The Secret Memoirs of Bertha Krupp

"The shaft of a big steamer, Uncle Majesty; the biggest – "

"I know, I know," shouted the War Lord above the din of machinery, "for Ballin. Wants to snatch the speed record from Bremen. Fetch the superintendent, Bertha."

To the official, who was undecided whether he ought to drop dead with devotion or burst with pride, he said in the tone of an ancient Father of the Church: "Work of the utmost importance is entrusted to you – in a measure you are the guardian of the Fatherland's supremacy at sea. England is building a giant steamship to steal our speed record. Her new ocean greyhound is to be ready for passenger service in 1907. Pray to God fervently, asking Him to grant you success that you may help to defeat the enemy of German commerce and our development as a sea power. To assist in taking the blue ribbon of sea power away from Great Britain should be the aim of all good Germans, even as it is your War Lord's duty to secure for the Fatherland the ocean coast-lines she needs." He dismissed the man with a wave of the hand.

It is interesting to note here that this speech was delivered a month before Wilhelm met King Edward at Wilhelmshohe to spout "his sincere wishes for a frank understanding with Great Britain" and for the "desirability of common action" where German or British interests were involved.

Meanwhile the shaft had been completed, a towering, solid mass, and the War Lord, walking round it, remarked admiringly: "Fine, looks as if come out of Vulcan's own smithy. What next?" he added, with his customary impatience.

The young girl was anxious to show her familiarity with the business. Had she not undergone much coaching by Franz for this very reason?

"Extracting the kernel," she answered, with an air of superiority.

"I should like to see the removal of the kernel," ordered the War Lord, as if the idea were original with him. Bertha pulled his sleeve and whispered again, after which Wilhelm admonished the superintendent: "Take care that it comes out in one piece."

No doubt the man would have died of mortification if the well-known "cussedness" of "inanimate objects" had played him a trick; but, luckily for him, it refrained, which encourages the thought that the supposed "inanimation" is not quite so hopeless after all. Maybe in this case the "inanimate object" was intent upon beating the War Lord out of a chance to scold and air his views on mechanics.

"Any more novelties?" asked Wilhelm, disappointed because the machinery worked to perfection.

"The hydraulic shears are busy in the next shop," said Bertha.

There the War Lord saw sections of armour-plates for one of his Dreadnoughts cut as if they were so many enormous Swiss cheeses.

"Some fine day," he commented, "we will mount one of these shears on the Calais coast, and next to it a giant magnet." He paused, contemplating the picture of his imagination.

"Yes, yes, Uncle Majesty!" cried the eager Bertha.

"The magnet," continued the War Lord, "will pull the English Dreadnought fleet out of the Channel, and toss ship after ship over into the jaws of the shears to be made mincemeat of. Fine heap of scrap-iron for you, Bertha."

"But the sailors!" cried the young girl.

"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori," declared the War Lord, shrugging.

Next they looked at some enormous presses capable of bending armour-plates to any shape desired. This amused the Majesty hugely. He likes to bend men and things.

"Any shape desired?"

"Any Your Majesty will be pleased to command."

"Very well. Model one on the left half of my moustache."

The supervisor shouted orders and the machinery stopped for a little while, then turned out the desired shape with photographic accuracy. But the War Lord would not have it: "The point's missing," he declared.

"I leave it to Fraulein," murmured the superintendent, wincing under the rebuke. And with the vivacity and carelessness of youth Bertha divined the situation, and instantly came to her employé's rescue.

"Herr Grier is right; Your Majesty's moustaches are not trimmed alike. The left one is much shorter."

Wilhelm put his hand up to his cheek. "So it is," he admitted grudgingly. "I remember I set fire to it last night on the train lighting a cigarette." This was addressed to Bertha. He was too small a person to excuse his rudeness to the superintendent.

"There is a ninety-ton block of steel making. Would Uncle Majesty like to see how it's done?" said Bertha, on the way back to Villa Huegel.

"Ninety tons! What a cannon that would make! Of course I would like to see it."

Bertha led the way to the crucible works, where at that moment fifty pairs of workers were engaged in carrying about on long bars white-hot crucibles of metal. They were acting with the utmost precision, and one shudders to think of the wounds and mutilation that would have ensued had either one of them stumbled or been seized by sudden illness. As each couple of men advanced and tilted the glowing mass into the mould, the War Lord observed:

"Much too long-winded and laborious. I will talk to the Director-General about that, Bertha."

