{London, about 2 June 1860] 

Dear Lassalle, 

For some three weeks past I’ve been suffering from a liver 
complaint, which has prevented me from doing any [kind]‘ of work, 
and which I haven’t completely shaken off yet. This state of affairs 
makes me a very poor letter-writer. 

Well, before I reply to your letter, just one or two preliminaries. 
The Daily Telegraph’s Berlin correspondent is called Abel. Can you 
provide me with any particulars about this individual? 

Schwarck, the Chief Public Prosecutor, has in turn dismissed the 
criminal action against the National-Zeitung on Appeal on the 
grounds that no ‘public interest’ would be served thereby. It won't 
be long now before the civil action is preferred. 

Now for your letter. 

I shall not come to Berlin.'” I did not go to Cologne and all I 
knew of the sworn evidence given there by Stieber was derived 
from the reports in the Kélnische Zeitung. It is upon those reports 
that my critique in the Revelations is based. Hence I could be of 
no use as a witness in this case. If they want to have me testify 
about one point or another, [ am prepared to make a deposition 

a Savoy, Nice and the Rhine - » G. Behrend - © Manuscript damaged. - 4 Reports on 
the Cologne Communist trial were published by the Kélnische Zeitung in October and 
November 1852 under the heading ‘Assisen-Procedur gegen D. Herm. Becker und 
Genossen. Anklage wegen hochverratherischen Complottes’. - ¢ Revelations Concern- 
ing the Communist Trial in Cologne 

(as apparently has often been done by other refugees) at the 
Prussian Embassy in London. 

During the early stages of the Eichhoff case Juch, the editor of 
the Hermann, appealed to me for help in this respect.'” I gave 
him the Revelations, recommended that Schneider II ..be sum- 
moned as witness from Cologne, and pointed out the necessity of 
questioning Hirsch, who was in gaol in Hamburg. The latter 
interrogation would seem to have been conducted most ineptly. 
Indeed, it would be absolutely essential to convey Hirsch bodily to 
Berlin to act as a witness. Only in this event could there be a 
proper cross-examination that would publicly lay bare the whole 
disgraceful operation, since Hirsch was fully initiated into these 
mysteries of Stieber-Goldheim-Greif-Fleury. 

Another essential witness would be Cherval (Joseph Cramer), at 
present in Paris. As he did a bolt from Aachen after forging some 
bills, Prussia could undoubtedly demand his extradition. But the 
government will take good care not to do so. Apart from that, he’s 
a French mouchard* and therefore under Bonaparte’s protection. 

Most of the other people whom it might be important to 
examine are in America. Only one is still over here, a certain de 
L’Aspée from Wiesbaden, who is employed as an inteERpRETER by the 
English police. I have taken the necessary steps [to arrange a 
meeting [with him] and shall see whether he is willing either to 
{travel] to Berlin [or] to submit to questioning at the Prussian 
Embassy. In 1853, [he] sent The Times an article denouncing 
[Sthieber. The article was suppressed owing to Bunsen’s interven- 
tion and did not [appear]. 

I shall [now] adduce a few points, which you may, perhaps, be 
able to put to use. I wrote the Revelations immediately after the 
Cologne trial was over. However, I subsequently made further 
investigations into this casus, which is of special interest to me. But 
first let me say what a capital idea it was of Eichhoff’s to cite the 
chief fellow culprits, Goldheim and Greif, as witnesses for the 
defence. As things stand, the only way to get at Stieber et cie. 
would be for the government to institute an inquiry into the 
Cologne trial. But it'll take good care not to. 

Stieber (see page 10 of my Revelations)” is said to have testified 
on oath in Cologne that ‘his attention had been drawn’ to ‘the 
conspiracy’s archives’ in the keeping of Oswald Dietz in London by 
the copy of ‘the papers found on Nothjung’ which were sent to 

* police spy - > See present edition, Vol. 11, p. 405. 

him in London from police headquarters in Berlin. A mere 
examination of the Cologne records, which must necessarily 
contain the papers found on Nothjung, should be enough to 
refute this perjured evidence. 

The actual state of affairs was as follows: Cherval (Joseph 
Cramer) was the Paris correspondent of the Willich-Schapper 
League '* and, as such, corresponded with Oswald Dietz. At the 
same time, Cherval was an agent of the Prussian ambassador in 
Paris, Prince Hatzfeldt. Not only did he denounce Dietz, as 
secretary of his London committee, to Hatzfeldt, he also wrote 
Dietz letters that were intended for use as evidence later on. 
Stieber and Greif (as Greif himself told Hirsch in Fleury’s presence) 
acted on Hatzfeldt’s information. What they found out through 
Reuter was where Dietz lived, after which Fleury, on Stieber’s 
orders, burgled Dietz’s lodgings accompanied by Reuter. This, too, 
is known to Hirsch. 

