On Tuesday, Great Britain’s National Archives released formerly top secret files. The documents came from UK military intelligence agency MI5. The files shed light on British spies in the 1930s—including one working right under Queen Elizabeth II’s royal nose.
Anthony Blunt was a distinguished Cambridge scholar, author, and art historian. He became a senior MI5 officer during World War II.
In 1945, he began working at Buckingham Palace as Surveyor of the King’s (and later the Queen’s) Pictures. His job was keeping the royal artwork clean and in good repair. Blunt held the position until 1972.
All the while, Blunt was spying for the Soviet Union. He passed along information that gave the Soviet Union an advantage over the Germans—and over France, the United States, and Great Britain.
Blunt was a member of the Cambridge Five. The group of spies, all educated at Cambridge, inspired myriad books, plays, movies, and TV shows.
For years, people suspected Blunt’s deception. But it wasn’t until 1964 that he admitted he had passed secrets to the Soviet Union’s KGB spy agency. In one newly released file, an MI5 officer notes that Blunt said he felt “profound relief” at confessing.
During his admission, Blunt named other spies. In return for the information, Blunt got to keep his job, his knighthood, and his social standing.
Officials decided not to tell the queen of Blunt’s betrayal. In 1972, her private secretary, Martin Charteris, told MI5 chief Michael Hanley that “the queen did not know.” Charteris could see “no advantage in telling her about it now; it would only add to her worries and there was nothing that could done about him.”
The government did tell the monarch in 1973. Blunt was ill at the time. Officials feared a media uproar if Blunt died. At that time, journalists would be able to publish stories without fear of lawsuits.
Charteris reported that the queen “took it all very calmly and without surprise.” She “remembered that he had been under suspicion way back” in the early 1950s.
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher publicly unmasked Blunt as a spy in November 1979. His knighthood was taken away. But he was never prosecuted. Blunt died in 1983 at the age of 75.
Files held by Great Britain’s secretive intelligence services usually remain classified for several decades. But today, the agencies are inching toward more openness. Some newly released documents will feature in a National Archives exhibition entitled “MI5: Official Secrets.” The display will open in London, England, later this year.
For nothing is hidden that will not be made manifest, nor is anything secret that will not be known and come to light. — Luke 8:17
