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For the latest news from Scotland see our ScotNews feed at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/
Electric Scotland News
On Thursday April 14th, 2016, The Scottish Coalition, USA, will present the National Tartan Day Award to Mr. Robert McWilliam as part of Washington DC's annual celebration of Scottish-American heritage. The reception, hosted by the National Capital Tartan Day Committee, will take place on Capitol Hill.
Robert McWilliam has devoted more than 40 years to supporting and promoting Scottish-American culture, in addition to his military, legal, business and philanthropic careers.
"I am delighted at the unanimous selection of Robert McWilliam for the 2016 Scottish Coalition, USA Award," announced Alan L. Bain, President of the TSC, USA and Chairman of the American-Scottish Foundation, a founding member of the coalition.
"Bob never stops!" added Bain. "He has been tireless in his support of so many Scottish-American causes, and I have worked with him on various boards where his energy and dedication has been boundless."
McWilliam, a long-time resident of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, enlisted in the Army after high school, and saw active duty in 1948 and 1949. He served in the reserves for many years, and was promoted to colonel in 1978.
As he completed his active duty in the Army, McWilliam took his bar exams. From 1957, he practiced law before joining a family-owned start-up company in the automotive and metal casting industries. During his 40 years with the company, he traveled extensively, speaking with engineering societies and presenting research papers at international meetings. At the time of his retirement, the company was providing materials and equipment to industries all over the world.
McWilliam has been involved with the Scottish-American community since the 1970s. He is currently:
- President Emeritus, current Trustee, and one of the founding members of The Scottish Coalition USA;
- President Emeritus and current Trustee of the Council of Scottish Clans and Associations (COSCA);
- Past President and current Trustee of the Milwaukee St. Andrews Society and recipient of the Society's Founder's Award;
- Past President and current Trustee of the Caledonian Foundation USA;
- a member of the Board of Directors for Scottish Heritage USA;
- and Emeritus Director of the Clan Donald Foundation.
McWilliam was granted a personal coat of Scottish arms by Scotland's Lord Lyon, King of Arms. The grant is unique in that it was not based on ancestry, but "for service to Scotland and Scottish Culture."
He is the originator of the Wisconsin State Tartan, passed by both houses of the state legislature and signed into law by Governor James Doyle on April 7, 2008.
Wisconsin State Tartan originated by Robert McWilliam, signed into law in April, 2009.
In July of 2009, he was invited by the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs to speak in the Debating Chambers of the Scottish Parliament on the occasion of the 2009 International Clan Gathering in Edinburgh.
He was a member of Clan Donald USA's 1993 crew of 13 that rowed and sailed the Aileach - an open decked, 40 foot replica of a Scottish Berlinn ( a short Viking long boat) - from Armadale, Skye; down the west coast of Scotland; through the Inner Hebrides, portaging the Aileach across the Kintyre Isthmus to commemorate Magnus Bare Legs, the King of Norway's 1098 portage; and then up the river Clyde to the center of the city of Glasgow, commemorating the 500th anniversary of the Forfeiture of the Lordship of the Isles.
In addition to his work with the Scottish-American community, McWilliam has been active with the Boy Scouts of America for a number of years, receiving awards for distinguished service and currently serving as a member of the Advisory Board for the Milwaukee County Council.
He has also been very involved with the Knights Templar. In 2003, His Royal Highness, the Grand Master, Don Francisco de Borbon y Escasany, Duke of Seville bestowed upon him the dignity of Knight of Grace in the Military and Hospital Order of St. Lazarus of Jerusalem.
In 2013, The Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of the Temple of Jerusalem (The Templars) conferred upon him the dignity of their Knight's Grand Cross for his 20 plus years of service, including a term as Prior of their St. John the Baptist Priory.
McWilliam and his wife Mary have been married for over 40 years. They enjoy spending time with their seven children and 10 grandchildren, and engaging in sailboat racing, camping, canoeing and downhill skiing.
The 2016 National Tartan Day Award has been designed by Keith Lipert Gallery for the TSC USA to reflect the historic story of Tartan Day, held annually on April 6th. With wording from the Senate Resolution that established the holiday, and historic images of Arbroath Cathedral, Robert the Bruce, the Capitol and the Scottish Parliament, the award represents the story of Tartan Day's evolution.
The Scottish Coalition, USA has been instrumental in setting up a national platform for the observance of Tartan Day in the US, and comprises five national Scottish-American organizations:
Brexit
Reports from the UK say that polls are showing equal results between staying and leaving. "EU referendum poll: Trust in PM falls as vote on knife edge" for which see:
http://www.theweek.co.uk/eu-referend...-camps-at-5050
Some stories from the Scottish Press this week...
Note that this is just a selection from our ScotNews Feed which is on our index page.
Is your surname among the 20 most common in Scotland?
