62 days ago
In Operation Mincemeat, in 1943, British Military intelligence dressed up a dead tramp as a Marine officer, floated his body carrying details of a planned invasion of Greece onto the Spanish coast knowing that the bogus plans would find their way to the Germans. The Germans fell for it and diverted tanks, boats and men from Sicily, where the allies really were going to land, to Greece. It was a triumph. There are two books written about the operation and both mention the underpants placed on the body but only in Ben Macintyre’s 2010 account, on which the Colin Firth film is based, is there real detail. Unfortunately, Macintyre engages in dramatic conceit and gets it all wrong. I start, once again, with those 4 young girls photographed in the late 1880s.
62 days ago
The sad demise of Michael Mosley in Greece and of Jay Slater in Tenerife this summer naturally made me think of my great Uncle David Cochrane, not just the manner of his death in 1931 but also of the waiting that all three families endured. With Cochrane there is also a villain of the story, his uncle by marriage, and this is, in a way, a precursor to a very long article I am preparing on Operation Mincemeat, the underpants and my family. It all starts with the four young girls pictured below in, I suspect, the late 1890s.
87 days ago
A Greek holiday looms and that should allow me the mental space to write a bit more about the death of my Great Uncle David Cochrane but also a much longer piece about Operation Mincemeat, the underpants, my family’s involvement and how that also links to agent Cicero. Trust me, it is gripping stuff. Ahead of that, enjoy a newly framed piece of family history from 1862.
260 days ago
First up are the trees, another five apple trees: a late fruiting variety. These should be harvested, in a few years time, in November. If the 23 trees I planted by the river survive, I should thus be harvesting from August right the way to the run up to Advent. Sadly, following my visit to the Countess of Chester on Tuesday, I have stitches in my back and hard exercise is forbidden and so they will not be joining my two peach trees, at the top of the area once known as the jungle, which is now the vegetable garden, for a good two weeks.
265 days ago
The Mrs keeps saying that buying any more books is what she terms GFD (Grounds For Divorce) as both the Welsh and Greek Hovels are now jam packed with my books, her books, and the books of my late father and Aunty Cly. But I reckon that she is bluffing as I’m a pretty hot catch and so three more books arrived this week as you can see below.
268 days ago
Every now and again the Mrs. suggests that I sort out the boxes and boxes of family papers including those of my late father. If I can throw away even some of them it will make the study and a storage room underneath the stairs that little bit less cluttered. In my heart of hearts I know that she has a point. Will any of my kids be that interested in the letters of my great great grandfather Sir Courtenay Ilbert or far more obscure dead white males? I suspect not. As a “nudge” the Mrs. sometimes leaves a book called “Swedish Death Clearing” on my pillow.
738 days ago
A kind reader sent Joshua some old fashioned postcards of railway trains. Half of them are now framed and sit at the top of the landing. Beneath them are just some of the books written by family members. One has a very famous pair of pants.
