Hede Massing

Hede Massing (born Hedwig Tune; verh / gesch Hedwig Eisler, .. .. Verh / gesch Hede Gumperz ) (* January 6, 1900 in Vienna, † March 8, 1981 in New York City ) was an Austrian actress, who since was the 1920s active as a Communist and has become known in the U.S. for their espionage activities of Soviet intelligence (GRU and NKVD ).

Life

Hedwig Tune moved with her first husband Gerhart Eisler early 1921 from Vienna to Berlin, where did Eisler career in the KPD. However, the couple separated, after which she lived from 1924 to the wealthy American Communists Julian Gumperz, who owned part of the Malik -Verlag. Gumperz graduated in 1923 the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research and later helped considerably in the reorganization of the Institute in New York. In May of the same year, she was a participant in the Marxist work week. Gumperz and Hede Massing married in 1927, which she acquired U.S. citizenship, but broke up soon after their return to Germany. They then lived together with the Marxist social scientist Paul Massing, who had been held for several months in 1933 in Sachsenhausen concentration camp prisoner and was later able to emigrate to the United States.

Hede Massing had been recruited in Frankfurt in 1928 by Richard Sorge for intelligence work; her supervisor at the GRU was Ludwig ( Ignace Reiss ). Both Massing were later part of the NKVD apparatus and worked for Boris Bazarov in New York. Hede Massing first was doing courier services ( to Paris ). In the U.S. its main task was to agents advertising. She was successful, which is also in the political climate in Washington, DC and was due to the anti-fascist sentiments of the issues raised by their officials.

The high official (Secretary of State ) Laurence Duggan was recruited from her. You could recruit Noel Field and wife, but lost it in a dispute with Alger Hiss soon to the GRU. 1947, in the second case against Hiss, Massing testified that she had spoken with Hiss in 1935 over whether Field - an employee of the State Department - for the NKVD or the GRU should work .. On the other hand left her ( and her husband ) despite its rhetoric, the Soviet espionage apparatus not yet ( they probably survived only because of their U.S. citizenship and a " Note " on the Fields ) in the late 1930s after a terrible stay in Moscow. Only after the defeat of Nazi Germany, they confessed their activities.

She appears as " Redhead" ( redhead ) on the Venona files.

The redhead people

This group consisted (after the so-called Gorsky Memo) from

• Laurence Duggan, Chairman of the Foreign Ministry ( State Department), Central and South America Division ( Division of Research for American Republics ), where he was responsible for South America.
• Hede Massing, who worked as a journalist.
• Paul Massing, who worked in exile at the Frankfurt Institute, the Institute of Social Research at Columbia University.
• Franz Neumann, a political scientist.

Works

• I was Stalin's spy in the United States. Parts I to VI. In: The Time. June 1 - 6th July 1950 ( six episodes).
• This Deception. Duell, Sloan & Pearce, New York, 1951.
• Richard Sorge: the almost perfect spy. In: German Rundschau. Volume 79, 1953, Number 4, pp. 360-377.
• The great deception. Story of a Soviet agent. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 1967.