Professor Andrade

The last to join us, and then only as an attachment who came in to sit with us for a few hours two or three times a week, was Professor H.A. de C Andrade - known to us, at his request, as 'Percy'. Johnny had asked for a scientific adviser and the powers that be had done him proud, as Percy was the President of the Royal Society.

But here again, in an even more marked manner, Johnny displayed his illogical distrust of civilians. He ordained that none of us was to give the Prof any information whatever about future operations.

This was a minor tragedy because, unlike 'The Ambassador', Percy was willing and eager to give his fine brain to helping us further our designs. I soon found that his knowledge of Germany and the psychology of the Germans was encyclopaedic. He knew more about the mentality of the enemy and what they were likely to do than all the rest of us put together. Moreover, although he was only consulted on such matters as gas and bacteriological warfare and, later, about the prospects of producing a nuclear bomb, he was constantly suggesting ideas as to how we could mislead and mystify the enemy in ordinary military matters.

His moods were unpredictable, and he would frequently discourse on subjects that were far above our heads; assuming them even semi-educated people such as us would understand what he was talking about. But it was a great pity that we did not make more use of him.

This then made up the nine of us who, in the later years of the war, succeeded time after time in fooling Hitler and the German General Staff.

Source: DW's unpublished Memoirs, slightly adapted for 'The Deception Planners' p 132.