Sign-In
Cart
The Baltimore Sabotage Cell: German Agents, American Traitors, and the U-Boat Deutschland During World War I
Paperback
Publisher Price: $23.95
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
Published: Aug 4 2026
Pages: 280
Weight: 0.88
Height: 0.59 Width: 6.13 Depth: 9.25
Language: English
By the summer of 1915 Germany was faced with two major problems in fighting World War I: how to break the British blockade and how to stop or seriously disrupt the British supply line across the Atlantic. The solution to the former was to find a way over, through, or under it. Aircraft in those days were too primitive, too short range, and too underpowered to accomplish this, and Germany lacked the naval strength to force a passage through the blockade. But if Germany could build a fleet of cargo U-boats that were large enough to carry meaningful loads and had the range to make a round trip between Germany and the United States without refueling, the blockade might be successfully broken.
Since the German navy could not cut Britain's supply line to America, another answer lay in sabotaging munitions factories, depots, and ships, as well as infecting horses and mules at the western end of the supply line. German agents, with American sympathizers, successfully carried out more than fifty attacks involving fires and explosions and spread anthrax and glanders on the East Coast before America's entry into the war on 6 April 1917.
Breaking the blockade with a fleet of cargo U-boats provided the lowest risk of drawing America into the war; at the same time, sabotage was incompatible with Germany's diplomatic goal of keeping the United States out of the war. The two solutions were very different, but the fact that both campaigns were run by intelligence agencies--the Etappendienst (navy) and the Geheimdienst (army), through the agency of one man, Paul Hilken, in one American city, Baltimore, make them inseparable. Those solutions created the dichotomy that produced the U-boat Deutschland and the Baltimore Sabotage Cell. Here, Messimer provides the first study of the degree to which U.S. citizens were enlisted in Germany's sabotage operations and debunks many myths that surround the Deutschland.
Also from
Messimer, Dwight R.
An Incipient Mutiny: The Story of the U.S. Army Signal Corps Pilot Revolt
Messimer, Dwight R.
Hardcover
Also in
World War I
The Lost Empire of Emanuel Nobel: Romanovs, Revolutionaries, and the Forgotten Titan Who Fueled the World
Brunt, Douglas
Hardcover
The Guns of August: The Outbreak of World War I; Barbara W. Tuchman's Great War Series
Tuchman, Barbara W.
Paperback
The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel: Genius, Power, and Deception on the Eve of World War I
Brunt, Douglas
Paperback
The Guns of August: The Pulitzer Prize-Winning Classic about the Outbreak of World War I
Tuchman, Barbara W.
Paperback
The War That Made the Middle East: World War I and the End of the Ottoman Empire
Aksakal, Mustafa
Hardcover
American Midnight: The Great War, a Violent Peace, and Democracy's Forgotten Crisis
Hochschild, Adam
Paperback
My Struggle: English Translation of Mein Kamphf - Mein Kampt - Mein Kampf
Murphy, James
Mein Kampf, Kamphf English Kampt
Hitler, Adolf
Paperback
Two World Wars and Hitler: Who Was Responsible?: Anglo-American Money, Foreign Agents and Geopolitics
MacGregor, Jim
O'Dowd, John
Paperback
The Great Halifax Explosion: A World War I Story of Treachery, Tragedy, and Extraordinary Heroism
Bacon, John U.
Paperback
The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel: Genius, Power, and Deception on the Eve of World War I
Brunt, Douglas
Hardcover
Ring of Fire: A New History of the World at War: 1914
Churchill, Alexandra
Eberholst, Nicolai
Hardcover
The Killing Season: The Autumn of 1914, Ypres, and the Afternoon That Cost Germany a War
Cowley, Robert
Hardcover
The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War, 1890-1914; Barbara W. Tuchman's Great War Series
Tuchman, Barbara W.
Paperback
Those Who Know The Sky: Hobey Baker, The Dawn of Aviation, and The War to End All Wars
Margiotti, Thomas F.
Hardcover
Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East
Anderson, Scott
Paperback
The Beauty and the Sorrow: An Intimate History of the First World War
Englund, Peter
Graves, Peter
Paperback
The Facemaker: A Visionary Surgeon's Battle to Mend the Disfigured Soldiers of World War I
Fitzharris, Lindsey
Paperback
The Escape Artists: A Band of Daredevil Pilots and the Greatest Prison Break of the Great War
Bascomb, Neal
Paperback
The Myth of the Great War: A New Military History of World War I
Mosier, John
Literary Group International
Paperback
The Deluge: The Great War, America and the Remaking of the Global Order, 1916-1931
Tooze, Adam
Paperback
Black Soldiers, White Laws: The Tragedy of the 24th Infantry in 1917 Houston
Haymond, John A.
Hardcover
The Africa Ship: Ludwig Bockholt, Zeppelin L 59, and the Most Daring Rescue Mission of Wwi
Etzold, Dominic
Hardcover
The Other Trench: The WW1 Diary and Photos of a German Officer
Pfeifer, Alexander
Cross, Philipp
Paperback
The White Lady: The Story of Two Key British Secret Service Networks Behind German Lines
Fry, Helen
Hardcover
Verdun: The Lost History of the Most Important Battle of World War I, 1914-1918
Mosier, John
Paperback
Poilu: The World War I Notebooks of Corporal Louis Barthas, Barrelmaker, 1914-1918
Barthas, Louis
Paperback
The Last Tsar: The Abdication of Nicholas II and the Fall of the Romanovs
Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi
Hardcover
The Last Ships from Hamburg: Business, Rivalry, and the Race to Save Russia's Jews on the Eve of World War I
Ujifusa, Steven
Paperback
The Last Cavalryman: The Life of General Lucian K. Truscott, Jr. Volume 48
Ferguson, Harvey
Hardcover
The Zimmermann Telegram: America Enters the War, 1917-1918; Barbara W. Tuchman's Great War Series
Tuchman, Barbara W.
