When Nazi Spies Came to Maine

An event happened this week in Maine which recalled a strange episode in World War II espionage.  Maine certainly had its encounters with Nazis during the war, but most of them were among the thousands of German POWs who were at the half-dozen or so camps in northern Maine.  Then, in the closing days of the war, a German U-boat torpedoed a US navy vessel just off-shore of the town where I now live – Cape Elizabeth- killing 48 crewmen. But Maine was also the launching point for a Nazi spy caper which still fascinates today.

On November 29, 1944 a German U-boat (U-1230) surfaced at Hancock Point, by Mt. Desert, Maine, and set ashore two spies: the veteran German espionage expert Erich Gimpel and the American traitor William Colepaugh. Their mission was to gather information on the Manhattan Project (the US atom bomb initiative) and transmit it back to Germany via a radio transmitter which Gimpel would build. The pair trudged through the snow of the Maine fishing village and attracted the attention of Mary Forni because of their unusual attire and behavior.  She alerted the authorities and the FBI set up a dragnet for the two spies.

Gimpel and Colepaugh eventually made their way to Boston by train, and then to New York City.  Their enterprise failed for the same reason so many dreams go up in smoke in New York: the impossible Manhattan real estate market.  It took the two men a long time to find an affordable apartment in New York City.  By then, Colepaugh had become discouraged, and turned himself in to the FBI. Not long afterwards, Gimpel was captured.  The two were sentenced to death by a military tribunal, but three days before their execution their sentences were commuted. Gimpel returned to Germany and wrote a book about his adventures as a Nazi spy (published in English as Spy for Germany – 1957).  Colepaugh is still alive and now lives in Florida.

Mary Forni – the Maine citizen who saw the improbable pair – died this week in Hancock, Maine at the age of 91,