The Fourth Horseman: One Man's Secret Campaign to Fight the Great War in America [Hardcover]

Robert Koenig (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 2006

The story of Anton Dilger brings to life a missing chapter in U.S. history and shows, dramatically, that the Great European War was in fact being fought on the home front years before we formally joined it. The doctor who grew anthrax and other bacteria in that rented house was an American—the son of a Medal of Honor winner who fought at Gettysburg—on a secret mission, for the German Army in 1915. The Fourth Horseman tells the startling story of that mission led by a brilliant but conflicted surgeon who became one of Germany's most daring spies and saboteurs during World War I and who not only pioneered biowarfare in his native land but also lead a last-ditch German effort to goad Mexico into invading the United States. It is a story of mysterious missions, divided loyalties, and a new and terrible kind of warfare that emerged as America—in spite of fierce dissention at home—was making the decision to send its Doughboys to the Great War in Europe.

This story has never been told before in full. And Dilger is a fascinating analog for our own troubled times. Having thrown off the tethers of obligation to family and country, he became a very dangerous man indeed: A spy, a saboteur, and a zealot to a degree that may have so embarrassed the German High Command that, after the war, they ordered his death rather than admit that he worked for them.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The specter of germ warfare lends an overblown touch of drama to this tepid tale of espionage and sabotage in WWI. In 1915, Anton Dilger, an American citizen who became a surgeon in Germany and was recruited by German intelligence, arrived in Baltimore to set up a secret lab to mass-produce the bacteria that cause anthrax and glanders. His intended target was not people but horses and mules procured for the Allied armies in Europe. It's not clear HOW MANY equines died because of the plot, but the author estimates it was in the thousands. Dilger's subsequent mission to draw Mexico into war with the U.S. was not successful. Indeed, aside from some bombings of munitions installations that Dilger had little to do with, the German covert operations detailed here seem mired in incompetence and squabbling. Journalist Koenig also uses Dilger's life to probe the conflicted loyalties of German-Americans during the war and the irony of a healer trying his hand at destruction . The author's efforts to associate Dilger with latter-day anxieties about anthrax and other much-hyped bio-menaces don't make this story more compelling. Photos. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Students of both World War I and the War on Terror may profit from this study of attempted German bioterrorism in the older conflict. Amon Dilger was a U.S. citizen from birth, whose immigrant father was a Civil War veteran. Amon's loyalties lay, however, with the German branch of the family and theVaterland. Armed with a medical degree and, of course, an American passport, he was able to set up a basement laboratory in Washington, D.C., during WWI and culture anthrax germs in it. He also worked along the Mexican border with German, Spanish, and Mexican nationals to foment trouble, before dying (probably) in the great influenza epidemic in 1918. He was a prototype of the kind of agent who can plausibly move across the globe to do his dirty work. Koenig has researched with great thoroughness and written with great clarity, and his account of Dilger's career increases readily available knowledge of German covert operations in the U.S. during WWI. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 376 pages
• Publisher: PublicAffairs (November 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1586483722
• ISBN-13: 978-1586483722
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,101,514 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Start of Systematic Biological Warfare, January 24, 2007

By 

R. Hardy "Rob Hardy" (Columbus, Mississippi USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Fourth Horseman: One Man's Secret Campaign to Fight the Great War in America (Hardcover)

When anthrax spores were sent through the mails in 2001, we had a reminder of just how scary germs can be as weapons, but the use of such methods has a long history. Until bacteria were scientifically understood, however, those who tried to use infections as armaments were doing so by guesswork. Germs were first systematically deployed as weapons in World War I, and they were used within America by German saboteurs. _In The Fourth Horseman: One Man's Mission to Wage the Great War in America_ (PublicAffairs), Robert Koenig has pieced together the career of Anton Dilger, an American of German roots, and his campaign to strike at one of the foundations of the US Army of the time, its horses and mules. Dilger failed in almost all his efforts; others in later wars would make germ warfare truly frightening. Speculations on his personality and motivations, however, provide fascinating reading, and Koenig has filled his book with valuable historical notes on social and military forces of the time.

