The Queen, Her Lover and the Most Notorious Spy in History

by Roland Perry

  Martin and Wright in London then queried Blunt on Straight’s limited ‘confessions’. Blunt agreed to ‘confess’ in exchange for a written guarantee of immunity from prosecution. But it was a stalling tactic in which he would give MI5 effectively nothing and instead lead them on false trails.

  ‘The government will grant you immunity from prosecution in return for a full confession,’ Wright told Blunt, with barely contained contempt for the double agent. ‘Personally, I’d prefer you were charged and hopefully executed. But we must do what the Masters of the Universe [their intelligence bosses] tell us to do.’

  Blunt would not make eye contact with his tormentor as they sat opposite each other on thread-bare couches and he did not respond.

  ‘You are most fortunate,Sir Anthony,’ Martin said. ‘The Palace is clearly protecting you. But if you don’t confess everything you know . . . ‘We are talking about your fellow traitors,’ Wright butted in eagerly, ‘and their KGB Controllers.’

  ‘That’s right, Sir Anthony,’ Martin continued.‘There will be no deal if you don’t give us the lot.’

  Blunt kept his eyes on the thin carpet of the main room of the interrogation safe-house. Then he glanced up, making fleeting eye contact with Martin.

  ‘I want this immunity in writing, please,’ he said.

  ‘And we want your agreement to spill everything in writing,’ Wright said with vehemence, ‘otherwise we’ll have you charged with espionage.’

  ‘I doubt that,’ Blunt said softly.

  ‘Oh, you do, do you?’ Wright said, leaning forward and barely containing his rage. Blunt looked up, his cool mien intact.

  ‘I doubt that you will need to do that,’ Blunt said correcting himself. ‘I shall keep my side of the bargain.’

  ‘That would be wise, Sir Anthony,’ Martin said.

  He stuck with presenting the image of a wartime anti-fascist rather than a fully-fledged KGB operative.Wright asked about his missions for the king from 1945 to 1947.

  ‘That was not a state espionage exercise,’ Blunt said, remaining ice-cool even during his admissions. ‘It was a private operation for King George VI. I am not at liberty to discuss it. I can only do that if you receive permission from the palace.’

  This gave Wright and Martin pause. They wrote to Adeane. He consulted Elizabeth II, who in turn had a discussion with her mother over breakfast at the palace. ‘Sir Anthony has confessed to spying for the Russians, mummy,’ Elizabeth II said. ‘It’s serious. MI5 interrogators have been asking him about his special mission to secure royal correspondence.’

  ‘He mustn’t say anything about that or the letters’ contents.’

  ‘What on earth could be of interest to the Russians in Queen Victoria’s letters?’

  ‘Nothing dear, nothing.’

  ‘Then what’s all the fuss about?’ Elizabeth II asked.

  ‘Much to do about nothing, dear. Tell Adeane to let them know that any discussion about the king’s missions is off limits.’

  ‘I would like to know what’s in the letters.’ Tea and toast was served by servants, who bowed and departed. ‘I think I should know.’

  ‘Dear, May [Queen Mary] was the only one of the family who bothered to read them, and she didn’t say much except that we should retrieve as much as we could from Germany. But we knew David and that woman [Wallis Simpson] had cosied up to Hitler.The fools!’

  Elizabeth II sipped her tea and frowned.

  ‘I take it Blunt knows what’s in them?’

  ‘Presumably he would have been briefed. Along with Morshead.’

  ‘You don’t think . . . ’ the queen began and then broke off as she took a half-interest in the Daily Mail among the several papers on the breakfast table.

  ‘What dear?’

  ‘If Blunt was still spying for the Russians post-war . . . ’

  ‘We’re told he says he wasn’t.’

  ‘Mummy, he is a spy; he would say that.’

  The queen mother picked up the Daily Telegraph as if the discussion should end there, but Elizabeth II persisted.

  ‘Just imagine he passed the Russians copies of all the correspondence between Victoria and Vicky, and Uncle David and the Nazis.’

  ‘Good God! There were thousands of letters.Would be impossible!’

  ‘Not at all. Spies use tiny little cameras to photograph things.’

  They both went on reading in silence. Philip, in dressing gown and pyjamas, entered the breakfast room carrying The Times.

  ‘Hear the news?’ the queen said.

  ‘What?’ Philip asked.

  ‘We have a Russian spy at the Palace.’