And, turning to the supervisor, he demanded curtly: "The composition of the mixture?"

The man bowed to the ground to hide his confusion, and once more Bertha jumped into the breach.

"He doesn't know – nor do I. Secret formula of Grandfather Frederick. Don't press him, Uncle Majesty, for even to speculate on these technicalities means dismissal and disgrace for an employé." Though she spoke in a pleading tone of voice, the War Lord continued to frown.

"Perhaps he is allowed to explain why no shorter process is used."

The supervisor fairly beamed with readiness and satisfaction. "May it please Your Majesty, our way – I beg Fraulein's pardon, the Krupp way – is the only absolutely sure method to forestall bubbles and flaws."

"And a flaw, is it a serious matter?" asked the War Lord, very much alert.

"Indeed, Your Majesty, for it may cause the shattering of a shaft, the breakdown of machinery, the bursting of cannon."

"And all cannon turned out by the works have the benefit of this process?"

"All without exception, Your Majesty."

A bystander says he heard the War Lord mutter under his breath: "What rot!" And there is a further report that he burst into the Director-General's room, and roared: "Fine kettle of fish I discovered. Guarding against flaws in cannon intended for enemy countries! Why not turn over to France and England and Russia all the secret plans of the German War Office?"

But no authoritative record of Wilhelm's sayings relating to this particular point has been obtainable. As a matter of fact, it isn't worth the pains of special research. It is to be noted, however, that after the Turkish defeat at Lule Burgas and Kirk Kilisse Bertha's husband was moved to say that the stories about the "inefficiency of Krupp guns and Krupp workmanship" were "fables," and that he was ready at any time "to take the field against all comers with Krupp guns and Krupp armour."

After tea the War Lord had a long, serious talk with Frau Krupp. Happily her ladyship had been mistaken. Bertha was not actually in love with Franz; just a sort of sisterly attachment, momentarily intensified by girlish longings. So much the better, since the right sort of husband for his ward had been found: Doctor von Bohlen und Halbach, the young diplomat, distinguished, well-bred, sound business head and ambitious. "Highest ambition to serve his king."

"Supposing Your Majesty understood Bertha correctly with respect to Franz, her change of heart does not mean that she will fall in love with Your Majesty's candidate for her hand," said Frau Krupp.

"Preparing to jump," thought Wilhelm; "I wish Phili were here." And as accident would have it, His Highness was announced that very moment. Eulenburg, or Hohenzollern luck?

The Baroness opened her mouth to deny herself to the visitor on the plea of unavoidable business, but Wilhelm got ahead of her. "The Prince is most welcome," he said to the major-domo.

There is no denying that His Highness, ten or more years ago, was a striking personality and had a peculiar charm. As Murat knew more about the art of dressing than Napoleon, so Eulenburg overshadowed Wilhelm as a glass of fashion, avoiding the latter's all-too-apparent striving for effect and pretence.

Despite their close relations, he greeted Wilhelm without a trace of familiarity and kissed Frau Krupp's hand.

"Just in time," cried the War Lord. "I was telling the Baroness about the Chancellor's young friend, von Bohlen. Bülow told me he would ask you to allow him sight of your records concerning the diplomat. Was he satisfied? Tell us all you know about Bohlen?"

That he was well aware of Frau Krupp's loathing for him need not be reiterated, and that in her ladyship's eyes praise from Sir Phili spelt the worst of condemnation for the party approved of he fully realised, and framed his answer accordingly:

"I am pained to acknowledge that I have no personal acquaintance with the young man who rejoices in the great Pontiff's love and friendship – "

"You have Pius's own opinion," cried the War Lord. His astonishment was equalled only by his appreciation of the lie told.

"At Your Majesty's service – through the kindness of the papal legate. When Majesty commissioned me to get reliable information about our foreign representatives, I went to headquarters – may it please Your Majesty."

"It pleases me immensely. What did the Pontiff say?"

"Exemplary habits, God-fearing, able and ambitious – these few words sum up the Holy Father's estimate of Bohlen."

