The Bentley Blog

 

Sir William Samuel Stephenson CC MC DFC was a Canadian soldier and spymaster. In WWI he was a fighter pilot in the Royal Flying Corps, bringing down 12 German aircraft. Shot down and captured on a mission, Stephenson managed to escape in October 1918. By the end of World War I, he had already earned the Military Cross and the Distinguished Flying Cross. After the war ended, Stephenson became an entrepreneur and inventor of communications equipment, but he grew concerned about the growing power of Nazi Germany. He was the senior representative of the British Security Coordination (BSC) for the Western Allies during World War II and is best known by his wartime intelligence code name, Intrepid. As head of the BSC, Stephenson handed British scientific secrets over to Roosevelt and relayed American secrets back to Churchill. 

In 1940 Churchill sent Stephenson to the United States to covertly establish and run BSC in New York City. It was registered by the State Department as a foreign entity and operated out of Room 3603 at Rockefeller Center. It was officially known as the British Passport Control Office and also acted as the administrative headquarters for MI6. 

BSC directly affected wartime covert intelligence and propaganda efforts across the entire South American continent. This is how, in Furniture Sliders, a fictionalized Stephenson came across Alicia Rayes (Artemis) and recruited her. One of Stephenson’s real major achievements for the war effort was setting up Camp X. This was the unofficial name of the secret Special Training School No. 103, a Second World War paramilitary installation for training covert agents in the methods required for success in clandestine operations. This is where the fictionalized Stephenson sent Alicia Rayes for her training. 

For his extraordinary service to the war effort, he was made a Knight Bachelor by King George VI in the 1945 New Year Honors. In recommending Stephenson for the knighthood, Winston Churchill wrote: "This one is dear to my heart."

In November 1946 Stephenson received the Medal for Merit from President Harry S. Truman, at that time the highest U.S. civilian award. He was the first non-American to be so honored. OSS chief General Donovan presented the medal with the citation paying tribute to Stephenson's "valuable assistance to America in the fields of intelligence and special operations".

Many people consider Stephenson to be one of the real-life inspirations for James Bond. Ian Fleming himself once wrote, "James Bond is a highly romanticized version of a true spy. The real thing is... William Stephenson."