Churchill's White Rabbit

by Sophie Jackson

  SOE had a simple agenda: to develop an underground resistance movement among the local population that would disrupt Nazi influence and control. This could be done by simply spreading information and keeping up morale or by taking risky acts of sabotage to hamper the Germans. There was a greater risk to the general population by the latter action, as the Nazis would initiate fierce reprisals for any act of destruction. While this was not a matter to be taken lightly, reprisals almost universally had the effect of stirring up more resistance and strengthening that which already existed.

  While their objective was simple, putting it into effect was much more complex. For a start the resistance movements that had already formed in France were divided by their political ideas as much as by their operating methods. The biggest factor in this was General de Gaulle, who on the one hand was useful for stirring up people to fight back, but on the other often divided potential comrades.

  It would be a mistake to believe that de Gaulle was universally popular among the French, as nothing in politics is ever that easy. France has always been a hotbed for political debate and contention and the war only interrupted that for a matter of months until it resurfaced within the underground. While the majority of resisters despised Pétain for ‘kissing up’ to the Nazis, there was just as many who despised de Gaulle and did not want to fight off the Germans just to get him into power; they also found it difficult to fight alongside ‘Gaullists’ who were now part of the Free French Independents (FFI). Add to that de Gaulle’s own personal dislike for various resistance elements and his refusal to aid them in any way, and the situation soon became unmanageable. Also in the mix were the French Communists, with connections to Russia. It was feared that they were working to see the Soviets take control of France. And let’s not forget the Maquis, the men who had fled to various mountainous and forested regions to escape being sent to Germany as forced labour. They lived permanently outdoors and in hiding, but built stocks of weapons and practiced guerrilla warfare.

  Somehow SOE had to bring together these differing groups to form a unified resistance. They didn’t have to like each other, but they must not conflict or hamper each other’s efforts. This would prove the full-time job of RF Section, and would cause a great deal of argument among the politicians back home, not least the Foreign Office, which was trying to keep on reasonable terms with Pétain.

  In warfare, nothing is as simple as it seems.

  Meanwhile, Forest was trying to find his way back into France via the intelligence services. He had been interviewed for employment within MI9 in December 1941 and then shortly after by Captain Strong of MI5. After his chance meeting with Piquet-Wicks he was sent to Boodle’s Club for another interview, this time by Major David Keswick. It was remarked that he gave ‘a favourable impression.’3 The resulting papers from the interview reveal revelations about Forest’s personal life and affairs.

  They record that Forest’s wife and two children were still in France and being looked after by his former employer Molyneux;4 Barbara was unmentioned. Forest listed Lillian’s address as rue de la Pointe and stated that she was the person named in his will. He also gave his religion as Calvinist (a branch of Christianity named after French reformer John Calvin), though later writings and records suggest that he was more inclined towards atheism. Intriguingly he claimed he had no political views, which seems oddly neutral for a man normally so full of opinions, but was perhaps a tactic for ensuring that he wasn’t disqualified from service by favouring the wrong party line.

  Barbara finally received a mention under section 23 – ‘First Person to be informed if you become a casualty’ – where her original surname, Dean, was tactfully written in. Under his personal particulars Forest gave his description as thickset, blue-eyed and fair-haired; he could almost be imagined as having German ancestry. He also mentioned that the third finger on his left hand was ‘defective’ but this did not prevent him from being able to shoot, mountaineer, swim or box, all things that the SOE interview asked if he could do.

  When it came to promoting his usefulness to SOE, Forest was not a shrinking violet and when asked which areas of France he was familiar with he bluntly responded ‘all’. He also made it clear that he had many contacts within France, both personal and professional, which he could use in his secret work. How much of this was accurate and how much was a ploy to ensure that he was employed by SOE is only known to Forest; he was indeed widely travelled and knowledgeable about France, but whether his fashion industry contacts could have been any use to the resistance is debatable. Forest was not afraid to promote his own self-interests if it meant getting into the service.

