Out of the NightPickle Partners Publishing, 2020 M01 30 - 724 pages A bestseller in 1941, selected by the Book of the Month Club for a special edition and described by Book of the Month Club News as: “...full of sensational revelations and interspersed with episodes of daring, of desperate conflict, of torture, and of ruthless conspiracy...It is, first of all, an autobiography the like of which has seldom been.” The son of a seafaring father, Richard Julius Herman Krebs, a.k.a. Jan Valtin, came of age as a bicycle messenger during a maritime rebellion. His life as an intimate insider account of the dramatic events of 1920’s and 1930s, where he rose both within the ranks of the Communist Party and on the Gestapo hit list. Known for his honesty and incredible memory, Krebs dedicated his life to the Communist Party, rising to a position as head of maritime, organizing worldwide for the Comintern, only to flee the Party and Europe to evade his own comrade’s attempts to kill him. As a professional revolutionary, agitator, spy and would-be assassin, Krebs traveled the globe from Germany to China, India to Sierra Leon, Moscow to the United States where a botched assassination attempt landed him a stint in San Quentin. From his spellbinding account of artful deception to gain release from a Nazi prison and his work as a double-agent within the Gestapo, to his vivid depiction of a Communist Party fraught with intrigue and subterfuge, Krebs gives an unflinching portrayal of the internal machinations of both parties. |
From inside the book
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... German by birth. But the years of my childhood were scattered over places as far apart as the Rhine and the Yangtze-kiang. My voyage began at the point where the Rhine suddenly sweeps westward to bite its course through the mountains ...
... German by birth. But the years of my childhood were scattered over places as far apart as the Rhine and the Yangtze-kiang. My voyage began at the point where the Rhine suddenly sweeps westward to bite its course through the mountains ...
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... German shipping came to a standstill. We continued to live in Genoa until Italy declared war on Germany in the following year. The intervening nine months savored of a protracted nightmare. They taught me what mass hatred and chauvinism ...
... German shipping came to a standstill. We continued to live in Genoa until Italy declared war on Germany in the following year. The intervening nine months savored of a protracted nightmare. They taught me what mass hatred and chauvinism ...
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... German educational system. My teacher, a man named Schlueter, had lost both his sons in France, whereupon his wife ... Germans. But my father, and other sailors, home on furlough with a load of filched sugar and Kommisbrot,
... German educational system. My teacher, a man named Schlueter, had lost both his sons in France, whereupon his wife ... Germans. But my father, and other sailors, home on furlough with a load of filched sugar and Kommisbrot,
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... German vessels marooned in the ports of Chile and Peru during the war. Desperately anxious to leave the hungerridden Fatherland, thousands schemed and bribed to get a berth aboard the Lucy Woerman. Scores of the nearly four hundred who ...
... German vessels marooned in the ports of Chile and Peru during the war. Desperately anxious to leave the hungerridden Fatherland, thousands schemed and bribed to get a berth aboard the Lucy Woerman. Scores of the nearly four hundred who ...
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... German. This is a German shipping office. I'm willing to work. Any ship. Anywhere.” “Aw, get out!” At this instant a broad-shouldered man with bronzed features, who had stood in the crowd around the windows, shoved me aside. “Come on ...
... German. This is a German shipping office. I'm willing to work. Any ship. Anywhere.” “Aw, get out!” At this instant a broad-shouldered man with bronzed features, who had stood in the crowd around the windows, shoved me aside. “Come on ...
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Out of the Night: The Memoir of Richard Julius Herman Krebs Alias Jan Valtin Jan Valtin Limited preview - 2004 |
Common terms and phrases
aboard agents Albert Walter Antwerp Apparat arms arrested arrived ashore asked Bandura Berlin British Brownshirts Captain cell chief Cilly Comintern Communist Party Comrade Copenhagen courier crew death Dimitrov door Elite Guards Ernst Wollweber eyes face Firelei front Fuhlsbüttel gave Gestapo girl guns Hall Halvorsen Hamburg hands harbor head headquarters Heinz Neumann Heitman Hertha Jens Hitler Hugo Marx hundred Inspector Kraus International Club Jensen John Scheer Karl Liebknecht knew later leaders Leningrad looked marine mass Michel Avatin morning Moscow murder Murmansk mutineers Narvik Nazi never night organization passport Pioner police policemen political ports prison Profintern propaganda Radam Reichswehr Rotterdam Russian sailors Samsing seamen secret sent shouted smuggled socialist Soviet Union station steamer stood storm troopers street strike told took towline train voice waiting walls wanted waterfront Western Secretariat window woman workers yard young