Agent Zigzag

by Ben MacIntyre

  Special Branch set about tracing the rest of the Jelly Gang. Jimmy Hunt, it transpired, had been convicted of warehouse breaking and larceny in 1938; Darry was still in Dartmoor, on a seven-year stretch; the others were all either deserters, doing time, or dead. This was ideal. There was no chance of accidental contact, and with the members of the gang safely out of the way they could be brought into the story with no danger that they might turn up unannounced. Chapman had been instructed to contact his old chums, and perhaps bring one back. Hunt seemed the ideal candidate. As Masterman pointed out, “the Germans had not a photograph13 of Hunt, but only a general description, [so] it would be possible to impersonate him by someone with a Cockney accent.” Hunt the safebreaker would play a central role in the coming drama, without once leaving his prison cell.

  Gradually, it was starting to dawn on Chapman’s handlers that they had obtained a double agent of potentially huge value. When Camp 020 mistakenly passed the identity of Zigzag to another branch of the intelligence service, there was a loud squeal of protest from Masterman, the master of the double cross, at this “gratuitous”14 sharing of information. B1A was jealous of its new treasure, and while Tar was happy to pass on his intelligence findings, he was not about to share Zigzag with anyone.

  The forensic investigations confirmed how highly the Germans prized Agent Fritz. The quality of his equipment was declared to be first class. The cash he had brought was genuine British currency, not the forged stuff that the Abwehr had often palmed off on lesser agents. The match heads were impregnated with quinine, which the boffins in the science department described as “a very good means15 of secret writing.” The brown pill was potassium cyanide, instantaneously lethal. The wireless was traced to a British SOE agent. Only in the matter of the forged ID cards did the Abwehr seem to have cut corners. The Stationery Office dismissed them as amateur forgeries and liable to be spotted as such by any observant policeman. “It does seem rather extraordinary16 that the Germans should not take a little more trouble in constructing their documents,” Tar complained, as if miffed that the Germans were not trying hard enough. One unsolved mystery was how the Focke-Wulf had managed to escape the pursuing RAF fighters: the Air Ministry could only conclude that “something queer was taking place17 in connection with the plane and the radio beams associated with it.”

  Camp 020 was no place to run a double agent. If Zigzag was to be effective, he must be kept happy, and that would require creature comforts at least comparable to those of La Bretonnière. Chapman had been pampered by the Germans: “They pandered to his vanity,18 granted him liberty and treated him with respect.” MI5 must now try to find a red carpet, or the nearest equivalent, and roll it out for Zigzag.

  Corporal Paul Backwell and Lance Corporal Allan Tooth were, by common agreement, the two best Field Security policemen in British intelligence. Both had been policemen before the war, and would enjoy successful careers in the intelligence corps after it. They were bright, well educated, and good natured; they were also large and, when they wanted to be, extremely intimidating. Tar Robertson summoned Backwell and Tooth to his office and told them to take a car to Camp 020, where they would pick up one “Edward Simpson,” “a dangerous criminal19 who is wanted by police and who has been released in order to carry out an operation of an extremely hazardous character.” They should accompany this man to a safe house in north London where they would live with him until further notice. Robertson was in deadly earnest: “The success of this operation20 depends upon the utmost degree of secrecy.” A photographic pass would be issued in the name “Simpson,” indicating that he was performing “special duties for the War Office,” which could be produced if they were ever challenged by officials.

  “There is no reason to doubt Simpson’s loyalty to this country and you are not therefore to regard yourselves as his guards,” Robertson continued. “You should look upon yourselves rather as chaperones, whose duty it is to prevent him getting into trouble with the police and with his old criminal associates, to act as a screen between him and the outside world.” “Simpson” should never be left alone, day or night. He should not communicate with anyone, use the telephone, or send letters. If he attempted to escape, Tooth and Backwell should not hesitate to “place him under restraint” and then contact either Reed or Masterman. Both policemen would be issued with firearms.

