Today, standing at last at his final resting place, surrounded by ex-prime ministers and national heroes in an isolated cemetery on the outskirts of Moscow, with two perfect strangers looming behind me, Im once again reminded of quite how different he was. I feel as if I have been through some form of therapy, Ive purged these questions in a way. His eldest son was my father, John - who was himself a 19-year-old art student in 1963 when he first learnt of Kim's espionage; stepping off a ferry on the Isle of Wight, he was met by a billboard stating that Kim was a wanted man. He and Pukhova married in 1971, when he was 59 and she was 38. Halfway there, they switched cars and drove to a small airport in the Soviet zone of Austria. For some, details like this have fuelled the question of whether arriving for the first time ever in the country for which hed sacrificed everything, which was supposed to represent everything hed fought for, and where he would live out the rest of his days in exile he became disillusioned and embittered, and longed instead for the land hed betrayed. Aileen died in 1957, when Tommy was just 11 years old; his contact with his father was cut off as soon as the double spy defected to the USSR in January 1963. Its my third day in Russia. The KGB's only object in the world is to destroy me and the agency. We searched every corner until Kim suddenly struck himself on the head with his hand, went to a cupboard and brought back the boot. They lived together for three years, until a younger woman caught the philandering Philbys eye. While working as a senior member of British intelligence, he spied on behalf of the Soviet KGB and NKVD from the early 1930s until 1963, when he defected to Moscow. In her article, published yesterday in British daily The Independent, she describes Kim Philby as a proud man, and one who chose to publicly stand by his actions. The pair returned to England in May and, by this point already an appointed Soviet agent, Kim found work as a foreign correspondent. that Philby, with his Communist views in Vienna and his Austrian Communist wife, had been recruited for SIS and had sailed through its vetting procedures?. Prince Harry drops 45 points and Meghan Markle 36 points in just over a month in US public opinion poll Sadiq Khan faces furious backlash over plans for biggest transport and council tax rises in a decade as James Martin warns This Morning viewers why they should NEVER store their eggs in the fridge. Edith and Kim by Charlotte Philby is published by HarperCollins (14.99). One can hardly overlook the irony of a man who so resolutely betrayed his country, surrounding himself in his Soviet apartment with British condiments, newspapers and light-hearted English classics. There are two more mobile-phone shops inside the post-office building, and on the steps, a babushka swathed in heavy furs and surrounded by plastic bags counts out a handful of pennies. Im reminded of a brief phone conversation I had earlier this morning with one of Kims old KGB comrades, whom Id been in contact with during the course of my research for this article, who told me that a gang of five or six of Kims former colleagues still meet up every month and raise a toast in his honour. So, too, have I seen images of his cold body decorated with medals in an open coffin, armed guards at either side, as the lavish funeral procession made its way through Kuntsevo Cemetery to this very spot. But as the author Graham Greene my grandfathers close friend and a fellow British intelligence officer, who worked under him at MI6 wrote in the introduction to Kims autobiography, My Silent War: The end, of course, in his eyes is held to justify the means, but this is a view taken, perhaps less openly, by most men involved in politics, if we are to judge them by their actions, whether the politician be a Disraeli or a Wilson. 58. He was able to order new books from Bowes & Bowes bookshop in Cambridge, who checked with MI5 whether they should be supplying him. Just beyond the crossroads which dominates Pushkin Square the spot where its said dissidents would meet, acknowledging each other by removing their hats is the former site of the Hotel Minsk (like much of the city, now under a lengthy reconstruction process), where Kim first met the journalist Murray Sayle in 1967. With his brilliant mind and First from Cambridge, Maclean could bask in being the superior intellect to an under-educated, attractive woman who was both affectionate and popular, where he was withdrawn, giving nothing of himself away. In this article for The Independent Magazine, I returned to Moscow to discover the truth about my grandfather, the infamous Third Man. When I asked my dad, shortly