The Secret Ministry of Ag. & Fish (12 page)

Sadly, some missions ended in tragedy due to treachery. Henri Déricourt, who before the war had been an experienced French pilot, was the man responsible for choosing
the landing sites and dropping zones, known as DZs, in France. But he turned out to be a ‘double agent’, working ostensibly for SOE, but also for the Gestapo and the Abwehr (German
military intelligence).

I never met Déricourt, though I have heard a great deal about him from Bob Maloubier, who knew him before the war when Déricourt was a stunt pilot working in a circus. Bob is
convinced he was not a double agent, as some believe, but a triple agent in the pay not only of SOE and the Gestapo and the Abwehr, but very possibly MI6 as well. He was an astute, one might say
devious, man, who had great personal charm and managed to play his cards very successfully, juggling between his three masters. He was responsible for grouping together letters, both personal
letters from agents to their families and official mail containing sensitive information which could not be trusted to the ‘radio’ since it risked interception by the enemy. This mail
was sent with any plane which landed for delivery to London on arrival. But before Déricourt handed them to the pilot of the plane he gave them to his Abwehr contact, who opened and copied
them before handing them back, which may explain why the Prosper/Physician
réseau
was ‘blown’.

Déricourt used to be at the DZ to meet the agents when they landed and would take them to the isolated farmhouse, from which the members of the reception committee had left a few hours
earlier. Here they would be given a substantial meal and a bed for the rest of the night. I remember one returning agent saying that they had had a very bumpy journey on the way over, being tossed
about all over the place as the pilot attempted to evade the German flak and the fighter pilots sent up to shoot them down. He was feeling sick and groggy when he landed and the wonderfully rich
meal awaiting him proved to be too much. On the pretext of getting a breath of fresh air, he walked out to the bottom of the garden and was violently sick!

Should they not be destined for a local resistance group, they would grab a few hours’ sleep, and at dawn a member of the reception committee would accompany the agents to the local
railway station. Before arriving, the agents would separate and take the first train to Paris or the nearest large city: each one travelling in a different compartment without any sign of
recognition passing between them, either on the platform while waiting for the train or on the train itself. When they left the train, they would then head off separately in different
directions.

Déricourt often not only accompanied the newly arrived agents to the station, but also travelled on the same train. He would have informed the Gestapo in advance of the drop and told them
at which mainline station the agents would arrive the following morning. The French police would be waiting at the barrier to do a ‘spot check’, which was not unusual. Déricourt
would give a prearranged signal, often an almost imperceptible nod or inclination of his head as he passed or walked behind the agent approaching the barrier. The agent would then be picked out by
the police for a ‘snap’ inspection of his or her papers. And although the papers were in order – London saw to that before they left – it was always possible for the police
to pretend that there was an anomaly and take the agent into custody for further investigation, from where he was inevitably handed over to the Gestapo. Some were never seen alive again.

The largest and most important
réseau
in France in 1943, the Prosper
réseau,
based in the Paris area, had tentacles stretching out all over the country from
Belgium to the Poitou. It was decimated by the treachery of Henri Déricourt, with the near-fatal result that, after Prospers collapse, F Section’s resistance in France threatened to
come to an end. One thousand five hundred people were arrested, and hundreds of agents and locally recruited résistants belonging to the group were seized, tortured, deported to
concentration camps and sent to their deaths.

Among them was Prospers organizer, Francis Suttill, who was brutally tortured before being sent to Sachsenhausen concentration camp and hanged. His courier, Andrée Borrel, was one of the
four women F Section agents who were burnt alive at Natzweiler. And the radio operator, Noor Inayat-Khan, having survived many months of solitary confinement in various prisons, terrible torture
and, for the last four months of her life, being shackled wrists to ankles, was finally shot in the back of the head, too weak from starvation and torture to be able to crawl across the floor. It
was said that when she died she no longer resembled a human being; she was just a mass of raw meat, the skin hanging off her back from her many beatings. But, like Suttill and Andrée Borrel,
she never once talked or gave the enemy any information.