  He told his new potential employers that he had been approached by MI9 (rather than him approaching them) but had come to the conclusion that he could do more for SOE. This was actually quite true as he was exactly the type of individual the fledgling SOE needed for their work with the resistance. He was therefore already being interviewed with a mind to being placed in the RF Section of the organisation.

  SOE liked the determined and dogmatic Forest, and after a final check into his background run by MI5 they were keen to offer him a place. But as usual in Forest’s life nothing was ever that simple. The Air Ministry kicked up a fuss about losing one of their own. The RAF and SOE never had an easy relationship: SOE was reliant on RAF aircraft to transfer their agents in and out of various countries, but the missions were not only time away from bombing raids for the pilots and planes involved, but were also high risk.

  With unhappy relations between the two organisations it was unsurprising that the RAF made a fuss about Forest’s transfer; it was not so much that Forest was indispensable to them, but that they were disinclined to respond favourably to any SOE request.

  Forest was furious. After so long trying to achieve his goal he had been thwarted by petty bureaucracy and internal politics. It had been a long time coming, but Forest finally exploded. He demanded to be released from the RAF, threatening to go to the national press and tell his story if he was not allowed his transfer. SOE, meanwhile, tried to stay in the background, not wanting to sour relations further between themselves and the RAF. Forest was therefore alone in his battle, but that had never bothered him and he kept pestering the Air Ministry until finally they relented and on 3 February 1942, Forest joined SOE.

  Barbara discovered Forest’s new role late in the day. She was aware that he had had a number of interviews about transferring from the air service, but had not realised he was trying to get into a secret operation. When she did find out she was understandably worried and cross. There was no getting away from the fact that Forest was trying to get into a division fraught with risk and danger. While SOE’s work was top secret and the public knew nothing about it, Barbara was aware of the terrible risks any agent had to take to achieve his goal. It is unclear how much Forest revealed to Barbara in those early days about his new role. SOE agents were meant to keep a lid on their work even with loved ones, but it was difficult not to say something to a person you might never see again. It seems likely that Barbara had a better knowledge than most families of what Forest was going to be up to, but that hardly alleviated her concerns. Her only hope had been the Air Ministry dragging its heels and refusing a transfer, and she tried to persuade Forest not to make a fuss and push too hard, but Forest was far too stubborn to listen.

  Forest stepped into a world of very complicated politics. SOE’s operations in France had been split into two independent sections (though in practice complete independence was impossible): F Section and RF Section. F Section was the British arm of the organisation, recruiting its own agents (either French or French-speaking British) and remaining, as much as it could, neutral among the various resistance movements. RF Section worked closely with de Gaulle’s Bureau Central de Renseignements et d’Action (BCRA), the Free French Intelligence movement. As such there was a natural antipathy towards it from the Independent French movements and the communists. There was also a constant niggling confli
ct between F and RF, whether it was over supplies or missions overlapping. F Section was a source of perpetual upset among the exiled French leaders in London and Forest often wrote unsympathetically about his co-division.5

  RF Section had its problems as well. Formed in May 1941 and originally comprising of Captain Eric Piquet-Wicks and his secretary, it had flourished into an operation supplying the resistance with arms and equipment as well as helping to transport Free French agents in and out of the country.

  Forest entered RF Section when it was at No. 1 Dorset Square (critics of the division rather enjoyed the irony of RF taking over premises recently vacated by the Bertram Mills Circus). His main responsibilities at the start were sorting through the reams of information that came in from the field, learning to recognise the pointless from the important, and to coordinate the equipping of supplies to whatever section project was running at the time. By this point he had been promoted to flight-lieutenant, but was no nearer being airborne.

