T1B

Posted: **Sat Dec 23, 2006 7:07 am**

I remembered this:

Truman wrote:I’m still waiting on that named German attack on US soil.

And spotted this today:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061222/ap_ ... zi_spotter

Woman who spotted Nazi spies in '44 dies

Fri Dec 22, 3:01 PM ET

BANGOR, Maine - A woman who had a key role in a little-known incident in World War II — when she spotted two Nazi spies who arrived by U-boat along the Maine coast — has died. Mary Forni, of Hancock, was 91.

Forni died Dec. 16, according to Hancock town officials.

Forni recalled the incident in a 2001 story in the Bangor Daily News. She reported that on Nov. 29, 1944, she saw the two men on the side of a rural road as she drove home from a card game in Hancock Point, near Bar Harbor on the central Maine coast.

The two men, German Erich Gimpel and American defector William Colepaugh, had slipped ashore from a German U-boat that had entered Maine waters.

"They just weren't like normal Mainers in November," Forni said in 2001. "You just never saw anybody walking without boots when it was snowy like that. It's a wonder I didn't stop and offer them a ride."

Forni called a friend, the wife of deputy sheriff Dana Hodgkins. Forni and the Hodgkinses' 17-year-old son, Harvard, who also reported seeing the pair, were later questioned by authorities. In January 1945, then-
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover announced the capture of the two men as spies in New York City.

Richard Gay, a retired government official who wrote a book about the incident, said Forni and Harvard Hodgkins were the first to sound the alarm that the Germans had landed, "and it was their alert that launched the FBI dragnet."

"They are New England patriots, no less than Paul Revere, and deserve full credit for their place in Maine and U.S. history," said Gay, who attended a 2004 event celebrating the 60th anniversary of the landing.

He described Forni as "a feisty woman with a quick wit and a keen sense of humor."

The two men had left the U-boat with loaded revolvers and more than $100,000 in cash and diamonds. Captured after Colepaugh broke with Gimpel and turned himself in, they were tried in secret military tribunals and sentenced to hanging. They were spared by President Truman after President Roosevelt's sudden death in April 1945 as the war with Germany was nearing its end.

Not technically an all out attack, however German soldiers coming ashore from an enemy sub onto American soil during the war, not quite technically a vacation either.

I knew a sub had been spotted off the main coast in WWII, but I hadn't heard that the krauts had attempted to establish a beach head. ;)

Posted: **Sat Dec 23, 2006 9:58 pm**

This is news to you?

How the fuck did you ever graduate from high school?

Posted: **Sat Dec 23, 2006 11:44 pm**

I'm not that old that this lady was ever made mention of. They tended to focus on the bigger parts of WWII, you know, the one going on in Europe and in the pacific.

You grew up in Bangor I see.

Posted: **Sun Dec 24, 2006 5:57 pm**

It's actually pretty fucking common knowledge, Babshice.

German U-boats carried out a fairly extensive campaign all up & down the eastern seaboard. Many of our merchant ships were sunk & lots of merchant seamen were killed. U-boats also helped infiltrate nazi agents in a handfull of locations- all of whom either defected, or were captured before they could do anything.

Posted: **Sun Dec 24, 2006 7:29 pm**

I challenge you to find any post 1970 public school american history curriculum that mentions this woman.

Posted: **Sun Dec 24, 2006 10:30 pm**

Nice remembrance.

But documentation of a concerted attack against the American homeland, Bushie?

Please.

Guess I must’ve missed the part where the Krauts leveled New York with U-Boat-based V-2s or successfully blockaded the Port of Baltimore…

As for the hundred-ger in cayshe and diamonds? Fuckers coulda been Cuban for all we know. Only thing missing from this story was a train-load of hoot or kilo-or-seven of blow. Sounds more like of a smuggling effort than an invasion.

Seriously, Bushie, spies landing in Maine? I mean, Maine, for God’s sake? Sweet Christ, Bushie, Newfoundland could invade Maine, and no one would notice for six months….

That said - and far be it for me to defend Cuda, but. …

Ol’ Cuds was simply making reference to the fact that WWII Kraut spy efforts against this country – as opposed to the dead old hook's story referenced in the article – have been well documented (or “pretty fucking common knowledge” in Cuda parlance) "post 1970 public school american history curriculum” for years.

Besides, no fricken’ U-Boat attack would’ve had a chance to succeed had Wild Bill been dispatched to defend the Right Coast

---------------

Read your PM Bushie… A bit slow, but I DO intend to reply in kind.

Merry Christmas to you and yours.

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 3:49 am**

mvscal wrote:
Truman wrote:But documentation of a concerted attack against the American homeland, Bushie?
Germany declared war on us, idiot.

Compelling take, mvsgoebbels, but you might wanna try actually reading the thread before you post next time.

Thanks in advance...

Idiot.

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 4:36 am**

I suppose Bushie is going to really freak out to learn that there were no less than three attacks on the mainland by the Japanese.

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 5:48 am**

Nope. All I'm saying is, I went to private schools for 12 years, on the east coast to boot, and this woman was never brought up in any history class regarding WWII. I had what would be considered an above average education, and she was never covered. Cuda made it seem like she was front page news.

And Truman I know - Germans in Maine. It's about the same as UFOS in kansas, but what the hell. :)

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 4:27 pm**

Cuda wrote:This is news to you?

How the fuck did you ever graduate from high school?

I was thinking the same thing Cuda and I am only 25 years old. I learned about it in high school, in both texas and North Carolina.

I believe the Germans did shell Miami for a couple of nights soon after D-Day, if I recall correctly. I believe the US Navy made short work of the effort though.

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 5:38 pm**

SunCoastSooner wrote:
Cuda wrote:This is news to you?

How the fuck did you ever graduate from high school?
I was thinking the same thing Cuda and I am only 25 years old. I learned about it in high school, in both texas and North Carolina.

I believe the Germans did shell Miami for a couple of nights soon after D-Day, if I recall correctly. I believe the US Navy made short work of the effort though.

All the school history books I've run across have never mentioned this woman or this incident. German U boats off the coast yes, but not this particular incident.

I'll have to pull out one of the kids history books, see if it's in there.

Are you serious SCS that you remember the story of this woman and her spotting those guys walking down a road from high school history class?

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 5:52 pm**

Mister Bushice wrote:
SunCoastSooner wrote:
Cuda wrote:This is news to you?

How the fuck did you ever graduate from high school?
I was thinking the same thing Cuda and I am only 25 years old. I learned about it in high school, in both texas and North Carolina.

I believe the Germans did shell Miami for a couple of nights soon after D-Day, if I recall correctly. I believe the US Navy made short work of the effort though.
All the school history books I've run across have never mentioned this woman or this incident. German U boats off the coast yes, but not this particular incident.

I'll have to pull out one of the kids history books, see if it's in there.

Are you serious SCS that you remember the story of this woman and her spotting those guys walking down a road from high school history class?

Yes, but I also took AP courses so I don't know what all the lemmings were being taught at the same time.

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 6:00 pm**

Well, perhaps time has wiped my memory clear. It's been a few decades since high school, after all. I recall the u boat campaign, but I've been to the site of where one U boat was spotted in southern maine, near the nubble lighthouse in York Beach.

The school systems in Cali leave much to be desired. This bilingual crap has watered down the curriculum significantly.

Posted: **Mon Dec 25, 2006 7:54 pm**

SunCoastSooner wrote: if I recall correctly. I believe the US Navy made short work of the effort though.

That's why, ultmately, their efforts weren't all that æffective.

Yes, but I also took AP courses

You learned how to drive a soviet underwater nuclear tank?

Rack you for that, I guess

T1B

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