There are three surnames in Scotland which have held the top spots for the past 40 years.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/is-your...land-1-4100176
Culloden battlefield landscape laser-scanned
The Culloden battlefield site is being scanned to provide a detailed model of the landscape 270 years on from the Jacobites' final stand.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...lands-36043839
Scottish mince makes it into Hansard
Kirsty Blackman, the MP for Aberdeen North, was contacted by Hansard over a criticism of standing orders.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...itics-36047943
Prejudice around Gypsy/Travellers must come to an end
It was International Roma Day on 8 April
Read more at:
http://www.thenational.scot/comment/...o-an-end.16165
Prejudice around Gypsy/Travellers must come to an end
Unemployment rates are 90 per cent within the Gypsy/Traveller community
Read more at:
http://www.thenational.scot/comment/...o-an-end.16165
The 20 best prehistoric sites to visit in Scotland
20 of the best prehistoric sites to visit in Scotland.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/heritage/peo...land-1-4099100
Killie Pie
THE future of the iconic Killie Pie is under threat after a bitter legal battle broke out over naming rights to it.
Read more at:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/sc...KgOq2ZYC7Wq.97
The truth about Knife crime in Scotland
By Kenneth Roy
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/KennethRoy45a.html
Patrick Harvie taps into unease over SNP
The Nationalists are well ahead in the polls, but there is still an argument for checks on power, writes Scott Macnab
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/scott-m...-snp-1-4098415
Could Scottish country dancing take a turn on the timetable?
It has been woven into the cultural fabric of the nation since the 18th century but has fallen out of fashion.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/co...able-1-4097449
In her own back yard
The First Minister's myopia about recial tension. This article provides some excellent information on racial diversity in Scotland.
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/KennethRoy44a.html
Sleepwalking into state control of families
We must ask what safeguards there are for parents in this situation.
Read more at:
http://www.thecourier.co.uk/opinion/...ilies-1.932849
Can we trust Nicola Sturgeon?
THE SNP planned this election around trusting Nicola Sturgeon, says Torcuil, but now they might need more than the post-referendum bloom.
Read more at:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/po...4bpDmlblgHx.97
Electric Canadian
Pioneer Schools of Upper Canada
By Frank Eames
You can read this at http://www.electriccanadian.com/pion...eerschools.pdf
Pioneer Transportation in Canad
By Lawrence J. Burpee, F.R.S.C., Secretary, International Joint Commission, Ottawa
You can read this at http://www.electriccanadian.com/tran...rtransport.pdf
Electric Scotland
Dictionary of National Biography
I have started to work my way through this 60 odd volume publication to extract the Scottish entries and am adding them to our Scottish Nation section as pdf files.
Black - http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...tion/black.htm
Bisset - http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ion/bisset.htm
Birrel - http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ion/birrel.htm
Birnie - http://www.electricscotland.com/HIST...ion/birnie.htm
Robert Burns Lives!
Edited by Frank Shaw
It’s always a pleasure to welcome Dr. Patrick Scott back to the pages ofRobert Burns Lives!. His writings continue to be enlightening and add much to our study of Scotland’s famous Bard. Today Dr. Scott introduces us to a Burns contemporary, poet and ornithologist, Alexander Wilson. As I write these words, Patrick is in Scotland doing further research and visiting with dear friends at the University of Glasgow. I imagine from somewhere along the way during his travels there will appear another article for our website. My compliments and continued thanks to Patrick for enriching the content ofRobertBurns Lives!from its inception. For our new readers, please see our index page for Chapter 135, “A Tribute to Dr. Patrick Scott, A Noted Robert Burns Scholar”, which is the talk I gave when he retired from the University of South Carolina few years ago. (FRS: 4.13.16)
You can read "A Scottish Contemporary of Burns: Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), Poet and Ornithologist" by Patrick Scott at :http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...s_lives234.htm
Glasgow Herald Archives
Added a few more snippets from these archives...
1936, May 11 Charities Week Carnival, Stirling at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...s/19360511.htm
Rugby at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...gby/195960.htm
and added a new category for Personalities at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ties/index.htm
Romantic Edinburgh
By John Geddie (1900) which I've added a link to this book at the foot of our Edinburgh page at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/edinburgh/
Queen Mother
Added a couple of videos to our page on the Queen Mother at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/women/wih20.htm
The Stirlings of Keir and their Family Papers
By William Fraser.
Added this book to the foot of our Stirling page in the Scottish Nation at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/HIST...n/stirling.htm
Maxwell
Another report on this family which I've added to our page on them in the Scottish Nation at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...on/maxwell.htm
Drummond
Another report on manuscripts of this family which I've added to their page in the Scottish Nation at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...n/drummond.htm
Montgomery
Found historical documents relating to this family and have added this to the foot of our Montgomery page in the Scottish Nation at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...montgomery.htm
THE STORY
The spying Scotsman who hunted the Nazis of New York
By Adam Lebor
In the summer of 1940, as British pilots fought desperately for the skies of southern England, the battle was joined on a very different front, thousands of miles from the coast of Kent.
