Spy basket

Lore & Background

The spy basket was developed from the Peilgondel, which Paul Jaray originally created as a heavy plumb bob for an airship's radio antenna to reduce movement and flexing of the free-hanging antenna wire. Jaray then further developed the Peilgondel into a crewed spy gondola. Spy baskets were used on, among others, Schütte-Lanz and Zeppelin airships. As of 1937, it was not always certain which airships used them: the blueprints for LZ 62 (L 30) and LZ 72 (L 31) included the spy basket operating plant but the German Navy was no longer installing them at that time; however a fish-shaped spy basket can be seen on photographs of the German Army LZ 83 (tactical number LZ 113). After the war the Americans briefly experimented with a spy basket on the USS Akron.

Captain Ernst A. Lehmann described in his book how he and Baron Gemmingen, Count Zeppelin's nephew, developed the device. To test the prototype, Lehmann blindfolded the helmsman of the airship and allowed himself to be lowered by a winch from the bombroom in a modified cask, equipped with a telephone. Hanging some 150 metres below the airship using a compass he could tell the blindfolded helmsman which bearing to take and effectively drive the airship. The basket was equipped with a wicker chair, chart table, electric lamp, compass, telephone, and lightning conductor. The tether was high grade steel with a brass core insulated with rubber to act as the telephone cable. Despite Gemmingen reporting a feeling of loneliness while being lowered and losing sight of the airship, crewmen would nevertheless volunteer for this duty because it was the one place where they could smoke.

Reader's Guide

The spy basket's significance lies in its tactical role during the First World War, allowing German airships to navigate and bomb targets while remaining hidden in or above cloud cover. As described in the article, during the aborted raid on London in March 1916, Baron Gemmingen in the hanging basket relayed orders on navigation and when and which bombs to drop on Calais, while the airship remained unseen. The Calais defenders could hear the engines but their searchlights and artillery fire did not reach the airship. The device's legacy includes its appearance in fiction, such as the 1930 film Hell's Angels and the comic Charley's War, where ruthless German airship commanders order the jettisoning of their ship's cloud car with the observer still in it to save weight when under attack. A surviving example is exhibited at the Imperial War Museum in London, found near Colchester after the Zeppelin air raid on the night of September 2–3, 1916, believed to have been carried by the LZ 90 and deployed uncrewed when the winch accidentally ran out of control.

Did You Know?

• The spy basket was a byproduct of Peilgondel development, which was used to weight an airship's radio antenna.
• Captain Ernst A. Lehmann tested a prototype by being lowered 150 metres in a modified cask while the helmsman was blindfolded.
• A surviving spy basket at the Imperial War Museum was found near Colchester after a Zeppelin raid on the night of September 2–3, 1916.