Investigation and The Arrest of Alfred Dreyfus - French Espionage

French Espionage

Among the military services reorganized after the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 was that of the French Counter Intelligence Department (disguised under the name of "Section de Statistique") led by a Lt Col Jean Conrad Sandherr. It watched the German embassy as one of its principal occupations. The ambassador, Count Münster, had promised on his word of honor that his attachés would abstain from bribing the French officers or officials. However, it was known at the "Section de Statistique" that the new attaché, Maximilian von Schwartzkoppen, probably without the knowledge of the ambassador, continued to pay spies and was in direct correspondence with the War Office in Berlin. According to indications furnished by a former Spanish military attaché, Valcarlos, Schwartzkoppen and the Italian military representative, Colonel Panizzardi, had agreed to exchange the results of whatever discoveries they might make.

To keep an eye on this plotting, the Counter Intelligence Office (the"Section de Statistique") secured the help of a cleaning lady employed at the German Embassy, a certain Marie Bastian. Madame Bastian, wife of a soldier of the Republican Guard, was "a vulgar, stupid, completely illiterate woman about 40 years in age," according to her boss. However she was of Alsatian descent and spoke German fluently.She was hired as a cleaning woman in the office of the German military attaché, Schwartzkoppen. Madame Bastian carefully collected all the scraps of paper, torn up or half-burnt, which she found in the waste-paper baskets or in the fireplace of Schwartzkoppen's office. She put them all in a paper bag, and once or twice a month took them or had them taken to the "Section de Statistique." There the pieces were carefully fitted together and gummed. By this means it was ascertained that, since 1892, certain secret information concerning the national defense had leaked out. Eventually, the conclusion was reached at high levels in the French General Staff that a traitor was passing on confidential military information to the German Embassy in Paris.