42 “into the question of providing”: Ibid.
43 “so he will be able to cope”: Ibid.
44 “continue with preparations”: Memo to XX Committee, February 4, 1943, IWM 97/45/1, folder #2.
Chapter Six: A Novel Approach
1 “active and well-distributed team”: J. C. Masterman, The Double Cross System in the War 1939–1945 (London, 1972), p. 119.
2 “The one man band of Lisbon”: Ibid., p. 146.
3 “for deception, ‘notional’”: Ibid., p. 33.
4 “The Germans could seldom resist”: Ibid., p. 21.
5 “How difficult it was”: Ewen Montagu, Beyond Top Secret Ultra (London, 1977), p. 43.
6 “must never step out of character”: Ibid.
7 “To work out the crime”: J. C. Masterman, The Case of the Four Friends (London, 1957), p. 23.
8 “The more real he appeared”: Ewen Montagu, The Man Who Never Was (Oxford, 1996), p. 149.
9 “Would the ink of the manuscript”: Ewen Montagu, manuscript “Post–script” to The Man Who Never Was, p. 4, Montagu Papers.
10 “give the game away”: Ibid.
11 “Many inks on a freshly written”: Ibid., p. 6.
12 “We talked about him until”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 149.
13 “He does not have to look like”: Ibid., p. 123.
14 “complete failure”: Ibid., p. 140.
15 “appearance that would have”: Ibid., p. 141.
16 “rudely staring at anyone”: Ibid.
17 “almost the same build”: Ibid., p. 146.
18 “The difficulty of obtaining”: J. C. Masterman, The Double Cross System in the War of 1939–1945 (London, 1972), p. 137.
19 “one enormous mausoleum”: Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life (London, 1998), p. 60.
20 “gift”: J. C. Masterman, The Double Cross System in the War of 1939–1945, p. 137.
21 “brilliant”: “Obituary” of William Martin, TNA, CAB 154/67.
22 “Keen for more active and dangerous”: Ibid.
23 “a thoroughly good chap”: Undated note, TNA, CAB 154/67.
24 “could sometimes come from head”: Ewen Montagu to Miss Winton of Lloyds Bank, February 29, 1978, Montagu Papers.
25 “a father of the old school”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 154.
26 “a brilliant tour de force”: Ibid.
27 “… at the last moment”: TNA, Records of the War Office (henceforth WO) 106–5921–15.
28 “effort to find a flaw in”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 149.
29 “We decided that a”: Ibid., p. 150.
Chapter Seven: Pam
1 “What on earth are we going to do”: Jean Gerard Leigh, interview with the author, March 5, 2008.
2 “glaring inconsistencies”: Ibid.
3 “I was frightfully willing”: Ibid.
4 “Don’t run, Miss Leslie!”: Ibid.
5 “In fact, he was trailing me”: Ibid.
6 “charming”: Ewen Montagu, Man Who Never Was (Oxford, 1996), p.152.
7 “very attractive”: Draft of Operation Mincemeat report EM and CC, April 27, 1943, IWM 97/45/1, folder #2.
8 “The more attractive girls in”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 152.
9 “I think he had every intention”: Jean Gerard Leigh, interview with the author, March 5, 2008.
10 “The swimming there was horrible”: Ibid.
11 “quite a collection”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 152.
12 “Uncle John gave specific orders”: Pat Davies (née Trehearne), interview with the author, October 4, 2009.
13 “We were all rather jealous”: Ibid.
14 “I knew it was going to be planted”: Jean Gerard Leigh, interview with the author, March 5, 2008.
15 “Has anybody else got that”: Ibid.
16 “I never realised how lonely”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, August 17, 1941, Montagu Letters.
17 “How ultra-happy our life was”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, December 30, 1940, Montagu Letters.
18 “You must have gone off”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, December 2, 1940, Montagu Letters.
19 “I am always the gooseberry”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, September 28, 1941, Montagu Letters.
20 “It was a question of whether”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, December 22, 1940, Montagu Letters.
21 “I took a girl from the office”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, April 4, 1942, Montagu Letters.
22 “skinny and embittered”: Jean Gerard Leigh, interview with the author, March 5, 2008.
23 “no German could resist the ‘Englishness’”: Ewen Montagu, The Man Who Never Was (Oxford, 1996), p. 152.
24 “achieved the thrill and pathos”: Ibid.
25 “P.L. from W.M. 14.4.43”: TNA, WO 106–5921–19.
26 “We will insert the legacy of £50”: Montagu, The Man Who Never Was, p. 156.