En passant, the following circumstance may be relevant, with 
which Mr Hirsch is familiar. Fleury had made exact copies of the 
letters stolen at Reuter’s and given them to Hirsch to read. Among 
those letters was one from Hanover written by Stechan in which 
he mentioned a remittance of 30 talers for the refugees. Stieber 
(together with his friend Wermuth in Hanover) altered this to 530 
talers for the leaders. Stechan, who, so far as I know, is now in 
Edinburgh, could perhaps swear an affidavit to this effect. Stieber 
(according to the Kdéln. Zeit., see p. 11 of the Revelations*) further 
stated on oath that the Dietz archives had arrived in Berlin on 
5 August 1851, having been sent to him from London. The fact is 
that Stieber took those ‘archives’ with him from London to Paris 
on 20 July 1851. This is a point which the above-mentioned 
L’Aspée could, if he so wished, corroborate on oath. 

Mr Greif testified on oath in Berlin that he did not know 
Hirsch, or knew him only very slightly. The ract is that Hirsch was 
introduced to Fleury by Greif at 39 Brewer Street, Golden Square, 
the private residence of Alberts (then, as now, secretary to the 
Prussian Embassy in London) at that time, after Greif had first got 
Hirsch to give him a report on the activities of the revolutionary 
emigration. From that time on, Greif, Fleury, and Hirsch worked 
together (under the direction of Greif), and were, in particular, 
jointly responsible for composing the forged minute-book. 

The month of April 1853 found Goldheim and Stieber back in 
London where they were intent on engineering a link between 

* See present edition, Vol. 11, p. 406. 

Kossuth’s mysterious gunpowder plot and the Berlin conspiracy 
(Ladendorf’s).'”> At that time (i.e. many months after the Cologne 
trial), Hirsch constantly accompanied them in London and worked 
together with them. 

Considering that the police have acknowledged their Fleury in 
court, let me provide a character sketch of these Prussian agents in 
London: The said Fleury is called Krause, and is the son of 
Krause the cobbler, who was executed in Dresden some 22 to 25 
years ago for the murder of Countess Schonberg and her maid. 
Some time after the Cologne trial, this same Fleury-Krause was 
convicted of forgery in London and sentenced to two or three 
years in the nuixs. Having now served his sentence, he is once 
again up to his old activities. 

The French plot (complot allemana-frangais)'** was engineered 
under Stieber’s direction by Cherval in company with Greif, 
Fleury, Beckmann, Sommer and the French spy, Lucien de la 
Hodde (under the name of Duprez). At Cherval’s instigation, 
Greif (who, like Stieber, swears he does not know the Franco- 
Prussian spies Cherval and Gipperich) went to North Germany 
where he was to find out the abode of a certain tailor named Tietz 
and obtain possession of the letters Cherval had written him on 
police instructions. He went to the home of Tietz’s betrothed in 
Hamburg, saying he had come ‘as a friend’ of Tietz’s and would 
take into safe keeping any potentially dangerous correspondence. 
However, the coup misfired. 

Greif also corresponded with Maupas, through de la Hodde- 
Duprez, about the release of Cherval and Gipperich. No sooner 
had Cherval arrived in London than he was taken on by Greif at a 
regular salary of £1 10s a week. In particular, Greif sent -him to 
Jersey to prepare a major political conspiracy there. Subsequently, 
the association between Greif and Cherval came to an end. If 
Mr Hirsch so wishes, he can affirm all these matters on oath. They 
are important, not only because Greif has again perjured himself, 
but also because they concern the relationship between Cherval and 
Stieber and the ‘veracity’ of the statements made at Cologne by 
Stieber in respect of Cherval. At the very time when Stieber swore 
in Cologne that he knew nothing of the whereabouts, etc, of 
Cherval (see p. 27 of the Revelations*), Cherval was cooperating 
with Greif, who himself was acting on Stieber’s orders. But the 
case could be legally proven only, of course, by obtaining 
depositions from Hirsch (who might perhaps talk in open court) 

* See present edition, Vol. 11, p. 418. 

and from Cherval (who cannot be got hold of). Needless to say, 
Alberts, secretary to the Embassy, won’t speak; nor will de la 
Hodde, Beckmann, Maupas, etc. 

