1949-06-11 — Page 9

T

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, SATURDAY, JUNE 11, 1949.

SECRET SERVICE

The story of

who

me brave men and

women

carried out Churchill's

directive TO

Set Europe Ablaze!

by JERRARD TICKELL

N the tense autumn of

Ten

were soon

hand-picked, security- 1940 a small group of screened volunteers

in hard and secret training.

men

scheduled

came together It was proposed to parachule and, after one or two there men Into France complete changes of address, settled with transmitting sets.. down in a sparsely furnished The first to go ΤΥΠΗ George block of offices in Baker- Noble. A few hours before his

departure. .street, London.

a high- Those of them for whom explosive bomb struck the house to consider ways and means of lived.

three-word Implementing the

Noble was out, at the time, but directive given them by Winston two oficers with whom he Churchill: "Set Europe ablaze.

Planning was started to the secretly trained were killed. A

third was seriously wounded. wall of sirens and continued to the baleful lumination of Incendiary bombs no London it- self began to burn.

The office

ใน

Baker street

and the flat in Port 12 & 11 --

square where it

The

་

first HAIR

The volunteers came from før. afleld and for a variety of motives. They came from all corners of Britain, from South- ern Ireland, from the French provinces of Canada, fron

Mauritius. all started:

parachuted

into France: How the new

recruits were selected.

They sprang from all walks of life. The head walter trained alongside the bon vivrur he had once served.

Some came for high adventure, some for revenge; some come because they were bored with regimental soldiering, others be cause they had an irresistible nostalgia for the cafes and the garlic of the Continent.

The best of them came becauso

the soldiers of two

belween

of questions Another set

For example, in the Paris occupied state and keep their

chairs could be found sat down where he and his companions of cerinin oli installations-wes Inadvertenlly to have slid her Their wishes should be respect they saw the fight, not as one

dealing with the vulnerability Metro, pa elderly lady seemed soll free of the German Army, 1 given to softly smiling "Benny" ivory-topped stick between the ed. That sulted Baker-street.

in the unoccupied zone, dis his ankles of a German officer. who set of to conduct

creet persons in possession of the researches on the spot.

While "Denny" nosed around flat on his face on the crowded about with reasonable freedom. To the delight of all, he fell requisite documents could move con~ platform. the refineries, de Guells ducted a miniature Gallup poil

Baker-street set out to provide

It,

The group, and everythnig and person connected with was subject to the most pro- found degree of secrecy,

CONTACT Max H.

had

ander the nores of the Gestapo. The old lady apologised with such documents—and such per-

Both men returned from their grace and manners and the Ger- sons. mfasions and "The Firm" set to man, mallifed, strode DWDY to study their reports.

brushing his uniform, It was manifest that France

The grand strategy had been established; information was to

It was a grim and silent had been successfully split into Madame, her blue eyes alight hand; targets had been pin- George Noble who drove to a occupied and unoccupied zones, with innocence, smiled at her pointed and the morse sounders hidden airfeld In Bedfordshire not only geographically but compatriots and remarked gent. were tap-tapping, and climbed into a Whitley. psychologically. Its official name, known only His Instructions were simple. to its more highly placed mem- He should contact a man called bers, and to a very few in Max H, a slaunch pre-war timately concerned people, was friend of Thomas Cadett's, and 5.O.E. — Special Operations reveal himself in his role of Executive,

commando, radio operator, and

ખ

KNOWN by many names Though its real and official Jocation was Baker-street, it had a number of other names and a number of accommodation ad-

dressey.

: Brkish agent.

Then, having melted into the French countryside. ho should transmit a code report to Baker- street and awalt the arrival of

Successors,

The colliary aircraft took off in the dusk before a rising moon. It survived the malice of flak on the French coast and the venom of German night-fighters. under At the agreed spot,

It was the tenant of a luxury

flat in Portman-square

George

The Germans, expert In the subjugation of the defeated, had applied to France the old adage "divide and rule."