27 “since the wife’s family will not”: Ibid.
28 “The nearer the approach”: John Godfrey, “Afterthoughts,” TNA, ADM 223/619.
29 “He is very old”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, November 13, 1942, Montagu Letters.
30 “He was the world’s prize shit”: Ewen Montagu to Captain A. N. Grey, June 24, 1980, Montagu Papers.
31 “the unhoped for benefit”: Ewen Montagu to “Ginger,” July 6, 1943, Montagu Papers.
32 “preparation and devising”: Ibid.
33 “was entirely unsupervised”: Ibid.
34 “‘How will that argument’”: Ewen Montagu, Beyond Top Secret Ultra (London, 1977), p. 90.
35 “There was almost complete”: TNA, ADM 223/794.
36 “Masterman raised the question”: Ibid.
37 “execution subcommittee”: Ibid.
38 “the only deceptioneer”: Ibid.
39 “enthusiasm for all things Russian”: TNA, archives of the Security Service, MI5 (henceforth KV2) 598.
40 “We have had a request”: Ibid.
41 “the keenest players”: Ibid.
42 “Dear Comrade Trotsky”: Ivor Montagu to Leon Trotsky, July 1, 1929, Montagu Collection, Labour History Archive and Study Centre (People’s History Museum).
43 “like Edinburgh at its worst”: Ivor Montagu Autobiography.
44 “Two Turkish policemen”: Ibid.
45 “to put under my pillow”: Ibid.
46 “I did not know what precautions”: Ibid.
47 “The memory I shall always”: Ibid
48 “fascinating and commanding”: Ibid.
49 “repelled by his self-admiration”: Ibid.
50 “I felt I understood”: Ibid.
51 “Ivor Montagu has”: Leon Trotsky to Reg Groves, July 13, 1932, TNA, KV2/598.
52 “Montagu has for some time”: Security Service memo, May 10, 1926, TNA, KV2/598.
53 “Montagu has dark curly hair”: Ibid.
54 “What is the use of living”: Ivor Montagu Autobiography.
55 “Last night Ivor came to dinner”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, June 30, 1942, Montagu Letters.
56 “He is simply enormous”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, August 8, 1940, Montagu Letters.
57 “Ivor is really bad”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, December 12, 1940, Montagu Letters.
58 “He is busy working for the Russian”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, June 30, 1942, Montagu Letters.
59 “knew in advance practically”: Montagu, Beyond Top Secret Ultra, p. 30.
60 “that particularly unpleasant”: Security Service memo, RHH to DP (unidentified), March 3, 1942, TNA, KV2/599.
61 “I have met representatives”: TNA, records of the Government Code and Cypher School (henceforth HW) 15/43.
62 “Intelligentsia considers there is”: Ibid.
63 “influential relatives”: TNA, Ibid.
64 “Intelligentsia has not yet found”: Ibid.
65 “Although one is somewhat deaf”: J. B. S. Haldane, What Is Life (London, 1949),
p. 32.
66 “I think that Marxism”: J. B. S. Haldane, The Marxist Philosophy and the Sciences (New York, 1939), p. 4.
67 “Intelligentsia has handed over”: TNA, HW 15/43.
68 “three military sources”: Ibid.
69 “reported that a girl”: Ibid.
70 “that this was a matter”: Ibid.
71 “an officer of the air ministry”: Ibid.
72 “The coastal defence is”: Ibid.
73 “30 Sausage Dealer bombers”: Ibid.
74 “he still seems to be going on with”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, June 11, 1941, Montagu Letters.
75 “Intelligentsia has reported”: TNA, HW 15/43.
Chapter Eight: The Butterfly Collector
1 “We felt that we knew”: Ewen Montagu, Man Who Never Was (Oxford, 1996), p. 160.
2 “an incurable romantic”: Christopher Andrew, The Defence of the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5 (London, 2009), p. 285.
3 “joined up to go to sea”: Ewen Montagu, Beyond Top Secret Ultra (London, 1977), p. 20.
4 “Ewen lived the part”: Jean Gerard Leigh, interview with the author, March 5, 2008.
5 “He wrote me endless letters”: Ibid.
6 “Till death us do part”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 168.
7 “Pam dearest”: Ewen Montagu to Jean Leslie, undated, courtesy of Jean Gerard Leigh.
8 “The girl from the Elms”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, January 9, 1943, Montagu Letters.
9 “One of her appealing virtues”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, June 29, 1943, Montagu Letters.