Hirsch and Fleury (the latter had rented a lithographic press at 
Stanbury’s Printing Works, Fether [Fetter] Lane, Fleet Street, 
London, to that end) had been instructed by Greif to produce 
leaflets, such as ‘To the Rural Proletariat’, “To the Children of the 
People’, etc., which Greif sent to the Prussian government as 
emanating from the Marx party. 

After the sudden ‘disappearance’ of the witness Haupt of 
Hamburg in the course of the communist trial at Cologne, 
Hinckeldey sent a courier to the Prussian Embassy in London with 
the request that someone be found to take over Haupt’s role, and 
to ‘swear’ Haupt’s denunciations before the Assizes. The Police 
Presidium, he said, would give a reward of a thousand talers. In 
his letter, Hinckeldey wrote that the very existence of the political 
police depended upon the outcome of this trial. Hirsch, having 
first consulted Fleury (out of the ‘noblest’ motives, as he himself 
subsequently said), declared himself willing. Everything was well in 
train when Fleury returned with tidings of the Prussian Embassy’s 
refusal. A further communication from Hinckeldey read: 

‘The State Prosecutor hopes that thanks to the happy constitution of the jury it 
will be possible to get a verdict of guilty even without extraordinary measures, and he’ 
(Hinck.) ‘therefore asks you not to trouble yourselves further.’ 

For the same reason, the order previously sent to Beckmann, 
the Prussian spy in Paris, bidding him come to Cologne and 
corroborate Stieber’s statements regarding the complot allemand- 
francais was countermanded. 

But now we come to the most curious part of the story, which is 
also perfectly known to Mr Hirsch and is typical of Stieber no less 
than of Goldheim. 

Fleury had learned that I intended to have the actual 
handwriting of the alleged signatories of the minutes (W. Lieb- 
knecht, Rings, and Ulmer) officially authenticated in London. He 
knew that a refugee called Becker lived in the same house 
as Willich. He therefore wrote the following letter in Becker’s 
name: 

‘To the Royal Presidium in Berlin; 
dated from London 
‘It is the intention of Marx and his friends here to discredit the signatures on 
the League Minutes by having handwriting specimens legally authenticated. These 

specimens are to be produced in the Court of Assizes as the really authentic ones. 
‘Everyone familiar with English laws knows that on this point they can be 
manipulated and that a person who vouches for the authenticity of a thing does 
not actually give any true guarantee. 
‘The person who gives you this information does not recoil from giving you his 
name in a matter like this where the truth is at stake. Becker, 4 Litchfield Street.’ 

Stieber had declared’ before the Assizes at Cologne that he had 
had the minute-book for a fortnight (before producing it in court), 
and had duly deliberated before putting it to use; he further 
declared that it had reached him through a courier, Greif. 
Mr Goldheim, on the other hand, in a Jetter to the Prussian Embassy 
in London, said: 

‘The minute-book was produced so late only in order to avoid scrutiny as to its 
authenticity. 

The letter signed ‘Becker’ was addressed to the Police Presidium 
in Berlin. Had it really emanated from Becker, therefore, it must 
have gone to Berlin. Instead, the letter went to Goldheim, the 
police official, at the Frankfurter Hof in Cologne, and a cover to 
that letter to the Police Presidium in Berlin containing a note: 
‘Herr Stieber in Cologne will give a complete explanation as to its 
use.’ Thus, Stieber knew to what end the letter had been forged. 
Moreover, Fleury had written expressly to Goldheim on the 
subject. 

Thus, between Fleury, Goldheim, Stieber and Prussian Police 
Presidium there was tacit collusion over the forgery. 

(Stieber did not make use of the letter, having already been 
compelled to drop the minute-book since, independently of the 
authéntications provided by me, Schneider II had not only 
discovered other signatures of Liebknecht’s and Rings’ in Cologne, 
but had also concluded from a much earlier letter of mine that the 
forger was Hirsch. Stieber got wind of the fact that Schneider had 
compared Liebknecht’s, etc., signatures at the Record Office, and 
that other counsel had done the same. It was then that, at the 
following session, he came out with the imaginary H. Liebknecht 
(see pp. 38-40 of Revelations*).) 

Stieber knew the minute-book to be a fake. Why otherwise 
should he fear authentication of the genuine signatures? 

On 29 October, Goldheim arrived in London. Stieber had sent 
him ithere to confer on the spot with Fleury and Greif and devise 

a See present edition, Vol. 11, pp. 427-29. 

some coup that might save the minute-book. He had to return 
empty-handed, having told Fleury that, rather than compromise 
the chiefs of police, Stieber was resolved, if needs be, to expose 
him, Fleury. 

