Alan Hugh Hillgarth
Alan Hugh Hillgarth OBE (born June 7, 1899 in London , † February 28, 1978 in Ballinderry , Tipperary , Ireland ) was British consul in the Balearic Islands during the Spanish Civil War .
Life
Hill Garth joined in 1911 as an officer in the Royal Navy and participated in the First World War in part. He then studied at the University of Cambridge . From 1919 to 1927 he did again in the Royal Navy service and gained the rank of Lieutenant Commander.
In 1929 he married Mary Sidney Katharine Almina and they settled in Spain.
In 1932 he acquired the Son Torrella estate in Santa Maria del Camí , became honorary consul in Palma and met Winston Churchill and Juan March .
When Francisco Franco's military coup began on July 19, 1936 , Hillgarth was out of the country and returned to Mallorca to organize the evacuation of British citizens.
From 1936 to 1939 he was first Vice-Consul and later Consul of the Balearic Islands and reported to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office on the situation in Mallorca. Following the coup's victory, Hillgarth played a vital role in the peaceful surrender of Menorca to Franco's troops, with some political refugees evacuated.
In 1939 Hillgarth was in the British Embassy in Madrid as a Naval Attaché under Hugh Bertie Campbell Pollard . With useful expenses he was able to convince about 30 high-ranking members of the Spanish military that Spain should not become a belligerent state in World War II . Franco had already sent the Blue Division to Leningrad. In May 1941, when the donations became apparent, there was a wave of resignations in the Francisco Franco regime. Among others, Ramón Serrano Súñer , José Enrique Varela and Antonio Aranda resigned. As Naval Attaché, Hillgarth coordinated the Naval Intelligence Division , the Secret Intelligence Service and the Special Operations Executive founded on July 22, 1940 . Hillgarth's representative duties included the burial of Operation Mincemeat's messenger .
Individual evidence
- ^ Josep Massot i Muntaner , El Cònsol Allan Hilgarth i les Illes Balears (1936–1939), Publicacions de l'Abadia de Montserrat
- ^ David Stafford : Roosevelt and Churchill. Men of Secrets. Little, Brown and Co., New York 1999. Pp. Xxiv, 359 p. After, La Nación , 7 de agosto de 1997, Churchill pagó sobornos para que España no entrara en guerra, Cien millones de dólares
- ^ Michael Alpert: Operaciones secretas inglesas en España durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Hillgarth era también responsable de sobornar a personajes importantes. Mientras tanto, el célebre armador y ex-contrabandista Juan March depositó importantes cantidades en la Swiss Bank Corporation de Nueva York, cuya finalidad era alentar el entusiasmo aliadófilo de ciertos generales ^ °. Para noviembre de 1940 the Foreign Office aceptaba que “los generales,… la fuente más probable de resistencia a la agresión alemana” ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) p. 459
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Hillgarth, Alan Hugh |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British consul in the Balearic Islands |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 7, 1899 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | London |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 28, 1978 |
| Place of death | Ballinderry , Tipperary , Ireland |