It was fought through the political salons of Washington DC, the boardrooms and the smoky nightclubs of New York.
The protagonists had no uniform save that of a well-tailored suit; their weapons were native cunning, a plausible manner, and, from time to time, a concealed revolver.
This was the secret battle for America, ordered by Winston Churchill himself, and the fate of the free world hung upon it.
Today, we can reveal the untold story of how British agents went to war on Wall Street, a story pieced together from a remarkable collection of secret intelligence reports lying untouched for decades.
Uncovered by the MoS, the documents show how British agents took on Nazi sympathisers in the US with a masterful campaign of dirty tricks and disinformation, how they outmanoeuvred Hitler’s network of American allies and how they, ultimately, destroyed the Third Reich’s powerful business and intelligence empire across the water.
[Uncovered documents show how British agents, headed by Highland clan chief Donald MacLaren, took on Nazi sympathisers in the US]
Today, amid talk of special relationships and historic links, few remember that a sizeable part of American opinion was pro-German, even as Europe burned – or that many well-placed Americans were virulently anti-British.
There was a strongly held belief, particularly in corporate and financial life, that the Nazis were the best bulwark against the advance of Communism.
In fact, America and its vast industrial output were vital for the Nazi war effort. German companies ran extensive US subsidiaries and supplied the Third Reich with pharmaceuticals, chemicals and the latest technology, directly or through South American subsidiaries.
The Third Reich needed information, too. Long before the outbreak of war, German firms had placed networks of deep-penetration agents across the American business world.
There was open sympathy for the German cause and it extended to the very top of American society.
Sullivan & Cromwell, a powerful New York law firm, brokered numerous deals between American business and the German companies that helped bring Hitler to power.
The partners included John Foster Dulles, who later became Secretary of State, and his brother, Allen Dulles, America’s wartime spymaster, who became the first head of the CIA.
Standard Oil, founded by the Rockefellers, was entwined with IG Farben, Nazi Germany’s most powerful conglomerate. Brown Brothers Harriman, the oldest private bank in the United States, was connected to Fritz Thyssen, the German steel magnate who had financed Hitler.
Thyssen ran his American business through the Union Banking Corporation, based in New York. Its directors included Prescott Bush, father of President George Bush and grandfather of President George W. Bush.
Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company, was the author of the anti-Semitic pamphlet, The International Jew. He received a medal from Nazi Germany in 1938. Hitler kept a portrait of him in his office.
All this, declared Winston Churchill, had to stop. The man charged with tackling the Germans’ formidable operation was Donald MacLaren, a Highland clan chief. Charming, persuasive and physically imposing, MacLaren was a skilled operative who established a network of 150 agents across the Americas in the early years of the War on behalf of British Security Coordination (BSC), the British intelligence organisation in the US. Working closely with George Merten, a German anti-Nazi, his mission was to report on Nazi-American business links.
By training, MacLaren was an accountant, a vital skill for industrial counter-espionage. But he was no grey man. A snappy dresser with a taste for good food, wine and cigars, MacLaren relished his time in Manhattan and entertained his contacts at 21, an upmarket restaurant a few blocks from the British intelligence HQ at the Rockefeller Centre.
Their enemy was IG Farben, the friend of Standard Oil. Born out of a merger between Bayer, BASF, Hoechst and Agfa, IG Farben was the largest and most powerful company in Europe and the biggest chemical conglomerate in the world, producing the basic components of a modern industrial state: explosives, film, plastics, fuel, rayon, paint, pesticides and much more. Including poisonous gases.
Without IG Farben, Nazi Germany could not wage war. Hermann Schmitz, its CEO, was one of Hitler’s earliest backers. IG Farben designed, built and ran the company’s concentration camp at Auschwitz, known as Auschwitz III, making Buna, or artificial rubber. Its managers oversaw tens of thousands of slave labourers in conditions of extreme brutality, forced to work until they died or were despatched to the gas chambers to be killed with Zyklon B – a patent owned by IG Farben.
Hermann Schmitz was also a director of the mysterious Bank For International Settlements, based in Basel. The BIS, which still exists, was a key point in the secret channels between the United States and the Nazis.
Naturally, IG Farben went by a different name in America, operating as a company known as General Aniline and Film, or GAF.
And helped by its association with Standard Oil, GAF extended its tentacles into the heart of the business, legal and political establishment, sending diplomatic and industrial secrets – plus huge profits – back to Berlin. MacLaren, then, was facing formidable opposition, and not just from Nazi agents. The mandarins of the State Department were obsessed with maintaining America’s neutrality and they instructed J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the FBI, to refrain from any collaboration with Britain.