  At the same time, they should provide him with companionship. “This regime is bound to be irksome,” said Tar, “and you must therefore do your best to make his life as agreeable as is possible in the circumstances.” They could take him to the local pub of an evening; each officer would receive £5 as a beer float, and Simpson would also be provided with cash in order to be able to “stand his round.” Having gained his confidence, the policemen should note down anything he said of importance, and encourage him to talk about his past. In short, they should guard him, befriend him, and then spy on him. If Backwell and Tooth thought it strange that they were being expected to keep a known crook out of the hands of the police, they were much too discreet to say so.

  Days before Christmas, Backwell and Tooth, in plainclothes, arrived at Camp 020, collected Chapman’s personal property, and escorted him from his cell. Chapman, without preamble, asked Backwell if he might borrow a pound, as he wanted to give a tip to the sergeant “who had looked after him21 so well.” (Only Chapman would leave Camp 020 as if checking out of a smart hotel.) They drove north. In the car, Chapman’s chaperones introduced themselves as “Allan” and “Paul” and explained they would now be his “permanent companions,22 friends who were protecting him from police and his previous criminal associates.” Chapman said little as they drove. “Conversation was strained,”23 Backwell reported.

  No one paid any attention to the three men who climbed out of the car and walked up the garden path of 35 Crespigny Road—a nondescript detached house, on a quiet street, in the unremarkable north London borough of Hendon. A few of the neighbors were “digging for victory” in their front gardens, but none looked up. It would have taken a neighbor of exceptional inquisitiveness to spot that Number 35 never took down its blackout curtains (many people did not bother), or that the locks had been changed, or that a man with a thin mustache had arrived that very morning to erect an aerial on the back roof.

  Inside Number 35, Backwell locked the door, and the three housemates began, in his words, to “settle in.”24 Reed had set up the radio room on the upper floor; Chapman’s bedroom was next door, while the two FSPs shared the third bedroom. The housekeeper, Mrs. West, would not be arriving for a few days, so the policemen divided up the chores: Tooth would do the shopping and Backwell the cooking. When Chapman was out of earshot, they divvided up their other task: “Allan and I agreed to concentrate on different aspects of Eddie. Allan studied his character, likes and dislikes, while I kept to the factual side and noted everything of interest that he said in conversation.”

  Chapman was anxious. He complained of sleeping badly, and showed no inclination to leave the house. Like a couple of burly mother hens, Tooth and Backwell set about “making Eddie feel at home.” Backwell asked Chapman what reading material he enjoyed, and was astonished to discover his love of serious literature. “His taste was unusual for anyone who had lived his kind of life,” thought Backwell, who bought him some German novels, the works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and the plays of Pierre Corneille, in French.

  Gradually, Chapman seemed to relax. His days were filled with further interrogations, sending wireless messages under Reed’s supervision, and making plans. In the evenings, he read, smoked, listened to the radio, and chatted with his amiable guards. Privately, Backwell and Tooth compared notes on their ward. They were struck that German propaganda seemed to have had an “enormous” effect on him; at first he dismissed BBC reports of Allied advances, claiming that he knew Germany was winning the war, that Russia was exhausted. The Allies, he insisted, would never succeed in invading France. Backwell decided to mount his own propaganda campaign, by
exposing him to such patriotic literature as I, James Blunt, H. V. Morton’s novel imagining a Britain under Nazi rule. “Gradually we made him realise that German propaganda, however convincing it had been, was far from the truth.”

  After a few days of communal living, Backwell and Tooth reported that Chapman now appeared “quite happy” and was “a mine of information.” Their companion seemed to know all about sabotage, and “often speaks of various methods25 of destroying pylons, bridges, petrol tanks, etc.” Often he insisted on conversing in French. The policemen agreed they were living with a most peculiar fellow. One moment he was reading classical literature in the original French and quoting Tennyson, and the next he would be discussing the best way to blow up a train.

  One night, as they were relaxing after dinner, Chapman wondered aloud “what it was that made him26 leave Germany to come over here.” He continued musing in the same vein: “In Germany27 he could have lived well, both now and after the war. He was not forced to come.” The two policemen pondered the same question. His politics seemed to be based on a close reading of H. G. Wells: “He has no sympathy with nationalism and in the post-war reconstruction he would like to see a world federation.” Tooth decided that deep down Chapman was a patriot: “He is proud to be British and wants us to win the war.” On the other hand, he was apparently impelled by some internal recklessness. “It seems that he is a man to whom the presence of danger is essential,” Tooth wrote. “I feel that it is for this reason that he would be undertaking his return to France, for he is virtually a man without a country.”

