Stewart Menzies

Stewart Menzies was born in 1890. Educated at Eton he served in the Grenadier Guards during the First World War and won the Military Cross. He also became a member of the staff of Sir Douglas Haig and worked in the counter-intelligence division at Montreuil. After the war he was appointed as head of the military division of MI6.

It was later claimed that Menzies and other MI6 officers attempting the bring down the Labour Government in 1924. Menzies eventually served as deputy to Hugh Sinclair.

In July 1939 Menzies went to Warsaw to supervise the capture of the Enigma coding device. On his return to Britain he became the Director General of MI6.

During the Second World War Menzies attempted to persuade Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the head of Abwehr, the German Secret Service, to become a British agent. This strategy was unsuccessful.

In 1953 Major-General John Sinclair, a former Director of Military Intelligence, replaced Menzies as Director-General of MI6.

Sir Stewart Menzies died in 1968.

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