Wilhelm Wassmuss

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Wilhelm Wassmuss (1880 – November 29, 1931; German spelling: Waßmuß) was a German diplomat and spy and part of Niedermayer–Hentig Expedition, known as "Wassmuss of Persia". According to British versions of history, he "attempted to foment trouble for the British" in the Persian Gulf in the First World War.

Birth and schooling

Wilhelm Wassmuss was born in 1880 in

Consul to Iran in the First World War

Wassmuss was a consular official, and in the first days of February 1915 Wassmuss and a few followers sailed a river steamer named

The Lawrence of Persia against British–Russian–Persian coalition before WWI

Wilhelm Wassmuss would achieve further victory if he succeeded in bringing Iran into the war on the German side and, failing that, by organizing revolts among the Iranians against the British occupiers. Wassmuss was a brave but short, broad and heavy man, with high forehead and blue eyes generally looking upward, and slightly melancholy mouth. While always a fervently patriotic German, he was also a mystic, a megalomaniac and a fanatic, a European who had learned to love the Mesopotamian desert and had educated himself into an intimate knowledge of it, its people, and their customs and languages. He was both a consummate liar as well as a man of deep principles. He was an actor, a man who enjoyed wearing the flowing robes of a desert tribesman, but he was also a hero. He became known as Wassmuss of Persia, and successfully organized and led a revolt against the British occupiers.^[4]

Based in Bushehr, Wassmuss organised the

In Iran, Wassmuss first passed through the market towns of Dezful and Shushtar. He conferred with the local chieftains and distributed pamphlets urging the tribesmen into a revolt against Britain. Once he started, any secrecy quickly dissolved and the local police at Shushtar tried to arrest him. He was warned and managed to escape but was soon in peril again. He traveled south some 160 kilometers to the town of Behbahan. Here the apparently friendly local chieftain invited him to dinner, and then promptly placed him under armed guard. The chieftain, planning to sell Wassmuss to the British, sent a messenger to them. The messenger met a British detachment on the road and excitedly told its mounted officers of the capture. They immediately galloped to Behbahan but once there, they lost valuable minutes through the politeness of Eastern protocol in the discussion of the chieftain’s price for Wassmuss. These moments were critical because when the officers went to take their prisoner he was gone. However, although Wassmuss had escaped, he left his luggage behind. It was found by the British in the chieftain’s courtyard and delivered unopened into storage in London.^[6]

Wassmuss’ story of his escape is beyond credibility. Wassmuss claimed that he told his guards his horse was sick. Every hour, (he claimed) he was then escorted under guard, to his horse’s stable (where he looked at the horse?), but in the early morning the guards were sleepy and grown tired of escorting him across the small courtyard to the stable. They therefore didn't bother escorting him, so he galloped away.

The British had read Wassmuss' pamphlets and realized he had to be stopped; they also knew doing this would not be easy because as the days went on, Wassmuss was rapidly becoming famous throughout Iran. First, he organized the

Wassmuss survived the war. For a time, he had been dazzlingly successful in Iran, but tribal support for him began to fade when it became obvious to the tribal leaders that Germany was not defeating Britain. After the war, Wassmuss, whose network had spread through Afghanistan and as far as India, and for whom the British had offered a $500,000 reward, was imprisoned by the British. He was released in 1920 and made his way back to Berlin. Once there, the man who had eloquently lied to the Persian tribesmen on Germany’s behalf struggled to persuade the German Foreign Office to honor his pledges and pay the money he had promised to the tribes; the German government refused.

As the post-war years went by, Wassmuss could not forget his promises. He returned to Bushehr in 1924 and, purchasing cheap farmland, promised to repay the tribesmen from the profits he hoped to make from farming. The farm failed. After legal squabbles over money with some of the tribal chieftains who once been his friends, Wilhelm Wassmuss returned to Berlin in April 1931. A broken man, he died virtually forgotten and in poverty in November 1931.

See also

External links

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Notes