  Some days later, Chapman let slip that he had a private plan of his own, but then he changed the subject, remarking: “It is such a wild scheme it would not be thought feasible.” Tooth duly reported Chapman’s remarks to Reed and Robertson, adding: “I can only glean that the success of these plans depends entirely on Dr. Graumann keeping a promise that he should visit Berlin, when I gather something of great importance was to take place.”

  Chapman showed no remorse for his past, and regaled his new companions with extravagant tales of his own villainy, such as the time he broke into the Grimsby pawnbrokers and the raid on Express Dairies. The information was duly added to MI5’s growing list of Chapman’s undetected crimes. “I think we should28 keep these new adventures entirely to ourselves, but have it on record,” wrote Reed.

  The interrogators, spy catchers, and double-crossers of MI5 (Reed excepted) were usually upper class and the products of English public schools. Most had never encountered a man like Chapman before, and their first instinct was to despise this uncouth fellow with his flamboyant manner. Yet in almost every case they came first to like, and then to respect him, though never entirely without misgivings.

  The horrific bloodletting of the war elsewhere in the world was reaching a climax. In a few weeks, the Battle of Stalingrad would end with German surrender after the most expensive battle, in terms of human life, ever known: 2 million killed or wounded, including civilians. The extermination camps continued to belch out human smoke; the Battle of the Atlantic raged between the U-boat and Allied convoys; U.S., British, and Free French forces had launched Operation Torch, to wrest control of North Africa away from the Germans. But away from the guns and noise, the spy controllers of both sides continued their silent, deadly, unseen war: As Christmas approached, espionage experts all over London wondered what to do about Eddie Chapman, and what made him tick.

  When he was not thinking up new ways to deceive and double-cross Nazi Germany, John Masterman, historian and athlete, liked to think about cricket. Sometimes he thought about espionage and cricket at the same time. “Running a team29 of double agents,” he reflected, “is very much like running a club cricket side. Older players lose their form and are gradually replaced by newcomers. It is not always easy to pick the best players to put into the field. Some of the players required a good deal of net practice before they were really fit to play in a match.” In Chapman, he seemed to have discovered a batsman of astonishing natural ability, who needed no additional training and who might well knock up a fantastic innings. If, that is, he did not stalk off the pitch, and then reappear to open the bowling for the other side.

  Masterman entertained these thoughts as he lay on the floor of the barbershop in the Reform Club on Pall Mall. At the start of the war, he had resided in the United University Club; then, when a bomb blew the roof off, he had moved in to the Oxford and Cambridge. Not long after that, the barber at the Reform Club had died and his salon had closed; Masterman was invited to make his digs there instead, an offer he readily accepted since the club was only a few minutes’ walk from B1A headquarters. And so now he spent his nights on the floor where the hair clippings of “great and clubbable” men had fallen ever since 1841.

  Sleeping on a thin mattress on the hard tiles was not easy. The cook at the Reform did his best with the rations, but the food was seldom anything but grim. The electricity shut down with monotonous irregularity. Baths were doled out in strict rotation, and were always cold. But Masterman loved living at the Reform: “I had, with my memories30 of my uselessness in the First War, a kind of unconscious wish for trials and discomfort.” He watched his fellow men at war (the women were, as ever, invisible to him) and reflected on their stoicism. One night, the Carlton Club was hit by a bomb. The members of the surrounding clubs, in pajamas and slippers, formed long lines to save the library from the flames, passing books from hand to hand and discussing the merits of each as they passed. Such people, thought Masterman, “made defeat seem impossible.”31 This strange warrior-monk would spend the rest of his war in this masculine world of institutional food, hard floors, and cold baths. And now, with a new, intensely fit, first-class batsman to send to the crease, John Masterman was as happy as he had ever been in his life.

