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List of Allied traitors during World War II

(Redirected from Walter Purdy)

The following is an incomplete list of people from Allied countries suspected of treachery or treason during World War II. It is not a list of Nazi war criminals.

Canada edit

New Zealand edit

Soviet Union edit

United Kingdom edit

  • John Amery - Civilian - Guilty of treason, executed on 19 December 1945
  • George Johnson Armstrong - Civilian - Guilty of treachery, executed on 10 July 1941
  • Norman Baillie-Stewart - Civilian - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to five years in prison.
  • Kenneth Berry - Member of Waffen-SS British Free Corps - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to nine months of hard labour.
  • James Brady - Member of Waffen-SS - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment.
  • William Brittain - Member of Waffen-SS British Free Corps - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to ten years imprisonment but released for ill health after two months.
  • Harold Cole - Soldier - A con man, thief and deserter who betrayed escaped airmen and French Resistance members to the Gestapo - killed by French police in 1946.[3]
  • Thomas Haller Cooper - member of Waffen-SS - Guilty of treason, sentence of death was commuted to life imprisonment - released in 1953
  • Raymond Davies Hughes - RAF airman - Informer at Dulag Luft POW camp and Nazi propagandist - Guilty of aiding the enemy, five-year prison sentenced reduced to two years
  • Philip Jackson - Soldier - Offered to guide German bombers to targets in Britain - Guilty of treachery, sentenced to death but on appeal the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
  • Oswald John Job - Civilian - London-born son of German parents - "may well have been an informer" within St Denis internment camp[4]- Guilty of treachery, executed on 16 March 1944.[5]
  • William Joyce - Civilian - American-born with Irish ancestry. The Attorney General, Sir Hartley Shawcross, successfully argued that Joyce's possession of a British passport, even though he had misstated his nationality to get it, entitled him until it expired to British diplomatic protection in Germany, and therefore he owed allegiance to the King at the time he commenced working for the Germans. Guilty of treason, executed on 3 January 1946. Nicknamed "Lord Haw-Haw."
  • Frank McLardy - Member of Waffen-SS British Free Corps - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to life imprisonment but released 1953.
  • Alfred Minchin - Member of Waffen-SS British Free Corps - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to seven years hard labour.
  • Dorothy O'Grady - Civilian - Guilty of treachery, sentenced to death but on appeal the sentence was commuted to 14 years’ penal servitude.
  • Eric Pleasants - Member of Waffen-SS British Free Corps - Imprisoned by Soviet Union until 1954.
  • Roy Walter Purdy - Merchant Navy officer,[6] propaganda broadcaster and informer at Colditz - guilty of treason - reports of his prosecution and trial in The Times available at [7][8][9][10][11][12][13] "reprieved on the grounds that [he] had been [a follower] in treason rather than [a leader] ... released from prison ... in December 1954... went to live with his ‘wife’ and child in Germany"[14] - died in 1982. An alternative version is that 'Instead of trying to trace his German wife Margarete and his son, Purdy married his childhood sweetheart, never revealing his childhood past to his wife. For many years he worked as a quality control inspector in an Essex car factory. He died from lung cancer in 1982.[15] A third version is that 'Walter Purdy was released from jail in 1954. He had a child called Stephan by a woman called Margaret Weitemeir born near Ravensbruck on 5 April 1945. Purdy planned to return to her but this never happened. He married his childhood sweetheart called Muriel in 1957 but she soon died. He married another lady in about 1960 and had a son. Walter Purdy died in Southend in 1982.[16][a]
  • Theodore Schurch - Soldier - Guilty of treachery, executed on 4 January 1946
  • Duncan Scott-Ford - Merchant seaman - Guilty of treachery, executed on 3 November 1942
  • Irma Stapleton - Civilian - Stole experimental munitions and attempted to sell them to a German agent, who was really an MI5 agent in disguise - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to ten years imprisonment.[18]
  • Henry Alfred Symonds - Member of Waffen-SS British Free Corps - Guilty of aiding the enemy, sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment

Gibraltar (UK Crown Dependency) edit

  • Jose Estelle Key - Civilian - Guilty of treachery, executed on 7 July 1942 at Wandsworth Prison, London, England[19]
  • Alphonse Timmerman - Civilian - Guilty of treachery, executed on 7 July 1942 at Wandsworth Prison, London, England[19]

Czech Republic (British Special Operations Executive operation) edit

  • Karel Čurda - Soldier - Guilty of treachery, executed on 29 April 1947. Betrayer of the Anglo-Czechoslovak army agents responsible for the assassination of top Nazi official Reinhard Heydrich in Prague.[20]

British India (Crown Colony) edit

Occupied France (British Special Operations Executive operation) edit

  • Henri Déricourt (allegedly) - Accused double agent, may have betrayed the Prosper spy network to the Germans - Not guilty, died a free man in 1962

United States edit

Notes and references edit

Notes edit

  1. ^ The National Archives holds a Foreign Office file relating to a request for assistance in obtaining travel documents to enter the Federal Republic of Germany under reference FO 371/109708, Security Service files on him under references KV 2/259 to KV 2/261, a Home Office file on him under reference HO 45/25798 and a file about his pardon under reference CRIM 1/585/141[17]

References edit

  1. ^ a b Weale, Adrian (2014-11-12). Renegades (Kindle Location 3370). Random House. Kindle Edition.
  2. ^ "15 Years' Sentence: Courlander Arrives in Dominion". paperspast.natlib.govt.nz. Evening Star. 21 December 1945. Retrieved 13 January 2022.
  3. ^ "Albert Guerisse (Pat O'Leary)". www.rafinfo.org.uk. Retrieved 17 July 2021.
  4. ^ Adrian Weale. Renegades: Hitler's Englishmen. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2nd edition, 2014
  5. ^ Sean Murphy. Letting the Side Down: British Traitors of the Second World War, PP45-8; London: The History Press Ltd, 2005. ISBN 0-7509-4176-6
  6. ^ Weale, Adrian (2014-11-12). Renegades (Kindle Location 1886). Random House. Kindle Edition
  7. ^ "High Treason Charge." Times, London, England, 18 Oct. 1945: 2. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  8. ^ "Aiding Enemy Charges." Times, London, England, 2 Nov. 1945: 2. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  9. ^ "Alleged work for Germans." Times, London, England, 21 Nov. 1945: 2. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  10. ^ "Engineer Sentenced To Death For Treason." Times, London, England, 22 Dec. 1945: 2. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  11. ^ "Traitors Tried." Times, London, England, 2 Jan. 1946: 10. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  12. ^ "News in Brief." Times, London, England, 28 Jan. 1946: 2. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  13. ^ "News in Brief." Times, London, England, 7 Feb. 1946: 2. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 14 May 2015.
  14. ^ Weale, Adrian (2014-11-12). Renegades (Kindle Location 3356-3358). Random House. Kindle Edition
  15. ^ Sean Murphy. Letting the Side Down: British Traitors of the Second World War, PP215-6; London: The History Press Ltd, 2005. ISBN 0-7509-4176-6
  16. ^ British Military & Criminal History 1900 to 1999
  17. ^ The Trial of William Joyce, P 188
  18. ^ "Irma Sophie Gertrude STAPLETON". The National Archives.
  19. ^ a b "1939-45 Espionage". The History Room.
  20. ^ "The Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich", holocaustresearchproject.org; accessed 13 May 2018.
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