10 “She has been much connected”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, April 15, 1943, Montagu Letters.
11 “I took the girl from the Elms”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, March 15, 1943, Montagu Letters.
12 “I feel definitely that you ought”: Ibid.
13 “If Mother did touch my things”: Ewen Montagu to Iris Montagu, June 29, 1943, Montagu Letters.
14 “I told her truthfully that it was”: Ibid.
15 “writing in her letters”: Montagu, Man Who Never Was, p. 168.
16 “would not carry enough weight”: TNA, ADM 223/794, p. 442.
17 “to fake documents of a sufficiently”: Ewen Montagu to Thomas Thibeault, March 18, 1980, Montagu Papers.
18 “a crooked lawyer’s dream of heaven”: Ewen Montagu, Beyond Top Secret Ultra (London, 1977), p. 150.
19 “bone from the neck up”: Rick Atkinson, The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy 1943–1945 (London, 2007), p. 130.
20 “as if he had just had a steam bath”: Ibid., pp. 130–131.
21 “Will Eisenhower go ahead”: Ewen Montagu, first draft of letter, February 16, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
22 “So and so—naming a general”: Ibid.
23 “personal and ‘off the record’”: Ibid.
24 “the contents of such a letter”: J. H. Bevan, report to T. A. Robertson, February 12, 1943, TNA, CO/43/66.
25 “almost completely ignorant”: Ewen Montagu, memo, March 5, 1943, TNA, ADM 223/794.
26 “is almost completely inexperienced”: Ewen Montagu, memo, March 5, 1943, TNA, ADM 223/794.
27 “From reports coming out”: German High Command to Command in Tunisia, February 26, 1943, MSS 2180/T.28, IWM 97/4/1, folder #1.
28 “Sicily has now been allowed”: Ewen Montagu, memo, March 5, 1943, TNA, ADM 223/794.
29 “It is much easier”: Ibid.
30 “He still has no deception”: Ibid.
31 “complete failure to”: Ibid.
32 “now in a highly dangerous situation”: Ibid.
33 “It would be a very great pity”: Ewen Montagu to T. A. Robertson, February 16, 1943.
34 “Spanish police records”: Tomas Harris, Garbo: The Spy Who Saved D-Day (London, 2004), p. 38.
35 “worked in military intelligence”: Jimmy Burns, Papa Spy: Love, Faith and Betrayal in Wartime Spain (London, 2009), p. 232.
36 “a Spaniard to Spaniards”: Ian Colvin, The Unknown Courier (London, 1953), pp. 98–99.
37 “because of his enormous”: Hector Lindi, Gibraltar Chronicle, August 1989.
38 “no more than a smattering of sea experience”: TNA, ADM 223/490.
39 “padding about Madrid”: Colvin, Unknown Courier, p. 98.
40 “exceptionally favoured by character”: TNA, ADM 223/490.
41 “He was invaluable”: TNA, ADM 223/490.
42 “privileges and facilities”: TNA, ADM 223/490.
43 “Spain contained a large”: TNA, ADM 223/490.
44 “Madrid was full of spies”: TNA, ADM 223/490.
45 “danger of the body”: TNA, ADM 223/794, p. 444.
46 “German influence in Huelva”: Ibid.
47 “a reliable and helpful man”: Ibid.
48 “very pro-German chief of police”: Cyril Mills to Ewen Montagu, November 11, 1983, Montagu Papers.
49 “active and influential”: TNA, ADM 223/794, p. 444.
50 “The Shadow”: Jesús Ramírez Copeiro del Villar, Huelva en la Guerra Mundial (Huelva, Spain), p. 306.
51 “the viceroys”: Jesús Copeiro del Villar, interview with the author, June 3, 2009.
52 “First the Romans”: Ibid.
53 “the black sheep”: Isabel Naylor, interview with the author, June 3, 2009.
54 “the only clever one in the family”: Ibid.
55 “He didn’t dispute”: Federico Clauss, interview with the author, June 2, 2009.
56 “cold, distant and silent”: Jesús Copeiro del Villar, interview with the author, June 3, 2009.
57 “He was an active and intelligent”: Copeiro del Villar, Huelva, p. 306.
58 “very efficient German agent”: Ewen Montagu to Lynne Gladstone-Miller, November 1, 1983, Montagu Papers.
59 “super-super efficient agent”: Ewen Montagu, “History of Section 17M (Now Section 12Z),” October 26, 1942, Montagu Papers.
60 “first rate”: Ewen Montagu to Lynne Gladstone-Miller, November 1, 1983, Montagu Papers.