  On the other side of London, in Latchmere House, the commandant of Camp 020 was also thinking about Agent Zigzag. Tin Eye Stephens regarded most enemy spies as “the rabble of the universe,32 their treachery not matched by their courage.” But Chapman was different—the “most fascinating case”33 to date. Unlike every other captured agent, he had not displayed even a flicker of fear. He seemed to crave excitement, and very little else. “What manner of man34 is the spy?” Stephens pondered. “Is he patriotic, brave? Is he of the underworld, a subject of blackmail? Is he just a mercenary? Spies who work for money alone are few, but they are dangerous.” For a crook, he observed, Chapman was strangely uninterested in money. He seemed genuinely patriotic, but not in the Hun-bashing, jingoistic way that Stephens epitomized. What Chapman seemed to want was another breathless episode in the unfolding drama of his own life. If MI5 could stage-manage the next act with enough flair, Tin Eye reflected, then Zigzag might be their biggest star yet.

  On Christmas Eve of 1942, Maurice, the German wireless operator in Paris, sent a message to Agent Fritz: PLEASE COME35 AT NINE FORTY FIVE AND FIVE PM QRQ. (The sign “qrq” was ham shorthand for “send more quickly.”) The Germans were still apparently having difficulty picking up Chapman’s transmissions. Ronnie Reed had fiddled with Chapman’s radio and could find no fault, but he was not too alarmed. The patchy link would buy them some more time.

  Far more worrying was something that Chapman had said. Soon after arriving in Crespigny Road, he asked Reed to find Freda Stevenson, his former lover and the mother of his child. Chapman had only vaguely alluded to Freda before. Now he explained that he had never held his own daughter, now three years old, that he was still in love with Freda, and that he wanted to see them both, urgently. Reed said he would try to find her.

  Freda was an unknown quantity. Allowing Chapman to contact her might lift his spirits, Reed reflected, but it would complicate the case. If Chapman was serious about his feelings for a woman he had not seen for years and a child he had never met, would that affect his willingness to return to France? Perhaps Freda had remarried; perhaps she had given the child up for adoption. Reed concluded: “We should know36 the exact situation concerning
them before Zigzag visited them, rather than that he should run his neck into what might be an extremely awkward situation.” But as the days passed, Chapman’s requests to see Freda and Diane grew more urgent. Reed stalled, and every time he did so, Chapman’s face would fall, and he would shuffle off to his room. Backwell and Tooth treated him like a particularly fractious and unpredictable teenager. “Eddie had moods,”37 wrote Backwell. “If things did not go as he planned, he would go upstairs to bed and stay there for hours on end and refuse to eat. He never got annoyed with Allan and me on these occasions. But we left him alone when he felt like this.”

  Chapman’s deteriorating temperament cast a pall over the Christmas celebrations at 35 Crespigny Road. Backwell roasted a chicken with sausages. Tooth took some photographs around the Formica-topped kitchen table. The series offers a strange reflection of Chapman’s volatile mood swings: In one snap he is drinking beer and grinning at the camera, in the next he appears sunk in misery.

  Another reason for Chapman’s frustration was the continuing difficulty in communicating with his German spymasters. His wireless could pick up messages sent from France, but he was unable to make direct contact and had to send his replies blind. Soon after Christmas, Reed announced that he had solved the problem. Chapman had casually remarked that during his time in La Bretonnière he had noticed a loose switch on the wireless, which he had fixed by soldering it with a hot poker. This, noted Reed primly, is “a method not calculated38 to provide a really satisfactory electrical connection.” He took the machine home, mended the switch himself, and returned it the next morning, saying he was sure it would now work.

  Chapman had written and encoded a simple message overnight. Reed checked it over, approved it, and switched on the wireless. At 9:45, a connection was made with the Paris receiving station. Everything was working perfectly. But in their haste and excitement to see if the repair had worked, they made a mistake. It was the first error of the entire case, but it was also the very worst mistake they could have made. At 9:47 on December 27, Chapman tapped out the following message: CALL AT 100039 IF PARIS UNABLE RECEIVE ME. OK FRITZ. HU HA HU HO. The acknowledgement came back that the message had been clearly received. Reed and Chapman were jubilant.