Sir William Stephenson | |
|---|---|
 1942 passport photo | |
| Born | William Samuel Clouston Stanger (1897-01-23)23 January 1897 Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada |
| Died | 31 January 1989(1989-01-31) (aged 92) |
| Other names | "Little Bill" |
| Occupations |
|
| Awards | Knight Bachelor Companion of the Order of Canada Military Cross Distinguished Flying Cross Medal for Merit |
| Espionage activity | |
| Allegiance |  Canada United Kingdom |
| Service branch | Canadian Expeditionary Force Royal Flying Corps British Security Coordination |
| Rank | Captain |
| Codename | Intrepid |
| Operations | World War I World War II |
Sir William Samuel StephensonCC MC DFC (bornWilliam Samuel Clouston Stanger, 23 January 1897 – 31 January 1989) was a Canadian soldier,fighter pilot, businessman andspymaster who served as the senior representative of theBritish Security Coordination (BSC) for theWestern Allies duringWorld War II. He is best known by his wartime intelligence code name,Intrepid. Many people consider him to be one of the real-lifeinspirations for James Bond.[1]Ian Fleming himself once wrote, "James Bond is a highly romanticised version of a true spy. The real thing is... William Stephenson."[2]
As head of the BSC, Stephenson handed British scientific secrets over toFranklin D. Roosevelt and relayed American secrets back toWinston Churchill.[3] In addition, Stephenson has been credited with changing American public opinion from an isolationist stance to a supportive tendency regarding the United States' entry intoWorld War II.[3]
Stephenson was bornWilliam Samuel Clouston Stanger on 23 January 1897, inPoint Douglas, Winnipeg, Manitoba. His mother wasIcelandic, and his father wasScottish from theOrkney Islands. Water Street in Winnipeg was renamed in his honour to William Stephenson Way.[4]
He left school at a young age and worked as a telegrapher. In January 1916, duringWorld War I, he volunteered for service in the 101st Overseas Battalion (Winnipeg Light Infantry),Canadian Expeditionary Force. He left for England onRMSOlympic on 29 June 1916, arriving on 6 July 1916. The 101st Battalion was broken up in England, and he was transferred to the 17th Reserve Battalion inEast Sandling, Kent. On 17 July, he was transferred to the Canadian Engineer Training Depot. He was attached to the Sub Staff, Canadian Training Depot Headquarters, inShorncliffe, and was promoted to Sergeant (with pay of Clerk) in May 1917. In June 1917 he was "on command" to the Cadet Wing of theRoyal Flying Corps at Denham Barracks,Buckinghamshire.
On 15 August 1917, Stephenson was officially struck off the strength of the Canadian Expeditionary Force and granted a commission in Britain's Royal Flying Corps.[5] Posted to73 Squadron on 9 February 1918, he flew theSopwith Camelbiplane fighter and scored 12 victories to become aflying ace before he was shot down and crashed his plane behind enemy lines on 28 July 1918. During the incident Stephenson was injured by fire from a German ace pilot,Justus Grassmann,[6] byfriendly fire (according to a French observer),[7][page needed] or by both. In any event, he was subsequently captured by the Germans and held as aprisoner of war until allegedly escaping in October 1918.[7][page needed] HisRoyal Air Force (RAF) Service file indicates that he was repatriated from theHolzminden prisoner-of-war camp on 9 December 1918.[8]
By the end ofWorld War I, Stephenson had achieved the rank of Captain and earned theMilitary Cross and theDistinguished Flying Cross. His medal citations perhaps foreshadow his later achievements, and read:
For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. When flying low and observing an open staff car on a road, he attacked it with such success that later it was seen lying in the ditch upside down. During the same flight he caused a stampede amongst some enemy transport horses on a road. Previous to this he had destroyed a hostile scout and a two-seater plane. His work has been of the highest order, and he has shown the greatest courage and energy in engaging every kind of target.
— Military Cross citation, Supplement to theLondon Gazette, 21 June 1918.
This officer has shown conspicuous gallantry and skill in attacking enemy troops and transports from low altitudes, causing heavy casualties. His reports, also, have contained valuable and precise information. He has further proved himself a keen antagonist in the air, having, during recent operations, accounted for six enemy aeroplanes.