LADY

in the Metro

In the occupied zone, where' the uniformed soldiers of the

"COLONEL MAURICE BUCKMASTER, flest Intelligence Officer, then Head of the Section. "I am not sure," said a German spy chief, "whom we skall hang first when we get to London, Winston Churchill or Colonel Buckmaster,"

Reich marched along the cobbles ly: "That is the third one this and drank in the cafes, the for- morning." gotten, unforgettable "smeil of invasion" had begun to curl sourly in the nostrils of the people, and trigger Angers had

begun to itch.

one set at initials, the occupant Nobel launched himself into A most extraordinary series

of Room 055A, War Office, under the night sky. another.

As he piroue

of accidents, each trivni în liself, pirouetted down the occurred whereby the con- The Admiralty knew it as one darkness, he bore with him not querors were made to loolt alphabetical series, the Air only a transmitting set and a foolish and indignified. Ministry as a completely dif- tiny gold Saint Christopher, but

ferent one.

also all the fears, hopes and

of the French section.

It was all things to all Minis- Punctually to the minute, the

tries, each of its various aliases having been deliberately de- mon signed to conceal the

1ts

unity.

fact

morse sounders at

D Recret In England of receiving station

to chatter and the mes- began

Baker- relayed to

at

To is founder-members it sage was

had one name only. It was street. George Noble was rato.

The Firm."

The French section had leaped

The Firm was destined to at a bound from plan to practice. cover subversive operations in

any part of the world where the During a speech made in enemy could be inconvenienced secret session to the House of by such action.,

Commons,

Churchili Winston Eald: "It is evident that Hitler, agonised By what, devious routes had master of a starving. the founder-members of "The and surging Europe, will have his Firm" come together? Who were

dangers as well as wo."

these-ordinary-yet extraordinary.. George Noble and the gallant

men?

company, men and women, who followed him, were not to be

In the autumn of 1040 Thomas the least among Hitler's dangers. Cadelt, formerly Parls corres- A mass of information con- pondent of The Times, became

in conditions

France cerning officer of the first operational

was available, most of it derived from refugees, much of it con-

the French Country Section.

A

prominent business man who had been in charge of the tradictory. The precise answers

French branch of a well-known

to certain questilons were TC- quired.

British company took over tho To get theso ongwers first administration of the section,

hand, Jacques de Guells, a

In early 1941, others joined genial giant of a man, descended them, ali chosen for their on France. specialised of France

knowledge and love

Major Lewis Gielgud was Ins charge of recruiting. Major Maurice Buckmonter, later to be a colonel and Head of the Sec- tion, was its Intelligence Offeer..

His activity was such as ta earn him a professional tribute from Heinrich Bielcher, GermaĎ counter-espionage

expert

Parls.

"I am not sure," said Bletcher genially to a captured British agent in Fresnes Prison, whom wo shall hang first when we get

to London-Winston Churchill:

or your Colonel Buckmaster.”

TASKS

to be done

Over the winter and under the bombs, a broad strategic policy crystallised. These were the tasks set themselves by "The Firm

TO RESTORE belief in the

might, of Britain rekindle faith in vicloru TO ORGANSE_the_scientific zabotage of industrial plant and of all methods of com- munication:

TO ESTABLISH routes in and

out of occupied Europe; “TO STIMULATE... the fatni- Michearted and to impose patience

on the amient SECRETLY to arm patriots in every occupied country with British weapone and to give Instruction in their use IN BRIEF, to recruit and trai

trais *** Gleantic Fifth Column—not of:

frallors but of patriots d forca: which should wait to launch itself, to the order of The Allied High Command, at the throats of the enemy.

The first countries to bo con sidered were France and Nor

"Erut "practical step slabklady, soèrot (fcom-

with-patriota-

THOMAS CADETT,

From ridicule to blood. In Lille, cradle of the Re- sistance, a German sergeant was stabbed as he made his

way

FLAT No. 6 on the second floor of Orchard, Court, the Portman square block of flats, was the headquarters nf the Section All secret agents passed through this flat,

freedom and slavery, between light and darkness.

