Hugh Pollard (intelligence officer)

Last updated

Major Hugh Pollard
Hugh Bertie Campbell Pollard.png
Hugh Bertie Campbell Pollard. Author, firearms expert and secret service agent
Born(1888-01-06)6 January 1888
London, England
DiedMarch 1966
Midhurst district, Sussex, England
Citizenship British
Occupation(s)Intelligence agent, Writer
Notable work
  • A Busy Time in Mexico: An Unconventional Record Of a Mexican Incident (1913),
  • The Story of Ypres (1917),
  • The Book of the Pistol and Revolver (1917),
  • The Secret Societies of Ireland, Their Rise and Progress (1922),
  • A History of Firearms,
  • Automatic Pistols,
  • Fox Hunting - The Mystery Of Scent,
    British & American Game-birds,
  • Hard Up on Pegasus,
  • The Keeper's Book; a Guide to the Duties of a Gamekeeper
SpouseRuth M Gibbons
AwardsKnights Cross of the Imperial Order of the Yoke and Arrows

Major Hugh Bertie Campbell Pollard (born London [1] 6 January 1888: died Midhurst district [2] March, 1966) was an author, journalist, adventurer, firearms expert, and a British SOE officer. He is chiefly known for his intelligence work during the Irish War of Independence and for the events of July 1936, when he and Cecil Bebb flew General Francisco Franco from the Canary Islands to Morocco, thereby helping to trigger the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. He served his country in both World Wars and was the author of many published works on weaponry, in particular on sporting firearms.

Contents

Early life

Hugh Bertie Campbell Pollard was born in London on 6 January 1888, the son of the physician Joseph Pollard. [3] At nine years of age he was sent to Westminster School as a day boy, but spent much of his time on his grandfather's estate in Hertfordshire, where he became an expert shot and first developed what became a lifelong interest in hunting and firearms. [3] At fifteen years of age he left Westminster and joined the engineering firm Armstrong Whitworth. Until 1908 he attended the Crystal Palace School of Practical Engineering. [3]

Career

Activities in Morocco and Mexico

In 1908 Pollard joined the Redmond-Hardwick exploration syndicate in Morocco, [3] where he participated in the revolution in Morocco which deposed the Sultan Abdelaziz and replaced him with his brother Abd al-Hafid. [4] He returned to England in 1909, where he took a Royal Geographical Society course. [3]

In 1911 he travelled to Tapachula, a remote corner of Mexico in the state of Chiapas, [5] where he engaged in a number of adventures (as narrated by himself), including a risky mission to collect rent from a remote coffee plantation, [6] and the shooting of much wild game. [7] Along the way he became fluent in Spanish. [8] He also became involved in the escape of Porfirio Diaz from Mexico. [4] His recollections of these adventures were published in 1913 in his memoir (the first of many books) titled "A Busy Time in Mexico - An Unconventional Record of a Mexican Incident". [3] Pollard wrote that, in Mexico, "the people in the next village , or over the next mountain, or in the next state, are inevitably evildoers, murderers, and bandits." [3]

Returning to London, Pollard was commissioned as an officer into the Territorial Army in May 1912. At the same time he began his career as a journalist, serving as assistant editor of The Cinema, editor of The Territorial Monthly and technical editor of The Autocycle. He also became a correspondent for the Daily Express . [3]

World War I

When World War I broke out Pollard was mobilised as officer of despatch riders in London, and in November 1914 he was seconded to the Intelligence Corps as a staff lieutenant. Pollard served during both the First Battle of Ypres and Second Battle of Ypres, both bloody and strategically inconclusive. [3] Blown off his motorcycle and wounded, he was invalided home, and granted five months home leave to recuperate. During this time he worked for his new father-in-law, James Gibbons, at his engineering factory in Wolverhampton managing the production of hand grenades. [3] He continued to write, producing The Story of Ypres, a well-received account of the battles. [3] [9]