— Distinguished Flying Cross citation, Supplement to theLondon Gazette, 21 September 1918.
AfterWorld War I, Stephenson returned toManitoba and with a friend, Wilf Russell, started a hardware business, inspired largely by acan opener that Stephenson had taken from hisPOW camp. The business was unsuccessful, and he left Canada for England. In England, Stephenson soon became wealthy, with business contacts in many countries. In 1924, he married American tobacco heiress Mary French Simmons, ofSpringfield, Tennessee. That same year, Stephenson and George William Walton patented a system for transmitting photographic images via wireless[9] that produced£100,000 a year in royalties for the 18-year run of the patent (about $12 million per annum adjusted for inflation in 2010). In addition to his patent royalties, Stephenson swiftly diversified into several lucrative industries: radio manufacturing (General Radio Company Limited[10]); aircraft manufacturing (General Aircraft Limited);Pressed Steel Company that manufactured car bodies for the British motor industry; construction and cement, as well asShepperton Studios andEarls Court. Stephenson had a broad base of industrial contacts in Europe, Britain and North America, as well as a large group of contacts in the international film industry. Shepperton Studios were the largest film studios in the world outside of Hollywood.
As early as April 1936, Stephenson was voluntarily providing confidential information to BritishMPWinston Churchill about howAdolf Hitler'sNazi government was building up its armed forces and hiding military expenditures of £800,000,000. This was a clear violation of the terms of theTreaty of Versailles and showed the growingNazi threat to European and international security. Churchill used Stephenson's information inParliament to warn against theappeasement policies of the government ofNeville Chamberlain.[7]: p.27
AfterWorld War II began (and over the objections ofSir Stewart Menzies, wartime head ofBritish intelligence) now-Prime MinisterWinston Churchill sent Stephenson to the United States on 21 June 1940, to covertly establish and runBritish Security Coordination (BSC) in New York City, over a year before U.S. entry into the war.[11][12][13][14]
His deputy at BSC was the Australian-born MI6 intelligence officerDick Ellis, who has been credited with writing the blueprint for William Donovan'sCoordinator of Information and theOffice of Strategic Services.[15] Ellis wrote an Historical Note for William Stevenson's 1976 biography of Stephenson,A Man Called Intrepid.[16]
BSC was registered by the State Department as a foreign entity. It operated out of Room 3603 atRockefeller Center and was officially known as the British Passport Control Office from which it had expanded. BSC acted as the administrative headquarters more than the operational one for theSecret Intelligence Service (MI6) and theSpecial Operations Executive (SOE) and was a channel for communications and liaison between US and British security and intelligence organisations.[17]
Stephenson's initial directives for BSC were to
Later this was expanded to include "the assurance of American participation in secret activities throughout the world in the closest possible collaboration with the British". Stephenson's official title was BritishPassport Control Officer. His unofficial mission was to create a secret British intelligence network throughout the western hemisphere, and to operate covertly and broadly on behalf of the British government and theAllies in aid of winning the war.
Stephenson was soon a close adviser to Roosevelt, and suggested that he put Stephenson's good friendWilliam J. "Wild Bill" Donovan in charge of all U.S. intelligence services. Donovan founded the U.S.Office of Strategic Services (OSS), which in 1947 would become theCentral Intelligence Agency (CIA). As senior representative of British intelligence in theWestern Hemisphere, Stephenson was one of the few persons in the hemisphere who were authorized to view rawUltra transcripts of GermanEnigma ciphers that had beendecrypted at Britain'sBletchley Park facility. He was trusted by Churchill to decide what Ultra information to pass along to various branches of the U.S. and Canadian governments.[citation needed]
While it was still neutral, agreement was made for all trans-Atlantic mails from the U.S. to be routed through theBritish colony ofBermuda, 640 miles off theNorth Carolina coast. Airmails carried by both British and American aircraft were landed atRAF Darrell's Island and delivered to 1,200 censors ofBritish Imperial Censorship, part of BSC, working in thePrincess Hotel. All mail, radio and telegraphic traffic bound for Europe, the U.S. and the Far East were intercepted and analyzed by 1,200 censors, ofBritish Imperial Censorship, part ofBritish Security Coordination (BSC), before being routed to their destination with no indication that they had been read.[18][19][20] With BSC working closely with the FBI, the censors were responsible for the discovery and arrest of a number of Axis spies operating in the US, including theJoe K ring.[20]
After the war, Stephenson lived at the Princess Hotel for a time before buying his own home in Bermuda.[20]
Under Stephenson, BSC directly influenced U.S. media (including newspaper columns byWalter Winchell andDrew Pearson), and media in other hemisphere countries, toward pro-British and anti-Axis views. Once the U.S. had entered the war in December 1941, BSC went on to train U.S. propagandists from theUnited States Office of War Information in Canada. BSC covert intelligence and propaganda efforts directly affected wartime developments inBrazil,Argentina,Colombia,Chile,Venezuela,Peru,Bolivia,Paraguay,Mexico, the Central American countries,Bermuda,Cuba andPuerto Rico.
