Italian espionage & Malta (KV 2/2869; KV 3/352-365; KV 4/432-434)
Italian espionage and Malta (KV 2/2869; KV 3/352-365; KV 4/432-434)
This release contains five folders of correspondence and a further nine supplementary volumes of original intelligence source material relating to Italian espionage in Malta in the run-up to the Second World War.
KV 3/352-356 (1935-1945) contain the original correspondence between the Defence Security Officer (DSO) in Malta and the Security Service, covering the espionage activities of the Italian Consul and his staff, family and agents. It is clear from the first folio on KV 3/352 that the Italians in Malta were aware that their correspondence with Rome was being intercepted and deciphered (serial 145a). The DSO had other means to call on, including reports of private conversations of the Consul being obtained as MESSENGER reports. These show, for instance at serial 194a in the same file, how Consul Ferrante was using his children to undertake espionage activities.
The files contain numerous reports and memos on Italian espionage in the islands, and proposed counter-measures. KV 3/354 includes (serial 275a) a memorandum on the Italian Fascist Club in Valetta in 1936. Pieces KV 3/355-356 are in reconstituted format.
The supplementary files (KV 3/357-365, 1935-1940) contain the voluminous end product derived from coverage of the Italian consul's premises, which resulted in the expulsion of many Italians from Malta, the trials of others, and the departure of Consul Ferrante. As these MESSENGER reports include transcripts of recorded conversations, they cover many items of broader interest, such as the reactions of Italians to developments in the Ethiopian campaign (various files) and reactions to the Munich Crisis (KV 3/364).
Complementing the files on Italian espionage in Malta are the policy files relating to the British security organisation in Malta between the wars and through to 1943. These weeded files cover the practical arrangements for security and control on the islands.
KV 4/432 (1918-1934) shows how MI5 funding for Malta during the First World War was wound down, and then cut off altogether in March 1922 (there is minuting from Vernon Kell stressing the importance of saving the £20 monthly costs of continued support for the Malta Bureau). The file includes periodical reports on the security situation, and there is discussion in the minutes of the merits of carrying out informal exchanges of views with the Italian Consul General. This and the following files all contain organisational charts setting out the officers involved in Maltese security, some of them specifying whether the postholder was British or Maltese.
KV 4/433 (1934-1937) includes a detailed report drawn up for the governor by the Defence Security Office on security work in Malta, which discusses the cases of suspected Italian agents. There is similar material in KV 4/434 (1937-1943) showing the development of the security organisation in war time, and including in the minutes the development of plans for similar arrangements for Sicily after the allied invasion.
This release also includes the file on Princess Marina Dmitri Romanov, the white Russian émigrée whose husband worked in naval intelligence in London during the Second World War (KV 2/2869, 1940-1956). It had been claimed that she had been recruited as an Italian spy by Anna Wolkoff, but on investigation the Security Service decided there was no basis in this claim. The file contains detailed analysis of the Prince and Princess' contacts and social networks, including links to the British Royal Family, and sheds interesting light on the lifestyle of white Russian aristocracy in London during the war.