At around this time Pollard began his propaganda-writing career for Wellington House, by inventing a "Phantom Russian Army" which was allegedly travelling by train from Scotland to support the British Expeditionary Force; a story which was even given credence by The New York Times. Pollard also invented an anti-German atrocity propaganda story about "corpse factories", in which the German government was said to be melting down corpses to make margarine. As a result of his creativity, Pollard found himself recruited by MI7. [3]

By this time Pollard had become a noted firearms expert, and in 1917 he published another book: The Book of the Pistol and Revolver. [3]

Ireland (1919–1921)

After the War, Pollard was sent to Dublin Castle in Ireland as an Intelligence officer. [3] During the Irish War of Independence (1919–1921), Pollard was Press Officer of the Information Section of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC). Together with the Section secretary, Captain William Darling, he produced the Weekly Summary, a weekly newspaper distributed to the police forces in Ireland.[ citation needed ]

He was also directly involved in two particularly bungled attempts at 'black propaganda'. One was the attempt to produce and distribute a fake version of the Irish Bulletin , the gazette of the Irish Republicans. The fraud was quickly exposed and the reliability of information emanating from Crown sources in Ireland severely damaged. A second incident involved the bizarre attempt to fake a military engagement in County Kerry (reported as the 'Battle of Tralee'). [10] The press-release included photographs of the purported scene of the battle. These were republished in a number of Irish and English papers before the actual location was identified as Vico Road in Dalkey, a quiet seaside Dublin suburb. [11] The entire event had been staged by Pollard and Captain Garro-Jones, a colleague of Major Cecil Street, and was without foundation. [12] In December 1920 in the House of Commons, the British government denied any knowledge of these pictures or the circumstances in which they were produced. [13]

Following the Anglo-Irish Treaty, Pollard recorded his interpretation of the history of Irish nationalist organisations in Secret Societies of Ireland, Their Rise and Progress. [14] He alleged that the Lord Mayor of Cork, Tomás Mac Curtain, had been assassinated by the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB), rather than by forces acting for the British Crown. [15]

Spanish Civil War

A de Havilland Dragon Rapide aircraft Dragon rapide g-aeml flying arp.jpg
A de Havilland Dragon Rapide aircraft

Pollard was a devout Roman Catholic and a supporter of the conservative side in Spain in the years leading up to the Spanish Civil War. [16] He and Cecil Bebb played an important role in the events leading up to the outbreak of hostilities. Pollard was described by the Nationalist volunteer Peter Kemp as being "one of those romantic Englishmen who specialise in other countries' revolutions". [4]

During lunch at Simpson's-in-the-Strand, Douglas Francis Jerrold, the conservative Roman Catholic editor of the English Review (and also a British intelligence officer), met with the journalist Luis Bolín, London correspondent of the monarchist and right wing newspaper ABC and later Franco's senior press advisor. They conceived a plan to move General Franco from the Canary Islands to Spanish Morocco, where the Army of Africa was stationed. The Madrid government recognised that Franco was a danger to the Spanish Republic, and had sent him to the Canaries to keep him away from political intrigue. If a Spanish plane flew to the islands, the authorities would most likely be alerted, but a British aircraft would attract little or no attention. Bolin asked Jerrold to find "two blondes and a trustworthy fellow" to carry out the mission, to make the group look like tourists. [17] Jerrold rang Pollard from the restaurant (Pollard was fluent in Spanish) and asked him if he could be ready to fly to Africa the following day, with two women as "cover"; Pollard, an anti-Communist who regarded it as "the duty of a good Catholic to help fellow Catholics in trouble", [17] replied: "depends on the girls". [17] Pollard was persuaded by Jerrold and Bolin to join the enterprise and he recruited his daughter Diana and her friend Dorothy Watson to accompany him. [18] [19] The group charted a de Havilland Dragon Rapide aircraft, piloted by Cecil Bebb, which flew out of Croydon airport, London, at 07.15 on the morning of July 11, 1936, bound for the Canaries. Pollard and Bebb delivered Franco to Tetuan on July 19, and the General quickly set about organising Spanish Moroccan troops to participate in the coming coup.

