Operation Garbo (29 page)

On the 27.5.42
GARBO
reported that, after having cultivated this man for a long time and having satisfied himself as to his loyalty, he had decided to recruit him as an agent.

The primary objective in this recruitment was to ascertain from the Germans the area of England which they were most interested to cover. It was also taken into consideration that the Germans had instructed
GARBO
to build up a network, and as seven months had passed since he had last recruited an agent personally it was considered that a new recruitment was in fact overdue.

After operating for three months on the east coast Agent No 4 presented
GARBO
with the opportunity of acquiring a
wireless
transmitter which he had discovered was for sale on the black market in Soho.
GARBO
used the agent as a cut-out for making the purchases of the radios, as well as for recruiting the operator.

In December 1942
GARBO
decided that this agent might most usefully be employed in a West End London hotel, where he would be likely to pick up gossip. With these plans in mind, the agent went to the Ministry of Labour where, to his great disappointment, and in spite of his qualifications as a waiter, he was directed to take work in a quarry, on the assumption that all Gibraltarians ought naturally to be good at tunnelling. He was directed to take employment with Highways Construction, on work which he at first believed would be connected with the construction of underground factories. In fact, he was sent to work in the Chislehurst Caves, where vast tunnelling operations had commenced to convert the caves into a huge arms depot. It was later to be discovered that the caves were connected to the London underground railway system by a miniature electric railway, and thus the depot was enabled to supply ammunition to the various airfields defending London.

Agent No 4, through his friends in the hotel business, provided
GARBO
with an assortment of writing paper with the headings of the leading West End hotels, which provided excellent camouflage for those of
GARBO
’s secret letters which were sent by air mail.

He also served as contact with the wireless operator and, from March 1943, he himself practised under the supervision of the
operator
so that he might later be qualified to substitute the regular
operator
in the event of his ever falling ill.

Reports on the development of the underground occupied a great bulk of the
GARBO
traffic between January and September of 1943. By this time, we were beginning to feel that the German reactions to the story about the Chislehurst Caves were none too good, and it appeared a little dangerous to push this story further with the knowledge that we might have to maintain it for another year if we were to be able to make use of it for deception purposes in connection with the Second Front. It was, therefore, decided to remove the agent from his employment in the caves. This was done by his making friends with someone in the canteen there, through whom he eventually obtained employment in the NAAFI. This gave him greater freedom of movement for a while, and more time to spend in his haunts in Soho. For several months he was posted by the NAAFI from one place to another, from where he sent military reports until April 1944, by which time the role he was to play in the implementation of
FORTITUDE SOUTH
had been settled. He was then requested by the NAAFI to sign a Military Security Certificate so that he might be posted to one of their canteens within a sealed area. Thus, he was situated in one of the most important
concentration
areas in the Southampton district. There he was allowed to collect very important information until he finally discovered the secret of D Day, which, by breaking camp, he managed to get to
GARBO
, who transmitted it to the enemy just too late for it to be of any use to them.

Having deserted from a sealed area at such a time, the agent was inevitably in danger, but he managed to escape arrest by taking refuge in a safe hideout in the south of Wales, which was provided for him by another member of the organisation.

Later, having furnished himself with false seaman’s papers, he managed to sign on as a steward on a ship, which he deserted on its arrival in Canada. There he was protected by Agent No 5, who was already well established in Montreal.

By this time Agent No 4 had become proficient as a
wireless
operator, and he was therefore given charge of the wireless station for the Canadian network which had in the meantime been developed.

It was through 4(1) that Agent No 4 heard of the transmitting apparatus which was for sale. Being himself of strong left-wing sympathies, 4(1) quickly jumped at the proposition put to him by Agent No 4 to work secretly for what he believed to be the Spanish Republican exiles in this country, and thus facilitate them to be able to maintain rapid and
clandestine
contact with their underground movement in Spain. He was to be well paid with a minimum salary of
£
6 per week, even when he did not transmit. During the long period over which he was operating, he was never given grounds to suspect that he was working for anyone other than the Spanish refugees, in spite of the fact that there was always a marked activity in the work at the time of every operation. The reason for the burst of activity was explained to him by
GARBO
, who made it appear as though it was always the hope of the Spanish refugees to bring the
underground
movement to revolt to coincide with an Allied success. Though the story was not very convincing, the operator never appeared to be inquisitive. During the periods of great activity he would earn upwards of
£
100 a month, and it became more and more apparent that he was working for this liberal award rather than for any true desire to help the unfortunate Spanish refugees. The messages were always handed to him enciphered and he was never aware of their contents. He was responsible for building the set which was later used by Agent No 5’s network in Canada. He was told that it was to be used by the Spaniards in Mexico who also wished to establish wireless contact with London and Madrid.