  ‘So I’m told.What’s to be done with him?’

  ‘Oh, he will be kept on,’ the queen mother proffered.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Sacking him might bring press attention.And, in any case,Anthony knows too many secrets.’

  ‘Better to keep him inside the tent?’ Philip asked.

  ‘I think so,’ the queen mother said. ‘Besides I really like him. Delightful fellow.’

  Philip and Elizabeth II remained silent.

  Wright in particular was keen to know about Blunt’s assignments for King George VI. He pushed Blunt, who began drinking heavily with the nagging, pressing MI5 methods that promised to go on for years. The pressures were getting to him as never before. At one point he turned up at the interrogation safe-house in Mayfair, London and said: ‘If I show you a certain piece of royal correspondence, you must promise not to ever disclose it.’

  ‘You can’t bargain with us—’ Wright began aggressively. Martin put up a hand.

  ‘If it is not to do with national security you have our word,’ he said, and then glancing at Wright added, ‘right, Peter?’

  Wright thought for a moment and then nodded sharply. He hated Blunt attempting to dictate terms.

  ‘What have you got for us?’ Wright asked sharply. Blunt handed him Queen Victoria’s letter to Vicky dated 25 July 1860, which spoke of her relationship with Elphinstone. Wright sat in a chair and put on glasses. As ever a tape recorder was sitting on a table between them. When Wright and Martin had finished reading, Blunt said: ‘That’s the sort of information in the letters. Hardly anything that would interest the Moscow Centre, is it?’

  ‘But you did give microfilmed copies to your Control,’ Martin probed.

  ‘I told you before,’ Blunt said, rubbing his face, which was unshaven, ‘I wanted to leave them after the war. My work for them was over. I had to make out that my new position at the palace was just as important as at MI5. I built up the king’s assignments as something important, to show, you know, my proximity to the king.’

  Martin glanced at Wright.

  ‘So you admit passing them copies of the royal letters after the war?’ Wright asked, staring at Blunt.

  ‘It was not espionage,’ Blunt said.

  ‘You are a true traitor, Sir Anthony,’ Wright said, ‘no better than Lord Haw Haw.’

  When Blunt had left, Wright and Martin mulled over the implications of what had been divulged.

  ‘He could blackmail the queen with that sort of stuff,’ Wright said, ‘or at least the KGB could.’

  ‘Would they do that?’ Martin asked.

  ‘Probably not. But fearing it was possible would be enough to keep Blunt his job at the palace.’

  Two days later Adeane met with Wright and Martin in a cafe off St James Street in the West End and told them: ‘Please do not pursue Blunt on the matter of his assignment on behalf of the palace. Strictly speaking, it is not relevant to considerations of national security.’

  ‘Did he complain to you?’ Martin asked.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Adeane said. ‘Please do not pursue it.’

  He left abruptly after the short ‘chat’.

  ‘We need to know everything,’ Wright said to Martin. ‘Must have the broader picture.’

  ‘Peter, you heard the man. He is the palace spokesman.’

  ‘What are
they afraid of ?’

  ‘It’s obvious, isn’t it? You read that Queen Victoria letter.’

  Wright grunted but said nothing.

  ‘In any case, we can’t grill him any more on his special royal missions,’ Martin added with a sigh. ‘The Masters of the Universe will take us off our “project” if we pursue it.’

  53

  CLIMATE OF TREASON

  Richard Crossman, 60, a minister in Harold Wilson’s government, visited Balmoral in October 1967. In a discussion with Elizabeth II, he brought up the London Sunday Times’ revelations by its Insight team about Kim Philby, the MI5 spy who had defected to Moscow in January 1963.

  ‘Your majesty,’ Crossman said, ‘have you read the story?’

  ‘No,’ Elizabeth replied frostily, ‘I don’t read that kind of thing.’

  Her manner cut Crossman short. It was not a subject she wished to discuss. But, despite her comment, it was a story that she devoured. Elizabeth’s fear was that Blunt might be connected to Philby, especially with all the tabloid talk about there being a Cambridge University ring of spies controlled by the KGB. Philby and Blunt had been at Cambridge at the time Blunt was a tutor. The press was touting the spectre of a ‘ring of five’ without telling the public that the KGB itself had first mentioned this figure. ‘Five’ was a simple odd number. It also diverted British intelligence and the pliant media from the idea that there might be more than 30 top British spies recruited at Cambridge, Oxford and other top British educational institutions. The tabloids became hysterical about the number ‘five’, which their editors, with their more numerate readers in mind, could count on the toes of one foot. Burgess and Maclean were one and two. Philby was number three. Who were numbers four and five? Had they defected? Were they still among us like feared aliens from another planet?