It is possible that British intelligence services may have been complicit in the flight. However it is not clear yet how much the British government knew or was involved in these activities, or if the Britons involved were in fact acting on their own. Britain remained officially neutral during the Spanish Civil War. [17]

The adventure earned Pollard the sobriquet The Spanish Pimpernel from Life Magazine. [20] After the war, in 1958, Pollard and his companions were personally decorated by General Francisco Franco, who awarded all four the Knights Cross of the Imperial Order of the Yoke and arrows. [17] [21]

Pollard continued to support the Nationalist cause. In 1937, after the bombing of Guernica, Pollard wrote a letter to The Times stating that Guernica was a "perfectly legitimate" target, being a centre of small arms manufacture, one which supplied weapons to terrorists:

The bombing of Guernica is not an attack on an unimportant civilian centre. Guernica is almost as much a centre for the manufacture of small arms at Eibar. [...] Arms of Spanish make have reached terrorists in India and Egypt and are also widely distributed in France. [...] No one who knows the industries of this region can believe that Eibar and Guernica are not perfectly legitimate objectives for attack.

Pollard argued later in his letter that the Basques who supported the Spanish Republic were "simply reaping what they have sown":

There need be little sentiment for [the Viscayans], for no community has ever tried to make more trouble in the world by the unrestricted sale of arms than these Basque industrialists. Autonomy for the Basque simply means sales of arms without control—and the world in general has had about enough of this. They are simply reaping what they have sown. [22]

World War II

When war broke out in 1939, Pollard briefly fell under suspicion for fascist sympathies. In December 1939 West Sussex police raided the Kent flat of Nora Dacre-Fox, whom MI5 suspected of being a fascist sympathiser. During the search, police discovered Pollard's name in her address book. Pollard was to be arrested, but MI5 instructed their regional liaison officer in Kent to "lay off" Pollard. [17]

On 31 January 1940 MI6 appointed Pollard head of the semi-autonomous "Section D" in Madrid . Section D was officially a sub-division of MI6, tasked with engaging in clandestine sabotage in Europe. In May 1940 Pollard was involved in a short-lived and unsuccessful plot to restore King Alfonso XIII to the Spanish throne, in order to reduce German and Italian influence over the Franco regime. [17] Pollard travelled to Estoril, Portugal in 1940 where he was involved in smuggling around three hundred Republican Vickers machine guns, still in their packing crates, back to England. [17] Of this adventure, Pollard wrote that he was “rather a good pirate in the best English tradition”. [17]

However, by this time confidence in Pollard was waning; he had acquired a reputation for being "most indiscreet", and he left Section D later that year. [17] Pollard spent much of the rest of the war at the Inspectorate of Armaments at the Woolwich Arsenal. In Pollard's file, a letter from one Colonel Jeffries, the Commandant of the Intelligence Corps, wrote: “Certain jobs Pollard apparently could do well, but he was definitely unreliable where money and drink was concerned.” [17] [23]

As the Allied armies advanced into Germany, Pollard was sent to Thuringia with the forces of General Patton, in technical intelligence on small arms. Here, Pollard removed many weapons before the Russians occupied the area. Later on, he became o.c. Intelligence, Technical, in Vienna where, he had to deal with many looters. Pollard wrote, “in three weeks I stopped all the nonsense...with sawn-off shotguns.” [3]

Pollard's personal SOE file was released after the war, revealing him to have been an experienced British intelligence officer. [23]

After the war

After the war Pollard retired to the country, leading a quiet life in Clover Cottage in Midhurst, West Sussex. [3] Pollard listed his hobbies in Who's Who as "hunting and shooting", and was a member of Lord Leconfield's hunt. [17] He died in 1966, firmly anti-Communist to the end. In the same year he was interviewed by The Guardian, the month before his death, in which he was quoted as saying that Communists "are better put down than anything". [17]