Lieutenant John Smith, R.A.. had joined the Army as a gun- ner in 1939. He came out of France vin Dunkirk 1040, was commissioned, and post- ed to a battery of 25-pounders on Salisbury Plain.

His ago was 26, he was mar- ried with one son, had a French grandmother-a Plearde-and spoke French fluently,

One of the founder-members of S.O.E. remembered meeting him once in a bistro in Pou and being impressed not only by his command of argot, but by the general unobtrusiveness of this Englishman in France,

Него Was potential TEW material. Lieutenant Smith was mysteriously summoned to для interview in a fat in Portman- square.

The requirement' now was for recruits, for men and for women who at No indication as to the purpose the risk of their limbs of the meeting was given. It was

and their lives, would be merely an amiable discussion

prepared to penetrate the about France, the war, politics, fastness of Europe and Serbian folk-songs or Chinese blow the smoulders of pottery-about any subject that

interested John Smith. resistance to flame.

If he passed that flest casual, Whal manner of people careful scrutiny he was asked if should they be? Spirit he would caro to undertake eer. was the first quality. It tale confidential and dangerous is easy

enough to be work of importance to brave in the society of Majesty's Government. ong's comrades when a

fortitude would hear more later.

He would?. Excelelnt, common

Huminates the host.

But the men who would swing

correspon home to barracks from a back- down the sky, or paddle ashore

dent of The street bawdy house.

Times In

Parti, be

from the wet casing of sub- marines, would have only the Ten hostages were taken from, strength of their own spirit to came the their homes and publicly sustain them. first opera machine-gunned. It availed donal officet nothing. oftheFrench]

pection.

THE NAMES of 13 women agents who "falled to return" from thele, missloda" are recorded" on this plaque in St. Paula;

Knightsbridge. – Tha plaqua, la dedicated to the Women's. Transport Service (FiA-NY)). In which álf women,

Kakadu agent were given commissions,

A well-known collaborator wan dragged from. his bed and hanged on a tree by men whom he had known since his boy hood.

WHEN

LIFE,

loves and friends

his

Но

While John Smith roturned to his battery and wondered what it had all been about, a depart- ment of the War Offles wenf over his life, his loves and his cost- nections with a small-tooth- comb.

men are alone They would face loneliness, treachery, doubt, anxiety. ond, All was well. Some feat.

' weal faler · he was re-summoned' to` If caught they could, at best, the same dat, presented with the ¿expect months or years of numb- single Christian name of "Felix," The conquerors began to look, ing Imprisonment. At worst, by which he would be known over their shoulders and to finch they could expect the extremes henceforth, and introduced to a at shadows. German bodies of physical torture until death dozen strange and equally cur- started to float face-downwards was kind enough to intervene. ious officers, also known by In the canals, and more French- men died the death,

The moment their foot touched the soil of an occupied country, the fend, the firing, squad, the rope, or the gas-chamber could

· readily be the reward of one in-

It was clear to the planners of cautious word. Baker-street that, a occupied

Knowing these things

France, the time was rapidly Firm" began to recruit

'approaching "when propaganda should be supplemented by, ex- plosive.

J

The

but

Britain is the country of the amateur, and those who passed

· In tho únoccupied zone, that through the fine masă, of, selco- heaven-sent springboard to the tion were fiercely proud of their enemy camp, caution should stiil ron-professional status, be the watchword. No vulgar They were "not ^xplos violence should, yet disturb the "officers 7, working behind the artificial calm of those brooding: enemy lines. *: Every single man acres. on and woman was, a volunteer. The French residents desired every single inission Voluntary Frassionately to retain their un-one.

single, Christian, names,

Within an hour or two, the anonymous band of linguists found themselves on their way to Wanborough: Manor, pa an- client country house in the up- danger and a school for glory, lands of Surrey, a school for

NEXT WEEK

In

identities: The training of a British agent,

[World copyright]

London Express. Bervice

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