William Ludwig Ullmann (August 14, 1908 – February 3, 1993) was an American Treasury Department official accused of spying for the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

Biography

He was born in

Springfield, Missouri Springfield is the third largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and the county seat of Greene County. The city's population was 169,176 at the 2020 census. It is the principal city of the Springfield metropolitan area, which had an estimat ...

, on August 14, 1908. He attended Drury College (now Drury University), and graduated from

Harvard Business School Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA p ...

with an MBA in 1935. Ulmann then took a job with the

National Recovery Administration The National Recovery Administration (NRA) was a prime agency established by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) in 1933. The goal of the administration was to eliminate "cut throat competition" by bringing industry, labor, and governmen ...

. There he met Greg and

Helen Silvermaster Helen P. Silvermaster (July 19, 1899 — December 22, 1991) was an accused Soviet spy. Biography Elena Witte was born in 1899 in the Russian Empire. Her father, Baron Peter Witte, was a counselor to Tsar Nikolai II and acted as an advisor to the ...

. The three jointly bought a house in 1938. In 1937 Ullman transferred to the Resettlement Administration (which became the

Farm Security Administration The Farm Security Administration (FSA) was a New Deal agency created in 1937 to combat rural poverty during the Great Depression in the United States. It succeeded the Resettlement Administration (1935–1937). The FSA is famous for its small but ...

). In 1939 Ulmann was recommended by his superior C. B. Baldwin to

Harry Dexter White Harry Dexter White (October 29, 1892 – August 16, 1948) was a senior U.S. Treasury department official. Working closely with the Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr., he helped set American financial policy toward the Allies of World W ...

and was hired at the

Division of Monetary Research Division or divider may refer to: Mathematics *Division (mathematics), the inverse of multiplication *Division algorithm, a method for computing the result of mathematical division Military *Division (military), a formation typically consisting ...

in the

United States Department of the Treasury The Department of the Treasury (USDT) is the national treasury and finance department of the federal government of the United States, where it serves as an executive department. The department oversees the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and t ...

. His immediate supervisor in his new post was Frank Coe. By 1941 Ullmann had become White's

administrative assistant A person responsible for providing various kinds of administrative assistance is called an administrative assistant (admin assistant) or sometimes an administrative support specialist. In most instances it is identical to the modern iteration of t ...

. Ullmann worked in the Treasury until he was drafted into

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

1942. He then obtained a commission in the

Army Air Force The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

and through

George Silverman Abraham George Silverman was a mathematician and statistician who was a member of the Soviet Ware Group. Biography Silverman graduated from Harvard University. In the early days of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, he worked for the ...

was assigned to

the Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense. It was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As a symbol of the U.S. military, the phrase ''The Pentagon'' is often used as a metony ...

. He was "chief photographer of stolen government documents for the Silvermaster espionage ring" while a Major in the Material and Services Division of the

Army Air Corps Army Air Corps may refer to the following army aviation corps: * Army Air Corps (United Kingdom), the army aviation element of the British Army * Philippine Army Air Corps (1935–1941) * United States Army Air Corps (1926–1942), or its p ...

. Among the information Ullmann supplied to Soviet intelligence were: aircraft production figures, allocation and deployment of aircraft, results of aircraft testing, reports on the efficiency of particular types of planes, technological developments in aircraft manufacture, statistics regarding high octane gasoline, personal data regarding important Air Force officers, opinions of aircraft personnel on other nations, Army gossip, all pertinent developments concerning planning, construction and actual completion of the

B-29 Superfortress The Boeing B-29 Superfortress is an American four-engined propeller-driven heavy bomber, designed by Boeing and flown primarily by the United States during World War II and the Korean War. Named in allusion to its predecessor, the B-17 Fl ...

, proposed movements of the planes when they were completed, the approximate schedule of D Day, copies of directives issued to General George Marshall, and information concerning production, allocation and development of tanks, guns and motorized equipment. He provided the Soviets with a considerable volume of almost every conceivable type of information relating to the United States Army Air Force's part in

. In the basement of the Silvermaster and Ullmann home, Ullmann maintained a photographic darkroom for copying and processing stolen documents and reducing them to microfilm. The volume of information eventually became so overwhelming that only negatives were completed because Ullman could not process the stolen documents fast enough. The information was then passed on through

Elizabeth Bentley Elizabeth Terrill Bentley (January 1, 1908 – December 3, 1963) was an American spy and member of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). She served the Soviet Union from 1938 to 1945 until she defected from the Communist Party and Soviet intelligenc ...

. Kathryn S. Olmsted, the author of ''Red Spy Queen'' (2002), points out: "Every two weeks, Elizabeth would travel to Washington to pick up documents from the Silvermasters, collect their Party dues, and deliver Communist literature. Soon the flow of documents grew so large that Ullmann, an amateur photographer, set up a darkroom in their basement. Elizabeth usually collected at least two or three rolls of microfilmed secret documents, and one time received as many as forty. She would stuff all the film and documents into a knitting bag or other innocent feminine accessory, then take it back to New York on the train." Moscow complained that around half of the photographed documents received in the summer of 1944 were unreadable and suggested that Ullmann should receive more training. However, Pavel Fitin, who was responsible for analyzing the material, described it as very important data. After his discharge in 1943, he returned to the Treasury Department. Ullmann was a United States delegate to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...

Charter meeting at San Francisco and to the Bretton Woods Conference as Harry Dexter White's assistant. Ullmann was never prosecuted. He later became a real estate developer in New Jersey and died on February 3, 1993, in Beach Haven, New Jersey, with an $8 million estate.It appears that he was living with

who also died in Beach Haven.

Biography

References

Further reading