Proceed to Peshawar. George J. Hill
guests, including a lounge and library; and the dining room, with its fireplace and George Washington’s portrait over the mantel. The second floor was the residence: the CO’s suite, the executive officer’s suite, a small library, and dormitories for the junior officers and about six enlisted men. There were social events there on many evenings, and grand parties, too, but there also was an ever-present reminder of the war; a locked gun closet was on the stairway with a dozen M-1 rifles, with slings and ammunition.
When AZ arrived there were four officers at the NLO in Karachi: the CO, Lieutenant Commander Francis H. Smith, USN; and Lieutenants Burns, Callahan, and Browning. Except for Smith, all were junior in years to AZ. Browning developed eye trouble and soon headed for home. The rest worked long days, taking their turn on duty call. It was secret work, and AZ said almost nothing about what they did during the days. The Navy’s long-distance radio network provided service for the Army and the State Department, so the code room must have been very busy. Karachi was a busy seaport, located near the mouth of the great Indus River. It was the entry point for everything that passed on land into India from the west, and to the north. The State Department cables show that Afghanistan was interested in selling and transshipping wool, of which AZ had special knowledge. Karachi was the entry and exit port for Axis diplomats who traveled under safe conduct to and from Kabul.
AZ was introduced to the strange ways of the NLO almost immediately on arrival, when he received an invitation to dinner with a Madame Dubash. He soon learned that she was a “good-looking” Russian woman of about fifty who was the “girlfriend” of the CO.30 He also believed that the NLO in Karachi was spending U.S. government funds for lavish entertainment, that they were living in a fool’s paradise. He believed all of this was contrary to the instructions to naval intelligence officers, and eventually he was proved right.31
In the evenings and on weekends, AZ played bridge with Brigadier N. Godfray Hind and his American-born wife; and with Major D. Montgomery (Monty) Smyth and his wife Joan Smyth.32 AZ played tennis and partied at the Sind Club, where Governor and Lady Dow held forth, and at the Boat Club. He was a frequent guest in private homes, where his ability to sing was much appreciated. He was also invited to the Karachi Club, which was for Indians (Parsi, Muslim, and Hindus), a rare invitation for an American. He was invited to dinner by his prewar Indian wool supplier, where he learned (with some difficulty) to eat Indian food, and to appreciate the customs of that part of the world. On weekends he often went to the private offshore beach known as Sandspit with members of the American commercial community. He was there on 12 September 1943 with Arlo Bond, who was with Standard Oil. The war rarely intruded; by then it appeared that Japan would not attempt an invasion of India, and the Germans were slowly retreating. In his first three months he mentioned the war only twice in letters to his wife: the fall of Mussolini and the surrender of Italy on 10 September.
The visitors who passed through the NLO were often mentioned in language that only AZ and his wife, Barbara (hereafter BSZ), could understand. Four groups of “Freeman’s friends” (sent out by Joseph Freeman Lincoln, a major in the OSS in London) were so secret that he could not mention their names, but he was able to identify some of them to BSZ because she knew them, too. Others who were named included Senator Richard Russell on 23 August, Ambassador Clarence Gauss “and his attachés” on his way to China on 15 September, and a Mr. Preston, the consul general at Lorenzo Marques, on 9 November. The new American commander, General Julian Haddon, arrived in town on 15 September.33
Tropical diseases were always threatening. The insect-borne diseases included dengue (which Zimmermann caught), yellow fever (hopefully protected by vaccination), and malaria (although you could take atabrine to prevent it, most people decided to use mosquito netting at night). And there was diarrheal disease, known as dysentery, which could be from amoebae (lingering and bad) or bacteria (even worse).
Through all of this, AZ was being observed by Clarence Macy, the hardboiled but wise American consul in Karachi, who AZ met for the first time on 15 August and who he saw at least twice after that, but prior to the trip to the NWFP. Macy was in frequent contact with J. R. Harris, the British intelligence officer who received the message on 26 October, asking for an American at the ALUSLO to go to the NWFP. AZ had made a lot of new friends, and he had not made any enemies. Charles Thayer in Kabul probably gave him the nod to make the trip.
