British sent fascist to frontline

Kyt · Mar 3, 2009

BBC NEWS | UK | British sent fascist to frontline

A fascist soldier who delighted in Nazi victories and did not want Britain to win the war was sent to fight the Germans at Dunkirk, it has emerged.

Gunner Ralph Dawson, a Kent antique dealer, had handed out British Union of Fascists material among UK troops.

National Archives papers reveal he was sent to the front in the hope he might expose other fascist sympathisers.

Other tales included that of a German spy plucked from a Portuguese fishing boat to stop him tracking a convoy.

The details emerged in security service files released by the archives.

Mr Dawson, from Canterbury, joined the British Union of Fascists (BUF) in 1939 when one of his customers turned out to be the group's secretary Lady Pearson.

In 1940 he signed up for the army and was stationed in Kent but was soon found distributing far right magazine Action among fellow squaddies.

His record in the army was "particularly bad", his file said, and he could not "be trusted to behave loyally".

Mr Dawson was transferred to a lesser post as a precaution.

But a Home Office note said: "He told another bombardier that he was a leading member of an organisation whose object was the destruction by revolution of the system at present in force in this country.

"Dawson also, according to this bombardier, said it would be unfortunate if Britain were to win the war outright.

"He had also been heard to say that he would refuse to fight abroad."

Another file recorded that: "On 28/5/40 we received a third report from another military source that Dawson, on hearing news of enemy advances, openly exhibited delight."

The plan to send him to Dunkirk on the chance that he might incriminate others failed and he was later jailed.

Crucial convoy

Police suspected him of whitewashing fascist signs around the city. He was also the composer of a right wing song Hymn to Britain, which was used at BUF meetings.

After the war Dawson travelled around the country performing as an actor using the name Gerald Murrell. The authorities monitored him until as late as 1970.

Other records revealed that Gastao de Freitas Ferraz, a radio operator on board a Portuguese fishing boat, was paid by the Nazis to pass on low level information on the whereabouts of Allied ships.

He was arrested to prevent him identifying the course of a crucial convoy due to take part in the allied landing in Africa in 1942.

Another file contained the letter of Fred Donovan, of Colliers Wood, south-west London, who wrote to the Home Office begging for help to get his wife to return home.

Eunice Donovan had run off to Bucharest with Romanian former pilot Alexandru Ionescu in 1958, taking her three children with her.

Mr Donovan wrote: "My wife is so infatuated that she says she can't give him up although I have begged her to try and do so."

Two weeks after leaving, Mrs Donovan called her husband saying she wanted to come home but he could not afford her air fare. The last recorded entry was that she remained living in a hotel in Bucharest.
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British sent fascist to frontline

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