before he died late last year, how hed felt about his own fathers betrayal, he told me exactly what Kim had told Sayle during that interview in 1963: To betray, you must first belong. And as Kim said himself: I never belonged. My dad always had great respect for my grandfather; he told me that even when he was a child, he always knew he was up to something he just didnt know what. Takes charge of British intelligence in Spain and Portugal. Lets have another drink on it, old man. Good old Kim. I would like to have drawn Bennett further on his comments, but unfortunately, when I contacted his agent to request a meeting, my invitation was declined. I love those images of him as a real person; for me, thats where the clues as to who he really was can be found. Many of the street names have changed since the collapse of the Soviet Union. And in 1951, as his spying activities unravelled and his Soviet masters told him to defect, she agreed the best course of action was for him to be ex-filtrated rather than try to brazen out the accusations of treachery that were soon to be levelled at him. Image: Barney Beech, Kim's graveside, at Kuntsovo Cemetry. Her mood changed, though, with Stalins death in March 1953 and the prospect that the Soviet Union might now become a more open place. It is an old-fashioned home, not like the homes of new Russia, where everything is modern and imported. She cannot imagine what Kim would have made of this new world, where a minority have benefited so enormously while many outside the capital, the vast majority live in abject poverty with little support from the state. When you look at the way Edith is referred to in the [security services] files as that foreign woman, I wonder whether theres a sense of embarrassment too. He feared that she would dump him because he was just a boring official in the British diplomatic service so to make myself look better and more important, I told her the reason why I led such a life. 1949Made SIS representative in Washington. Harold Adrian Russell "Kim" Philby (1 January 1912 - 11 May 1988) was a British intelligence officer who worked as a spy for the Soviet Union, before defecting in 1963. 1941Transferred to SIS Iberian sub-section. That was my dad leaving to go to Kims funeral [in 1988] and we were hounded by paparazzi. Inside he wrote: Herewith a few extracts from our bible. The kitchen where he would ritualistically make his daily breakfast of bacon, eggs and toast (another English habit he never broke), and spent hours cooking every evening, is now rich with the smell of the savoury pancakes Rufa is preparing for our five-hour feast. According to a recent piece in the Daily Telegraph: For years Philby had sabotaged Allied missions behind the Iron Curtain and had calculatedly sent dozens of agents to their deaths. Most famously, he was almost certainly responsible for the tip-off which led to the deaths of the first British-sponsored Albanians who parachuted in to remove Enver Hoxhas Communist regime. But that didnt mean the ideal itself was corrupt or not worth pursuing. What are you writing next?After publishing four novels in four years, Im taking more time to write the next one. Did you feel that as you uncovered her story?I feel a huge amount of sympathy for her situation, and admiration, really. Image: Barney Beech, A Sunday Times best book of the year, here is Edith and Kim in review - and where to find signed first editions, An interview with Stephanie Merritt about Edith and Kim, the perils of writing about family, and why female spies often get overlooked, From a compendium of stories about life at the Bauhaus to a Modernist memoir by the founder of the iconic Isokon, here are some of the books that inspired my forthcoming novel, For the Telegraph, I wrote about the woman who recruited my grandfather to the Soviets - the subject of my forthcoming novel Edith and Kim, My tribute to the late - and truly great - master of spy fiction, for the i paper, From a celebration of the life of John le Carr at Cheltenham to an exploration of women and crime in Chiswick, please join me at one of the following events, across the country (and the internet!). ", His habit was fuelled by his sorrow over what he saw around him, she added. But I dont think my grandfather ever questioned a single decision he made. He sounded in good health and expressed the strong hope that she would join him in. After five years of silence, communications were re-established with family and friends. The comments below have not been moderated. There are so many ways that Kims choices have continued to occupy my mind since my dad died in 2009, but I do feel that this book draws a line under it. Doubtless Jeremiah faced