Stephenson worked without salary.[21]
He hired hundreds of people, mostly Canadian women, to staff his organization and covered much of the expense out of his own pocket. His employees included secretive communications geniusBenjamin deForest "Pat" Bayly and future advertising wizardDavid Ogilvy. Stephenson employedAmy Elizabeth Thorpe, codenamed CYNTHIA, to seduceVichy French officials into giving up Enigma ciphers and secrets from their Washington embassy.[23] At the height of the war Bayly, aUniversity of Toronto professor fromMoose Jaw, created theRockex, the fast secure communications system that would eventually be relied on by all the Allies.[24]
Not least of Stephenson's contributions to the war effort was the setting up by BSC ofCamp X, the unofficial name of the secret Special Training School No. 103, aSecond World War paramilitary installation for training covert agents in the methods required for success in clandestine operations.[25] Located inWhitby, Ontario, this was the first such training school in North America. Estimates vary, but between 500 and 2,000 British, Canadian and American covert operators were trained there from 1941 to 1945.[26][27][28]
Reports indicate thatCamp X graduates worked as "secret agents, security personnel, intelligence officers, or psychological warfare experts, serving in clandestine operations. Many were captured, tortured, and executed; survivors received no individual recognition for their efforts."[26][27] Camp X graduates operated in Europe (Spain, Portugal, Italy and the Balkans) as well as in Africa, Australia, India and the Pacific. They may have includedIan Fleming (though there is evidence to the contrary), future author of theJames Bond books. It has been said that the fictionalGoldfinger's raid onFort Knox was inspired by a Stephenson plan (never carried out) to steal $2,883,000,000 inVichy French gold reserves from the French Caribbean colony ofMartinique.[7][page needed]
BSC purchased a ten-kilowatt transmitter fromPhiladelphia radio stationWCAU and installed it at Camp X. By mid-1944, Hydra (as the Camp X transmitter was known) was transmitting 30,000 and receiving 9,000 message groups daily – much of the secret Allied intelligence traffic across the Atlantic.[29]
For his extraordinary service to the war effort, he was made aKnight Bachelor byKing George VI in the1945 New Year Honours. In recommending Stephenson for the knighthood,Winston Churchill wrote: "This one is dear to my heart."
In November 1946 Stephenson received theMedal for Merit from PresidentHarry S. Truman, at that time the highest U.S. civilian award. He was the first non-American to be so honoured. General"Wild Bill" Donovan presented the medal. The citation paid tribute to Stephenson's "valuable assistance to America in the fields of intelligence and special operations".[30] The first non-American was the BelgianEdgar Sengier on 9 April 1946[31][32]
The "Quiet Canadian" was recognized by his native land late: he was made a Companion of theOrder of Canada on 17 December 1979, and invested in the Order on 5 February 1980.
On 2 May 2000, CIA Executive Director David W. Carey, representing Director of Central IntelligenceGeorge Tenet and Deputy DirectorJohn A. Gordon, accepted from the Intrepid Society of Winnipeg, Manitoba, a bronze statuette of Stephenson. In his remarks, Carey said:
Sir William Stephenson played a key role in the creation of the CIA. He realized early on that America needed a strong intelligence organization and lobbied contacts close to President Roosevelt to appoint a U.S. "coordinator" to oversee FBI and military intelligence. He urged that the job be given to William J. "Wild Bill" Donovan, who had recently toured British defences and gained the confidence of Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Although Roosevelt didn't establish exactly what Sir William had in mind, the organization created represented a revolutionary step in the history of American intelligence. Donovan's Office of Strategic Services was the first "central" U.S. intelligence service. OSS worked closely with and learned from Sir William and other Canadian and British officials during the war. A little later, these OSS officers formed the core of the CIA. Intrepid may not have technically been the father of CIA, but he's certainly in our lineage someplace.