The powerful Irish and Catholic lobbies were violently anti-British, none more than Joseph Kennedy, US ambassador to London. A pro-Nazi lobby, the German-American Bund, boasted celebrity supporters, such as the aviator Charles Lindbergh. At its peak, the America First Committee, the most formidable isolationist lobbying organisation, had several hundred thousand members, including future President Gerald Ford.
MacLaren decided to use the same tactics as the Germans. He, too, became a fake businessman and, using an alias, claimed he wanted to establish a relationship with GAF.
His first attack was the work of a classic agent provocateur. The GAF directors, he discovered, were split into two factions over how they would protect their interests should America enter the war. MacLaren, who by now was close to a number of GAF board members, began leaking and fabricating information to set one faction against another.
This, he later said, resulted in one group racing the other to Washington to report the wicked activities of their colleagues to the Department of Justice. Each faction denounced the other as working for the Nazis; each was exposed.
MacLaren’s masterstroke, though, was a publicity blitz against IG Farben that finally forced the US authorities to take action.
It was in spring 1942, that BSC launched a 70-page pamphlet called Sequel To The Apocalypse, a taut distillation of MacLaren and Merten’s investigation of IG Farben’s American networks. Booktab, a BSC front company, published 200,000 copies, on sale at 25 cents, the striking cover featuring the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, one holding a torch aloft, whose smoke spelled out ‘IG Farben’.
The contents were explosive. They revealed, for example, the role of IG Farben in promoting the war, and the huge profits it was making from the destruction. It also detailed the company’s web of links with American household names, especially Standard Oil. With a foreword written by Rex Stout, a popular mystery novelist, it sold out immediately. Stout proclaimed that IG Farben’s American business partners were traitors, working for Nazi Germany’s interests.
For GAF and Standard Oil, the pamphlet was a public relations catastrophe. They immediately despatched teams of employees to buy up copies. But it was too late. The US authorities felt obliged to act; IG Farben’s business empire in America was closed down and its subsidiaries placed on a blacklist. The US government also seized 2,500 patents from Standard Oil, on the grounds that they were owned by IG Farben.
This was a massive setback for Nazi Germany, as it could no longer use its American network to supply vital war materials.
Its US allies were named and shamed, causing a wave of revulsion – especially as, by now, the United States was at war with Germany.
In many ways, Donald MacLaren seemed an unlikely spy – and it is thanks only to a cache of yellowing intelligence papers that some part of this story has been retrieved. The BSC archives were deliberately destroyed after the war because they were judged too sensitive for the public gaze. But MacLaren was as stubborn as he was brave. He kept his papers.
Paradoxically, it was his upbringing as a son of the manse that aided his work as a spy. The teenage Donald helped out on his father’s parish rounds, sometimes even ministering to the dying. Warm and convivial, he had an unrivalled ability to get people to share their deepest confidences.
By 1938, MacLaren had moved to New York. His skills at forensic accounting made him a natural recruit for BSC. New York in 1940 was a magnet for Allied and Axis intelligence agencies. Its immigrant populations provided natural cover for spies. It was dangerous work. He once told his son, Donald, he had killed an enemy agent and interrogated many more, but would not reveal where or when. ‘But fortunately, I never had to torture anybody.’
MacLaren himself was keen to fight and obtained a commission with the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders but British intelligence refused to let him leave.
As the War ended, MacLaren went to Germany to build a legal case against IG Farben executives. He submitted a series of lengthy memos on the company and its leaders who, said MacLaren, embodied the dark nexus of German industry and the Nazi war machine. MacLaren argued, with remarkable foresight, that the way the Allies dealt with IG Farben would determine the economic balance of power in post-War Europe.
‘We are dealing here ... with denazification and demilitarisation of the heart and soul of the German war machine,’ he wrote.
In 1947, 24 senior IG Farben officials were tried for war crimes. Thirteen were found guilty. Their sentences were derisory. Hermann Schmitz received four years for ‘plunder’.
All IG Farben executives were released by 1951 on the orders of John McCloy, US High Commissioner for Germany.
Schmitz and his colleagues were warmly welcomed back to the German business world. The Cold War meant revitalising German industry was more important than punishing those complicit in mass murder.
IG Farben no longer legally exists. It was broken up into its constituent companies. But they are more powerful than ever. BASF is now the world’s largest chemicals company, with annual sales of almost €80 billion. Bayer is the world’s biggest producer of aspirin.
Donald MacLaren eventually moved to London, where he worked for the United Baltic Shipping Corporation, becoming a director.
He died in June 1966, aged 56, having never spoken publicly about his wartime role, the risks he took and the remarkable service he performed for his country.
And that's it for this week and hope you all enjoy your weekend.
