Rodolphe Lemoine

Rodolphe Lemoine (1929).

Rodolphe Lemoine (* 1871 in Berlin ; † October 3, 1946 in Baden-Baden ; maiden name: Rudolf Stallmann; code name: Rex) was a French intelligence service . He was best known for his role in the capture of important secret documents about the German rotor key machine ENIGMA . These included the instruction manual ( H.Dv. g. 13) and especially the key instructions (H.Dv.g.14). This subsequently had a significant impact on the warfare of the Allies against the German Reich during the Second World War.

Live and act

Lemoine was born under the name Rudolf Stallmann as the son of a wealthy Berlin jeweler. In his youth he made numerous trips, where he is said to have come into contact with espionage for the first time. In 1918 Lemoine was naturalized in France , taking the name of his French wife. Soon afterwards he entered the service of the Deuxième Bureau of the French foreign intelligence service, for which he henceforth worked as an agent and recruiter in espionage related to the German Reich . As a recruiter, Lemoine was able to win, among others, Ludwig Maringer as a spy for the French. Lemoine officially lived as a merchant in Paris during his time as an agent .

In 1931 Lemoine met Hans-Thilo Schmidt , an employee of the Berlin Reichswehr Ministry , whom he was able to win as a spy for the Deuxième Bureau . Through his work in the Chi site (Chiffrierstelle) of the Ministry (see also: Cipher Department of the High Command of the Wehrmacht ) had Schmidt access to important documents concerning the ENIGMA, a new type of machine for encryption of radio messages . On November 8, 1931, Schmidt Lemoine handed over the "Instructions for Use for the ENIGMA Encryption Machine" and the "Instructions for the ENIGMA Key Machine". Over the next few years, Schmidt handed Lemoine over to other documents about ENIGMA, including key boards with keys that change every day, as well as secret documents about the establishment of the Wehrmacht and the planning for the "Yellow Case" (the invasion of France).

Lemoine handed the documents he had received from Schmidt to his superior Gustave Bertrand , who in turn handed them over to the encryption departments of the British ( Bletchley Park ), French and Polish ( Biuro Szyfrów ) intelligence services. After the German encryption process had already been broken by Polish cryptanalysts before the Second World War , British codebreakers in Bletchley Park, England , succeeded in breaking into the German machine completely from 1940 , so that the Allies subsequently received the encrypted German radio messages during the Second World War almost without delay and could read along continuously.

At the end of 1942, after the occupation of the previously free southern zone of France , Lemoine fell into the hands of the Gestapo or went over to them. He was brought to Berlin, where he confessed during interrogation - possibly with the use of torture - in March 1943 that Schmidt had been one of his sources of information. However, he kept his knowledge of the ENIGMA deciphering and the fact that Schmidt had passed this information on to the Allies from the German authorities. Schmidt, who was then arrested in May 1943, finally committed suicide in September of the same year.

Lemoine went into hiding in Berlin during the last days of the war, where he was arrested by the French army in October 1945.

literature

• Diethart Kerbs : Lifelines. German biographies from the 20th century. 2007.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ OKW: Instructions for use for the Enigma cipher machine . H.Dv.g. 13, Reichsdruckerei , Berlin 1937. Accessed: March 24, 2015. PDF; 2.0 MB
2. ↑ OKW: Key instructions for the Enigma key machine . H.Dv. G. 14, Reichsdruckerei , Berlin 1940. (Copy of the original manual with some small typing errors.) Accessed: March 24, 2015. PDF; 0.1 MB ( Memento of the original from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
3. ^ Hugh Sebag-Montefiore: ENIGMA - The battle for the code . Cassell Military Paperbacks, London 2004, p. 22. ISBN 0-304-36662-5