  Forest quickly came into contact with the significant figures within the section and became familiar with names that regularly reoccur in histories of SOE and the resistance. Commandant (later Colonel) Passy, the head of BCRA, whose real name was André Dewavrin, impressed Forest, who considered him cool and efficient. Passy was not afraid to join his colleagues in the field when the need arose and parachuted into France in 1943 with Pierre Brossolette, another man who became a close friend to Forest. Via Passy, Forest came into contact with a number of young agents who he would later work with in the field.

  At the other end of the spectrum there was Piquet-Wicks, the man who had inspired Forest to join the section, but who Forest now developed a distinct dislike for. He described him as having a ‘brilliant mind [but his caustic wit] made one feel like giving him a hefty kick in the pants.’6

  The sentiment was mutual and Piquet-Wicks felt that Forest carried a permanent and rather hefty chip on his shoulder. He probably had a point, but that did not make their working relationship any easier.

  RF spent the majority of 1942 building up their organisation within France. Arms dumps and secret stashes would be essential when the section went into full operation and Forest was integrally involved in sorting these issues out. While RF was supposed to be a purely non-combative team (they were organisers, not saboteurs) they still trained agents in the art of destruction, as well as radio operators and specialists detailed to find landing grounds for planes and parachutes.

  By the autumn of 1942 the unit was considered important enough to be issued with a senior officer commander to replace Piquet-Wicks. This was Lieutenant-Colonel J.R.H. Hutchison, who quickly became nicknamed ‘Hutch’. He was enthusiastic and courageous, insisted that everyone at Dorset Square speak French exclusively, and in 1944 parachuted into France with a Jedburgh team when he was well into his fifties. Hutch rapidly became a driving force at RF and he was just the sort of man who would not restrict another’s entrance into the field due to age. This was great news for Forest who was beginning to suffer the same dismal feelings he had endured at 308 Squadron while watching young pilots going into action while he was left behind. His requests to be sent into the field had been turned down, but his persistence was always his strongest point and after making himself a nuisance it was agreed that should a mission requiring his talents come up he would be assigned to it.

  Forest set about finding himself just such a mission and his first thought was to get assistance from his old friend Molyneux. The navy was short of small craft for coastal operations and Forest recalled that his friend had a motor yacht moored in Monte Carlo harbour. Thinking this could be his ticket in, he suggested that he be given the mission of seizing the yacht and taking her on a mad dash to Gibraltar. The idea was approved, Molyneux gave his consent and an agent named Charvet was assigned to provide a crew of three. A felucca7 would provide supplies in the form of 450 gallons of petrol, 50 gallons of oil, two light machine guns and food. Forest would either travel on the felucca or be parachuted to the location. His excitement was mounting, as it seemed he was finally going to get his chance; he even had his first operation name, the rather obvious ‘Seahorse’.

  But typically, just as everything seemed to be going swimmingly, something happened, and on this occasion it was the changing wartime situation and someone realising that the risk being undertaken for one small yacht was ridiculous. The mission sounds utterly absurd in the cold light of peacetime and proves how desperate Forest was to get involved in anything. The project was unconditionally shelved. Fortunately for Forest this did not translate into relegating him back to his desk duties and he was allowed to keep himself in readiness for another mission and to attend parachute training. There was hope yet that he would finally get himself into action.

  * * *

  Notes

  1. Foot, M.R.D., SOE in France.

  2. MacKenzie, W., Op cit.

  3. Yeo-Thomas SOE personnel file, the National Archives.

  4. Molyneux was listed as a captain in the MI9 records, having served with the Duke of Wellington Regiment in the First World War. Having lost an eye in that conflict and being 48 at the time of the next he was not involved in the fighting, but carried on work in his fashion house, temporarily moving it to London during the Second World War. It is not clear how he was looking after Mrs Yeo-Thomas, but it was possibly financially.

  5. F Section is best known for the many heroic agents, such as Odette Sansom, who operated under its auspices. It was keen on encouraging sabotage and much of the SOE material already published deals with the people working in this division.

