the entry of the United States into the war. Albert subsequently had a
successful career in international business before his death in Wies-
baden on 1 November 1960.ALDINGER, ZACHARIAS (1806–1840). An important informant
working for the Mainzer Informationsbüro (MIB), Zacharias
Aldinger was born in Dörzburg (Württemberg). Enlisted in April
1834 and assigned to penetrate revolutionary émigré circles in Swit-
zerland, he became the first MIB agent active outside Germany.
Under the code names Baron Eyh and Albert, he arrived in Bern
posing as a political refugee and began to work as a teacher and opti-
cian. Despite some influential contacts with the Italian revolutionary
leader Giuseppe Mazzini and members of a fervently nationalistic
student group, his erratic work style led to meager results. Austrian
chancellor Klemens von Metternich called him an “honest and alert
reporter” but frequently had to urge him to apply himself in a more
diligent and thorough manner.
In 1836, officials in Zurich discovered Aldinger’s true identity
when he became a suspect in the murder of a Prussian student infor-
mant, Ludwig Lessing. Although a lack of evidence resulted in his
acquittal (and Austria’s role was not compromised), both the Swiss
and exile press characterized the false baron as a high-living spy in
the pay of a foreign power. Imprisoned for one year owing to other
charges and then expelled from Switzerland, he was no longer con-
sidered viable as an agent. With a severance payment from Austria
and a new passport in the name of Karl Gross, Aldinger moved to
Hungary and faded into anonymity.
ALMÁSY, LÁSZLÓ (1895–1951). An Abwehr officer who had
developed an expertise regarding the eastern Sahara Desert,
László Almásy was born in Borostyánkõ in western Hungary (now
Bernstein, Austria) on 22 August 1895, the son of a nontitled lesser
noble family. After studying in a boarding school in Great Britain
and obtaining his first pilot’s license there, he served with the Aus-
tro-Hungarian air force during World War I. Afterward, he worked
as a representative of an Austrian automobile company in Hungary.
A drive along the Nile from Egypt to Sudan in 1926 whetted his
interest in the area and led to repeated archeological expeditions and
8 • ALDINGER, ZACHARIAS