Born in 1864, the son of a poor Austrian railroad official and one of 14 children.

Attended Lemberg Cadet School, a military academy and graduated in 1882. Received a commission in the Austrian Army, noted for his abilities with different languages. In 1889, was assigned to serve as a military observer, accompanying the Russian Army. Made a number of friendship and contacts among the Russians.

Was continually promoted until he reached the rank of Colonel. At this point was placed in the Austrian Military Counterintelligence Corps. In 1900, was named the head of the Kundschaftsstelle, the Austrian espionage and counter-espionage service. He immediately set to work modernizing the service, implementing new technologies as well as new methods for obtaining intelligence. Within his office, he often collected information on his visitors, obtaining their fingerprints by way of a special powder on the arms of their chair. He also photographed and recorded the conversations of visitors to his office. Introduced a new method of interrogation, where he shined lights directly in a suspect's eye while questioning him - this he called the "third degree."

Ethel Rosenberg's brother David Greenglass was involved in the research taking place in Los Alamos, New Mexico on the atomic bomb. Code-named "the Manhattan Project", the work involved many of the most respected scientific minds in the world. One of the people involved was Klaus Fuchs, a brilliant physicist from sent over from England.

Julius Rosenberg had begun working as an organizer and recruiter of spies and sought help from Greenglass. He convinced David's wife, Ruth Greenglass to visit him in New Mexico and obtain classified secrets about the atomic bomb from her husband, explaining that the information would be passed on to the Soviet Union so that the United States ally would be in a position to better defend itself against Nazi Germany. Ruth returned from her visit with names of scientists involved in the Manhattan Project, locations of test sites and descriptions of different experiments being conducted. She passed this information to the Rosenbergs.

In January 1945, while on leave from New Mexico, Greenglass met with Julius and Ethel. He had been a member of the Communist Party for several years already, persuaded to join by his sister Ethel. Emphasizing the importance of his contributions, Julius took a box of Jell-O and tore it in half marking each half in a particular manner. He gave one half to David Greenglass and told him that a new Soviet contact would be arranged for him, recognizable because the contact would possess the other half of the box.

In June 1945, David was approached by Harry Gold, a Soviet agent who was also gathering information at the time from Klaus Fuchs. Gold showed Greenglass the other half of the Jell-O box as his identification. Greenglass gave Gold the documents that he had procured and Gold, in exchange, gave Greenglass $500.00.

In September 1945, Greenglass traveled to New York and met with the Rosenbergs. Here, he gave a detailed description of the Uranium bomb dropped on Hiroshima and the Plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki. In 1945, Julius Rosenberg was dismissed from his position at the U.S. Signal Corps, based in large part, because his loud, pro-Soviet stance had placed him under suspicion of being a Communist.

On February 3, 1950, Klaus Fuchs was arrested and charged with stealing secrets from the Los Alamos research center. Fuchs confessed, identifying Harry Gold as his Soviet contact. Julius warned the Greenglasses that Gold might implicate David and that David should make plans to flee the country. As Julius predicted, Gold was arrested in May 1950 and ultimately would name Greenglass as another source of information.

Although he was provided with an escape plan developed by the Soviets that would take him to Moscow by way of Mexico, David decided not to leave the United States. Subsequently, he was arrested on June 15, 1950. He quickly informed the FBI about the Julius Rosenberg and the spy ring that Julius was involved in. In spite of his preparations for the inevitability of arrest (Julius had obtained passport photos and applications for his family), Julius and Ethel did not flee in time (as had other Soviet spies, including Morris and Leona Cohen) and he was arrested on July 17, 1950. Ethel was subsequently arrested on August 11, 1950 and both were charged with espionage, as was Greenglass. Greenglass pled guilty while the Rosenbergs pled not guilty. Also arrested was Morton Sobell, another spy involved.

The Rosenbergs were tried in March of 1951 represented in the U.S. District Federal Court by the noted attorney Emanuel Bloch. Julius took the stand but denied involvement with anything actionable, repeatedly invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Ethel did much the same. The jury found Ethel, Julius and Sobell guilty of espionage. Sobell was sentenced to 30 years in prison and Greenglass 15, but the judge harshly sentenced both of the Rosenbergs to death, a sentence aggressively sought by the Justice Department. The judge in the case, Irving Kaufman, reasoned that by passing the secrets to the Soviets, they had allowed the Soviet Union to begin building an atomic weapon years faster than it other would have, setting in motion a series of events that would ultimately lead to the Korean War.

The death sentences provoked world-wide criticism and charges of anti-Semitism, despite the fact that Judge Kaufman as well as two of the prosecutors was Jewish. It was believed that Ethel, whose role was much more limited than Julius' was sentenced to death in order to compel Julius to make a full confession, yet none would be forthcoming. More than 15 appeals to the United States Supreme Court and to President Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower were denied and the execution date was set for June 19, 1953.

Julius Rosenberg was executed in the electric chair at the Ossining Prison in upstate New York as was Ethel minutes later. Both maintained their innocence until the end.

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