AZ was sent to Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), on a courier mission on 29 October—only three days after Harris received the message from IB Quetta. His courier mission was surely just a cover; he must have been there to be briefed by Navy intelligence on what to look for and how to comport himself on the NWFP. He stayed in Colombo for two nights and a day with a Lieutenant Commander B. W. Goldsborough. He wrote to his wife that Goldsborough was from Baltimore, and that he “knew the right people.” Indeed he did; Brice Worthington Goldsborough II was the son of Phillips Lee Goldsborough, who was governor of Maryland in 1911, and later a U.S. senator. Ceylon had just been designated as the headquarters of the new South East Asia Command (SEAC), and the supreme commander of SEAC, Lord Louis Mountbatten, was moving his staff from Delhi to Kandy, in the interior of Ceylon. AZ would visit Kandy later, but this trip was just to visit Navy intelligence in Colombo. He left on Friday 29 October via Ahmedabad, Bombay, Hyderabad, to Colombo; and he retraced his route, going back to Bombay and then to Karachi, where he arrived on Tuesday 2 November. He saw another ALUSLO, Lieutenant Al Payne, presumably passing on information orally to him, on both trips through Bombay.
The purpose of the trip on the NWFP was stated in the message from IB Quetta, to make “it clear to the American Legation in Kabul what are our frontier problems and our ideas and policy in dealing with them and the Afghans.”34 This was restated with little change by AZ when he sent his typed report to his family: “The trip had been already instigated by the Military Attaché to Kabul (Maj. Enders) to give him an opportunity to see what was on the other side of the fence.”35 But there were many more things that AZ and Enders were looking for. Some of these would be details that provided depth to the main goal, but others were quite different. They may not have been told about some things to watch for, but as good intelligence officers they would be on the lookout for whatever they could see.
Zimmermann was added to balance Enders. Those who had heard Enders speak, and those who had read his books, knew he could tell a good story, but his story was often very selective. It was hard to know if Enders was telling the truth, and he often exaggerated. Zimmermann, on the other hand, though not always an interesting writer, would be inclined to tell it as he saw it, not as he wished it to be.
The Governor: Cunningham
The trip would have been impossible if the governor of the NWFP, Sir George Cunningham, had not approved it. He knew the tribes along the border were quiet at that time, in November 1943, so he was willing to allow the Americans to join Bromhead on his tour.
Sir George Cunningham was born on 23 March 1888, third son of the late James Cunningham and Anna Sandeman, at Broughty Ferry in Forfarshire, now called Angus. His parents later had another son and a daughter. His father was a friend of Robert Louis Stevenson, and received an honorary LLD from St. Andrews.36
Cunningham was a good student and was even better at sports at Fettes College, Edinburgh, and later at Magdalen College, Oxford. He was president of the Junior Common Room and captained the Oxford University rugby team that defeated Cambridge by a record score. He entered the Indian Civil Service and left Scotland on 26 October 1911, and except for home leaves on regular occasions, he remained in India for his entire career until he retired in 1946.37
Cunningham was posted to Lahore and paid his first visit to the NWFP in the winter of 1913–14; he returned to the NWFP at the end of October 1914 on appointment to the Foreign and Political Department of the government of India. He received the word of his transfer to the NWFP and immediately rode thirty-six miles on horseback to headquarters at Peshawar. He left for Kohat a few days later. It was his first assignment to the tribal territory. The so-called Durand Line of 1893 separated Afghanistan from British India, and it left a depth of tribal territory of about forty miles.
In May 1918 he took a “most memorable tour” to Malakand and Dir, and over the Lowari Pass to Chitral. In his diary, he wrote that he saw yellow crocus, hyacinth, and