One of the first members of the Prosper
réseau
to be arrested was Suttill’s lieutenant, Gilbert Norman, codename ‘Archambaud’. Norman was later accused of being
a traitor and betraying his comrades. He did, but unwittingly. He was tortured and brainwashed to such an extent that the Gestapo convinced him that it was pointless to withhold information, since
the other members of his
réseau
had all been arrested and interrogated and had revealed the names of his colleagues, as well as the place where their considerable supply of arms was
hidden, none of which was true. In actual fact Francis Suttill and Norman’s other resistance colleagues were arrested after a confession was dragged out of Norman. To add to his agony, when
they were all brought in for interrogation, the Gestapo seated him at a desk in the entrance to the building in the avenue Foch, giving the members of his
réseau
the impression that
he had defected to the German camp. When they arrived he became the recipient of their incredulous and often contemptuous stares and realized that he had been tricked into betraying them. His
colleagues believed he was responsible for their arrest, which in a way I suppose he was. But had he intentionally betrayed them? To all outward appearances it looked very much like it, and the
word ‘traitor’ clung to him. However, many people who were later questioned did not think so. His father apparently spent the rest of his life trying to clear his son’s name. But
even if he had collaborated with the Gestapo, it did not save him. He later suffered the same fate as his organizer, Francis Suttill, and was hanged at Sachsenhausen concentration camp.

Buck had had his doubts about Déricourt’s loyalty for some time. But he was never able to actually pin any accusation on him. The disaster of the collapse of the Prosper circuit
confirmed Buck’s suspicions, and he decided to recall Déricourt to London for a debriefing. When the plane landed, Gerry Morel, who had been sent by Buck to bring Déricourt
back, was standing in the doorway. Although a major in the British Army, as a precaution in case of capture Morel was wearing a squadron leader’s uniform, which would enable him to claim
prisoner of war status as a member of the aircrew. He ordered Déricourt to climb in, but Déricourt, taken by surprise, refused to leave without his wife. There was a terrible scene,
and a heated argument broke out between the two men, during which in the wind Morel’s cap blew off and had to be chased across the airstrip by one of the reception team. The whole landing and
take-off operation was supposed to be effected in less than three minutes. After fifteen minutes the pilot shot his head out of the cockpit and began banging on the fuselage, yelling: ‘What
the hell’s going on?’ He threatened to leave without Morel.

When they landed back in England Buck was on the airstrip, waiting to receive Déricourt. He was not amused when Morel confessed to returning without him. However, Déricourt had
promised to leave on the next flight provided his wife could accompany him and, for once, he kept his word. The following week, when the plane bringing radio operator Noor Inayat-Khan and courier
Cecily Lefort to work for the Prosper and Jockey
réseaux
respectively landed, Déricourt’s rather vulgar wife was waiting with him on the airstrip, covered in jewels and
wearing a floor-length fur coat. On arrival in England they were given a suite at the Savoy, where they were seen dancing, he wearing a squadron leader’s uniform, to which he was not
entitled, his rank being flying officer, and sporting DFC and DSO ribbons on his chest, to which he was not entitled either.

In spite of Déricourt’s protestations, Buck refused to allow him to return to France. He was given a splendid flat in a fashionable part of London – I believe it was
Kensington – where he and his wife entertained lavishly
.
I can understand Déricourt’s anger and frustration at being kept in London. Being a double agent was extremely
dangerous, but it was also a very lucrative business. Déricourt, although from humble origins – his mother was a seamstress and his father a postman – had amassed a fortune
through his treachery, ending the war a very rich man
.
He not only owned a royal hunting lodge in the countryside outside the capital but also a luxury flat in the sixteenth
arrondissement,
the most expensive district in Paris, with a live-in Spanish maid for the rare occasions when he wished to use it. After the war he became a pilot for the company which
later became Air France. One evening, he was passing through British customs on the way to his plane and said he had nothing to declare. The customs officer asked him all the same to open his
overnight case. Underneath his pyjamas was a layer of gold bars. He was arrested, but at his trial he managed to charm the judge and convince him that he was a ‘war hero’. The judge did
not give him a prison sentence but let him off with a £500 fine – peanuts to Déricourt – though his gold bars were confiscated.

