Erich Gimpel - German Secret Agent

German Secret Agent

Gimpel had been a radio operator for mining companies in Peru in the 1930s. When World War II began, he became a secret agent, reporting the movement of enemy ships to Germany. When the United States entered the war in December 1941, Gimpel was deported back to Germany. He then served as an agent in Spain.

He was next chosen to attend a spy-school in Hamburg. His final exam was to infiltrate German-occupied The Hague, where he first met the American malcontent and traitor William Colepaugh, an unstable drifter who would ultimately betray him. As unreliable as Colepaugh was, Gimpel felt he needed an American to help him succeed on his mission in the United States.

The pair were transported to the USA by the U-boat U-1230, landing at Hancock Point in the Gulf of Maine on 29 November 1944. Their mission was to gather technical information on the Allied war effort, especially the Manhattan Project, and transmit it back to Germany using an 80-watt radio Gimpel was expected to build.

Together they made their way to Boston and then by train to New York. Before long Colepaugh decided to abandon the mission, visiting an old schoolfriend and asking to turn himself in to the FBI, which was already searching for German agents following the sinking of a Canadian ship a few miles off the Maine coastline (indicating a U-boat had been nearby) and suspicious sightings reported by local residents. The FBI interrogated Colepaugh, who revealed everything, enabling them to track down Gimpel.