A new exhibition of declassified documents is full of espionage thrills. MI5: Official Secrets is at the National Archives in Kew from April 5 to September 28.
Exhibits includes an unseen snap of wicked old Anthony Blunt, as well as the manually-typed transcripts of interrogations of him and Kim Philby.
The ordinariness is gripping. An agent’s 1963 transcript of meeting Philby (codename “Peach”) to hand over a confession, adds, “We arranged that we would go to the Gents together.”
Then there’s German spy Karl Muller, who in 1915 infiltrated Britain posing as a Russian. Foolishly, Muller used the schoolboy trick of lemon-juice secret ink to transmit military intel. The Old Un can confirm that heating reveals the lemon juice script, as carbon from the acetic acid oxidises.
The postal censorship office, manned by women, quickly picked up Muller’s treason. He was briskly hanged, but one of his leathery lemons survived to appear in the show.
Similar delights include a cork, cleverly carved to form a tiny message box with a sliding cover.
The story of American agent Virginia Hall (1906-82) is still little-known. She was well-bred, brilliant and undeterred by the wooden leg she called Cuthbert — caused by a hunting accident.
SOE’s first female field-agent in France, she stomped fearlessly about for 14 months, saving countless lives, earning her the Croix de Guerre, Distinguished Service Cross, and MBE.
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