Alastair
http://www.electricscotland.com/
Electric Scotland News
On Thursday April 14th, 2016, The Scottish Coalition, USA, will present the National Tartan Day Award to Mr. Robert McWilliam as part of Washington DC's annual celebration of Scottish-American heritage. The reception, hosted by the National Capital Tartan Day Committee, will take place on Capitol Hill.
Robert McWilliam has devoted more than 40 years to supporting and promoting Scottish-American culture, in addition to his military, legal, business and philanthropic careers.
"I am delighted at the unanimous selection of Robert McWilliam for the 2016 Scottish Coalition, USA Award," announced Alan L. Bain, President of the TSC, USA and Chairman of the American-Scottish Foundation, a founding member of the coalition.
"Bob never stops!" added Bain. "He has been tireless in his support of so many Scottish-American causes, and I have worked with him on various boards where his energy and dedication has been boundless."
McWilliam, a long-time resident of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, enlisted in the Army after high school, and saw active duty in 1948 and 1949. He served in the reserves for many years, and was promoted to colonel in 1978.
As he completed his active duty in the Army, McWilliam took his bar exams. From 1957, he practiced law before joining a family-owned start-up company in the automotive and metal casting industries. During his 40 years with the company, he traveled extensively, speaking with engineering societies and presenting research papers at international meetings. At the time of his retirement, the company was providing materials and equipment to industries all over the world.
McWilliam has been involved with the Scottish-American community since the 1970s. He is currently:
- President Emeritus, current Trustee, and one of the founding members of The Scottish Coalition USA;
- President Emeritus and current Trustee of the Council of Scottish Clans and Associations (COSCA);
- Past President and current Trustee of the Milwaukee St. Andrews Society and recipient of the Society's Founder's Award;
- Past President and current Trustee of the Caledonian Foundation USA;
- a member of the Board of Directors for Scottish Heritage USA;
- and Emeritus Director of the Clan Donald Foundation.
McWilliam was granted a personal coat of Scottish arms by Scotland's Lord Lyon, King of Arms. The grant is unique in that it was not based on ancestry, but "for service to Scotland and Scottish Culture."
He is the originator of the Wisconsin State Tartan, passed by both houses of the state legislature and signed into law by Governor James Doyle on April 7, 2008.
Wisconsin State Tartan originated by Robert McWilliam, signed into law in April, 2009.
In July of 2009, he was invited by the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs to speak in the Debating Chambers of the Scottish Parliament on the occasion of the 2009 International Clan Gathering in Edinburgh.
He was a member of Clan Donald USA's 1993 crew of 13 that rowed and sailed the Aileach - an open decked, 40 foot replica of a Scottish Berlinn ( a short Viking long boat) - from Armadale, Skye; down the west coast of Scotland; through the Inner Hebrides, portaging the Aileach across the Kintyre Isthmus to commemorate Magnus Bare Legs, the King of Norway's 1098 portage; and then up the river Clyde to the center of the city of Glasgow, commemorating the 500th anniversary of the Forfeiture of the Lordship of the Isles.
In addition to his work with the Scottish-American community, McWilliam has been active with the Boy Scouts of America for a number of years, receiving awards for distinguished service and currently serving as a member of the Advisory Board for the Milwaukee County Council.
He has also been very involved with the Knights Templar. In 2003, His Royal Highness, the Grand Master, Don Francisco de Borbon y Escasany, Duke of Seville bestowed upon him the dignity of Knight of Grace in the Military and Hospital Order of St. Lazarus of Jerusalem.
In 2013, The Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of the Temple of Jerusalem (The Templars) conferred upon him the dignity of their Knight's Grand Cross for his 20 plus years of service, including a term as Prior of their St. John the Baptist Priory.
McWilliam and his wife Mary have been married for over 40 years. They enjoy spending time with their seven children and 10 grandchildren, and engaging in sailboat racing, camping, canoeing and downhill skiing.
The 2016 National Tartan Day Award has been designed by Keith Lipert Gallery for the TSC USA to reflect the historic story of Tartan Day, held annually on April 6th. With wording from the Senate Resolution that established the holiday, and historic images of Arbroath Cathedral, Robert the Bruce, the Capitol and the Scottish Parliament, the award represents the story of Tartan Day's evolution.
The Scottish Coalition, USA has been instrumental in setting up a national platform for the observance of Tartan Day in the US, and comprises five national Scottish-American organizations:
Brexit
Reports from the UK say that polls are showing equal results between staying and leaving. "EU referendum poll: Trust in PM falls as vote on knife edge" for which see:
http://www.theweek.co.uk/eu-referend...-camps-at-5050
Some stories from the Scottish Press this week...
Note that this is just a selection from our ScotNews Feed which is on our index page.
Is your surname among the 20 most common in Scotland?
