsuspicious employment the Line continued to pay his wages, his work for the conspirators being covered by special bills and von Papen’s special checks. Koenig kept a book in which were listed the names of hundreds of persons—German-Americans and Americans, clerks, army reservists, scientists, city and federal employees, etc.—indicating his wide range of sources of information and the effectiveness of his system of poisonous propaganda.
His staff had numbers and special initials as well as aliases for identification in correspondence and telephone or other communications. He provided against the tapping of his telephone wires by talking in code. His code seems to have been devised with some sense of humor in the possibility of sending listeners-in on wild-goose chases, which was often the result. Then to prevent being shadowed he had one or two of his own men trail him, ready to notify him by signal if he seemed to be the object of too persistent attention. It is said he had the trick, when being followed, of suddenly turning a corner and waiting until the detective came up, when, taking a good look to identify the follower, he would go on with a boisterous laugh. By this trick he came to know quite a number of the agents of the Department of Justice. Such a cunning and cautious fellow of course gave the police a deal of trouble to keep tabs on him. Mr. John Price Jones says in his book: