All the King's Men (37 page)

26
Donaldson, see note 6 above.

27
Léon Doulet, 5 January 1986.

CHAPTER VI

1
Gubbins memo to Sir Charles Hambro, 8 August 1942.

2
M. R. D. Foot, November 1985.

3
The SOE in France
, M. R. D. Foot, Chapter VII.

4
The growth of PROSPER is well chronicled in Foot’s history
The SOE in France
, Cookridge’s
Inside SOE
and Nogueres’
Histoire de la Resistance en France
.

5
Jacques Bureau, 24 February 1986.

6
For a more detailed account of French involvement in the Final Solution see Robert Paxton’s
Vichy France
, and of course there is the French documentary
Le Chagrin et La Pitié
.

7
Jacques Bureau, 24 February 1986.

8
Dr Josef Götz, 28 February 1986.

9
Rolfe Boemelburg, 23 January 1986.

CHAPTER VII

1
Léon Doulet, 5 January 1986.

2
ibid.

3
I asked the Foreign Office in June 1986 for details of Déricourt’s whereabouts during the period between his separation from Doulet and his arrival at SOE. No reply was received.

4
Foreign Office, 28 November 1985.

5
There is no reference to BOE/48 (Déricourt’s German identification) before 1943 in any of Boemelburg’s papers or any German papers now in the hands of the French authorities.

6
From an interview with Léon Doulet, 5th January 1986, and a subsequent letter to the author, 21 September 1986.

7
Déricourt’s first statement to DST (Int.I). Undated, but 1946, in the Déricourt trial papers, Dépot Central d’Archives de la Justice Militaire.

8
Group Captain Frederick Winterbottom, Head of Section IV, Air Intelligence. Interviewed by the author July 1985.

9
Nigel West, 23 January 1986.

10
Marie-Madelaine Foucarde, 9 January 1986.

11
Winterbottom, July 1985.

12
See Read and Fisher’s account of the Z Organization in
Colonel
Z.

13
Dansey lectured to American intelligence officers in May and June 1917: ‘In any really delicate matter we always keep our fingers on every move in the game, and see the police do not spoil a good thing. If you catch one of their best men and can lead them to believe that he is still loose and operating, and they continue to rely on him for their information, and use his reports, it is of infinitely greater value than having a dead man.’ See p. Ill,
Colonel Z
, Read and Fisher.

14
British Intelligence in the Second World War
, Vol. 2, Appendix 4, Prof. Hinsley
et al
.

15
ibid.

16
Memo from Group Captain Grierson to Air Ministry, 29 October 1942, AIR 40/2352/8B – in the PRO.

17
Foreign Office, 28 November 1985.

18
Letter from Jepson to author, November 1986.

19
Foreign Office, 17 December 1985.
SOE in France
, M. R. D. Foot, p. 291.

20
Interview with Buckmaster, October 1985.

21
Interview with Vera Atkins, February 1986.

22
Foreign Office, 28 November 1985.

23
Déricourt’s log book was not authorized by any organization, French or British, from 6 August 1942 to 28 September 1945. According to Group Captain Hugh Verity (11 February 1986), ‘If he had been a 161 Squadron pilot his log book entries would have been checked and countersigned each month by his Flight and Squadron Commanders.’

Not until Déricourt joined Air France in October 1945 is there any kind of regular confirmation of his flights. The Air France authorities seem to have accepted his fictitious ‘hours’ concocted during the unauthorized period.

24
Air Historical Branch records. One curious thing about the RAF records is a strange number attached to Déricourt’s name. According to Personal Records at RAF Barnswood, he had the number S 92908. It is not an RAF number; SOE did not use numbers at all; it is not his RPS file number; it is not his French pilot’s licence number. Is it an MI6 number?

25
Harry Sporborg, 18 April 1983.

26
ibid.

27
Private information.

28
Déricourt correspondence with Jean Overton Fuller, undated.

29
Harry Sporborg, 18 April 1983.

30
‘There was no record at this (nor indeed at any later) stage of any pre-war contacts with German intelligence.’ Foreign Office, 17 December 1985.

31
Vera Atkins, letter to the author, 11 January 1987.

32
Group Captain Hugh Verity, 31 October 1985.

CHAPTER VIII

1
C. Besnard, December 1982.

2
Déricourt family friend, Coulognes-en-Tardenois. Also Henri told Juju he had given some of his cash to his mother and Juju passed this on to Charles, her future husband, when finally she explained to him her involvement with SOE.

3
C. Besnard, December 1982.

4
Clément, 8 January 1986.

5
C. Besnard, December 1982.

6
Déricourt’s second statement to DST (Int.II). Undated but 1946 in the Déricourt trial papers, Dépot Central d’Archives de la Justice Militaire.
Int. II
. 1946.

7
Kopkow hinted at this story on 30 June 1983, but Dr Götz had the most complete version (3 December 1982):

I remember being told then [1943] that Déricourt went to Boemelburg – that it was he who had sought contact with us. Which explains why Boemelburg had complete confidence in him, which he did. Boemelburg never wanted to believe he’d been tricked. Don’t forget, at the beginning of ’43, the German position was not totally lost. It was perfectly possible for Boemelburg to believe in a German victory at that time, to believe someone who said the same thing. To think – here’s another one who wants to escape, who wants to choose the right side. Déricourt said to a devoted Nazi like Boemelburg, ‘I believe absolutely that we must defeat the Russians, the real threat against Europe is Bolshevism. I went to London and there were Communists everywhere, their terrible influence etc’ You must realize something, Boemelburg was no great thinker.

