Under Every Leaf: How Britain Played The Greater Game From Afghanistan to Africa
Author(s): William Beaver (Author)
- Publisher: Biteback
- Publication Date: 17 April 2012
- Edition: 1st
- Language: English
- Print length: 352 pages
- ISBN-10: 1849542198
- ISBN-13: 9781849542197
Book Description
‘Anywhere in the world, where a leaf moves, underneath you will find an Englishman.’- Farsi proverb
Much has been written about espionage, secret agents and MI6 missions abroad but what of the origins of British Intelligence as we know it today? This is the story of intelligence at the height of the British Empire and the characters that shaped its narrative.
William Beaver delves into the mysterious Intelligence Division of the War Office, whose shrewd observations and analysis of international events provided the basis for modern military espionage and changed the landscape of the British Empire from India to South Africa. Focusing on the years between the Crimean War and the formation of MI5 and MI6 at the start of the twentieth century, Beaver charts the Intelligence Division’s course from a misunderstood army unit to an elite body central to the British military.
Under Every Leaf is a rollicking adventure into the minds behind the muscle of the British Army their successes, sacrifices and expertise in weaving a global net of information.
Editorial Reviews
Review
‘William Beaver’s ‘Under Every Leaf’ offers an impressive insight into the world of Britain s first intelligence officers. The British blundered into the Crimean War in 1854 relying on the Army s reputation for pluck and gallantry rather than any appraisal of the enemy s potential. The ensuing disaster gave impetus to the conviction of a few that terrains to be fought over should be mapped. William Beaver shows how over the years the chaps with maps of the Topographical and Statistical Department evolved into the Intelligence Division. They injected a new technocratic intellect into operations, which is presumably why they were held in such suspicion by the military types who considered intelligence a murky sideline . The story of these early spooks is as much about intrigue in the War Office as secret inks and prisoners sprung from foreign jails. The intelligence officers were men from Oxford, Cambridge or Dublin who had been through the Royal Engineers and Royal Artillery. Sources are scant because these fellows generally destroyed their papers. This book has therefore required hard work in poorly labelled archives, with papers often preserved by chance. The intelligence officers were mocked for supposedly spending their time reading risqué French periodicals when they were in fact analysing an ever-increasing library of foreign publications for information that could be processed into intelligence. They went on holidays and clandestine business trips, watching for signs of a mobilisation of the French who could, it was believed, invade with as few as 100,000 men. In 1885, when war fever was being stoked by the British press and the Indian army insisted the Russians were about to attack India through Afghanistan, intelligence officers were able to reassure the prime minister it would not happen, because they had obtained the annual contract of the Russian army for flour. There were no plans to bake bread to feed large numbers of troops towards their south-east. Britain did not overreact and there was no war. Beaver documents the contribution of intelligence to the British annexation of Cyprus and purchase of the Suez Canal; and struggles with the French over the upper waters of the Nile. The division s assessment of Boer military capacity was so accurate that when the Boers captured a copy, they reprinted it as a reliable handbook to their forces. Beaver is, or has been in the past, an Oxford don, minister and Army intelligence officer, and has a real insight into the attitude of the men who gave rise to the Farsi expression used in the title: Anywhere in the world where a leaf moves, underneath you will find an Englishman. ‘ – Jad Adams, Sunday Telegraph –http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/historybookreviews/9217244/Under-Every-Leaf-by-William-Beaver-review.html
About the Author
After serving as an operational combat intelligence officer, William Beaver became the Beit Senior Scholar at Oxford and director of the university s Development Records Project. Following a twin-track civil and clerical career, he became first the Officiating Chaplain to the Household Cavalry Mounted Regiment and is now chaplain to the Light Cavalry of the Honourable Artillery Company.
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