Chapter 10: The Journey Home

The trip to the coast from Brussels was most boring; the escort consisted of two elderly Wehrmacht soldiers who were not inclined to talk, and seemed to resent being made to chauffer him. It was noticeable that he had no additional escort, and Tony was fairly sure that the Governor himself had been rather remiss in not providing a stronger escort for him, and if anything happened to him someone he would surely pay for it knowing the Nazi hierarchy.

They were just outside Bruges, on a lonely country road when the car came to a sudden stop, ostensibly for a hay wagon which had lost a wheel, and was blocking the road. The two escorts got out protesting vehemently to the farmer, with a lot of shouting, and waving of arms, when suddenly, they were overpowered by about five men. The car door was opened, and Tony was roughly dragged out, blindfolded, gagged and his hands bound. He felt himself being tossed into the back of a truck of some kind, and covered with hay. It seemed about three hours later, that he was hauled out the truck, and allowed to fall on the ground. He was forced into some sort of building, and his blindfold was taken off. It was a farmhouse kitchen. He looked up to see himself surrounded by a number of rough looking men, obviously partisans and three women who were armed with an assortment of weapons.

The men there were arguing about what to do with him, in a mixture of Flemish and French. It seemed to Tony, that it was a debate whether to hang him or shoot him. Tony was able to understand the conversation, and politely interrupted in French and said "I am not a traitor I was sent for a specific task from the UK but the operation was cancelled just after we got here. He told them that Janine herself would vouch for him.

Only one person there seemed to know of Janine, and while a significant number of the partisans wanted to take no notice and execute him Tony interrupted their talk, and asked quietly in French.

"Can I speak to your leader alone please?" There was a large amount of shouting and protests, but eventually he was left with a middle aged woman.

"Are you the group leader." he asked.

She said that she was. He explained briefly that he needed to get to England as soon as possible. She laughed and Tony could see that she was not convinced. He had to take a chance so he said.

"Will you take what I have to say in total and absolute confidence?"

"Of course, you are to be executed anyway, so talk while you can."

Tony then explained his mission in detail missing very little out, while she sat and listened. Fortunately, he could remember the name of the leader of the group, who had picked them up from the Lysander drop, and he mentioned Janine and Anne- Marie. Halfway through, she got up, and gave Tony a glass of water, which was encouraging. After a drink she let him continue.

When Tony had finished, she left the room, and he could hear talking in the next room. After about two hours the door opened and Janine came in, she rushed over to him, and undid his bonds and they embraced. She turned to the on looking partisans. "My friend's thank you, today you have made a wonderful capture. We have to get Commander Nash back to England as soon as possible."

The relief Tony felt, was probably one of the best feelings he had felt for a long time. Janine and Tony spent the next two days almost joined at the hip. ^Tony wanted Janine to go back to England with him, but her parents would not hear of it, but having got Tony's address in England her parents agreed that after the war they would allow Janine to visit him. They just wanted to be with each other so much. She told him that she had seen him in Brussels, and that they had set up an ambush to capture him, on the main road to Oostende, but it had failed as his drivers had taken a back road, and it was just good fortune that this group had managed to capture him. They had killed both his two escorts, and taken their uniforms and side arms.

He was quizzed about his trip to Burchesgarten and Hitler by the group. He answered as honestly as he could about everything he had seen there. Janine was a bit cynical, about his explanation of his betrothal to Elizabeth. He told her that he had taken the opportunity as it arose, but he had to admit that he did have some feelings for Elizabeth at first as he thought that basically she was quite a nice woman.

The next evening, now in civilian clothes, he was taken to a field some 20 Kilometers' away, to await his pick up. It was about 11.30 at night when the Lysander came into land. It turned round into the wind ready to take off without stopping. The plane had barely come to a halt when two ladies jumped out, and some packages were tossed out on to the grass, and he was halfway through the open door when there was a burst of firing. Tony was hit in both legs, but a pair of strong hands hastily dragged him into the plane, as the plane started its run to take off ... His presence took the crew by surprise, he as instantly recognized, as his photograph had been well publicized in the press, but his explanation was weak, as he told them his defection was a sham, and he had been on a secret mission. It was partially accepted and the fact that they half believed his story of being a double agent, it seemed to them to be partially credible. It was obvious that his name had been vilified in the popular press, and Lord Haw-Haw had made the most of his defection on his daily radio broadcasts.

As he talked, the co-pilot had been attending to his wounds and had managed to stop the bleeding. On landing at an airfield in the south of England, he was met by two military policemen and escorted to the base hospital. He was handcuffed to the bed in a secure room and had a guard of two military policemen.

After a few hours an intelligence officer visited him, and Tony asked him to contact Mr. Broughton, at the Admiralty, and or Captain S/M at Portsmouth, who would vouch for his identity, and confirm the operation that he had been assigned. He was however, kept under lock and key, for another 24 hours until Mr. Broughton arrived, together with the Staff Officer Submarines from the Submarine Base at Portsmouth...

The following day, he was transferred to a secure military hospital near Gloucester. It was in a large park in a facility normally reserved for VIP's. He was kept in a single room, and all his uniforms and personal possessions were returned to him, and he noted that all his uniforms had now been altered, and now had the three wide rings of a full Commander. Tony went through three days of intensive de-briefing, with officers from the various branches of the intelligence service.

However, he did refuse to tell them the purpose of his mission, insisting that they got the details direct from the Admiralty if they needed to know. Tony was well aware that if the Germans knew what his mission was, and that it had been cancelled they would guess that somehow Britain had got the codes they needed, and that could be disastrous.

Tony's cousin Jean visited him at the hospital. The news that he had defected, had been a terrible shock to her, and she was so relieved that he was not the traitor everyone believed him to be. She told him that she too had been vilified by a number of newspapers, and people as she was related to him, and many narrow minded people regarded her as a traitor as well. No-one from the admiralty had in any way done anything to alleviate her anxiety.

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