ROMANIA• 461the purges. Upon the outbreak of World War II, he was ordered to
subordinate his activities to Leopold Trepper, the illegalrezidentin
Brussels, and reluctantly he obeyed. There was no love lost between
the two men, and their mutual hostility was later to be exploited by
the Germans, who succeeded in penetrating the network which they
codenamed therote kapelle.
When Robinson was arrested at his apartment in Paris in Decem-
ber 1942, the Gestapo seized four false passports and a large quantity
of incriminating files that after the war were to be studied byMI5’s
Michael SerpellandRobert Hemblys-Scales. Some of the docu-
ments, known as ‘‘the Robinson Papers,’’ indicated that before the
war Robinson had been running an espionage network in London and
identified his contacts asWilfred Vernonand Ernest Weiss. Subse-
quent study ofvenonasuggested that his agentjeromewasAndre ́
Labarthe. Robinson’s principal agent in England in 1939 was a man
codenamedjean, who also appeared in thevenonatraffic;jeanhad
experienced financial difficulties in February 1941 when he had been
unable to establish a link with Robinson’s successor. Among the
Robinson Papers was a copy of a message to Moscow dated March
1941 which referred toprofessor, his wifesheila, and M.P.
According to postwar interrogations of Gestapo personnel, Robin-
son had been kept in a villa on the Avenue Victor Hugo in Paris for
six months and then transported to Germany, where he was tried in
June or July 1943 and executed.ROLPH, WILLIAM.The manager of a restaurant, Hatchett’s of Pic-
cadilly, William Rolph was an electrical engineer who had served in
the Security Service during World War I. In May 1940 he was con-
fronted by ColonelT. A. Robertsonwith information that he had
supplied an MI5double agent,snow, with documents to be passed
on to theAbwehr, and he confessed. However, he gassed himself
beforeMI5made a decision about what action should be taken.
ROMANIA. Special Operations Executive(SOE) was in contact with
Dr. Julius Maniu (codenamedtom), the leader of the opposition to
the pro-Axis government in Romania during World War II, but in
1941 Gardyne de Chastelain ofautonomouswas arrested and his
wireless set captured. However, in March 1944 Prince Stirbey arrived