There are three surnames in Scotland which have held the top spots for the past 40 years.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/is-your...land-1-4100176
Culloden battlefield landscape laser-scanned
The Culloden battlefield site is being scanned to provide a detailed model of the landscape 270 years on from the Jacobites' final stand.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...lands-36043839
Scottish mince makes it into Hansard
Kirsty Blackman, the MP for Aberdeen North, was contacted by Hansard over a criticism of standing orders.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...itics-36047943
Prejudice around Gypsy/Travellers must come to an end
It was International Roma Day on 8 April
Read more at:
http://www.thenational.scot/comment/...o-an-end.16165
Prejudice around Gypsy/Travellers must come to an end
Unemployment rates are 90 per cent within the Gypsy/Traveller community
Read more at:
http://www.thenational.scot/comment/...o-an-end.16165
The 20 best prehistoric sites to visit in Scotland
20 of the best prehistoric sites to visit in Scotland.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/heritage/peo...land-1-4099100
Killie Pie
THE future of the iconic Killie Pie is under threat after a bitter legal battle broke out over naming rights to it.
Read more at:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/sc...KgOq2ZYC7Wq.97
The truth about Knife crime in Scotland
By Kenneth Roy
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/KennethRoy45a.html
Patrick Harvie taps into unease over SNP
The Nationalists are well ahead in the polls, but there is still an argument for checks on power, writes Scott Macnab
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/scott-m...-snp-1-4098415
Could Scottish country dancing take a turn on the timetable?
It has been woven into the cultural fabric of the nation since the 18th century but has fallen out of fashion.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/co...able-1-4097449
In her own back yard
The First Minister's myopia about recial tension. This article provides some excellent information on racial diversity in Scotland.
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/KennethRoy44a.html
Sleepwalking into state control of families
We must ask what safeguards there are for parents in this situation.
Read more at:
http://www.thecourier.co.uk/opinion/...ilies-1.932849
Can we trust Nicola Sturgeon?
THE SNP planned this election around trusting Nicola Sturgeon, says Torcuil, but now they might need more than the post-referendum bloom.
Read more at:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/po...4bpDmlblgHx.97
Electric Canadian
Pioneer Schools of Upper Canada
By Frank Eames
You can read this at http://www.electriccanadian.com/pion...eerschools.pdf
Pioneer Transportation in Canad
By Lawrence J. Burpee, F.R.S.C., Secretary, International Joint Commission, Ottawa
You can read this at http://www.electriccanadian.com/tran...rtransport.pdf
Electric Scotland
Dictionary of National Biography
I have started to work my way through this 60 odd volume publication to extract the Scottish entries and am adding them to our Scottish Nation section as pdf files.
Black - http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...tion/black.htm
Bisset - http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ion/bisset.htm
Birrel - http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ion/birrel.htm
Birnie - http://www.electricscotland.com/HIST...ion/birnie.htm
Robert Burns Lives!
Edited by Frank Shaw
It’s always a pleasure to welcome Dr. Patrick Scott back to the pages ofRobert Burns Lives!. His writings continue to be enlightening and add much to our study of Scotland’s famous Bard. Today Dr. Scott introduces us to a Burns contemporary, poet and ornithologist, Alexander Wilson. As I write these words, Patrick is in Scotland doing further research and visiting with dear friends at the University of Glasgow. I imagine from somewhere along the way during his travels there will appear another article for our website. My compliments and continued thanks to Patrick for enriching the content ofRobertBurns Lives!from its inception. For our new readers, please see our index page for Chapter 135, “A Tribute to Dr. Patrick Scott, A Noted Robert Burns Scholar”, which is the talk I gave when he retired from the University of South Carolina few years ago. (FRS: 4.13.16)
You can read "A Scottish Contemporary of Burns: Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), Poet and Ornithologist" by Patrick Scott at :http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...s_lives234.htm
Glasgow Herald Archives
Added a few more snippets from these archives...
1936, May 11 Charities Week Carnival, Stirling at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...s/19360511.htm
Rugby at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...gby/195960.htm
and added a new category for Personalities at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ties/index.htm
Romantic Edinburgh
By John Geddie (1900) which I've added a link to this book at the foot of our Edinburgh page at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/edinburgh/
Queen Mother
Added a couple of videos to our page on the Queen Mother at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/women/wih20.htm
The Stirlings of Keir and their Family Papers
By William Fraser.
Added this book to the foot of our Stirling page in the Scottish Nation at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/HIST...n/stirling.htm
Maxwell
Another report on this family which I've added to our page on them in the Scottish Nation at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...on/maxwell.htm
Drummond
Another report on manuscripts of this family which I've added to their page in the Scottish Nation at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...n/drummond.htm
Montgomery
Found historical documents relating to this family and have added this to the foot of our Montgomery page in the Scottish Nation at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...montgomery.htm
THE STORY
The spying Scotsman who hunted the Nazis of New York
By Adam Lebor
In the summer of 1940, as British pilots fought desperately for the skies of southern England, the battle was joined on a very different front, thousands of miles from the coast of Kent.
