# Books/films dealing with pre-WWI espionage? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 4, 2007, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788 "2007-02-04T16:07:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Scott\_O](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Scott\_O](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_O)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2007, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/1 "2007-02-04T16:07:21Z")
Recently I’ve been watching and enjoying the Sam Neill miniseries from the early eighties, \*Reilly: Ace of Spies. \* It’s awakened an interest in intelligence stories of that period in Britain and Europe. Novel-wise, all I can find in the ballpark at the moment is Erskine Childers’ _Riddle of the Sands,_ which I hope to start soon. Are there obscurer titles I might seek out? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2007, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/2 "2007-02-04T16:23:26Z")
In [_The Confusion,_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Confusion_%28novel%29) second volume of Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle, Eliza functions as a spy (coding her reports in embroidery) in the Palatinate, for the Duchess of Orleans. Another character is Juvissy, the king’s cryptographer, who breaks her code. ---
**Author:** ![TV\_time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f17d59/32.png) [@TV\_time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TV_time)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2007, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/3 "2007-02-04T16:54:36Z")
I believe it was James Fenimore Cooper who wrote (i)Spy(/i). The Silent Film (i)The General(/i) featuring Buster Keaton had at its core a spy thriller of northern spies stealing a locomotive and blowing up bridges as they went. A few years later Disney did it as a talking feature. Summerset Maughm did at least one novel called Espionage (I think). ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_O](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Scott\_O](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_O)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/4 "2007-02-05T18:37:11Z")
Just wanted to top this in case anyone else had recommendations. **Brain Glutton, TV time** – thanks. Just not what I had in mind. And thanks in advance to anyone else with ideas. P.S. **TV time** , are you thinking of Maughm’s _Ashenden_? Those are based on his WWI experiences. Not to be too niggling, but I was interested in the era juust prior to WWI. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/5 "2007-02-05T18:45:35Z")
Check out the book store at the **International Spy Museum** in Washington, D.C.: [http://www.spymuseumstore.org/bookmusic.html](http://www.spymuseumstore.org/bookmusic.html) Heck, if you can , check out the Museum. It’s worth it, if you’re in DC. They have lots of info on pre-WWI espionage. I read about this in my Classics Illustrated Special Issue on Spies (The World Around Us #35). Or read James Fenimore Cooper’s _The Spy_. Or a book on Nathan Hale, or… ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/6 "2007-02-05T20:54:11Z")
I’m not sure how pre-WWI you want, but Sherlock Holmes got involved with spies in the short story “His Last Bow.” ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/7 "2007-02-05T20:59:43Z")
> [@](#): > > I’m not sure how pre-WWI you want, but Sherlock Holmes got involved with spies in the short story “His Last Bow.” oh, SH did much more spy-stuff than that: \*\*The Bruce-Paryington Plans The Second Stain The Naval Treaty \*\* And that’s not getting into the more recent pack of Holmes pastiches (“Holmes and the Prisoner of the Devil”, for instance, where he meets Dreyfus.) ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/8 "2007-02-05T21:16:56Z")
John Jakes “On Secret Service” is a novel about espionage in the American Civil War. For nonfiction, there’s a fairly new biography of Rose O’Neale Greenhow, called “Wild Rose: Rose O’Neale Greenhow, Civil War Spy”. She also wrote an autobiography, “My Imprisonment and the First Year of Abolition Rule in Washington”. Greenhow was a Washington DC socialite who used her connections to pass information to the Confederacy at the beginning of the Civil War. You might also want to check out Allan Pinkerton’s “The Spy of the Rebellion” and Lafayette Baker’s “A History of the Secret Service”. Pinkerton, and then Baker, were in charge of US intelligence during the Civil War, and Baker was the one who discovered who had been involved in the plot to kill Lincoln. Of course, having read your OP more carefully, I need to include the caveat that none of these books deal with espionage in Europe. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2007, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/9 "2007-02-10T13:21:26Z")
Buchans “Thirty nine steps”. An episode of “Ripping Yarns”(Michael Palin and co.)was about German spies replacing the native country folk of an entire area of England to further Germanys evil plan to start WW1 early. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2007, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/10 "2007-02-10T13:24:29Z")
Nearly forgot ,theres quite alot about espionage ,(British and Napoleonic)in the Aubery/Maturin series by Patrick O’brien. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/11 "2012-03-07T18:47:55Z")
Philadelphia was once a den of spies, believe it or not: [http://www.amazon.com/Spies-Continental-Capital-Pennsylvania-Revolution/dp/159416133X/ref=sr\_1\_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1331146048&sr=8-1](http://www.amazon.com/Spies-Continental-Capital-Pennsylvania-Revolution/dp/159416133X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1331146048&sr=8-1) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/12 "2012-03-07T18:53:27Z")
Joseph Conrad’s THE SECRET AGENT, naturally. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/13 "2012-03-07T18:58:23Z")
Rudyard Kipling’s “Kim” is partially a spy story. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/14 "2012-03-07T19:17:11Z")
There are several good (and several bad) biographies of Mata Hari–who, it turns out, was no Mata Hari. ---
**Author:** ![Damfino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Damfino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damfino)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2012, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/15 "2012-03-09T22:00:26Z")
You could try [William le Queux](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Le_Queux) who wrote a number of pre-WWI espionage novels dealing with the European situation. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2012, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/16 "2012-03-14T03:40:00Z")
Just heard of Alexander Rose’s _Washington’s Spies: The Story of America’s First Spy Ring_, which has gotten good reviews since it came out in 2007: [http://www.amazon.com/Washingtons-Spies-Story-Americas-First/dp/0553383299/ref=sr\_1\_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1331696261&sr=8-1](http://www.amazon.com/Washingtons-Spies-Story-Americas-First/dp/0553383299/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1331696261&sr=8-1) ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_A.Robrin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sam_a.robrin/32/14497_2.png) [@Sam\_A.Robrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_A.Robrin)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2012, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/17 "2012-03-14T04:45:18Z")
Jim DeFelice wrote three novels (_The Golden Flask_, _The Silver Bullet_, and _The Iron Chain_) around Jake Gibbs, a spy for the American side during the Revolution, that are fun to read. ---
**Author:** ![jasg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f0a364/32.png) [@jasg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasg)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2012, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/18 "2012-03-14T04:52:28Z")
Here is a [free](http://books.google.com/books?id=oO0LAAAAIAAJ) one. ---
**Author:** ![Meurglys](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/258eb7/32.png) [@Meurglys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meurglys)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2012, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/19 "2012-03-14T16:28:46Z")
There are a few more mentioned in this [Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spy_fiction#Pre-First_World_War) article; _The Riddle of the Sands_ is a classic… ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2012, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788/20 "2012-03-14T16:49:05Z")
Flashman. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-films-dealing-with-pre-wwi-espionage/390788.md?page=2)