Page 37 - History of War - Issue 01-14

Members of Section 17M, the naval
department of British intelligence that helped
to hatch the Operation Mincemeat plan.
Ewan Montagu is front row, second right

insufficient depth of water, a dinghy could take gizmos such as miniature cameras, invisible ink With the help of Fraser-Smith, Cholmondeley
the body closer inshore. The captain could and hidden weaponry. (Fraser-Smith provided drew up a blueprint for the world’s first
monitor the winds and tides in order to surface Ian Fleming with equipment for some of his underwater corpse transporter. This was a
and drop the body at the optimum moment. more outlandish plans, and doubtless helped to tubular canister, six feet six inches long and
“After the body has been planted, it would help inform the character of Q, the eccentric inventor almost two feet in diameter, with a double
the illusion if a ‘set piece’ giving a flare and in the James Bond films.) skin made from 22-gauge steel, the space
explosion with delayed action fuse could be Fraser-Smith possessed a wildly ingenious between the skins packed with asbestos wool.
left to give the impression of an aircraft crash.” but supremely practical mind. He invented garlic- One end would be welded closed, while the
The only problem, as Cholmondeley put it, was
the “technical difficulties in keeping the body
fresh during the passage”. Submariners were submariners were a hardy bunch, able to withstand
a hardy bunch, able to withstand long periods
underwater in the most foetid conditions. But long periods underwater. but even they would surely
even they would surely object to having a rotting
corpse as a shipmate. Moreover, the operation object to having a rotting corpse as a shipmate
was top secret: the presence of a dead body on
a submarine would not remain secret very long.
“Of these methods,” Cholmondeley concluded, flavoured chocolate to be consumed by agents other had an airtight steel lid, which was
“a submarine is the best (if the preservation of parachuting into France, in order that their screwed onto a rubber gasket with 16 bolts.
the body can be achieved).” There is no easy way breath should smell appropriately Gallic as soon A folding handle was attached to either end, and
to smuggle a dead body aboard a submarine, as they landed; he made shoelaces containing a box spanner was clipped to the lid for easy
let alone prevent it from rotting in the warm, a vicious steel garrotte, and created a compass removal. With the body inside, Cholmondeley
fuggy atmosphere of a submarine hold. For help, hidden in a button which unscrewed clockwise, estimated that the entire package would
Cholmondeley turned to Charles Fraser-Smith based on the theory that the “unswerving logic weigh 400lb and fit snugly into the pressure
of Q-Branch, whose job was to furnish secret of the German mind” would never guess that hull of a submarine. [Leading pathologist]
agents, saboteurs and prisoners of war with something might unscrew the wrong way. Sir Bernard Spilsbury was consulted.
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