Another inducement for him to work with enthusiasm was the fact that all the equipment which had been paid for by
GARBO
was promised to him as a gift on the termination of his services.

To avoid arousing the suspicions of the operator when, after VE Day, communications with Spain suddenly broke down, he was told that the Spanish underground movement, stimulated by the total defeat of the Germans, had come out into the open too soon, with the result that their leaders and their wireless station had been
discovered
by the Falangist Police, thus bringing their activities to an end.

The guard in the Chislehurst Caves was responsible for prohibiting the entrance of all unauthorised persons into the depots of the caves. Thus, he served as a source of information for Agent No 4 about the activities within the caves, without putting Agent No 4 in the
position
of having to give too much first hand information, which might have been the case had he been allowed access to all the underground workings. The information about the caves was intentionally always kept rather vague, in the absence of a concrete plan, and thus this contact served a useful purpose.

After Agent No 4 left his employment at Chislehurst, contact with the guard was not maintained regularly, and in September 1944
GARBO
informed the Germans that they could consider this contact as no longer operative.

This character was created purely to assist in reporting on US
formations
in the UK in connection with the deception plan.

He was first represented as having met Agent No 4 (the Gibraltarian) in Soho, and believing him to be a Spaniard he got into conversation with him about the Spanish Civil War, showing that his sympathies had been with Franco. He took advantage of the
friendship
which thus sprung up to practice Spanish with Agent No 4. He showed himself to be extremely anti-British and a great boaster who took delight in demonstrating how well he was informed about the formation of the US Army and their operational plans.

In December 1943 he had occasion, in conversation with Agent No 4, to mention the return of landing craft from the Mediterranean theatre of war. This information was based on a Most Secret Source message on information received through German observers
operating
at Algeciras. The information was accurate, but there was no harm in it being repeated through
GARBO
channels since it was already out of date and known to the Germans. In passing on this
information
,
GARBO
suggested that they should check with Berlin to ascertain whether it was accurate or not and let him know, as, on their reply, he would be able to estimate the potential future usefulness of this new collaborator. The Germans, as was anticipated, replied that the information was entirely accurate and that the contact should
therefore
be developed. This gave him a very good start. From then on, he reported mostly on the build-up of American forces in the UK, in accordance with the cover plan for
OVERLORD
.

He was first mentioned by
GARBO
during the period when
GARBO
was working in Lisbon. He was brought on to the scene in connection with a provocation by
GARBO
to ascertain whether the Germans were refuelling their submarines in the Caribbean. He then offered the services of this individual to set up a refuelling base near his parents’ property in Venezuela. The offer was turned down. He was later used as bait to draw the Germans to disclose whether they were interested in having an agent in Northern Ireland. Finally, he was recruited in June 1942 as an active member of the
GARBO
network.

At that time the Germans were very interested in the Isle of Wight. It would, in fact, have been difficult, if not impossible, to have got an agent in there, but we decided to satisfy their request to send Agent No 5 to investigate activities there. To make it appear plausible that he should have been able to enter the island, we depicted this agent as an adventurous young man prepared to take any risks for his masters. We set out in great detail the story of his adventurous,
clandestine
entry to the island and the perilous experiences he had there.

Though the story told was similar to that which one might read in any spy novel, the Germans liked it and believed it to be true, and thus he rose in their estimation.

Having completed this dangerous mission and toured the south coast of England and Wales, the agent, a restless character, decided that he wanted a change.

With the help of Agent No 7 he eventually smuggled himself out of England to Canada, having received instructions from
GARBO
to endeavour to set up a sub-organisation there. This he successfully did, and, by August 19 he was already communicating in secret writing to a cover address in Lisbon provided by the Germans far this purpose. To avoid Censorship the letters were sent from Canada to a cover address in Scotland provided by Agent No. 3 on the assumption that there was no testing for secret writing in correspondence between
these two countries. The letters were then handed by Agent No. 3 to
GARBO
who forwarded them to Lisbon by his courier service. After the arrival of Agent No. 4 a wireless station was established in Montreal. Communications from Montreal by wireless to Madrid were started up in February, 1945. Though trials were made to establish contact between Montreal and London the results were never successful.