Hester Leggatt
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Hester Leggatt | |
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| Born | 20 December 1905 Karachi, India (now Pakistan) |
| Died | 26 July 1995 (aged 89) Chilton, Buckinghamshire, UK |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation | Secretary, administrator |
| Employer | Osbert Sitwell, MI5 |
| Known for | Operation Mincemeat |
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Hester May Murray Leggatt (20 December 1905 – 26 July 1995) was an English secretary and administrator. She worked as Osbert Sitwell’s private secretary and was the head of a secretarial division at MI5, where she contributed to the naval deception Operation Mincemeat. She was the sister of Bill Leggatt, who served in the Royal Artillery during World War II.
Early life
Leggatt was born in Karachi in India (later Pakistan) in 1905, the daughter of Ernest and Jessie Leggatt. Her father served in the Indian Civil Service. The family moved back to the UK soon after and by 1917, Leggatt attended Tormead School in Guildford.[1][2] She was further educated at Wycombe Abbey.[3]
In the 1930s until at least 1937, Leggatt worked as a private secretary to Osbert Sitwell.[4] She also did some work for Golden Cockerel Press – in his introduction to The Journal of James Morrison, Boatswain of the Bounty, Owen Rutter thanked her for the “great attention and accuracy” in her contributions.[5]
Operation Mincemeat
During World War II, Leggatt led a secretarial division in MI5. In this position, she became involved in Operation Mincemeat, a deception operation for which the body of Glyndwr Michael was disguised as a captain and left in the Mediterranean Sea with a set of fake documents. To construct a believable backstory, personal items were produced to accompany Michael’s body, including two handwritten letters from his fictional girlfriend “Pam”. Leggatt was tasked with writing these letters, as according to Ewen Montagu, who was in charge of the operation, “none of us had felt up to writing the love letters—after all, ours was not the feminine point of view.”[6][7]
After the war, Leggatt worked at the British Council. She died in 1995.[3]
In popular culture
Leggatt is portrayed in Operation Mincemeat (musical), a musical about the operation that was first performed in 2019 and transferred to London's West End in 2023. In it, she plays a central role and a fictionalised version of her letters is performed in the first act’s song “Dear Bill”.[3]
References
- ↑ "Academy of Music". West Surrey Times. 1917-01-19. p. 4. Retrieved 2023-09-18.
- ↑ "Music Pupils' Successes". Surrey Times. 1918-05-04.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Macintyre, Ben (2023-09-09). "How musical fans forced MI5 to come clean". The Times. p. 27. Retrieved 2023-09-18.
- ↑ Ziegler, Philip (1998). Osbert Sitwell. London: Chatto & Windus. p. 419, endnote 93. ISBN 1-856196-46-1.
- ↑ Morrison, James (1935). "Introduction". In Rutter, Owen (ed.). The Journal of James Morrison, Boatswain's Mate of the Bounty. London: Golden Cockerel Press.
- ↑ Montagu, Ewen (1965) [1953]. The Man Who Never Was. New York: Scholastic Book Services. p. 68. ISBN 978-1-55750-448-7.
- ↑ Macintyre, Ben (2010). Operation Mincemeat: The True Spy Story that Changed the Course of World War II. London: Bloomsbury. p. 73. ISBN 978-1-40880-921-1.
External links
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