"Did you hear that?" asked Wilhelm, addressing Frau Krupp. "We will get the details from Bülow." And turning to Phili, he said: "You wanted to meet my ward. I will summon her, and she shall show you over the house and grounds. Beats Liebenberg," he added in an undertone.

Phili beamed. "His Majesty is joking," he said to Frau Krupp. "To compare my poor Tusculum to Villa Huegel and surroundings is to put my Skalde songs next to the immortal ballads of Beranger."

Frau Krupp dared not object to Wilhelm's arrangements. She played into the War Lord's hands.

"I will meet you and His Highness at the fountain in five minutes," she told Bertha – a welcome cue to Uncle Majesty.

"Aside from the Pope's estimate, does the Chancellor himself approve of Herr von Bohlen?" asked Frau Krupp.

"Enthusiastically. Bohlen's record in Washington and in Peking equalled his success at the Holy See. Gnädige Frau," added Wilhelm in a tone of conviction, "let's hope that the estimable young man's heart is still free. I have no doubt that he would be a dieu-donné to Bertha, yourself and – Essen."

"And Your Majesty desires me to broach the matter to my daughter?"

"What is gnädige Frau thinking of? Do you suppose I would have wooed Augusta if I had known that Bismarck wanted me to marry her? No, no; matters of that kind must be left to accident, or apparent accident. This is the time for diplomatic furloughs. Tell me where you want to take the girls on their holiday, and I will have your son-in-law-to-be introduced quite casually. Bülow will manage."

"Bertha spoke of having another look into Rome before the hot season," said the Baroness.

"Fate," cried Wilhelm (if he was a Catholic he would have crossed himself). "God's will," he corrected his lapsus linguæ. "Herr von Bohlen und Halbach will be ordered not to leave his post until further notice. When you are in Rome he will present himself with Bülow's compliments, offering to act as my ward's cicerone. This will give you abundant opportunity for intimate observation and Bertha a chance to fall in love if she cares.

"All's arranged, then," he added in the finality vein peculiar to his nature, when he kissed Frau Krupp's hand at the door, which he had opened for her. In the Teuton Majesty's eye this was a great and almost overpowering act of condescension; the twentieth-century Prussian-en-chef rather prides himself on such mannerisms, fondly mistaking them for dignity.

Well satisfied with the success of his stratagem, Wilhelm rang for his adjutant and dictated to him a long dispatch to the Chancellor, giving a well-coloured version of the interview with Frau Krupp and instructing Count Bülow how to answer the lady's forthcoming inquiries.

"The holiest of the holies, of course," ordered Wilhelm, referring to the telegraphic code. "I don't trust these Essen fellows," he deigned to explain; "the Chasseur shall take the message to Düsseldorf and personally hand it to the President to be sent over the official wire."

Afterwards he joined the ladies and Phili, finishing up the day's strenuous work of intrigue and sight-seeing with the talk to Franz, recorded at the opening of this chapter.

Just before leaving Villa Huegel he had another tête-à-tête with Frau Krupp. "I have conferred signal honours on your protégé" (meaning the chief engineer), he said. "I am sending him to the States to study new inventions and investigate patents relating to war materials – greatest chance that ever came to a young man. If he does as well as I expect, I will make him special representative of my General Staff. Is your Ladyship satisfied now?"

Frau Krupp breathed her humblest thanks. What else could she do?

CHAPTER XXV

A ROYAL LIAR

High-Placed Plagiarists – Diplomatic Trickery – The Kaiser Whitewashes Himself – "What of the German Navy?" – Clumsy Espionage

October 10th, 1905, 6 p. m.

The red disc betraying the War Lord's presence at the other end of the wire thrust itself between the Chancellor's eyes and the copy of Echo de Paris he was reading.

"I command Bohlen," said Wilhelm's impatient voice.

"I am afraid he is not available just now, Your Majesty. Gone shopping with his fiancée the last I heard."

"Order Wedell to find him. He shall be at the Chancellery at nine sharp, when I expect to find you too, Prince."

"Gracing my wife's soirée?"

"Soirée to-night? Excellent! I will order all my boys to kiss Madame's hand. It will put her into good humour, and she will the more readily allow you to attend to business."