On 8 August 2008, Stephenson was recognized for his work byMajor General John M. Custer, Commandant of the U.S. Army Intelligence Corps. Custer inducted him as an honorary member of the U.S. Army Intelligence Corps, an honour shared by only two other non-Americans.[33]
In 1997, a new public library built inWinnipeg was named for him, after a vote was held to choose the name of the new library. Leo Mol donated a miniature of his statue of Stephenson to the library.
On 24 July 1999,The Princess Royal unveiled, in Stephenson's hometown ofWinnipeg, Manitoba, near the Provincial Legislature on York Street,Leo Mol's life-sized bronze statue of Stephenson in military aviator uniform. The monument is dedicated to Stephenson's memory and achievements.[34]
On 15 November 2009, Water Avenue indowntown Winnipeg was renamedWilliam Stephenson Way.[35]
Whitby, Ontario has a street named for Stephenson. It connects with streets named Intrepid and Overlord. The town is also home to Sir William Stephenson Public School, which opened in 2004.
InOshawa, Ontario, Branch 637 of the Royal Canadian Legion is named for Stephenson. Intrepid Park, named after Stephenson's wartime code name, is located in southern Oshawa near the original Camp X site. A historic plaque erected at the park reads as follows:
On this site British Security Co-ordination operated Special Training School No. 103 and Hydra. S.T.S. 103 trained Allied agents in the techniques of secret warfare for the Special Operations Executive (SOE) branch of the British Intelligence Service. Hydra Network communicated vital messages between Canada, the United States and Great Britain. This commemoration is dedicated to the service of the men and women who took part in these operations.
In Memory of Sir William Stephenson 'The Man Called Intrepid'
Born at Winnipeg, Manitoba, 11 January 1896. Died at Paget, Bermuda, 31 January 1989. Director of British Security Co-ordination. 1941–1946.[36]
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In 1976 British-born Canadian authorWilliam Stevenson published a biography of Stephenson,A Man Called Intrepid. Some of the book's statements have been called into question; in a review the same year,Hugh Trevor-Roper wrote that "This book ... is, from start to finish, utterly worthless," while other former intelligence personnel and historians criticized the book for inaccuracies.Nigel West's 1998 bookCounterfeit Spies asserts that "Intrepid" was probably not Stephenson's codename, but BSC'stelegraphic address in New York.[37] Stevenson was a frequent visitor to Bermuda, where Stephenson had taken up residence during and after the war. He was an ex-naval officer, having served in theFleet Air Arm during the war with prominent Bermudian lawyerWilliam Kempe (a founding partner ofAppleby, Spurling & Kempe), a prominent Bermudian law firm (another author and frequent visitor to Bermuda was ex-naval officer Ian Fleming).
Intelligence historianDavid A. T. Stafford asserts that a more reliable source on Stephenson's career isH. Montgomery Hyde'sThe Quiet Canadian, published in 1962, before Stevenson's book.[38] But generally acknowledged as the most accurate account of Stephenson's life is Bill Macdonald'sThe True Intrepid (1998), with a foreword by the late CIA staff historian Thomas Troy. The book clears up the spymaster's fictitious background in Winnipeg and contains oral histories from his ex-agents. Macdonald's book includes a chapter on the secretive communications geniusBenjamin deForest "Pat" Bayly, who according to Stafford's book Camp X – refused to speak with Stafford. Bayly is not mentioned inThe Quiet Canadian orA Man Called Intrepid.
In 1979 Stephenson was portrayed byDavid Niven in the miniseriesA Man Called Intrepid, based onWilliam Stevenson's bestseller,A Man Called Intrepid.[39]
Churchill launched Stephenson on his spymaster career by appointing him to head the British Security Co-ordination Service in New York before the United States had entered the Second World War.
From the bookIntrepid's Last Secrets by Bill Macdonald, page 258, letter to Stephenson from Hugh Dalton.
