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Austin Macauley Publishers LLC - Mark Roddy

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192 pages

English

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In mid-1943, at the behest of their Japanese allies, the Germans send their best agent, Johann Schmidt, code name "RAVEN", to sabotage the U.S. Navy's torpedo factory in Newport, Rhode Island. Cunning, intelligent, resourceful, and utterly ruthless, Schmidt arrives off the Rhode Island coast by German U-boat, seemingly undetected. The agent then succeeds in getting on to the Newport Navy Base and finds employment there. This aids Schmidt in discovering the location of the Navy's bulk explosives storage site: Rose Island, located in the middle of the Eastern Passage of Narragansett Bay, one mile west of Newport. However, through cooperation between the British Intelligence Service MI6 and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and aided by a stroke of luck, RAVEN's arrival is discovered. The FBI assigns one of their best counterespionage agents, Brian Weeple, to track down and capture and/or eliminate the saboteur. But Schmidt is not who everyone assumes him to be, significantly complicating the search. Will Schmidt's secret identity be discovered, and can RAVEN be caught and stopped before the assignment is carried out?

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Publié par	Austin Macauley Publishers LLC
Date de parution	30 novembre 2022
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781649794635
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	2 Mo

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Raven
Mark Roddy
Austin Macauley Publishers
2022-11-30
Raven About the Author Dedication Copyright Information © Acknowledgment Chapter 1: Mid May, 1943 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9: 7:00 a.m., June 1, 1943, Daylight Savings Time Chapter 10: 2:00 a.m., June 2, 1943, Eastern War Time Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14: 8:00 a.m., June 3, 1943, Eastern War Time Chapter 15 Chapter 16: 10:30 p.m., June 3, 1943, Eastern War Time Chapter 17: 3:15 a.m., June 4, 1943, Eastern War Time Chapter 18: 12:30 p.m., June 4, Eastern War Time Chapter 19: June 5, 1943 Chapter 20: 2:00 p.m., June 5, 1943, Greenwich Mean Time Chapter 21: June 18, 1943 Chapter 22: June 21, 1943 Chapter 23: June 29, 1943 Chapter 24: July 4, 1943 Chapter 25: July 6, 1943 Chapter 26: July 22, 1943 Chapter 27: 5:00 p.m., July 22, 1943, Greenwich Mean Time Chapter 28: 5:30 p.m., July 22, 1943, Greenwich mean Time Chapter 29 Chapter 30: 10:00 p.m., July 22, 1943, Greenwich Mean Time Chapter 31: 7:00 a.m., August 2, 1943, Daylight Savings Time
About the Author
Mark Roddy is a retired US Air Force officer, whose 24-year active-duty career consisted of 12 different assignments around the world, including two tours in Germany.
Mark earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, with honors in English Literature from Saint Michael’s College, and a master’s degree in International Relations from Troy University. He has previously published the novels The Third Day and Angela’s Letter .
Mark lived in Rhode Island while in high school and college. Today, he lives in Northern Virginia, with his wife of 50 years, Dawn, whom he met when both were on active duty in the Air Force.
Dedication
To my dad, Paul, whose marvelous storytelling and writing skills were the inspiration for this book.
Copyright Information ©
Mark Roddy 2022
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher.
Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Ordering Information
Quantity sales: Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the publisher at the address below.
Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication data
Roddy, Mark
RAVEN
ISBN 9781649794529 (Paperback)
ISBN 9781649794505 (Hardback)
ISBN 9781649794635 (ePub e-book)
ISBN 9781649794628 (Audiobook)
www.austinmacauley.com/us
First Published 2022
Austin Macauley Publishers LLC
40 Wall Street, 33rd Floor, Suite 3302
New York, NY 10005
USA
mail-usa@austinmacauley.com
+1 (646) 5125767
Acknowledgment
Sometimes when I read a piece of fiction, I wonder what motivated the author besides feeling there was a particular story to tell. The genesis of RAVEN started in the late 1960s when I spent college summers with my parents at their home in Southern Rhode Island. My dad occasionally mentioned that there had been millions of pounds of explosives stored under Newport harbor during World War II. After I graduated from college and became a US Air Force aircraft maintenance officer, that thought never left me, particularly when I was dealing with all kinds of munitions at various times in my career.
The story got another “boost” in the early 2000s when my sister, Debbie, sent me a DVD: ‘Historic Lighthouses of Rhode Island’. In the video, the narrator tells how Rose Island, which lies about a half mile off the west coast of Aquidneck Island – the piece of land on which Newport rests – was a US Navy World War II storage site for millions of pounds of explosives used in producing torpedoes. That really got me thinking: What if a German saboteur had gone to Newport to try and destroy those explosives and, perhaps, most of Rhode Island in the process? Thus, the plot of RAVEN was born.
In bringing this story to life, I have had a lot of help I want to acknowledge. Mr. John W. Kennedy, former Director of Education at the Naval War College Museum in Newport, suggested I read two books: Walter K. Schroder’s book Defenses of Narragansett Bay in World War II and Annie Sherman’s Legendary Locals of Newport. Both books proved invaluable in adding detail and local color to the novel.
My son, US Navy Senior Chief Petty Officer, Al Roddy, made sure those portions of the narrative which deal with and take place on a World War II navy destroyer read true.
Ms. Pam Gasner, the executive director of the Block Island Historical Society, also provided valuable information concerning that wonderful place. Mr. Nathaniel Patch and Mr. Nathaniel Wiltzen, archivists with the National Archives, gave me good leads on background information such as maps and other documents related to Rose Island, Newport, and Narragansett Bay.
My friend, Mark Kramer, helped ensure the portion of the book dealing with a visit by the one of the main characters to a fictional Jewish synagogue in Newport properly reflected what a visitor would see in such a special building.
Personnel who worked for the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) play a major role in this novel. Mr. Ray Connolly and Mr. Kevin O’Brien, both retired FBI agents, whom I am privileged to count as friends, were instrumental in ensuring the agents in the book accurately reflect the way FBI agents would have dealt with the issues these characters face.
I would also like to thank Ms. Debra S. Satkowiak, the president of the Institute of Makers of Explosives (IME), and Doctor Joshua M. Hoffman, IME’s director of technical services, who provided invaluable information concerning the storage and handling of explosives so critical to the story’s plotline.
A key plot point in the novel involves issues the US Navy was having with their torpedoes at this time. Background information on this issue came from the book Silent Victory: The US Submarine War against Japan by Clay Blair, Jr.
Finally, my biggest thanks go to my wife, Dawn. She has been my cheerleader, sounding board, historian, and morale booster throughout my time in writing this book. Quite honestly, if there had been no Dawn, there would have been no RAVEN .
My thanks to all of these wonderful people for their time, effort, and interest in RAVEN . If you enjoy reading this book half as much as I enjoyed writing it, you have these folks to thank.
–Mark Roddy

