THREAD

Sit down and get ready for a 1920s tale of spies, cash, invisible ink and 2 young French women, one named 'Mademoiselle foxtrot' who smuggled secrets from French military installations in her corsets and a Jewish boy from Poland called #WolfieFisher

Around 20 years ago my great great uncle Jack passed away, before he died he wrote a family history detailing my family on my mother's side, according to him my Great Grandfather Harry had a cousin called #Wolfie who came from Poland to live with him and his family in 1914

According to Jack Wolfie enlisted into the @BritishArmy on arrival in England and he only met him for the first time in 1919 when he was on leave (Jack was born in 1911)

Wolfie doesn't appear again in the family history until 1927 when Jack writes...

You have to understand I was 19 & desperate to join the @IDF to go on an adventure of my own.

My heroes were my Dad and my Grandpa, one sold pensions and the other was a captain of the rag trade.

To find out I had an actual James Bondstein in the family was a revelation!

So while at uni I spent hours at Manchester Central Library scanning through microfiche trying, failing, to find the story uncle Jack had written about.

I went back to it every now and then to try and find bits and pieces and I did come up with some things over the years...

Through the @UkNatArchives I found a Wolf Fisher who enlisted in the @BritishArmy in 1914 to the Middlesex Reg and then into the #Intelligence Corps

He had been awarded the #MilitaryMedal for bravery in combat and can be found in the London Gazette and in something called the British Jewry Book of Honour, now Sergeant Fisher with the same ID number 7957 as given in archive documents https://www.jewsfww.uk/media-centre.php

In 1920 a Wolf Fisher became a naturalised British citizen (I think he'd earned it).

But all the research was undermined by nagging doubt that I'd really found the right guy. There are plenty of W Fishers and Wolf Fishers and Woolf Fishers how could I be sure that the one I was following was the right one?

Today I registered to @findmypast and gained access to a massive media archive where I FINALLY found the article Uncle Jack had been talking about in the family history.

Actually loads of articles in a whole range of publications including in the USA

. @WolfieFisher was a member of a three person unit assigned to collect information about French technology, they used two girls to do it, one a dancer the other a parachutist.

There was Fisher, Phillips and John Leather

Once I found all the names I looked up his co-conspirators and found this photo of them on @Shutterstock

An article in the Press claims Fisher had been a member of the Intelligence Corps while in the Army.

Fisher is last on the right

Officially Great Britain denied everything (read on to see the WWI exploits of one of his colleagues Ernest Phillips a regular action man by this account)

So my Mum went looking through old photos today and came up with this one. He was said to be 30 at his trial I think that's a younger version of Wolfie standing behind my great grandma Jenny who's in white

They were given up by Marthe Moreuil who said she'd been tasked with gaining info on "hydroplanes & aeroplane carriers, the design of aeroplane rotors and the facilities for construction and housing...at Brest Litovsk" she had "communicated in letters written in invisible ink"

Fisher & Phillips got two years and 2,000 franc fines with Leather, considered the ringleader, getting 3 years and a 3,000 franc fine. The women received 6 months (time served)

Uncle Jack takes up the tale; after #WolfieFisher was released he was deported to Dover, Jack and my great great grandpa Max picked him up & brought him home.

A retired Maj General took interest in 'William' and saw to it he received £5,000 on condition he went to Canada

Jack writes that the General was Lord Leverhulme of Lever brothers. There's no record of him being involved with the military much less SIS, but I suppose there wouldn't be.

On the way to the boat Wolfie told them he didn't expect to make it to Canada alive. But he did...

What happened to him afterwards is still being researched. I'll let you know as soon as I figure it out.

@stephenpollard @ShirazMaher @lowles_nick @KarenPollock100 @Claud_Mendoza @adamlevick @mishtal you might enjoy this thread