New York, Oct. 19, Echo of the bombing and sinking of the USS. Panay, river gunboat, by. Japanese planes near Nanking "last December was heard in the Federal Court today when Guenther Rumrieh, the state's witness in the greatest spy trial in America since the World War, mentioned the incident in connection with the forging of President Roosevelt's signature, The first man to be arrested in the resent spy investigation and deserter from the United States Army reveal-fed that the suggestion to forge the President's signature was made by Karl Schleuter, seaman of a German ner and known to him as the "pay-eff" man of the German espionage ring operating the United States Schleuter formed the idea of forging the President's signature and faking official White House stationary when American newspapers reproduced facsimiles of the President's memmorandum in connection with the Panay incident, Rumrich said.
The papers published the facsimiles of the President's memorandum instructing the Secretary of State, Mr. Cordell Hull, to file a strong protest in the President's own name with Japan against the bombing and sinking of the Panay.
Since the President's signature and White House stationary were clearly reproduced, Schleuter suggested the forging of the signature as a means of obtaining the plans of the aircraft carriers, Enterprise and Yorktown, Rumrich testified.
Obtaining copies of the facsimiles of the signature, Schleuter sent them to German superiors hoping that they might prove useful in acting as a model for fraudulent stationary. and help in the forging of the signature, Rumrich said.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.