Harry Houghton
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Harry Houghton (born 1906, date of death unknown) was a spy for the People's Republic of Poland and the USSR during the Cold War. He was part of the Portland Spy Ring.
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[edit] Early life
Henry Frederick Houghton was born in Lincoln, England, in 1906. Like most working-class children of his time he left school at 14 to become an errand boy. He later joined the Royal Navy. By the end of World War II he was a master-at-arms, one of the highest ranks for non-commissioned officers.
Houghton had married in 1940. After the war he joined the civil service and in 1951 he was attached to the staff of the naval attaché of the British Embassy in Warsaw, Poland. Houghton dabbled in the black market, starting with coffee and later moving on to medical drugs. This made him plenty of money and acquaintances but it also led him to heavy drinking and the attention of the Polish Secret Police.
Houghton's heavy drinking did get him into trouble. His wife complained of domestic abuse and there were concerns at the embassy that he was mixing with the wrong people. In 1952 he was ordered home.
Whether or not Houghton passed on secrets to the Poles at this time is a matter for speculation. His wife at the time has claimed that she once found confidential embassy papers at their home.
Although some considered him a security risk, Houghton was appointed to the Admiralty Underwater Weapons Establishment at Portland where the Royal Navy would test equipment for undersea warfare. For a while he lived in a caravan. He and his wife separated in 1956 and later divorced, and he started an affair with Ethel Elizabeth Gee, a filling clerk who also worked at the base.
His ex-wife is said to have warned the authorities that he was a security risk and had even brought secrets home. But these were taken as simple resentment for the way he had treated her.
He never had children with his first wife although he was a father to her child.[citation needed]
[edit] Spying career
By 1956 it is believed that Houghton was by now passing secrets over to Polish spies who sent them on to the Russians. These would have included details on submarine warfare. Gee had access to secrets that were out of his department. She would make them available to him and he would photograph them. On the first Saturday of every month Houghton would go to London, sometimes with Gee, and swap packages with a contact.
Houghton's heavy drinking did not stop, and he was soon living far in excess of his salary. This included buying a new house and car and buying large rounds at the pub. This did bring suspicion and MI5 put him under surveillance. This led to other members of what was to be known as the Portland Spy Ring.
In his book Spycatcher, Peter Wright claims that Harry Houghton first came to MI5's attention when a Polish mole (codenamed Sniper) reported that he had information that there was a Russian spy in the British Navy. According to Wright, Sniper did not know the exact name of the spy, but knew that his name sounded like Huiton. Additionally, Sniper managed to obtain documents that had been sent by the spy, helping MI5 to discover Houghton by determining who had been given access to those documents.
Houghton and Gee were among five persons who were arrested in London by Special Branch detectives on 7 January 1961. The others arrested were Gordon Lonsdale and Morris and Lona Cohen, all professional spies.
At their trial, Houghton claimed that he had been blackmailed by the Poles, and thus the Russians, into spying for them. While in Poland, he had had an affair with a woman black marketeer and was told that she could go to prison in Poland if he did not supply them with secrets. Threats were also made concerning Gee and his ex-wife, and he said he was attacked twice by thugs. He even claimed that the information he did give them were newspaper cuttings and matters that were already in the public knowledge.
All these claims, and the rejected offer to cooperate with the British authorities, were more than likely ploys for Houghton to portray himself as a reluctant spy, in the hope for a lesser sentence. It was also attempts to minimize Gee's involvement in the spy ring.
[edit] Later life
Houghton and Gee were both sentenced to 15 years in prison. They married soon after their release in 1970 and changed their names. According to research, Houghton died sometime between 1981 and 1992.[1]
[edit] References
- Soviet Spy Ring, by Arthur Tietjen, published by Pan Books, (1961)
- Spy Book The Encyclopedia of Espionage, by Norman Polmar and Thomas B. Allen, published by Greenhill Books, ISBN 1-85367-278-5 (1997)