It was fought through the political salons of Washington DC, the boardrooms and the smoky nightclubs of New York.
The protagonists had no uniform save that of a well-tailored suit; their weapons were native cunning, a plausible manner, and, from time to time, a concealed revolver.
This was the secret battle for America, ordered by Winston Churchill himself, and the fate of the free world hung upon it.
Today, we can reveal the untold story of how British agents went to war on Wall Street, a story pieced together from a remarkable collection of secret intelligence reports lying untouched for decades.
Uncovered by the MoS, the documents show how British agents took on Nazi sympathisers in the US with a masterful campaign of dirty tricks and disinformation, how they outmanoeuvred Hitler’s network of American allies and how they, ultimately, destroyed the Third Reich’s powerful business and intelligence empire across the water.
[Uncovered documents show how British agents, headed by Highland clan chief Donald MacLaren, took on Nazi sympathisers in the US]
Today, amid talk of special relationships and historic links, few remember that a sizeable part of American opinion was pro-German, even as Europe burned – or that many well-placed Americans were virulently anti-British.
There was a strongly held belief, particularly in corporate and financial life, that the Nazis were the best bulwark against the advance of Communism.
In fact, America and its vast industrial output were vital for the Nazi war effort. German companies ran extensive US subsidiaries and supplied the Third Reich with pharmaceuticals, chemicals and the latest technology, directly or through South American subsidiaries.
The Third Reich needed information, too. Long before the outbreak of war, German firms had placed networks of deep-penetration agents across the American business world.
There was open sympathy for the German cause and it extended to the very top of American society.
Sullivan & Cromwell, a powerful New York law firm, brokered numerous deals between American business and the German companies that helped bring Hitler to power.
The partners included John Foster Dulles, who later became Secretary of State, and his brother, Allen Dulles, America’s wartime spymaster, who became the first head of the CIA.
Standard Oil, founded by the Rockefellers, was entwined with IG Farben, Nazi Germany’s most powerful conglomerate. Brown Brothers Harriman, the oldest private bank in the United States, was connected to Fritz Thyssen, the German steel magnate who had financed Hitler.
Thyssen ran his American business through the Union Banking Corporation, based in New York. Its directors included Prescott Bush, father of President George Bush and grandfather of President George W. Bush.
Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company, was the author of the anti-Semitic pamphlet, The International Jew. He received a medal from Nazi Germany in 1938. Hitler kept a portrait of him in his office.
All this, declared Winston Churchill, had to stop. The man charged with tackling the Germans’ formidable operation was Donald MacLaren, a Highland clan chief. Charming, persuasive and physically imposing, MacLaren was a skilled operative who established a network of 150 agents across the Americas in the early years of the War on behalf of British Security Coordination (BSC), the British intelligence organisation in the US. Working closely with George Merten, a German anti-Nazi, his mission was to report on Nazi-American business links.
By training, MacLaren was an accountant, a vital skill for industrial counter-espionage. But he was no grey man. A snappy dresser with a taste for good food, wine and cigars, MacLaren relished his time in Manhattan and entertained his contacts at 21, an upmarket restaurant a few blocks from the British intelligence HQ at the Rockefeller Centre.
Their enemy was IG Farben, the friend of Standard Oil. Born out of a merger between Bayer, BASF, Hoechst and Agfa, IG Farben was the largest and most powerful company in Europe and the biggest chemical conglomerate in the world, producing the basic components of a modern industrial state: explosives, film, plastics, fuel, rayon, paint, pesticides and much more. Including poisonous gases.
Without IG Farben, Nazi Germany could not wage war. Hermann Schmitz, its CEO, was one of Hitler’s earliest backers. IG Farben designed, built and ran the company’s concentration camp at Auschwitz, known as Auschwitz III, making Buna, or artificial rubber. Its managers oversaw tens of thousands of slave labourers in conditions of extreme brutality, forced to work until they died or were despatched to the gas chambers to be killed with Zyklon B – a patent owned by IG Farben.
Hermann Schmitz was also a director of the mysterious Bank For International Settlements, based in Basel. The BIS, which still exists, was a key point in the secret channels between the United States and the Nazis.
Naturally, IG Farben went by a different name in America, operating as a company known as General Aniline and Film, or GAF.
And helped by its association with Standard Oil, GAF extended its tentacles into the heart of the business, legal and political establishment, sending diplomatic and industrial secrets – plus huge profits – back to Berlin. MacLaren, then, was facing formidable opposition, and not just from Nazi agents. The mandarins of the State Department were obsessed with maintaining America’s neutrality and they instructed J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the FBI, to refrain from any collaboration with Britain.
