7/1/2023 0 Comments Donald macclean![]() In autumn 1949 Burgess visited Gibraltar and Tangiers. Living double lives clearly took its toll, and the period before their defections saw major indiscretions from both Burgess and Maclean. The files paint a rather mixed picture of Burgess, perhaps summed up best by senior Foreign Office figure Gladwyn Jebb’s comment that ‘my general impression was that Burgess was undoubtedly brilliant, and indeed attractive, but he gave me, I confess, a most uneasy feeling’ ( FCO 158/182).Įvelyn Mary Bassett, Guy Burgess’ mother (catalogue reference: KV 2/4116) A friend noted even after Maclean’s defection that they did not believe he could be a communist spy and instead viewed him as a ‘wooly Liberal’ ( FCO 158/186).īurgess was a very different character and the files give considerable insight into his career, including his time working for SOE and his recruitment as an MI6 agent by none other than Anthony Blunt, another of the Cambridge Five ( KV 2/4101). He is, too, nice looking and ought, we thinking to be a success in Paris from the social as well as the work point of view’. Maclean was in many ways the archetypal career diplomat, and in 1938 a senior figure observed on his appointment to the British Embassy in France that, ‘He is a very nice individual indeed and has plenty of brains and keenness. Interviews with friends and colleagues after Burgess and Maclean’s defection in 1951 provide accounts of two very different men, but no one suspected either of being a Soviet spy. The files released today give a good idea of how they managed this extraordinary feat. For almost two decades these men moved unsuspected in the highest circles of the British diplomatic and intelligence world, while at the same time feeding back thousands of pages of top secret documents to their handlers in Moscow. Burgess had a more colourful career, working for a right-wing MP, the Secret Operations Executive (SOE), and the BBC before also ending up in the Foreign Office. Maclean passed the Foreign Office exam with flying colours and was thought to be one of the most promising young diplomats throughout the 1930s and 1940s. ![]() From these humble beginnings the legendary Cambridge Five spy ring was born.Īfter leaving Cambridge, both Burgess and Maclean disassociated themselves with their communist past and quickly built careers at the heart of the British establishment. ![]() Two years later Philby was recruited by the Soviet intelligence officer Arnold Deutsch and proceeded to supply Deutsch with further candidates for recruitment, among them Maclean and Burgess. It was here that Philby met fellow travellers Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess. The story began at the rather innocuously named Cambridge University Socialist Society, where Harold ‘Kim’ Philby was elected Junior Treasurer on 9 March 1932. Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean (catalogue reference: FCO 158/6) ![]()
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