"And, Majesty," said Bülow, hopefully, "the Princess Maria is counting on having the honour of Your Majesty's presence."

"I will send the insignia of dell' Annunciatainstead."

"I beg Your Majesty, don't. Maria might not remember that Charles XII. sent his boots to preside at the Swedish Council of State."

As before remarked, it is one of Bülow's tricks always to have on the tip of his tongue some historic bon mot suitable to the occasion.

There was an outburst of rough laughter. "He did, did he? And yet they called him the Madman of the North. Next time Herr Bebel has a congress, I will send the Reds a pair of my riding breeches, and no new ones either. But revenons àBohlen. Devil of a chap! Made Bertha his goods, his chattel, his stuff, his field, his barn, his horse, his ox, his ass, his everything! That's the way! Make them eat out of your hand, Prince!"

Bülow was a Prince since the 6th of June, and the War Lord never tired of calling him by the title of his own creation. He had just borrowed boldly from the Bard, and the theft being apparently undiscovered by his literary Chancellor, Wilhelm felt justified in relaxing his imperious mien some more.

"Can't you prescribe a dose of sleeping sickness for that fool Liebert? His shouting about 'our war' to obtain supreme sea power is co-responsible for the Entente Cordiale. Of course I like to strike terror into the hearts of the enemy, but in his Navy League speech Liebert went too far. If he keeps it up, I shall put him on half-pay. Tell him so." (The War Lord referred to General von Liebert, ex-Governor of German East Africa, who had made a speech threatening Great Britain and France.)

And more talk of that kind. The more gossipy, the better for Bülow, as there had been no time to digest the Echo de Paris article and to enter into its discussion before he had fully made up his mind what to say about the reported Anglo-Franco-Russo-Japanese Alliance. His comments might lead to serious dissension with Majesty, for Wilhelm was sure to fasten on to some supposed negligible point in the Chancellor's argument to distort the whole tenor of his interpretation.

Tit for tat. Only when Bülow was the victim, there was no prearrangement like in the case of the repudiations of the Joseph Chamberlain and the London Daily Telegraph interviews.

When in England five years before, the War Lord had prompted Mr. Chamberlain to make his historic appeal in favour of co-operation between Great Britain, Germany and the United States, assuring him that Germany's future policy would rest on such an understanding as on a roche de bronze.

Mr. Chamberlain, being under the impression that only gentlemen were invited to Sandringham House, thought His Majesty sincere and gave public utterance to the message, promising peace and mutual understanding.

But the Roi de Prusse had no sooner shaken the dust of England from his boots than Bülow was ordered to repudiate the whole thing (without directly impugning his Sovereign's word, of course) and to ridicule Chamberlain's "Utopian schemes."

Notwithstanding, the then German Ambassador in London, Count Wolff-Metternich, later had the impudence to complain to Sir F. Lascelles, British representative in Berlin, that the state of English opinion toward Germany and the British Foreign Office's coldness toward the Wilhelmstrasse gave him considerable uneasiness; whereupon Sir Lascelles demanded to know whether Germany expected British Secretaries of State, having been struck in the face, were to turn the other cheek for further castigation and insult?

Three years after the birth of the Quadruple Alliance, at which we are now assisting, the War Lord and his Chancellor had another repudiation game between them. Mr. Harcourt having prepared the way in his amazing Lancashire speech,1 Wilhelm strove to outdo the Father of Lies in the notorious Daily Telegraph interview, the general theme of which was:

"You English are mad, mad – mad as March hares. What has come over you that you are so completely given over to suspicions quite unworthy of a great nation? What more can I do than I have done? I declared with all the emphasis at my command, in my speech at Guildhall, that my heart is set upon peace, and that it is one of my dearest wishes to live on the best of terms with England. Have I ever been false to my word? Falsehood and prevarication are alien to my nature.

"My actions ought to speak for themselves, but you listen, not to them, but to those who misinterpret and distort them. That is a personal insult which I feel and resent. To be for ever misjudged, to have my repeated offers of friendship weighed and scrutinised with jealous, mistrustful eyes, taxes my patience severely. I have said time after time that I am a friend of England, and your Press – or, at least, a considerable section of it – bids the people of England refuse my proffered hand, and insinuates that the other holds a dagger.