61 “No ship can move without being”: Montagu, “History of Section 17M.”
62 “one of the most difficult”: J. C. Masterman, cited in David Stafford, Roosevelt and Churchill: Men of Secrets (London, 1999), p. 94.
63 “the tiniest jewel in the imperial”: TNA, KV4/260.
64 “mercenary instincts were”: Ibid.
65 “increased and spread”: Ewen Montagu, “History of Section 17M,” October 26, 1942, Montagu Papers.
66 “in all Spanish and Spanish owned ports”: Ibid.
67 “one of the most important”: Copeiro del Villar, Huelva, p. 306.
68 “sufficient evidence can be obtained”: Draft of Operation Mincemeat Report, EM and CC, 27 April 1943, IWM 97/45/1, folder #2.
69 “They would have to”: Ibid.
70 “washing ashore of any”: Ibid.
71 “was to be told the outline of the plan”: Ibid.
Chapter Nine: My Dear Alex
1 “owing to the need for placing”: Charles Cholmondeley, Memo 6a, TNA, W0 106/5921.
2 “if the body were dropped in this way”: Ibid.
3 “come in from out at sea”: Ibid.
4 “After the body has been”: Ibid.
5 “technical difficulties in keeping”: Ibid.
6 “Of these methods”: Ibid.
7 “unswerving logic of the German”: Ben Macintyre, For Your Eyes Only, p. 108.
8 “if most of the oxygen had previously”: TNA, ADM 223/794, p. 446.
9 “keep perfectly satisfactorily”: Ewen Montagu to J. H. Bevan, March 26, 1943, TNA, ADM 223/464.
10 “an enormous thermos flask”: Montagu, The Man Who Never Was (Oxford, 1996), p. 126.
11 “HANDLE WITH CARE”: TNA, ADM 223/794, p. 445.
12 “the Spaniards and Portuguese”: N. L. A. Jewell, operational orders, March 31, 1943, TNA, ADM 223/464.
13 “the tides in that area”: Ibid.
14 “wind
between S and W”: Hydrographer’s Report, March 22, 1943, TNA, W0 106/5921.
15 “if it did not strand”: Ibid.
16 “The currents on the coast”: Ewen Montagu to J. H. Bevan, March 23, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
17 “I am not quite clear as to who”: J. H. Bevan to Ewen Montagu, March 1, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
18 “thinking it couldn’t come off”: Ewen Montagu to “Ginger,” July 6, 1943, Montagu Papers.
19 “Mincemeat will be taken out”: Ewen Montagu to J. H. Bevan, March 26, 1943, TNA, ADM 223/464.
20 “All the details are now ‘buttoned up’”: Ibid.
21 “alteration and improvement”: Ibid.
22 “more personal”: J. H. Bevan to A. Nye, April 8, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
23 “a letter in answer to one from”: Ewen Montagu draft of letter, April 6, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
24 “should not be undertaken”: Admiralty amendment to official report, June 3, 1945, TNA, CAB 154/67.
25 “rather too official”: J. H. Bevan to A. Nye, April 10, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
26 “we must get Dudley Clarke’s”: J. H. Bevan, memo TNA, CAB 154/67.
27 “danger of overloading”: Dudley Clarke to J. H. Bevan, April 2, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
28 “a mistake to play for high”: Admiralty amendment to official report, June 3, 1945, TNA, CAB 154/67.
29 “If anything miscarries”: J. H. Bevan, memo, April 12, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
30 “merely a lowish grade innuendo”: Excised paragraph 13 in “Draft History of Operation Mincemeat,” May 29, 1943, IWM, 97/45/1, folder #2.
31 “Mincemeat should be capable”: Admiralty amendment to official report, June 3, 1945, TNA, CAB 154/67.
32 “of a type which could have”: Excised paragraph 14 in “Draft History of Operation Mincemeat,” May 29, 1943, IWM 97/45/1, folder #2.
33 “If it isn’t too much trouble”: Ewen Montagu, undated draft letter, TNA, CAB 154/67.
34 “How are you getting on”: Ibid.
35 “Do you still take the same size”: Ibid.
36 “What is wrong with Monty?”: Ibid.
37 “the best way of giving it”: Ewen Montagu, draft letter, April 6, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
38 “ideally suited to the purpose”: Ibid.
39 “not blatantly mentioned”: Ewen Montagu, memo, April 4, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
40 “Your signature in ink might”: J. H. Bevan to A. Nye, April 8, 1943, TNA, CAB 154/67.
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