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EWEN MONTAGU |
The true story of 'The man that never
was' is all about the intriguing world of espionage. It is a new book written
by Ben Macintyre called 'Operation Mincemeat'
The story as such is about a young
Major William Martin of the Royal Marines who served in the Second World War.
He had great courage and taking on mission in hostile territories and dying in
the attempt.
Since he was of a middle rank he
could be trusted with the most sensitive information about strategies of the
Allies in the war. These entailed letters of the planned invasion in Italy and
written by Lieutenant-General Sir Archibald Nye, vice-chief of the Imperial
General Staff to General Sir Harold Alexander, commander of the 18th Army Group
in Algeria and Tunisia.
Young Bill, as Major William Martin
was known, was in love and engaged to his pretty sweetheart Pam. He carried her
love letters right to his end.
However, he was a young officer in
London and enjoyed himself in theatres and nightclubs. In his precious days of
leave and he was reckless with money and therefore overdrew his account.
Lloyds' bank wrote him a letter accordingly. Another letter from his father Mr
John C Morris who gave a stern advice to curb his spending. These two letters
were also found on him
A story which was of a young man with
a promising future and was cut short in his prime. Hollywood made a film called,
'The Man Who Never Was'.
The whole story was entirely made up
by two men back at the Admiralty in London. It was a daring operation designed
to deceive the enemy over the Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied Southern Europe.
Churchill decided to invade Europe
via Italy after they defeated the Nazis in Africa. Obviously Sicily was perfect
but the German were not that stupid and not realizing that was the next point
of attack. Therefore they invented 'Operation Mincemeat' and William Martin to convince
the enemy that the Allies would invade Sardinia and Greece.
A young flight lieutenant in the RAF
Charles Cholmondely and second to MI5 and Lieutenant-Commander Ewen Montagu a
brilliant barrister recruited in wartime to the head of Section 17M. This
British intelligence section was so secret it was barely known within the
service. However, they control the agents, double agents, espionage and
counter-espionage.
Cholmondely had the idea to plant this
vital information of the Allied invasion on a dead body. It would be found and
handed over to the Germans. Montagu had contacts with a coroner called Bentley
Purchase. He informed Montague that a 34 year old Welshman had died of rat
poison and he would keep him in cold storage until Montague was ready.
Cholmondely and Montague created a
life story with a fake identity which spies called it a legend. That dead man
become a Marine since they were under the authority of the admiralty and be
given the rank of acting major - senior enough to be trusted with such high
information and junior enough to pass unnoticed among many dozens of other
majors. The name Martin was chosen because it was quite common and the Germans
managed to get a Navy list but only from A to L.
Martin became a Roman Catholic, born
in Cardiff, a family, social habits (a smoker, theatres and dancer) and
financial history. The letters from Lloyds were written by Ernest Whitley
Jones, manager of Lloyds, at Montagu's request. An attractive MI5 secretary was
his fiancée Pam and her boss Hester Leggett wrote Pam's passionate letters.
Cholmondely worn Major Martin's
uniform for three months to make it look worn. They also got a replacement ID
card to make him look reckless and an expired Combined Operations HQ pass. The
sensitive documents Major Martin carried were named 'Operation Husky and the
invasion of Greece from Egypt and Libya and two assault beaches. The documents
were placed in a briefcase and chained to Major Martin's wrist.
They invented a further point that
Major Martin died in an aircrash and they put the body with everything in a
steel canister filled with dry ice. It was loaded onto a submarine at Holy
Head, Scotland; HMS Seraph sailed to Spain on April 19.
The submarine arrived in Huelva,
Spain and surfaced at 4.30am. They put a lifejacket on Martin and put him into
the sea. Huelva was known that the Spaniards were friendly with a German
intelligence officer. The body was found five hours later and the British
military attaché in Spain was informed three days later.
The Germans seen the documents and
believed every word of it. They reinforced Sardinia and Corsica instead Sicily.
The man behind Major Martin was
Glyndwr Michael born on 4 January 1909 in Abergoed in South Wales to unmarried
and illiterate Parents. His father was a miner and went mad and died when
Glyndwr was 15. His mother died in 1940. He was homeless, penniless and was
found in an empty warehouse in London's King's Cross on January 26, 1943. Nobody
knows whether he swallowed the rat poison because he ate the food which was put
down or he committed suicide.
The amazing turn of his destiny was
that he was buried in Huelva on May 4, 1943 with full military honour
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