Reputation

Douglas Jerrold of The English Review said of Pollard that he "looked and behaved like a German Crown Prince and had a habit of letting off revolvers in any office he happened to visit". [17] Jerrold once asked Pollard if he had ever killed anybody; Pollard replied: "never accidentally". [17] The journalist Macdonald Hastings wrote of Pollard that he was "a fascinating person, who probably had a greater impact on events than he cared anybody should know. If you can unravel him you need to know all the tricks of Mr. Smiley and James Bond. I confess that all I know about him is mischief. He was a remarkable man". [3]

Author and firearms expert

Pollard was a much-published expert on firearms, having written the 'small arms' section in the official War Office textbook. His history of the Second Battle of Ypres is still in print today.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Owen Roe O'Neill</span> Irish soldier (c. 1585 – 1649)

Owen Roe O'Neill was a Gaelic Irish soldier and one of the most famous of the O'Neill dynasty of Ulster. O'Neill left Ireland at a young age and spent most of his life as a mercenary in the Spanish Army serving against the Dutch in Flanders during the Eighty Years' War. After the Irish Rebellion of 1641, O'Neill returned and took command of the Irish Confederate Ulster Army. He is known for his victory at the Battle of Benburb in 1646.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone</span> Irish earl (died 1616)

Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone was an Irish Gaelic lord and key figure of the Irish Nine Years' War. Known as the "Great Earl", he led the confederacy of Irish clans against the English Crown in resistance to the Tudor conquest of Ireland under Queen Elizabeth I.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Condor Legion</span> German military unit assisting Nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War (1936–39)

The Condor Legion was a unit of military personnel from the air force and army of Nazi Germany’s Wehrmacht which served with the Nationalist faction during the Spanish Civil War. The legion developed methods of strategic bombing that were used widely during the Second World War. The bombing of Guernica was the Condor Legion's most infamous operation. Hugo Sperrle commanded the unit's aircraft formations, and Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma commanded the ground element.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bombing of Guernica</span> Attack by military aircraft during the Spanish Civil War

On 26 April 1937, the Basque town of Guernica was aerially bombed during the Spanish Civil War. It was carried out at the behest of Francisco Franco's rebel Nationalist faction by its allies, the Nazi German Luftwaffe's Condor Legion and the Fascist Italian Aviazione Legionaria, under the code name Operation Rügen. The town was being used as a communications centre by Republican forces just behind the front line, and the raid was intended to destroy bridges and roads. The operation opened the way to Franco's capture of Bilbao and his victory in northern Spain.

<i>Guernica</i> (Picasso) 1937 oil painting by Pablo Picasso

Guernica is a large 1937 oil painting by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. It is one of his best-known works, regarded by many art critics as the most moving and powerful anti-war painting in history. It is exhibited in the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Steer</span> South African-born British journalist

George Lowther Steer was a South African-born British journalist, author and war correspondent who reported on wars preceding World War II, especially the Second Italo-Abyssinian War and the Spanish Civil War. During those wars he was employed by The Times, and his eye-witness reports did much to alert western nations of war crimes committed by the Italians in Ethiopia and by the Germans in Spain, although little was done to prevent them by the League of Nations, and his 1937 exclusive on the bombing of Guernica inspired Pablo Picasso to paint his anti-war masterpiece, Guernica. He returned to Ethiopia after the world war started and helped the campaign defeat the Italians and restore Hailie Selassie to the throne.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Irish Brigade (Spanish Civil War)</span> Military unit

The Irish Brigade fought on the Nationalist side of Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War. The unit was formed wholly of Roman Catholics by the politician Eoin O'Duffy, who had previously organised the banned quasi-fascist Blueshirts and openly fascist Greenshirts in Ireland. Despite the declaration by the Irish government that participation in the war was unwelcome and ill-advised, 700 of O'Duffy's followers went to Spain. They saw their primary role in Spain as fighting for the Roman Catholic Church against the Red Terror of Spanish anticlericalists. They also saw many religious and historical parallels in the two nations, and hoped to prevent communism gaining ground in Spain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Julian Hatcher</span> United States Army general (1888–1963)

Julian Sommerville Hatcher was a major general in the United States Army. As a firearms expert, he wrote technical books and articles relating to military firearms, ballistics, and autoloading weapons. He also pioneered the forensic identification of firearms and ammunition.

