Ace of Spies (13 page)
In 1912 the Duma approved funds for the next phase of the rebuilding of the Russian naval fleet. Shipyards from all over Russia would shortly be competing for these orders that had the potential to keep their yards in work and their coffers full for many years to come. It was at one such reception that Reilly met Nadezhda. As a renowned beauty, she would have caught his eye immediately. At 5ft 3ins, of slight build, with dark hair and complexion, she had a captivating personality and spoke fluent French and English.
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Compared with his other mistresses at this time, such as Myrtil Paul, Ganna Walska and Paulette Pax, Nadezhda’s attractions were clearly unique. He was drawn not only by her outstanding beauty, but perhaps more so by the connections and influence that might be had through her. Not only was her husband the right-hand man to Admiral Grigorovich, who would decide the tendering arrangements for navy contracts, but ultima-tely he would also carry great weight in deciding to whom the contracts would be awarded. By the time they met, her father had been promoted to colonel, and her younger brother, Georgi, had graduated from the Elisavetgradsky Cavalry School, and enlisted in the 3rd Hussar Regiment.
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Reilly was introduced to her family, who also lived in St Petersburg, and the evidence suggests that the family themselves provided him with a great deal of inspiration in terms of the cover identities he would use in the future.
It is worth thinking back, at this point, to the story Reilly often related to George Hill and others, concerning his origins. We have already noted Lockhart’s account of how his name at birth was apparently Georgi, the son of ‘a colonel in the Russian army with connections at the Court of the Tsar’. We are also told that Georgi had a passion for swordsmanship and ‘took up pistol shooting to reveal marksmanship quite remarkable in one so young’. It is quite evident, however, that this is a description not of the young Reilly, but of Nadezhda’s brother, Georgi Petrovich Massino, whose military service file reveals him to be the mirror image of Reilly’s ‘Georgi’ character. Reilly’s fascination with the Massino family went somewhat further a decade later, when he adopted the name Konstantin Markovich Massino when he was working undercover in Russia after the Revolution. He also claimed on a different occasion that his mother’s maiden name was Massino.
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While Reilly’s Georgi character might be a perfect fit for Nadezhda’s brother, how close a match is her father for Reilly’s colonel, who had ‘connections at the Court of the Tsar’? If Col. Massino did have such connections, this would have been yet a further attraction for Reilly in terms of forming a relationship with Nadezhda.
According to Col. Massino’s military service file,
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he had an exemplary career from the time he joined the army as a private on 28 May 1853. Promotions followed swiftly to under-officer (1855), ensign (1859), lieutenant (1862), captain (1868), major (1872), lieutenant-colonel (1877) and finally to colonel (1901). However, his career came to sudden halt when, on 2 May 1905, he was relieved of his command in the Siberian Military District and placed under arrest. The military authorities in St Petersburg confirmed his dismissal on 17 June 1905. After a long investigation, he was charged with corruption, profiteering and abuse of power. Finally, on 24 August 1906, he appeared before the Siberian Military District Court in Irkutsk.
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The court was told that Massino had used a military hospital train to transport duty free commercial goods, including food and alcohol, from Yekaterinoslav to Irkutsk. On arrival in Irkutsk, the goods were unloaded by a merchant by the name of Mrozovsky, who then sold the goods on at a significant profit. The verdict of the court was that while insufficient evidence had been presented by the prosecution to demonstrate that Massino had received money from Mrozovsky, he was clearly guilty of an abuse of power. He was therefore sentenced to serve sixteen months imprisonment in a civilian jail, and given a dishonourable discharge from the army. As a consequence of his discharge he also lost his rank, medals and, more importantly, his pension.
He filed an appeal against the verdict, and an appeal hearing was scheduled to be heard in St Petersburg on 12 October 1906. Each and every point on which he appealed was rejected and the original verdict and sentence were upheld. This, under normal circumstances, would have been the end of the matter. However, three months later on 14 January 1907, Tsar Nicholas II himself intervened in the case and issued a decree commuting Massino’s sentence to discharge and loss of rank only. Such an intervention was most unusual to say the very least. What happened eight months later was even more so. On 19 August 1907 the Tsar issued a further decree, reinstating Massino’s former rank, along with his pension, medals and additional
privileges. Who or what could possibly have accounted for this near miraculous turn of events? Who could have interceded on Massino’s behalf, at the highest level, to secure his release? Whilst high-level decisions could, at a price, be influenced, securing the release of prisoners like Massino was not any everyday occurrence.
However, Massino’s rehabilitation was engineered, it must have been done at Court level. Those with access to the Tsar’s immediate circle would have included ministers, high-ranking military officials and Rasputin. The Tsar’s former ministers and their fabled misdemeanours were a particular target for the Provisional Government which came to power after the Tsar’s abdication in March 1917. One of its first acts was to set up, in March of that year, ‘The Extraordinary Commission of Enquiry for the Investigation of Illegal Acts by Ministers and Other Responsible Persons’. One of the principal areas for investigation was Rasputin and the influence he had on ministers and the Royal family. The enquiry also had access to the Ochrana reports which catalogued the comings and goings at Rasputin’s apartment and a general digest of those he met. Although the commission’s investigations were still in progress at the time of the Bolshevik takeover in October, the new government disbanded the commission and its conclusions were never published.
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However, the enquiry’s transcripts survived and provide a rare insight into the activities of those in high places. It would seem that statements from some twenty-two people associated with Rasputin were taken, which provides a vivid picture of the influence he wielded at the Royal Court.
