Digging in the National Archives to uncover secrets of The Pond, US spy group predating the CIA

Few people had heard of the spy network known as The Pond until we wrote about it for The Associated Press in July 2010, using a newly opened collection at the U.S. National Archives in College Park, Md. Our story highlighted the value of reporting from historical archives and revealed new details about American intelligence operations during World War II and the early years of the Cold War.

The Pond was created by the U.S. military intelligence during World War II, under the leadership of Col. Jean “Frenchy” Grombach, as a super-secret rival to Wild Bill Donovan’s O.S.S. At one point, Grombach’s organization operated a network of 40 chief agents and more than 600 sources in 32 countries. It endured for 13 years.

Among the nuggets we uncovered in our reporting: a top secret narrative of the daring night-time rescue by Pond agent James McCargar of top anti-communist Zoltan Pfeiffer from Hungary in 1947; details on the penetration of communist groups around the world by one of its foremost agents, Ruth Fischer (code-named Alice Miller), a former leader of Germany’s prewar Communist Party who worked under her cover as a correspondent; and descriptions of the use of corporations, including American Express and Philips companies, for funding, contacts and radio technology.

A U.S. State Department official said this to us in an email after the story was published: “I can’t believe that any news operation in this age of the Internet and instant information still pays journalists to do this kind of good digging, especially for history-focused features.”

Documents describing the activities of the Pond — Grombach’s personal and organizational records — were found in a barn in Virginia in 2001 and turned over to the CIA for review. Randy, reporting another story in 2007, learned that the collection was about to be transferred to the archives in College Park.

But it was not until the spring of 2010 that the Grombach collection was opened to the public and we had an opportunity to travel down to Maryland to review it. 

The recipe for any successful investigation into the past is enthusiastic collaboration, so we enlisted the help of intelligence historians and staff at the archives to help guide us through the tens of thousands of pages in the collection. The resulting story uncloaked the role of the obscure spy organization in the formation of today’s U.S. intelligence services.

By Randy Herschaft and Cristian Salazar, The Associated Press

How the Nation’s Archives Touched the Lives of 5 People in 3 Countries Living on 2 Continents

Sixty-two years after the end of World War II, the National Archives at College Park, Maryland was the source for documents that touched the lives of no less than five people from three countries living on two continents.  The documents provided evidence to family members in Germany and the US that their grandfather was not a war criminal. 

In June 2007, a Canadian collector of WWII militaria purchased a coat named to a Dr. Karl Lüdcke.  Interested in the history behind the owner of the coat, the Canadian researcher contacted my archival research firm, Stenger Historica, in Fredericksburg, Virginia.  I looked up the name in the captured German records from the Berlin Document Collection, RG 242, Microfilm Publication A3343, Roll # 281A.  An extensive file existed which provided evidence that, although Dr. Lüdcke was a member of the Schutz Staffel (SS) and the chief of a Sicherheitsdienst (SD or Security Service) branch office in France, there was no proof that Lüdcke was in any way connected with the Holocaust or the deportation of French civilians from the region of Charlons sur Marne.  On the contrary, Dr. Lüdcke was a hardworking criminal inspector. During the German withdrawal from France in 1944, he was tried by an SS court for encouraging the members of his staff to seek the safety of their homes and families, by disbanding the unit and sending them home.  The trial determined that Lüdcke followed orders and he was released from custody.  However, the fate of Lüdcke was not contained in the documents.  No additional leads were found searching the names of Lüdcke’s children, which were contained in the archival documents. 

When the documents were posted publicly online, they connected Lüdcke’s daughter and husband, living in Germany, the grandson who lived in New York, the Canadian collector, and the researcher for hire.  The collector received information on the fate of Lüdcke from the grandson.  Lüdcke was killed while being evacuated on a train from Poland back to Germany, when the train was attacked by Russian aircraft.  Lüdcke is buried in Germany near the site where he was killed.  The most important aspect to this story is that the documents from the US Archives contained proof that Dr. Lüdcke was not a war criminal, which the Lüdcke family never knew until 2007.

by Dieter Stenger, Stenger Historica, Inc.