Narragansett Bay Eastern Passage and Newport, Rhode Island
Circa mid-1940s
Map courtesy of US Department of Commerce US Coast and Geodetic Survey

Block Island, Rhode Island
Map courtesy of US Department of Commerce US Coast and Geodetic Survey

Rose Island, west of Newport, Rhode Island
Circa 1943
Map courtesy of Historic American Engineering Record, National Park Service, Artist Todd A. Croteau: 2000
Chapter 1

Mid May, 1943
Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the chief of “ Abwehr ” – the German Military Intelligence Organization, did not look up from the maps he was studying as he heard the soft knock on his office door, which then opened. “Yes, Franz?” was all he said, with his back to the door, the maps consuming his attention.
“Herr Admiral, Herr Schmidt is here.” The Admiral’s right arm made a waving motion to his aide, Lieutenant Franz Mueller.
“Send him in, Franz, and bring coffee and strudel as well, please.”
“Yes sir.” Lieutenant Mueller turned to look at the impeccably dressed and coifed individual standing before him. Johann Schmidt was not particularly tall – only about five feet, five inches or so – but possessed of a well-trimmed moustache and goatee and perfectly-parted and slicked-down dirty, blond-colored hair. Schmidt’s erect bearing and tailored suit fit perfectly the well-toned body of a champion athlete. But what struck Mueller the most were the eyes: pale and piercing blue but seemingly devoid of any emotion, hiding behind a pair of lightly tinted and expensive wireframe glasses.
“The Admiral will see you now, Herr Schmidt.” Schmidt nodded in what could only be regarded as a combination of acknowledgment and a thank you and walked silently past the aide into the Admiral’s office. Mueller did not sense any attitude of condescension or disdain from the other man as he walked by him; but whether it was out of jealousy of the man’s apparent wealth (and reputation) or because this person seemed to be one of his Admiral’s favorites, Mueller felt a twinge of anger toward Schmidt. Mueller was an old and trusted staff member of the Admiral, and he did not take well to new members joining the elite inner circle around Canaris, a group of which there were only four or five members.
While seemingly oblivious to Mueller’s feelings, Schmidt had picked up on them in earlier visits and ignored them. To Schmidt, Mueller was a doorkeeper, someone to be given the same attention or lack thereof as would be given to, say, the doorman at a fine Berlin hotel or restaurant. He merely served to let you in to the real object of your trip: a nice room, a fine meal, or in this case, the probability of a new assignment for one of Canaris’s top agents, code-named ‘RAVEN’ but known to the Admiral’s staff as ‘Johann Schmidt.’
Once inside the Admiral’s office, Schmidt proceeded with the raised right-arm Nazi salute, simultaneously calling out, “Heil Hitler,” loud enough to be heard by Mueller as he closed the door. Schmidt’