At the end of the Second World War, nearly 200 British citizens were under investigation for assisting Nazi Germany. Many have remained notorious, but this study shows there was a much larger and more intriguing story below the surface. Drawing from original documents, eyewitness accounts, and intelligence files, Adrian Weale traces the course of British treason in World War II, from its roots in Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists, through the war and subsequent investigations, up to the trial, imprisonment, and, in some cases, execution of the traitors. In fact, German efforts to cultivate British traitors were largely unsuccessful—not least, as this book reveals, because much of that effort was entrusted to a British Fascist-turned-double agent at work in the heart of the Third Reich.
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Editorial Reviews
Review
“A fascinating footnote to the history of the war... with more shady characters than a le Carré novel.” – Sunday Telegraph
“A meticulously researched study which draws on a huge body of material, including closed intelligence files, to chart the careers not only of notorious traitors such as William Joyce and John Amery, but of minor players as well.” – The Times
“A meticulously researched study which draws on a huge body of material, including closed intelligence files, to chart the careers not only of notorious traitors such as William Joyce and John Amery, but of minor players as well.” – The Times
From the Inside Flap
Contrary to the perception of a staunchly unified Britain in the face of Nazism during WWII, there were many who, for various reasons, turned traitor. At the end of the War, nearly 200 British citizens were under investigation for assisting Nazi Germany. Adrian Weale traces the course of treason from its roots in Oswald Mosley?s British Union of Fascists, and includes the first complete account of the British Free Corps - the Waffen-SS unit composed entirely of British subjects.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Particularly insightful on Waffen-SS and POW intimidation,
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This review is from: Renegades (Hardcover)
This book, in the updated 2004 edition from Pimlico press in London, revises Weale's 1994 study. The strengths of the study lie in the formation of the Waffen-SS and why it--unlike the Wehrmacht--recruited foreigners, gradually loosening the "aryan" requirements as the war advanced and the prospects declined for the Nazis. Weale, with a military background, gives intriguing information about how pressure was brought down on susceptible POWs to often mislead them into signing up for anti-Bolshevik, pro-German (although this latter motive could be obscured) activity. The author tells the story of the British Free Corps, and this part takes up largely the latter half of the book. Earlier sections recapitulate stories of traitors such as John Amery, William Joyce, and the pre-war British Fascists and how idealists, con artists, counterspies, and those soldiers simply double-crossed or blackmailed by their German guards turned to the other side, for a variety of reasons, not all of them as clear as would be supposed.
Compared to Sean Murphy (no relation to me) in his similar 2003 "Letting the Side Down: British Traitors of the Second World War," (for which Weale wrote the preface), Weale lacks some of Murphy's verve and irony. Especially in the pre-BFC sections, the pace bogs down in terminology, ranks, and background details that befit military history but do slow the narrative. On the other hand, Murphy and Weale--whose studies often overlap and compliment each other, as they work from the same archives--rely more on these primary sources which were opened to historians in the later 1990s. Weale's first-hand knowledge of how military intelligence operates makes for informative and instructive reading. Few noble actions emerge in these pages, and one of the quirks of this tale is that the worst traitor in number of lives he betrayed, Harold Cole, also saved many British soldiers during the earlier, post-Dunkirk period, before regressing back to his wonted criminality. Weale finds little nobility in much of his study's participants, but he examines their deeds fairly, soberly, and with an eye for the rather futile cause for which a few British soldiers risked so much, daring to place fighting the Soviets, making some money, avoiding jail, or simply acting out of fear while trying to align their loyalty to Britain with their assistance to the Reich.
5 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A well-told and overlooked story of venality and stupidity,
By
This review is from: Renegades (Hardcover)
This book tells the story of those few Englishmen who served the cause of Nazi Germany in the Second World War. I know of no other account of these shamed and shameful men (and one or two women); it is a little-known story, and Weale - who has done much research in the Public Records Office on matters of national security - tells it well. (I should add that, while the only edition of the book that appears on the Amazon web site is the original 1994 edition, a new and revised edition has lately been published in Great Britain, and is available from Amazon's UK site.)The book begins with a useful historical account of the development of British Fascism, which was led by the former Labour Cabinet minister (and, before that, Conservative MP) Sir Oswald Mosley - sometimes thought to have been an economic visionary and great orator, but in fact a silly and unintelligent man with thuggish tendencies. It then discusses individual cases of Britons who served the Nazi cause, either as propagandists (notably William Joyce, who broadcast defeatist propaganda under the title 'Lord Haw-Haw') or as soldiers under the specifically British division of the SS, the Free Corps. Apart from Joyce, who was a ferocious and bitter anti-Semite, many of the men depicted appear more pathetic than sinister. This judgement especially applies to the dull and untalented POWs who turned to the Nazi cause but were in fact despised by their masters as much as they were reviled at home. The most perplexing case is of a scoundrel and waster called John Amery, who, extraordinarily, was the prodigal son of a British Cabinet Minister (an impeccable patriot and supporter of Churchill) Leo Amery. John Amery clearly never got a grip in life, and lived in a haze of debauchery and drug abuse, constantly hounded by creditors. Yet Weale makes it clear that no sympathy should be extended to these traitors. He tells of one young Englishman, Thomas Cooper, who was trapped in Germany as war was declared, had never travelled far from home, and who joined and stayed with the SS believing the alternative would have been a concentration camp. Yet there is clear and chilling circumstantial evidence that Cooper committed atrocities against Jews and even boasted about his actions. The close of the book tells of the inevitable fate of these malcontents. Joyce and Amery were hanged as traitors, while others - among them a disgusting man called Eric Pleasants - continued to live out their days. The finale gives the reader an uneasy feeling. Amery was a traitor, but he was clearly mentally unfit to stand trial and should not have been hanged. The British traitors - even Joyce, who was too hardened a Nazi to be effective as a propagandist - were too incompetent and too few in number to do much damage to our side in the War. British Fascism was never such a threat to the war effort as were, say, pro-German isolationists in the US, who acted as a lobby against US entry into the war. But these men betrayed their country, a liberal democracy, and served the cause of evil; they were accessories to the most vile regime in recorded history. Their pathos should not overshadow their support for that cause. Weale gives an important, indeed unparalleled, account of this aspect of Britain's war, with extensive research and much detail.
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