"I repeat that I am the friend of England, but you make things difficult for me. My task is not of the easiest. The prevailing sentiment of large sections of the middle and the lower classes of my country is not friendly to England. I am therefore, so to speak, in a minority in my own land.

"It is commonly believed in England that throughout the South African War Germany was hostile to her. German opinion undoubtedly was hostile – bitterly hostile. The Press was hostile; private opinion was hostile. But what of official Germany? Let my critics ask themselves what brought to a sudden stop, and indeed caused the absolute collapse of the European tour of the Boer delegates who were striving to obtain European intervention? They were fêted in Holland; France gave them a rapturous welcome. They wished to come to Berlin where the German people would have crowned them with flowers. But when they asked me to receive them I refused. The agitation immediately died away, and the delegation returned empty-handed. Was that, I ask, the action of a secret enemy?

"Again, when the struggle was at its height, the German Government was invited by the Governments of France and Russia to join with them in calling upon England to put an end to the war. The moment had come, they said, not only to save the Boer Republics, but also to humiliate England to the dust. What was my reply? I said that, so far from Germany joining in any concerted European action to put pressure upon England and bring about her downfall, Germany would always keep aloof from politics that could bring her into complications with a Sea Power like England.

"Posterity will one day read the exact terms of the telegram – now in the archives at Windsor Castle – in which I informed the Sovereign of England of the answer I had returned to the Powers which then sought to compass her fall. Englishmen who now insult me by doubting my word should know what were my actions in the hour of their adversity.

"Nor was that all. Just at the time of your Black Week, in December of 1899, when disasters followed one another in rapid succession, I received a letter from Queen Victoria, my revered grandmother, written in sorrow and affliction, and bearing manifest traces of the anxieties which were preying upon her mind and health. I at once returned a sympathetic reply. Nay, I did more. I bade one of my officers procure for me as exact an account as he could obtain of the number of combatants in South Africa on both sides, and of the actual position of the opposing forces.

"With the figures before me I worked out what I considered to be the best plan of campaign under the circumstances, and submitted it to my General Staff for their criticism. Then I dispatched it to England, and that document, likewise, is among the State papers at Windsor Castle, awaiting the serenely impartial verdict of history.

"And, as a matter of curious coincidence, let me add, that the plan which I formulated ran very much on the same lines as that which was actually adopted by Lord Roberts, and carried by him into successful operation. Was that, I repeat, the act of one who wished England ill? Let Englishmen be just.

"But you will say, what of the German Navy? Surely that is a menace to England. Against whom but England are my squadrons being prepared? If England is not in the minds of those Germans who are bent on creating a powerful fleet, why is Germany asked to consent to such new and heavy burdens of taxation? My answer is clear. Germany is a young and growing empire. She has a world-wide commerce, which is rapidly expanding and to which the legitimate ambition of patriotic Germans refuses to assign any bounds.

"Germany must have a powerful fleet to protect that commerce and her manifold interests in even the most distant seas. She expects those interests to go on growing, and she must be able to champion them manfully in any quarter of the globe. Germany looks ahead. Her horizons stretch far away. She must be prepared for any eventualities in the Far East. Who can foresee what may take place in the Pacific in the days to come, days not so distant as some believe, but days at any rate for which all European Powers with Far Eastern interests ought steadily to prepare?

"Look at the accomplished rise of Japan; think of the possible national awakening of China; and then judge of the vast problems of the Pacific. Only those Powers which have great navies will be listened to with respect, when the future of the Pacific comes to be solved; and if for that reason only, Germany must have a powerful fleet. It may be that even England herself will be glad that Germany has a fleet when they speak together on the same side in the momentous debates of the future."

When the interview set the world guessing, disputing, imputing and passing the lie freely, Prince Bülow again disavowed his master, with His Majesty's consent and at his instigation, of course, otherwise the fate of Bismarck would have seemed much too good for the obstreperous servant.

But to return to the 10th of October, 1905, 6 P.M. While the Chancelleries of all Europe were quaking with deliberations on the Anglo-Russian rapprochement in connection with the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, the War Lord's chief minister spent an anxious quart d'heure trying to convince His Majesty that he was not intriguing against one of the numerous Eulenburg-maggots, fattening in the public cheese, Limburger brand.