Paperback
Anglo-French Military Planning, 1905-1914.: Before the First World War: A Study in 'Military Diplomacy'
Krause, Michael D.
Paperback
Walking Since Daybreak: A Story of Eastern Europe, World War II, and the Heart of Our Century
Eksteins, Modris
Paperback
The Great War and the Transformation of Habsburg Central Europe
Judson, Pieter M.
Zahra, Tara
Hardcover
Tatiana Romanov, Daughter of the Last Tsar: Diaries and Letters, 1913-1918
Nicholson, Nicholas B. a.
Azar, Helen
Hardcover
The Other Trench: The WW1 Diary and Photos of a German Officer
Pfeifer, Alexander
Cross, Philipp
Hardcover
Italian Adriatic Fleet 1915-18: The Fierce Naval War with Austria-Hungary
Cernuschi, Enrico
Paperback
Fighting Proud: The Untold Story of the Gay Men Who Served in Two World Wars
Bourne, Stephen
Paperback
World War I for Kids: Amazing Facts, Key Players, Heroic Acts, Major Battles, and How the War Changed the World
Burrows, James
Paperback
Worlds of Wartime: The First World War and the Reconstruction of Modern Politics
Kelly, Duncan
Hardcover
The Football Battalions: The Elite Footballers Who Fought in the Great War
Evans, Christopher
Hardcover
Orchestrating Power: The American Associational State in the First World War
Finney, Nathan K.
Hardcover
Prolonging the Agony: How the Anglo-American Establishment Deliberately Extended WWI by Three-And-A-Half Years.
MacGregor, Jim
Docherty, Gerry
Paperback
The Marne, 1914: The Opening of World War I and the Battle That Changed the World
Herwig, Holger H.
Paperback
The Unknowns: The Untold Story of America's Unknown Soldier and Wwi's Most Decorated Heroes Who Brought Him Home
O'Donnell, Patrick K.
Hardcover
My Reminiscences of East Africa: The German East Africa Campaign in World War One - A General's Memoir
Lettow-Vorbeck, General Paul Emil Von
Paperback
500 World War I & II Facts - Interesting Events & History Information To Win Trivia
Matthews, Scott
Paperback
The Blitzkrieg Myth: How Hitler and the Allies Misread the Strategic Realities of World War II
Mosier, John
Paperback
Democracy's Foot Soldiers: World War I and the Politics of Empire in the Greater Caribbean
Goldthree, Reena N.
Hardcover
Fighting the Flying Circus: The Greatest True Air Adventure to Come Out of World War I
Rickenbacker, Eddie V.
Paperback
The Unknowns: The Untold Story of America's Unknown Soldier and Wwi's Most Decorated Heroes Who Brought Him Home
O'Donnell, Patrick K.
Paperback
The Storm of Steel: From the Diary of a German Storm-Troop Officer on the Western Front
Jünger, Ernst
Hardcover
The Story of the American Legion: The History and Founding of the U.S. Veterans Organization in the Aftermath of World War One
Wheat, George Seay
Paperback
The Aviator: A Biography of James R. McConnell, Lafayette Escadrille Fighter Pilot
Tom, Steven T.
Hardcover
A Footnote to Freedom: Reclaiming the Life and Legacy of a Black Battalion Soldier
Dixon, Lance B.
Paperback
The First World War in the Baltic Sea Volume 1: Essen's Triumph, 1914 to February 1915
Harris, Mark
Hardcover
World War I for Teens: An Enthralling Guide to the Conflict that Redefined Nations
Wellman, Billy
Hardcover
Burning Beethoven: The Eradication of German Culture in The United States During World War I
Kirschbaum, Erik
Paperback
Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea
Massie, Robert K.
Paperback
Life and Death on the Western Front: Marine Private Charles Jefferson Rhea's World War I Memoir
Presley, James
Paperback
Citizen of the Shadows: The Lives and Lies of Lothar Witzke
Friedland, Paul
Hornick, Robert N.
Paperback
Guardians of the Pass: America's Rainbow Division Against the Final German Offensive of World War I
Thompson, Robert
Hardcover
Victory at Sea: The Story of Admiral Chester W. Nimitz: The Admiral Who Defeated Japan
Mitchell, Gary
Paperback
George, Nicholas and Wilhelm: Three Royal Cousins and the Road to World War I
Carter, Miranda
Paperback
Delta Force: A Memoir by the Founder of the U.S. Military's Most Secretive Special-Operations Unit
Beckwith, Charlie A.
Knox, Donald
Paperback
The Greatest Spy: The True Story of Churchill's Secret Agent Who Became the Model for James Bond, 007
Harte, John
Paperback
History of Naval Warfare: A Captivating Guide to the Strategies, Battles, and Innovations That Have Shaped Maritime History
History, Captivating
Hardcover
Manipulating the Masses: Woodrow Wilson and the Birth of American Propaganda
Hamilton, John Maxwell
Paperback
War and Remembrance: The Story of the American Battle Monuments Commission
Conner, Thomas H.
Hardcover