Of all the persons associated with the sinking of the British passenger ship Athenia and the rescue of her passengers, no one is more enigmatic than the Swedish multimillionaire Axel Wenner-Gren. His yacht, Southern Cross, was the second ship to join the rescue operations the morning of September 4, 1939, and he saved 376 passengers.

When he answered Athenia’s distress call following the German U-boat attack, Wenner-Gren was one of the wealthiest men in the world, worth more than $100 million. He ran a business empire that spanned the globe. But he also was a very private man who preferred to shun the spotlight. As a result, rumors swirled about his relationship with Nazi Field Marshall Herman Gӧring, his business interests in Germany, and his motives for attempting to broker a peace accord between Germany and Great Britain.

Was Wenner-Gren a Nazi spy or simply a man out of his depth in the world of diplomacy? Read More