Provisional Irish Republican Army arms importation in forms of both firearms and explosives began in the early 1970s during the Troubles. With these weapons it conducted an armed campaign against the British state in Northern Ireland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Teruel</span> 1937 Spain civil war battle

The Battle of Teruel was fought in and around the city of Teruel during the Spanish Civil War between December 1937 and February 1938, during the worst Spanish winter in 20 years. The battle was one of the bloodiest actions of the war, with the city changing hands several times by first falling to the Republicans and eventually being retaken by the Nationalists. In the course of the fighting, Teruel was subjected to heavy artillery and aerial bombardment. In the two-month battle, both factions together took 110,000 casualties.

The international response to the Spanish Civil War included many non-Spaniards participating in combat and advisory positions. The governments of Italy, Germany and, to a lesser extent, Portugal contributed money, munitions, manpower and support to the Nationalist forces, led by Francisco Franco. Some nations that declared neutrality favored the nationalists indirectly. The governments of the Soviet Union and, to a lesser extent, Mexico, aided the Republicans, also called Loyalists, of the Second Spanish Republic. The aid came even after all the European powers had signed a Non-Intervention Agreement in 1936. Although individual sympathy for the plight of the Spanish Republic was widespread in the liberal democracies, pacifism and the fear of a second world war prevented them from selling or giving arms. However, Nationalist pleas were answered within days by Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini and António de Oliveira Salazar. Tens of thousands of individual foreign volunteers travelled to Spain to fight, the majority for the Republican side.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Spanish Civil War</span> 1936–1939 civil war in Spain

The Spanish Civil War was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republicans and the Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the left-leaning Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic, and consisted of various socialist, communist, separatist, anarchist, and republican parties, some of which had opposed the government in the pre-war period. The opposing Nationalists were an alliance of Falangists, monarchists, conservatives, and traditionalists led by a military junta among whom General Francisco Franco quickly achieved a preponderant role. Due to the international political climate at the time, the war had many facets and was variously viewed as class struggle, a religious struggle, a struggle between dictatorship and republican democracy, between revolution and counterrevolution, and between fascism and communism. According to Claude Bowers, U.S. ambassador to Spain during the war, it was the "dress rehearsal" for World War II. The Nationalists won the war, which ended in early 1939, and ruled Spain until Franco's death in November 1975.

Herbert Rutledge Southworth was a writer, journalist and historian specializing in the Spanish Civil War and the subsequent Francoist State in Spain and whose work led the Francoist ministry of information to set up an entire department to counter his demolition of the State's propaganda. He also founded a radio station in Tangier following the end of World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cecil Bebb</span> British commercial pilot and airline executive

Captain Cecil William Henry Bebb was a British commercial pilot and later airline executive, notable for flying General Francisco Franco from the Canary Islands to Spanish Morocco in 1936, a journey which was to mark the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Republican faction (Spanish Civil War)</span> Side in the Spanish Civil War that supported the Second Spanish Republic

The Republican faction, also known as the Loyalist faction or the Government faction, was the side in the Spanish Civil War of 1936 to 1939 that supported the government of the Second Spanish Republic against the Nationalist faction of the military rebellion. The name Republicans was mainly used by its members and supporters, while its opponents used the term Rojos (Reds) to refer to this faction due to its left-leaning ideology, including far-left communist and anarchist groups, and the support it received from the Soviet Union. At the beginning of the war, the Republicans outnumbered the Nationalists by ten-to-one, but by January 1937 that advantage had dropped to four-to-one.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">German involvement in the Spanish Civil War</span> German involvement in the spanish civil war

German involvement in the Spanish Civil War commenced with the outbreak of war in July 1936, with Adolf Hitler immediately sending in air and armored units to assist General Francisco Franco and his Nationalist forces. In opposition, the Soviet Union sent in smaller forces equipped with more advanced equipment to assist the Republican government, while Britain and France and two dozen other countries set up an embargo on any munitions or soldiers into Spain. Nazi Germany also signed the embargo, but simply ignored it.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Douglas Francis Jerrold</span> British journalist and publisher

Douglas Francis Jerrold was a British journalist and publisher. As editor of The English Review from 1931 to 1935, he was a vocal supporter of fascism in Italy and of Francoist Spain. He was personally involved in the events of July 1936 when two British intelligence agents piloted an aircraft from the Canary Islands to Spanish Morocco, taking General Francisco Franco with them and thereby helped to spark the military coup that ignited the Spanish Civil War.