Alexei Filippov, a banker and publisher, provided interesting testimony as to how some of those within Rasputin’s close circle exploited the influence he had with the Tsar and Tsarina by accepting ‘gifts’ from those whose interests were forwarded by Rasputin. Whether this was with or without Rasputin’s knowledge is not clear. In 1906 and 1907, Rasputin’s connections with the Court were not so well known as they became in later years, but it is interesting to note that the person who first introduced Rasputin to those of influence in St Petersburg was
Bishop Feofan, who was born in Poltava. He himself had very close royal connections, particularly to the Tsarina, and is another possible link between the Massinos and the Royal Court.
Filippov himself had very close associations with Rasputin and became the semi-literate peasant’s publisher. Some six years after Col. Massino’s re-instatement, there is also evidence that Rasputin’s aide Sophia Volynskaya had links with Varvara Massino, who like herself was a converted Jew from Poltava. Filippov told the 1917 enquiry that Rasputin shifted from charitable acts of help to the exploitation of clients with the help of Volynskaya. Her husband, an agronomist, had been tried and imprisoned, but had been pardoned on representations from Rasputin. Rasputin, however, justified these acts as part of his teaching. The Tsarina had written down his words in her notebook, ‘Never fear to release prisoners, to restore sinners to a life of righteousness… Prisoners… become through their sufferings in the eyes of God – nobler then we’.
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Another Rasputin acolyte, Pyotr Badmaev, may also have had a connection with Reilly, according to Richard Deacon.
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Badmaev, known as the ‘cunning Chinaman’, was a doctor in Tibetan medicine, or so he claimed. In reality he was, like Reilly, a cross between a patent medicine salesman and a businessman- cum-broker. A Buryat of Asiatic descent, Badmaev was born in Siberia in 1857. His brother had established a Tibetan pharmacy in St Petersburg, and Pyotr followed him to the capital and soon established himself practising Tibetan medicine. His patients were predominantly in the upper echelons of St Petersburg society and, thanks to Rasputin, his influence permeated to the very top. He established a trading company, Badmaev & Ko, which was involved in land speculation and also sought to market a range of commodities including his Tibetan herbal remedies. These claimed to treat such complaints as pulmonary disease, neurasthenia, venereal disease and impotence. It is significant that while most patent medicine companies in England at this time promoted home-grown remedies or those imported from America, the Ozone Preparations Company was unique in having amongst its stock ‘Tibetan Remedies’.
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The banker and publisher Alexei Filippov, as well as having associations with Rasputin, also knew Vladimir Krymov, the accountant of the Suvorin family, the proprietors of the
Novoe Vremia
newspaper. Krymov, who had power of attorney from Alexei Suvorin due to Suvorin’s ill health, was closely involved in the affairs of the family, from which perspective he provides an interesting insight into Reilly’s life during the period 1910–1914. Krymov relates how Reilly visited the newspaper’s editorial office nearly every day and was treated by the staff there as ‘one of their own’.
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Reilly’s ability to network and keep his ear to the ground was obviously well recognised by editor Mikhail Suvorin and utilised accordingly.
Mikhail’s younger brother Boris shared Reilly’s interest in aviation. According to Robin Bruce Lockhart they formed a flying club called The Wings Aviation Club,
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which sponsored the St Petersburg–Moscow Air Race.
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The reality, however, was somewhat different. Although Reilly was a member of a flying club, the All-Russian Aviation Club,
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Krylia (Wings) was, in fact, a commercial company set up principally by Boris Suvorin, at Reilly’s instigation. In other words, it was Reilly’s idea but Suvorin’s money was used to launch it. The Krylia Joint-Stock Company opened for business at Apartment 42, 12 Bolshaya Morskaya on 21 April 1910, amid a flurry of interest from the press, aviators and central government.
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The Ministry for the Interior in particular seems to have taken a close interest in the company, requesting that the Ochrana make routine enquiries into the five directors of the company – Frenchman Ludovic Arno, Mikhail Efimov, Boris Suvorin, Konstantin Veygelin and ‘Englishman’ Sidney Reilly.
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All five were given a clean bill of health by the Ochrana, which would seem to indicate that up to this point they had nothing on Reilly and furthermore did not identify or associate him with one Sigmund Rosenblum who was still on their ‘wanted list’. Such official interest might also reflect the fact that the Russian government was now taking a particular interest in the development of aviation for military purposes. In
fact, Tsar Nicholas had, only a few months before, announced the creation of the Imperial Russian Air Service under the command of Grand Duke Alexandr Mikhailovich.
Advertisement in
Vozdukhoplavatel
announcing the opening of the Krylia Aerodrome in September 1910 another Reilly project financed by other people’s money.
Suvorin invited the famous Russian aviator Nikolai Evgrafovich Popov to open the office, and arranged for the event to be exclusively covered by
Novoe Vremia.
The company was the first to commercially market aircraft in Russia. Reilly’s interest in aviation had apparently been kindled by Wilbur Wright’s demonstration of the ‘Wright Flyer’ at the Hunaudières Racecourse at Le Mans in August 1908. The Wrights had, by this time, concluded that there was more to be gained from displaying their machines in public than from continued secrecy. It is clear from the European press at the time that there was certainly widespread scepticism concerning the merits of the Wright aircraft owing to their publicity-shy reputation. This attitude changed dramatically when Wilbur Wright arrived in France three months before the Le Mans demonstration and began touting the merits of the 1905 ‘Flyer’, a machine capable of flying up to twenty-five miles at a time when
Henry Farman was endeavouring to achieve one kilometre in his Voisin.
Reilly was among the large crowd that gathered at Hunaudières on 8 August to watch Wilbur Wright take to the air. All scepticism vanished as he rose to a height of thirty feet and made three circuits of the racecourse before making a perfect landing within fifty metres of where he had taken off. Louis Bleriot, who was also in the crowd, told the
New York Herald
that, ‘for us in France and everywhere, a new era in mechanical flight has begun… my view can best be conveyed in the words – it is marvellous!’