The powerful Irish and Catholic lobbies were violently anti-British, none more than Joseph Kennedy, US ambassador to London. A pro-Nazi lobby, the German-American Bund, boasted celebrity supporters, such as the aviator Charles Lindbergh. At its peak, the America First Committee, the most formidable isolationist lobbying organisation, had several hundred thousand members, including future President Gerald Ford.
MacLaren decided to use the same tactics as the Germans. He, too, became a fake businessman and, using an alias, claimed he wanted to establish a relationship with GAF.
His first attack was the work of a classic agent provocateur. The GAF directors, he discovered, were split into two factions over how they would protect their interests should America enter the war. MacLaren, who by now was close to a number of GAF board members, began leaking and fabricating information to set one faction against another.
This, he later said, resulted in one group racing the other to Washington to report the wicked activities of their colleagues to the Department of Justice. Each faction denounced the other as working for the Nazis; each was exposed.
MacLaren’s masterstroke, though, was a publicity blitz against IG Farben that finally forced the US authorities to take action.
It was in spring 1942, that BSC launched a 70-page pamphlet called Sequel To The Apocalypse, a taut distillation of MacLaren and Merten’s investigation of IG Farben’s American networks. Booktab, a BSC front company, published 200,000 copies, on sale at 25 cents, the striking cover featuring the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, one holding a torch aloft, whose smoke spelled out ‘IG Farben’.
The contents were explosive. They revealed, for example, the role of IG Farben in promoting the war, and the huge profits it was making from the destruction. It also detailed the company’s web of links with American household names, especially Standard Oil. With a foreword written by Rex Stout, a popular mystery novelist, it sold out immediately. Stout proclaimed that IG Farben’s American business partners were traitors, working for Nazi Germany’s interests.
For GAF and Standard Oil, the pamphlet was a public relations catastrophe. They immediately despatched teams of employees to buy up copies. But it was too late. The US authorities felt obliged to act; IG Farben’s business empire in America was closed down and its subsidiaries placed on a blacklist. The US government also seized 2,500 patents from Standard Oil, on the grounds that they were owned by IG Farben.
This was a massive setback for Nazi Germany, as it could no longer use its American network to supply vital war materials.
Its US allies were named and shamed, causing a wave of revulsion – especially as, by now, the United States was at war with Germany.
In many ways, Donald MacLaren seemed an unlikely spy – and it is thanks only to a cache of yellowing intelligence papers that some part of this story has been retrieved. The BSC archives were deliberately destroyed after the war because they were judged too sensitive for the public gaze. But MacLaren was as stubborn as he was brave. He kept his papers.
Paradoxically, it was his upbringing as a son of the manse that aided his work as a spy. The teenage Donald helped out on his father’s parish rounds, sometimes even ministering to the dying. Warm and convivial, he had an unrivalled ability to get people to share their deepest confidences.
By 1938, MacLaren had moved to New York. His skills at forensic accounting made him a natural recruit for BSC. New York in 1940 was a magnet for Allied and Axis intelligence agencies. Its immigrant populations provided natural cover for spies. It was dangerous work. He once told his son, Donald, he had killed an enemy agent and interrogated many more, but would not reveal where or when. ‘But fortunately, I never had to torture anybody.’
MacLaren himself was keen to fight and obtained a commission with the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders but British intelligence refused to let him leave.
As the War ended, MacLaren went to Germany to build a legal case against IG Farben executives. He submitted a series of lengthy memos on the company and its leaders who, said MacLaren, embodied the dark nexus of German industry and the Nazi war machine. MacLaren argued, with remarkable foresight, that the way the Allies dealt with IG Farben would determine the economic balance of power in post-War Europe.
‘We are dealing here ... with denazification and demilitarisation of the heart and soul of the German war machine,’ he wrote.
In 1947, 24 senior IG Farben officials were tried for war crimes. Thirteen were found guilty. Their sentences were derisory. Hermann Schmitz received four years for ‘plunder’.
All IG Farben executives were released by 1951 on the orders of John McCloy, US High Commissioner for Germany.
Schmitz and his colleagues were warmly welcomed back to the German business world. The Cold War meant revitalising German industry was more important than punishing those complicit in mass murder.
IG Farben no longer legally exists. It was broken up into its constituent companies. But they are more powerful than ever. BASF is now the world’s largest chemicals company, with annual sales of almost €80 billion. Bayer is the world’s biggest producer of aspirin.
Donald MacLaren eventually moved to London, where he worked for the United Baltic Shipping Corporation, becoming a director.
He died in June 1966, aged 56, having never spoken publicly about his wartime role, the risks he took and the remarkable service he performed for his country.
And that's it for this week and hope you all enjoy your weekend.
Alastair
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