8
Mme Déricourt, 9 May 1982.

9
ibid.

10
This and subsequent accounts of Déricourt’s operations have been compiled from the 161 Squadron and 138 Squadron Operations Record Books (PRO AIR 27/1068 and AIR 28/820 in the PRO), the memoirs of those who were carried by or worked with Déricourt, and, of course,
SOE in France
, by M. R. D. Foot.

11
A. Brooks, P. Culioli, A. Borrel, J. Barrett. These are some of the people on record about Déricourt’s insatiable curiosity.

12
Horst Kopkow, 30 June 1983. According to Götz, Knochen and Kopkow, Boemelburg’s first priority was PROSPER and the invasion. Information about flights was secondary.

13
‘Boemelburg was a crack criminal investigator. He knew
recruiting agents came down to two things: money and ideology. He always preferred the ideological to the scoundrel who was out for money. Someone else would come along and pay him more than you were offering. Some people like to think you can find recruits in jails. This is garbage, human garbage and they’ll never produce anything for you.’ Horst Kopkow, 30 June 1983.

14
A great many eminent people are on record about the playing of ‘double agents’. Roger Hesketh describes in his unpublished book
Fortitude
, the process of playing the ‘double’, as does J. C. Masterman in
The Double Cross System
. Interviews with T. A. R. Robertson, Roman Czerniawski (BRUTUS), Ewen Montague and Roger Fleetwood-Hesketh have all contributed to this account of the role of the ‘double’.

15
Private information.

16
Sporborg, 21 March 1983.

CHAPTER IX

1
Winston Churchill and the Second Front 1940–1943
, Trumbell Higgins.

2
CAB 80/65 COS (42)399(0), Minute from Churchill dated 18 November 1942. (CAB – Cabinet papers, COS – COSSAC, in the PRO).

3
Press reports of Casablanca Conference, quoted in
The Pinstripe Saboteur
, Charles Weighton.

4
A paper by the Joint Planners at Casablanca, CCS/167, 22 January 1943 – in the PRO.

5
SOE in France
, M. R. D. Foot, pp. 233–4.

6
Ewen Montague, 26 May 1982.

7
Fortitude
, Roger Hesketh, p. 20. This is an unpublished book which describes in some detail ‘The History of Strategic Deception in North Western Europe April, 1943 to May, 1944’. Hesketh, who was posted to Section Ops (B) COSSAC, concerned with deception plans, and where he was eventually given charge of the ‘Special Means’ subsection, wrote this history at the request of the Ministry of Defence. A few copies were printed for official use and in 1976, Hesketh finally received official permission to publish. Curiously, in 1986, the MOD withdrew this permission and Hesketh has been ‘debarred
from even showing the book to anyone’ or discussing its contents. This is a most extraordinary set of circumstances as Hesketh had already given hours of interview material on precisely this subject for Roy Davies’ BBC documentary, ‘Destination D-Day’, transmitted in June 1984.

CHAPTER X

1
Joint memo from the Naval Staff and Chief of Combined Operations, 1 April 1943, COS (43)170(0) Ref CAB 80/68 (Cabinet papers) in the PRO.

2
Minute by Churchill, 10 April 1943, COS (43)194(0) Ref. CAB 80/68 (Cabinet papers) in the PRO.

3
Interview with Prof. Michael Howard, Oriel College, Oxford, 22 January 1986. ‘COCKADE had originally been devised to shroud a real invasion of France. Once the decision not to invade had been taken, the LCS had to throw COCKADE together at very short notice, but now not based on any real event, just a few spoof advances.’ Prof. Howard has recently completed a history of Second World War strategic deception.

4
COS (43)219(0) (Final), Ref. CAB 80/69 (Cabinet papers) report to War Cabinet, 30 April 1943 – at the PRO.

5
This catalogue of
materiel
dropped by SOE’s French Section to
all
the French networks was compiled from the archives of the Ministère de la Guerre at the Château de Vincennes in Paris (Ref. 13P68.
Materiel sur parachute et deportation
).

The slight dip in the figures for July, before they resume their exponential rise, is explained by the events that occurred on the ground during that month.

6
Double Webbs
, Jean Overton Fuller, p. 196.

7
Clément, 24 February 1986.

8
Kopkow’s post-war interrogation (27 January 1947)
makes it quite clear Hitler had taken a deep interest in PROSPER from the very earliest reports. (Copy of this interrogation in SOE’s archives at FO still restricted, and in Berlin Document Centre.) Kopkow confirmed Hitler’s obsession with PROSPER in another interview, 30 June 1983.

9
Kieffer papers, Berlin Document Centre.

10
‘Kieffer was an average police official. He had a very strong sense of duty which probably led him to the Nazi Party – more than any personal conviction. He was an indefatigable man, without any great skills. A bit simple in his intellectual process.’ Interview with Dr Götz, 26 November 1982.

11
Dr Götz, 3 December 1982.

12
The precise details of Déricourt’s arrangement with Boemelburg are described in the interrogations of Placke, Götz, Vogt
et al
in the Déricourt trial papers.

13
Taken from Kopkow’s description of Boemelburg as a ‘master controller’ of double agents. These offers of help were standard. Kopkow expanded, ‘If they were committed to us and Germany lost the war, we’d take care of them. Believe me, we did this in many cases.’ Kopkow, 30 June 1983.

14
Rémy Clément, 8 May 1982.

15
SOE in France
, M. R. D. Foot, p. 291. He refers to Frager’s interrogation 22–26 October 1943.