  This espionage revelation made Elizabeth II edgy. She had no idea of where her art curator and purchaser fitted into the nomenclature of the KGB and collaborative British media. But she had used Adeane to warn Wright and Martin not to interrogate Blunt about his special missions for her father. Elizabeth II did not want the Blunt connection and his missions being unravelled for public consumption. Too many other secrets could be laid bare.

  Just before Christmas 1977, Arthur Martin sat down with Scottish radio journalist Andrew Boyle, 58, in a drab pub off the Strand, London. It was 4 p.m. and one other patron, in a hat and overcoat, drank alone in a corner while reading a paper. The two had known each other since the war when they both worked in military intelligence. Martin had left MI5 in 1970 to work in a more sedate job as a member of the Clerks Department in the House of Commons.

  He took a thick folder from a briefcase, glanced around at the other patron and handed it to Boyle.

  ‘It’s just about all there,’ Martin said in a near-whisper. Boyle placed it in his own briefcase.

  ‘Remember, Andrew, you have not met me since late in 1945.’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Under no circumstances are you to even hint at the source.’

  ‘I gave you my word, Arthur.’

  ‘I know, but it is very sensitive. Blunt has the support of the palace and the government.’

  ‘I can’t mention Blunt by name?’

  ‘No. Use false names for all the key players.’

  Boyle sipped his pint of Guinness.

  ‘Can you remind me of your motive for this?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s simple. Peter Wright and I worked to the point of dropping and these shits got away with the most traitorous activity in British history.’

  Boyle nodded his agreement.

  ‘We just want a bit of justice,’ Martin said, his face determined.

  Boyle’s book, The Climate of Treason, was published in 1979.The author did not name Anthony Blunt but instead drew a pen-sketch of the fictitious homosexual ‘Maurice,’ The Fourth Man. The satirical London magazine Private Eye jumped on the book and named Blunt as the hidden spy. No other story in peacetime in British history caused as much media frenzy, especially with the many papers on Fleet Street.

  Perhaps only the Jack the Ripper tale of 90 years earlier created as much fuss, but where the Ripper was never discovered, Blunt had been named. The similarity was that the press could become intertwined in the revelations by uncovering more and more angles. Packs of Fleet Street hacks went on the trail of both and the Blunt story had more ‘meat’ and intrigue. His connections included co-spies, the royals, former employers at the palace, the KGB, MI5, the Courtauld Institute, and his many former and current friends and associates at Cambridge. It could not be more ‘juicy’ for hungry reporters ready to trample on anything or anyone to grab a different line on the story. Editors moved to wring every last drop from it. Book publishers whirled into action commissioning a run of mostly fatuous, uninspiring tomes that created an industry. Many of Blunt’s connections were concerned with what now might be revealed by his ‘outing’. Would he ‘sing’? Would he say anything that might incriminate others? A few saw the funny side of the media’s endeavours that waxed between earnest and vicious. In Rome, art historian and Blunt friend Eric Hebborn had his home invaded. Undaunted, he answered the door to a gaggle of journalists and photographers. Seeing them he gasped. Slamming the door, he shouted: ‘Quick Anthony, it’s them! Get upstairs!’

  Former MI5 spies Tess and Victor Rothschild, both very close friends of Blunt, sweated.Tess worked hard in support of Blunt, hoping that this would avoid him mentioning the Rothschilds’ own secrets. Straight was worried. Like the Rothschilds, he had been interrogated many times by British Intelligence officers. The royal family was nervous. How many questions would now be asked about Blunt’s special assignments for George VI from 1945 to 1947? Elizabeth II was concerned that not even the royal connections were safe from unwanted prying.

  At breakfast at Buckingham Palace, the discussion soon after the revelations was about Blunt.

  ‘Will he be prosecuted?’ Elizabeth II asked.

  ‘Never!’ the queen mother said, flicking open the Daily Express. ‘What’s he done that hundreds didn’t do at university?’

  ‘Oh, mummy, it seems more serious than university exuberance.’

  ‘He was a very loyal servant of your father, remember that!’

