07 Jan John Alexander Lönnegren, Swedish spy
John Lönnegren. 4 September 1944. Photo taken by Herman Allen is found both at the National Archives and in Allen’s wartime scrapbook.
During World War II, neutral Sweden was a prime outpost for all the combatants. Allied and Axis countries had legations in Stockholm, and their representatives moved freely throughout the country.
John Alexander Lönnegren, at 65 years old, was known as an independent Swedish businessman. Because he had obtained his doctorate degree, he was occasionally referred to as “Dr. John Lönnegren,” and that is what his business card read.
An American airman, 1st Lt. Herman F. Allen, was interned along with the rest of his crew in Sweden after their B-17, Liberty Lady, miraculously force-landed on a Swedish island on 6 March 1944 — the day of the Eighth Air Force’s first large-scale daylight bombing raid on Berlin.
Allen had been in Sweden a month when he was recruited to work at the American Legation in Stockholm. The original request for the job was for someone who could type, and Herman could.
On his first day at his new job, Herman met Bill Carlson, a commercial attaché whose office was tucked away in the back hallway of the legation. The two men hit it off at once, and Herman quickly learned that Carlson was not an attaché at all. Instead, Carlson headed the counterespionage division of the United States intelligence agency, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). One of Carlson’s jobs was to identify and catalog persons who might be working for the enemy and then, if possible, feed them false information to pass on.
Before long, Carlson asked Herman to visit the apartment of a middle-aged Swedish businessman known as “Doctor.”
This was the beginning of a carefully researched record of what culminated in one of Sweden’s most publicized spy scandals of the war.
The full story is told in my newly published book, Liberty Lady: A True Story of Love and Espionage in WWII Sweden.
If you would like a signed copy, (U.S. only) order from here.
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Also available on Adlibris.
Barbara Davis
Posted at 14:18h, 08 JanuaryYour book is very intriguing and I highly recommend it to your readers. I have a signed hard copy to save, a soft copy to loan, and a kindle version to read. On my second reading now. Thanks, Pat, for the beautiful job of careful research.