Luis Antonio Bolín Bidwell was a Spanish lawyer, journalist and tour-operating expert. That led to his appointment as Head of the National Union of Catering and Allied Attorney in Parliament during the first four legislatures of Francoist Spain. In his memoirs, he simply uses the English spelling, Bolin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Daly (Irish republican)</span> Irish Socialist and Republican (1903–1937)

Peter Daly was an Irish socialist and republican who fought in the Irish War of Independence as well as serving as a volunteer in the Spanish Civil War, where he died serving with the International Brigades.

References

Notes

  1. ↑ "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 17 June 2014.
  2. ↑ "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 17 June 2014.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Pollard at frontiersmenhistorian.info Retrieved 15 November 2020
  4. 1 2 3 Kemp, Peter, Mine Were of Trouble, a Nationalist Account of the Spanish Civil War, p16
  5. ↑ A Busy Time in Mexico, p.2 Retrieved 18 November 2020
  6. ↑ A Busy Time in Mexico, p.16 Retrieved 18 November 2020
  7. ↑ A Busy Time in Mexico, p.42 Retrieved 17 November 2020
  8. ↑ A Busy Time in Mexico, p.12 Retrieved 17 November 2020
  9. ↑ Bertie Campbell Pollard, Hugh (1917). The Story of Ypres. McBride.
  10. ↑ "LABOR PARTY AGAIN HITS CROWN FORCES". New York Times. 18 January 1921. p. 14. Retrieved 14 November 2009.
  11. ↑ Henderson M.P, Arthur; Members of the Commission (1921). Report of the Labour Commission to Ireland. London Labour Party. pp. 49–51.
  12. ↑ Kenneally, Ian (2008). The paper wall: newspapers and propaganda in Ireland 1919-1921. Collins Press. pp. 32–36, 41–42, 21. ISBN   978-1-905172-58-0.
  13. ↑ "PHOTOGRAPHS - HC Deb vol 135 cc1420-1". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) . 2 December 1920. Retrieved 15 November 2009.
  14. ↑ Secret Societies of Ireland at amazon.co.uk Retrieved 15 November 2020
  15. ↑ Pollard, Hugh Bertie Campbell (1922). The secret societies of Ireland: their rise and progress. P. Allan. pp. 186, 193–194. ISBN   978-0-7661-5479-7.
  16. ↑ Riess, Curt, They Were There: The Story of World War II and How It Came About Retrieved November 2012
  17. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Macklin Retrieved November 2012
  18. ↑ Alpert, Michael. A New International History of the Spanish Civil War, p.18 Retrieved January 2012
  19. ↑ Puzzo, Dante Anthony (1962). Spain and the great powers, 1936-1941. Columbia University Press. p. 51.
  20. ↑ Life Magazine, 18 January 1938
  21. ↑ www.alamy.com Retrieved 16 November 2020
  22. ↑ Letter to The Times, 3 May 1937.
  23. 1 2 National Archives HS 9/1200/5 1914.
  24. ↑ The Book of the Pistol and Revolver at amazon.co.uk Retrieved November 2012
  25. ↑ Riling, p.1842
  26. ↑ Riling, p.1898
  27. ↑ Shot-Guns; Their History and Development at www.amazon.com Retrieved November 2012
  28. ↑ Riling, p.1951
  29. ↑ Riling, p.2009
  30. ↑ The Gun Room Guide at www.amazon.co.uk Retrieved 2012
  31. ↑ Riling, p.2091
  32. ↑ Riling, p.2203
  33. ↑ Fox Hunting - The Mystery Of Scent at www.amazon.co.uk Retrieved November 2012
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.