As a last recourse, Fleury now brought Hirsch a specimen of 
handwriting for him to use to copy out a statement, sign the latter 
with Liebknecht’s name, and then attest it before the Lord Mayor 
while falsely declaring himself (Hirsch) to be Liebknecht. On 
handing Hirsch the said specimen to be copied, Fleury told him 
that the handwriting was that of the person who had written the 
minute-book, and that Goldheim had brought it (the specimen) 
back from Cologne with him. 

(Hence it follows that the minute-book produced in Cologne was 
not the same as had been writien by Hirsch and Fleury. Stieber 
himself had had it copied. The chief difference between it and the 
one fabricated by Fleury and Hirsch—a few insignificant altera- 
tions apart—lay in the fact that, whereas the minutes provided by 
Fleury had been unsigned, signatures had been appended to those 
submitted by Stieber.) 

Hirsch copied out the statement in handwriting as similar as 
possible to that of the specimen. (This last was still in his 
possession when he left London.) The statement was to the effect 
that the undersigned, i.e. Liebknecht, declared the authentication 
of his signature obtained by Marx and Co. to be false, and this, his 
signature, to be the only genuine one. While en route to the Lorp 
Mayor, Hirsch declared that he would not take an oath before 
him, whereupon Fleury said he would do so himself. First he 
called in at the Prussian consulate (where, of course, he was 
well known) and got the Prussian consul to endorse his handwrit- 
ing (as that of Liebknecht). Then, together with Hirsch, he betook 
himself to the Lord Mayor for the purpose of attestation. The Lorp 
Mayor, however, asked for guarantees, which Fleury was unable to 
provide, and thus no oath was taken. (One day later—but trop 
tard*—Fleury obtained credentials from a lawyer.) 

All this dirty business came to light in an affidavit Hirsch swore 
before Jardine, the Bow Street magistrate. The affidavit was sent 
to Gébel, the president of the Appellate Court, and two copies 
went off simultaneously to Schneider II and the lawyer Esser. 

Whether Hirsch can be conveyed bodily from Hamburg to 
Berlin to testify in open session and confront Stieber-Goldheim- 
Greif, I cannot say. The present régime being what it is, there can 

4 too late 

be no question of getting hold of Cherval—now, what is more, an 
avowed ‘civiliser’ and ‘liberator’. 

In the case of my own testimony, I could not, of course, without 
being guilty of all manner of indiscretions, in any way show how 
one fact or another had come to my knowledge. Moreover, such 
evidence would not constitute proof. 

The trial would be altogether straightforward were the govern- 
ment de bonne foi. As things are, it is most difficult to conduct. 

Now I come to Fischel.” 

My relations with David Urquhart and his followers (I won't say 
party because, apart from the sect which holds him to be a 
prophet in all disciplines, Urquhart can, in his own proper domain 
of foreign pouicy, boast supporters among all English parties, from 
the Tories to the Chartists) have been amicable since the 
appearance, in 1853, of my first anti-Palmerston pamphlet.© Ever 
since, there has been a constant interchange, they providing me 
with information, I making unpaid contributions to their Free Press 
(e.g. my Revelations of the diplomatic history of the 18th century, or 
again, the Progress of Russia in Central Asia,'” etc.), and placing at 
their disposal my personal knowledge of Russian agents such as 
Bangya, etc. Now, Fischel is the Urquhartites’ recognised and, as it 
were, official agent in Berlin and my knowledge of his activities 
there is confined to what I have heard about the Portfolio.”° This 
was how I came into contact with Fischel (it was only by chance 
that I ran into him at a London newspaper office,? on which 
occasion I asked him to convey my regards to you). He has carried 
out various commissions for myself and Engels in Berlin. We have 
never exchanged so much as a word, either verbally or in writing, 
on the subject of internal policy, nor for that matter have I done 
so with Urquhart since the time when I told him once and for all 
that I was a revolutionist, and he retorted no less frankly that all 
revolutionists were agents or purrs of the Petersburg cabinet. 

In the letters we have exchanged with Fischel he has always 
- observed the utmost discretion and confined himself solely to the 
one field of foreign policy in which we are in accord with the 
Urquhartites. 

You will have read Urquhart’s writings, and hence it would be 
otiose for me (aside from the strain already involved in writing so 
long a letter in my present state of health) to embark on an 
analysis of this highly complex figure here. He is, I grant you, 

ain good faith - > See this volume, pp. 136-37, 141-45. -¢ Lord Palmerston - 
4 Presumably that of The Free Press. 

subjectively reactionary (romantic) (though not, indeed, in the 
sense of any real reactionary party but, as it were, metaphysically 
so); this in no way precludes the movement in foreign policy, of 
which he is the head, from being objectively revolutionary. 