  6. Seaman, Op cit.

  7. Small motor-powered craft.

  – 6 –

  The Man with the White Streak in his Hair

  THE PARACHUTE WAS STILL in its infancy in terms of military use when Forest travelled to Cheshire in November 1942 to undertake his training. Initially introduced in the First World War as a means of escaping from air balloons or damaged planes, it had been suggested that they could be used as a means of dropping troops en masse as early as 1917 by an American general.1 However Britain remained unconvinced by parachuting, and held off forming a parachute regiment until 1941.

  The military authorities could hardly be blamed for their scepticism. Parachutes were a dangerous business, as SOE agents would learn. The usual means for deploying a parachute involved a static line attached to the transport aircraft. When the paratrooper or agent jumped from the plane the static line became taut and automatically caused the parachute to open. This was the easiest way to release inexperienced jumpers, but it had its problems and there is at least one reported incident of a man plummeting to his death because his parachute was not attached to the static line.

  Even if a parachute was deployed safely, the landing still had to be endured. Harry Peulevé, who met Forest in 1944, parachuted into France as an SOE agent only to break his leg on landing. As most agents had to be dropped in ‘blind’ (at night and only with a rudimentary idea of the exact location they were being launched over) the risks of hitting something or landing badly were all too high, and the number of SOE agents whose stories begin (or end) with them being knocked unconscious or fracturing something upon arrival is rather dismaying.

  But if Forest wanted to get into France the parachute was his only real option. SOE had its own training field for parachutists at Ringfield, near Manchester, and Forest arrived there in the early hours of a cold Sunday morning. He had only a brief moment of respite before he had to be up and doing physical training for an hour and a half. The experience was gruelling after being stuck behind a desk for so long.

  Forest then got to try some dummy jumps. A pretend plane fuselage had been built with an exit hatch of the correct size in order to teach the men how to launch themselves from the aircraft, and once this had been practiced for a while Forest moved on to swinging in a practice harness to get a feel for parachuting.

  The next day Forest experienced his first real descent and the
jump terrified him despite his grim determination. He later recorded his thoughts at the moment of having to jump as: ‘You damned fool, why ever did you undertake such a silly job – in a few minutes you’ll have to jump through that hole and it doesn’t appeal to you a bit, you are scared stiff and you’ll have to force yourself to do it. Twerp!’2 He was not alone in being unnerved by the prospect of the fall and it was some comfort to know that his fellow jumpers were equally scared. He summoned his courage and made his first descent without a hitch; he landed so elated that he was instantly ready to try again. Over the next few days he had plenty of opportunities. The training school had their pupils jumping from planes and balloons day and night. His only real disaster happened during a water jump, when he was dropped over a lake at Tatton Park into freezing water. His waterproof suit quickly began to leak and the inflatable dinghy he had been provided with turned out to have a tear in the bottom. He was supposed to inflate it using a CO2 gas canister, but this proved to be almost empty and he had to resort to using a hand pump that, in the freezing conditions, would not connect properly to the valve on the dinghy. After a fraught 15 minutes the dinghy had enough air inside it to be usable, but when Forest climbed in his added weight caused the tear to worsen and water flooded in. By desperately bailing out the dinghy he was just able to reach the shore before it sunk completely.

  Despite these accidents Forest enjoyed his training and returned to Barbara in high spirits and full of hope that soon he would be descending into action.

  The resistance groups within France were not operating as well as de Gaulle and SOE had originally hoped. They were constantly harassed by the Gestapo, the Vichy Police, the Group Mobile and Darnand’s Milice3 and were still trying to operate independently of each other. SOE knew the only way to make the resistance efficient was somehow to unite them under one organisational body, preferably something operated by the British. In particular the paramilitary divisions of the movements needed to be brought together under a single commander if they were to be any use when the Allies invaded France. In the background there were also the communists, who out of all the groups proved most adept at keeping their activities secret and even SOE wasn’t certain of the extent of their work or what combat units they had created.