description
Object description
British officer served as intelligence officer with Headquarters, Combined Operations in London, GB, 1942-1944; served as intelligence officer with Headquarters, Special Air Service Bde in GB and France, 2/1944-8/1944; POW in France, 8/1944-11/1944
Content description
REEL 1 Aspects of period with 35th Searchlight Bty, Royal Engineers in GB, 1939-1940: attitude towards Nazi regime and British Government. Recollections of period as intelligence officer with Headquarters, Combined Operations in London, GB, 1942-1944: duties as intelligence officer; raid on north coast of France, summer 1943; briefing naval officer for raid on Norway, autumn 1943; instruction from MI 9 on how to behave if captured; memories of Bob Laycock; organisation of headquarters; a security breach.
REEL 2 Continues: visit by King George VI; personalities at headquarters; purpose of small scale raids prior to D-Day; advantages and disadvantages of job. Aspects of operations as intelligence officer with Headquarters, Special Air Service Bde in GB and France, 1944: background to posting, 2/1944; sensitivity in brigade about collaboration with intelligence services; pre-D-Day deception operation; operations on D-Day, 6/6/1944.
REEL 3 Continues: his capture during raid to assassinate French civilian, near St Nazaire, France, 8/1944. Aspects of period as POW in France, 8/1944-11/1944: treatment of captured Special Air Service personnel by Germans; his deliberate obstructive attitude towards Germans; escape attempts; German morale; living conditions; a successful escape from Germans; his exchange for German POW. Calculation of human cost of invading Japan, 1945.