The fact that some of his German followers such as Bucher, 
Fischel, etc. (I don’t know the latter’s Moskowitertum, but I know 
what’s in it without reading it), have chosen to adopt some of his 
‘Anglo-Saxon’ fads—which, by the by, are not without a kind of 
perverse critical sense—, is to me a matter of complete indiffer- 
ence, just as in a war against Russia, say, it would be a matter of 
indifference to you whether, in firing on the Russians, the motives 
of your neighbour in the firing-line were black, red and gold or 
revolutionary. Urquhart is a power, of which Russia is afraid. He is 
the only official personage in England who has the courage and 
honesty to affront public opinion. He’s the only one of them who is 
incorruptible (whether by money or ambition). Finally, and strange 
to say, I have so far encountered none but honest men among his 
followers, and hence feel bound to regard Fischel as such until I 
have proof of the contrary. 

As for F.’s relations with the Duke of Gotha," I have very good 
reason to believe that they are not venal. Seeing that this Gotha 
chap belongs to the English dynasty, which Urquhart is using 
against Palmerston and ministerial usurpation generally (‘Why 
doesn’t anyone ever shoot at cabinet ministers?’ Humboldt asks, 
presaging such usurpation), what could suit him better than to 
promote anti-Russian and anti-Palmerston sentiment in Germany 
in his (Gotha’s) name? This is why Fischel’s pamphlet, Despoten und 
Revolutiondre, was translated into English as The Duke of Coburg’s 
Pamphlet, and was thought important enough by Palmerston to 
warrant a personal reply in the form of a pamphlet (anonymous), 
which has greatly compromised him.'” For Palmerston had hitherto 
made the unfortunate House of Coburg the scapegoat for his 
Russophilia, and the pamphlet compelled him to abandon this rarsr 
PRETEXT. 

It is very possible, indeed probable, that Fischel’s anti- 
Palmerstonianism is of little significance in Berlin. On the other 

hand, so far as England (and thus par ricochet? Germany) is 
concerned, it is important in that this controversy is being skilfully 
exploited by the Urquhartites and magnified into the German view 
of Palmerston, for the furtherance of the English controversy. 

4 Ernst IL - > indirectly 

Hence, in the war that we, together with the Urquhartites, are 
conducting against Russia, Palmerston and Bonaparte, and in 
which people of all parties and classes in every capital of Europe as 
far as Constantinople are playing their part, Fischel, too, is a 
component. On the other hand, I have never exchanged so much 
as a syllable with Bucher, because to do so would have been 
pointless. Were he living in Berlin instead of London, it would be 
quite a different matter. 

Should we enter into a revolutionary phase in Germany, this will, 
of course, put an end to diplomacy—of a kind, by the by, that 
entails not the least concession on either side nor even a shadow of 
pretence. And even then this English connection will be useful to 
us. 

Come to that, it goes without saying that, in foreign policy, 
there’s little to be gained by using such catchwords as ‘reactionary’ 
and ‘revolutionary’. In Germany now there is no such thing as a 
revolutionary party, and to me the most loathsome form of reaction 
is Royal Prussian court democracy as practised, say, by the 
National-Zeitung and also, to some extent (their acclaim of that 
scoundrel Vincke, the Regent,* etc.) by the Volks-Zeitung. 

At all events, the Urquhartites have the advantage of being 
‘educated’ in foreign policy, so that the ignorant members obtain 
their inspiration from the educated ones; the advantage, too, of 
pursuing a definite goal, the fight against Russia, and being 
engaged in a life and death struggle with that mainstay of Russian 
diplomacy, Downing Street at London.' Let them imagine, if they 
wish, that this struggle will result in the establishment of 
‘Anglo-Saxon’ conditions. It is up to us revolutionaries to go on 
using them so long as we have need of them. This does not 
prevent us from actually knocking them on the head wherever 
they threaten to frustrate our internal policy. ‘The Urquhartites 
have never reproached me for also writing under my own name 
in the Chartist newspaper that was their bugbear until its 
demise—Ernest Jones’s People’s Paper. E. Jones laughed at 
Urquhart’s oddities, ridiculed them in his paper and yet, in that 
same paper, acknowledged his outstanding worth in the matter of 
FOREIGN POLICY. 

Finally, despite his fanatical hatred of the French Revolution 
and everything ‘universal’, Urquhart’s romanticism is exceedingly 
liberal. The freedom of the individual, if in a very topsy-turvy 

4a William, Prince of Prussia 

way, is to him the be-all and end-all. It is true that, in order to 
achieve it, he dresses up the ‘individual’ in al] manner of ancient 

garb. 
Salut. 
Your 
K. M.