The wharves and embankments of the Surrey shore of the Thames, from Erith to Kingston, were being patrolled day and night by armed men. Any boat crossing the river was at once challenged, and not allowed to approach unless under a flag of truce, or it was ascertained that its occupants were non-belligerents. Everywhere the greatest precaution was being taken against spies, and on the two or three occasions when the Germans had reconnoitered by means of balloons, sharpshooters had constantly fired at them.
As may well be imagined, spy-mania was now rife in every quarter in South London, and any man bearing a foreign name, no matter of what nationality, or known to be a foreigner, was at once suspected, and often openly insulted, even though he might be a naturalised Englishman. It was very unsafe for any foreigner now to go abroad. One deplorable incident occurred that afternoon. A German baker, occupying a shop in Newington Butts, and who had lived in England twenty-five years and become a naturalised British subject, was walking along the Kennington Road with his wife, having come forth in curiosity to see what was in progress, when he was met by a man with whom he had had some business quarrel. The man in question, as he passed, cried out to the crowd that he was a German. "He's one of Von Kronhelm's spies!" he shouted.
At the word "spy" the crowd all turned. They saw the unfortunate man had turned pale at this charge, which was tantamount to a sentence of death, and believed him to be guilty. Some wild and irrepressible men set up a loud cry of "Spy! Spy! Down with him! Down with the traitor!" and ere the unfortunate baker was aware of it he was seized by a hundred hands, and lynched.
More than once real spies were discovered, and short shrift was meted out to them; but in several instances it is feared that gross mistakes were made, and men accused as spies out of venomous personal