similar problems.. Fergus announced to some children with whom he was playing that My Daddy wants to stop all wars. And perhaps he felt that he certainly resented having to be escorted pretty much wherever he went for his first years in Moscow, as Rufa attests. Given a heros burial in Moscows Kuntsevo Cemetery. Im conscious that his story belongs to different people in different ways, within our family and also more widely. But it wasnt true. . He got himself a job teaching English in a school. The two men in the front seat my guards of honour peer out in silence, squinting their eyes against the sunlight as it pours in through the canopy of trees above. Macleans study resembled that of a Cambridge professor, with copies of Trollope, biographies of Gladstone and airmail editions of The Times. Charlotte Philby. Photograph: Daily Mail/Rex Features, MI5missed early chance to expose Soviet agent Kim Philby, files reveal, Charlotte Philby: We visited Kim in Moscow, Love and Deception: Philby in Beirut by James Hanning review the spy who loved, maybe, ASplinter of Ice review Graham Greene and Kim Philby clink glasses, Graham Greenes showdown with Soviet spy Kim Philby: A Splinter of Ice review, KimPhilby: new revelations about spy emerge in secret files, George Blake exemplified the desolation, waste and treachery of the cold war, Moscow names square after British double agent Kim Philby, Athriller of spies and betrayal: by Kim Philbys granddaughter. In her article, published yesterday in British daily The Independent, she describes Kim Philby as "a proud man, and one who chose to publicly stand by his actions". Melinda returned to Donald, but two years later moved to her own apartment. The gang of British spies who ended up in Moscow in the 1950s and 1960s were employed in KGB training schools and international research institutes. Here, surrounded by an extensive library, he would sit for hours. Kim Philby and Nicholas Elliott. Little Donald said perhaps he had gone to India because that would be a good place to hide., Donald Maclean with his wife Melinda Marling and his two sons Ronald and Fergus in the 50s, Wanted pictures are posted at a Berlin checkpoint for Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess, Guy Burgess (pictured) did not cope well to life in the Soviet Union - he got drunk and roamed Kuybyshev looking for action, on one occasion having his teeth knocked out in a brawl. 1951Tips off fellow Cambridge Spy Donald Maclean that a warrant has been issued for his arrest. Kim Philby, byname of Harold Adrian Russell Philby, (born January 1, 1912, Ambala, Indiadied May 11, 1988, Moscow, Russia, U.S.S.R.), British intelligence officer until 1951 and the most successful Soviet double agent of the Cold War period. He achieved the deception by employing his occasional stutter, so as to buy himself time to think before telling another bare-faced lie. When Burgess and Maclean fled to Moscow, avoiding capture, Kim was the chief suspect for having given them the heads-up. Over the years he did everything that was asked of him: he gave everything he had to the cause, and yet still Moscow was deeply suspicious of a man who has been described as their finest and most loyal servant. He did all he could do for a cause he believed in: what was there to regret? The spy novelist, whose latest book tells the story of her grandfather Kim Philby and the Soviet agent Edith Tudor-Hart, talks about the perils of writing about family, and why female spies get overlooked. Then, with no more information to be had, the story of the Macleans went dead. Heavy blankets of snow have settled across the plains of Moscow, and either side of our track, the ground is a brilliant white. 1988Dies 11 May at the age of 76. Pukhova said he was a "special" and principled man. Although she would be left pitied, even censured, and alone in a country in which she had spent barely one-tenth of her life, it might be better that he should be free to live a new life in Moscow than spend a decade behind bars. Kim Philby drank while Guy Burgess, who was gay, missed his friends in London, including Anthony Blunt whose spying activities, though known to the government, were kept under wraps until they. He went on to serve the KGB for 54 years. They gave a lot of parties. Kim even duped his own children, and left them behind when he fled to Moscow. To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Debt-ridden couple killed their dog and then shot themselves dead with shotgun on the day they were due to Rishi Sunak says he is 'ensuring the safety of women and children' by blocking Scottish gender law as SNP Let them eat cake! References. 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