  ‘Phillip,’ Elizabeth II said, ‘what do you think?’

  ‘I think he’s a bloody traitor.’

  ‘Oh, Philip!’ the queen mother protested, ‘we are not at war with Russia!’

  ‘He passed state secrets to the enemy,’ Philip said. ‘Used to be a hanging offence.’

  ‘But that was all during the war.The Russians were not the enemy.’

  ‘We don’t know for certain that his “activities” were restricted to the war period, mummy,’ Elizabeth II said.

  ‘It’s what the government will say,’ Philip remarked.

  ‘Will he be punished, Philip?’ Elizabeth asked.

  ‘No. They’d never put ’im in the dock. It’d open a can of worms. Can’t do it.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Take away his knighthood,’ Philip said, opening The Financial Times. ‘That will show your disdain for the bugger.’

  ‘I shall discuss it with my staff, who will no doubt be contacted by Thatcher’s staff.’

  At 10 Downing Street, Prime Minister Thatcher met in her office with her key advisers, who gave a briefing on the background to Boyle’s book, Blunt’s immunity from prosecution, and the palace’s reaction.

  ‘The palace is comfortable with Blunt being relieved of his knighthood,’ one staffer informed her.

  ‘That’s all very well,’ Thatcher said, sitting up in her chair as the six advisers stood in front of her desk, ‘but I had no idea about this immunity business.Why on earth was it granted?’

  ‘We are informed by the service that it was in exchange for him divulging certain detail about other fellow traitors.’

  ‘And you say he has always had the palace’s support?’

  ‘Yes, Pri
me Minister.Apparently he went on special assignments for King George VI just after the war.’

  ‘What special assignments?’

  ‘It’s a very sensitive issue, Prime Minister, but we believe that there were certain royal family letters that the king did not wish to fall into American or German hands.’

  Thatcher’s eyebrows arched.

  Another adviser added: ‘The palace would prefer that Blunt’s er . . .involvement . . .was not made public—’

  ‘Oh, would it?’ Thatcher interrupted. ‘Well, it’s too late for that. There are already questions in the Commons about who the characters are in Boyle’s book.’

  ‘Secrecy is preferred by the palace, Prime Minister. But it understands that this is impossible and that he could not be relieved of his knighthood without public mention of it.’

  ‘Quite,’ Thatcher snapped. She reflected for a moment. ‘I take it that Blunt’s immunity from prosecution does not include a guarantee to him of secrecy?’

  ‘No, prime minister,’ two advisers replied, almost in chorus.

  ‘Then we shall publicly strip him of his honours.’

  In Moscow, Blunt’s former KGB ‘Control’, Modin, looked on with interest. He knew many of the royal secrets that had been passed to him by Blunt. He chuckled at the claim by Thatcher in the House of Commons that Blunt had stopped spying for the Soviet Union as soon as World War II was over in 1945. Modin had engineered that angle himself. ‘Funny that,’ he commented later.‘I had “run” Blunt from 1947 to 1958.’ Modin was an exceptional psychologist. He was Control for some of the best, brightest and most complex men and women at Cambridge and Oxford. He passed word to Blunt for him to write his memoirs, which the KGB would see first and censor. Modin had persuaded Philby in Moscow in 1967 to write My Silent War, and Straight to compose his After Long Silence. Modin had even suggested the titles, both with ‘silence’ in them. Blunt began writing, but became stranded halfway through. Unlike Philby and Straight he could not extend the lie of his existence, which had been laid so bare, so publicly. Modin believed in justifying their traitorous trade through books and he knew that half the Western public would accept the excuses put forward. Publishers were seduced into gullibility by the prospect of big book sales. False confessions had worked well for Philby, Straight, Blunt and many others before. Modin’s approach was to intellectualise lies thematically in fat tomes, which caused much longer distractions than defensive newspaper articles planted by Western journalists who were in the KGB’s pay—so-called ‘Agents of Influence’.The books never contained footnotes or clues of how to check authenticity but instead were memoirs of the most unreliable kind. Literary criticism of these books could always be countered by spurious and specious arguments. Spies such as Philby, Straight and Blunt secured Masters degrees and PhDs in deception. Modin preferred the literary route to the KGB’s other form of ‘silence’, which came with a poisonous umbrella jab or a dose of Strontium 90 slipped into the food of an unsuspecting victim.