Buck was not the only one to be suspicious of Déricourt. Vera Atkins, Buck’s close assistant, had never trusted him. She was convinced, right from the start, that he was playing a
double game, and it may well have been at her insistence that Buck had him recalled.

But the French authorities might also have been keeping their eyes upon Déricourt. In 1946, when he returned to France, he was arrested and imprisoned, and in 1948 he was tried for
treason. At his trial Déricourt managed, as usual, to be very convincing. He had fooled many people, who spoke in his favour, though Buck refused to testify for him or even to attend the
trial. But Nick Bodington, Buck’s one-time assistant and former ‘right-hand man’, went to Paris, claiming to have been sent by SOE to testify in Déricourt’s favour.
Although untrue, this so-called ‘authentic’ testimony from a former very influential member of F Section helped swing the balance. Déricourt was acquitted and saved from the
firing squad.

Vera Atkins and Nick Bodington had always disliked each other intensely, which can’t have made life easy for Buck. Vera did not hide her feelings about Bodington, whom she always suspected
was in league with Déricourt, playing a double game. Since Buck had absolute confidence in Vera and trusted her completely, especially her judgement, which he relied upon, it may well have
been Vera who persuaded Buck to have Bodington rusticated for six months during the war. She was in Paris at the time of Déricourt’s trial and bumped into Bodington in the street.
‘Nick, if you attend Déricourt’s trial,’ she apparently threatened him, ‘I’ll never speak to you again.’ Bodington calmed her down, assuring her that there was
no question of his doing so, and she took him at his word. He then went to the Palais de Justice and testified in Déricourt’s favour. Vera kept her word, and never spoke to him
again.

Déricourt’s insatiable greed finally got the better of him. He went to Laos and, together with a pilot friend and two small planes, formed a company, Air Laos – known
colloquially as ‘Air Confiture’ (Air Jam), since it was common knowledge that they were trafficking opium. With these two planes they evacuated rich refugees from Laos to Saigon –
at a price! Déricourt’s plane could carry six passengers, but he regularly crammed in eight. One afternoon in November 1962 he returned to base and decided that he could do one more
flight while it was still light. There were ten passengers waiting. He took eight, refusing the last two. They pleaded with him, upping the exorbitant fare he charged by so much that he finally
accepted. The seriously overloaded plane was unable to rise above the trees. It crashed soon after take-off, with no survivors. Déricourt’s body was never found – there were only
limbs and torn flesh scattered over the jungle floor. However, a funeral was held with great pomp and ceremony for the well-known ‘war hero’, with many attachés from neighbouring
embassies and other dignitaries present. Déricourt deceived everyone right to the end!

After the war there was also suspicion in the hierarchy surrounding Bodington’s loyalties. There were questions about whether or not he was a double agent working closely with
Déricourt, so perhaps Vera’s mistrust was not unfounded. It has also been said that he was a ‘mole’ planted into F Section by MI6, who disliked SOE intensely. His pre-war
connections with the Germans, when he was a Reuters correspondent in Paris, seemed to give weight to the theory that he was a double agent in touch with, and passing secret information to, former
friends he had known at the German embassy. These friends were now high-ranking officers in the Gestapo and the Abwehr. But no definite evidence has yet come to light.

Nick Bodington was not liked by his colleagues. They complained that he was mean, never having his wallet on him when it was his turn pay for a round of drinks in the pub. In appearance, he was
not an attractive man, though he married three times. He seemed to be a loner, intelligent, but without a great deal of charm. Henri Déricourt, on the other hand, was a handsome man who had
great charm and was very intelligent. What a pity he did not put his talents to better use.