Anton Dilger was born on the Shenandoah farm of his father, who was born in Germany but had become a hero in the Union Army. Dilger was sent to German for an education, eventually studying medicine at the University of Heidelberg. When WWI started, as American citizen, he could have returned to the United States and remained neutral. He could not enter the German military, but he did volunteer to be a noncombatant surgeon. He got to see how America's slanted neutrality was hobbling Germany, and he sought a more active role in helping out his homeland. In 1915, the General Staff in Berlin were investigating the use of germs as weapons. The target for the operation would be horses and mules; this bypassed any early international conventions that forbid germ warfare against soldiers. Dilger had medical experience and an American passport, and he was thoroughly loyal to Germany; he was the perfect selection as saboteur to carry out the plan. He set up a basement lab in a house six miles outside of Washington, preparing to breed the germs that cause glanders, an incurable and highly infections equine disease. Dilger equipped his agents with vials of the germs that could be taken to ports on the east coast, where mules and horses were boarding for service in the war. The plot produced casualties, but although glanders could not be cured, it could be reliably tested for and afflicted horses could be culled. Dilger's efforts made little dent in the millions of animals shipped to Europe. He became part of the equally unsuccessful effort to make Mexico a German ally and to arm the units of the Mexican army that could invade the United States. He left Mexico for Madrid. There is nothing certain, but best evidence is that he died there in 1918, the victim of the Spanish flu pandemic, caused by a virus more potent than any he had tried to spread.

The importance of horses and mules to the war effort is a theme which runs through Koenig's fine book. How they were raised and shipped to be of service in the war is covered in detail. It is not clear how Dilger, a smart man and a sympathetic doctor, as well as a horseman from his youth, could have accepted an assignment that he must have hoped would have killed thousands of the animals. He must have thought that any means toward German victory was worth taking. Of the horses shipped to Europe, only the special mounts of officers ever made it back to America; the three quarters of a million other horses and mules either died in the fighting, or afterwards were sent to work in European farms or were slaughtered for meat. The carnage of horses in the war led to increased efforts in animal protection, but the Great War was the last conflict in which horses played a big role on the battlefield, and it is a good bet that they will are safe forever from again being the targets of a biological war. Humans, well, they are going to have to take their chances.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gripping book, painstakingly researched, April 5, 2007

By 

Judith Bishop "Judith Bishop" (Pretoria, South Africa) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Fourth Horseman: One Man's Secret Campaign to Fight the Great War in America (Hardcover)

To someone from outside the US, this book brought many revelations, foremost of which was the insight into the thriving German community that existed there prior to 1914, but now is no more. We are familiar with Italian, Greek and Polish influences, but the Germans, as the enemy after a bitter war, had to subsume their culture.

The anti-hero of this gripping book, Anton Dilger, belonged to a family which was more American than German already, but he felt the pull back to earlier roots. The personal letters and insights that Rob Koenig has painstakingly researched show how horrific incidents like the Corpus Christi Massacre in Karlsruhe can have far-reaching effects through people struggling with their identity.

Koenig tells this story in such a way that you do not know what is coming, and thus every chapter has an impact. Throughout, he reveals his mastery of scientific writing for the public. I've read some of his other work on contemporary science, and was delighted to see this historical work. I hope he does another book. This one, meanwhile, is highly recommended to those who like biography, travel, history, science and warfare, all rolled up in one.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Fourth Horseman, March 13, 2007

By 

Patricia Bernhardt - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Fourth Horseman: One Man's Secret Campaign to Fight the Great War in America (Hardcover)

Prior to the events of September 11, 2001, many Americans had a false sense of security regarding foreign attacks on U.S. soil. But in the post 9/11 world, we sadly realized our vulnerability and acknowledged the possibility of subsequent, similar attacks and the potential for equally as heinous attacks of a chemical or biological nature. It is this vulnerability to horrific acts committed by foreign agents living among us and blending into our society, that draws us into the fascinating story of Anton Dilger, an American-born doctor, beloved by his family and well respected in his community, who came to lead a secret life as a German spy and saboteur during World War I.

This thought provoking and informative tale, with its blend of history, intrigue and espionage, will entertain the most ardent history buffs and WWI aficionados, as well as those simply looking for an entertaining and enjoyable change of pace book.