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Fine Arms, Armour & Militaria Auction (169) 23/10/24 10:00 AM Closed

Starts Ending 23/10/24 10:00 AM BST

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Lot 21A Rare and Historically Important OBE Medal Group of 8, to One of the Founding Members of the Special Operations Executive (S.O.E) Who Went on to Command Both F and Later DF Sections and was Responsible for Setting Up Some of the Most Successful SOE Escape Routes in Western Europe

A Rare and Historically Important OBE Medal Group of 8, to One of the Founding Members of the Special Operations Executive (S.O.E) Who Went on to Command Both F and Later DF Sections and was Responsible for Setting Up Some of the Most Successful SOE Escape Routes in Western Europe
A Rare and Historically Important OBE Medal Group of 8, to One of the Founding Members of the Special Operations Executive (S.O.E) Who Went on to Command Both F and Later DF Sections and was Responsible for Setting Up Some of the Most Successful SOE Escape Routes in Western Europe, The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Civil Division, 2nd type Officers Breast Badge, 1939-45 Star Medal, France & Germany Star Medal, Defence Medal, War Medal 1939-45, France Legion D’Honneur, Officers Breast Badge, France Croix De Guerre 1939-45 with bronze palm, Belgium Order of the Crown, Officers Breast Badge. The group display mounted in a frame with an enclosed name plate. Accompanied by the following items, Bestowal document for the O.B.E. (Civil) to Lt. Colonel Leslie Alexander Longmore Humphreys dated 1st January 1946 (framed). Bestowal document for French Legion D’Honneur to Lt Col Leslie Alexander Longmore Humphreys dated 19th March 1948 (framed). Cardboard tube of issue for Legion D’Honneur document, cases of issue for O.B.E., Legion D’Honneur, Order of the Crown, cardboard postal box for Secon World War campaign medals with Army Council slip for 4 medals, addressed to LAL HUMPHREYS, UNION CLUB, 10 CARLTON HOUSE, LONDON, SW. Most Excellent Order of the British Empire London Gazette, 9th January 1946 - The KING has been graciously pleased to give orders for the following promotions in, and appointments to, the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire: — To be Additional Officers of the Civil Division of the said Most Excellent Order: —Lieutenant-Colonel Leslie Alexander Longmore HUMPHREYS, Civil Assistant, War Office. Belgium, Officer of the Order of the Crown, London Gazette 14th May 1948 – Lieutenant-Colonel (temporary) Leslie Alexander Longmore -HUMPHREYS (108305), Special List.' London Gazette, 23rd July 1948 - DECORATIONS CONFERRED BY HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE REGENT OF BELGIUM, Officer of the Order of the Crown – Lieutenant-Colonel (temporary) Leslie Alexander Longmore HUMPHREYS, O B E. (108305), Special List (Substituted for the announcement made in the London Gazette No 38288, dated 14th May, 1948). Leslie Alexander Francis Longmore Humpreys was born in Budapest on 4th July 1904, the only son of Richard John Edward Humphreys and his wife Elizabeth Agnes Lyons. His father taught English in Budapest later becoming commercial secretary at The Hague, Budapest and Bucharest. Leslie studied at Cardinal Vaughan School and Stonyhurst College then spent a year at Faculté des Lettres in Dijon before moving to Magdalene College, Cambridge. He gained a 3rd class in modern languages in 1925 and a lower 2nd in part two of the history tripos in 1926. By this point he was virtually trilingual in French, German and Romanian. In early 1939 he joined section D of the British Secret Service, the predecessor of the Special Operations Executive making 2 operational trips to the Netherlands and 1 to Poland before the outbreak of war. In September he was sent to Paris with the rank of Major to liaise with the French Fifth Bureau, planning sabotage lines from Paris and later a sabotage network inside falling France. He was evacuated on 20th June 1940 and on the formation of the SOE in July 1940 he became head of its F Section, charged with organising subversion in France. His main principle was that communications are the essential basis of all clandestine work. In December he was moved over to work on clandestine communications (DF Section), a task well suited to his abilities. He visited Lisbon twice during the winter of 1940/41 to investigate reported lines for passing letters, parcels and people into France. Unimpressed by what he found he decided to construct links of his own designing the blueprint of a system that would serve SOE throughout Western Europe for secret travel and secret supply. His first agent landed in France in April 1941 ultimately Humphreys was responsible for establishing SOE’s biggest and best escape line. A strong administrator with a firm belief in maintaining secrecy, he kept his people inconspicuous, and this was the main reason for his DF Section’s run of successes. The effectiveness of his process was demonstrated when one of his ‘lines’ was penetrated by the German Abwher in 1943 and none of the 11 arrested sub-agents provided any exploitable information to the German forces. DF’s methods were sometimes unorthodox, by passing regular, approved channels in order to deliver results. The results of his section were remarkable with several hundred passengers carried without loss and the carrier’s casualty rate of 2 per cent was by far the lowest of any of SOE’s French sections. By the end of the war, he had attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Post War he returned to the business world but in 1950 he accepted an opportunity to serve in the Foreign Office spending time in Frankfurt, Pusan (South Korea), Vienna and finally London. In 1964 he retired and joined the staff at Stonyhurst Preparatory School until his second retirement in 1973 when he moved to Bexhill where he lived until his death on 19th December 1976. Categories: Medals
Estimate:
Lot closed - Winning bid:£5,000
Estimate: £5,000 - £10,000
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