Stella Rimington

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Dame Stella Rimington, DCB (born May 1935) was the Director-General (DG) of MI5 from 1992 to 1996. She was the first female DG of MI5, and the first DG whose name was publicised on appointment. In 1993, Stella Rimington became the first DG of the British Secret Service MI5 to pose openly for cameras at the launch of a brochure outlining the organisation's activities.

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[edit] Early life

Born Stella Whitehouse in South London, England, Rimington's family moved from South Norwood to Essex in 1939, due to the danger of living in London during World War II. Her father got a job as chief draughtsman at a steel works in Barrow-in-Furness in Cumbria, and the family moved there after spending some time in Wallasey. When her father got a job in Ilkeston, Derbyshire, the family moved to the Midlands, where Stella attended Nottingham High School for Girls. She spent her last summer of secondary school working as an au pair in Paris, France, before enrolling at the University of Edinburgh in 1954 to study English. By chance, she met her future husband, John Rimington, whom she had known from Nottingham, in Edinburgh.

Completing her degree in 1958, she studied archive administration at the University of Liverpool, before beginning work as an archivist at the County Record Office in Worcester in 1959. In 1961, she married John Rimington and moved to London, where she successfully applied for a position at the India Office Library.

In 1965, her husband was offered an overseas posting as First Secretary (Economic) for the British High Commission in New Delhi, India, and the couple sailed to India in September.

[edit] India and MI5

In 1967, after two years in India, Rimington was asked to assist one of the First Secretaries at the High Commission with his office work. She agreed, and when she began, discovered that he was the representative in India of the British Security Service (MI5). Gaining her security clearance, she worked in the MI5 office for nearly two years, until the couple returned to London in 1969, where Stella decided to apply for a permanent position at MI5.

Between 1969 and 1990, Rimington worked in all three branches of the Security Service: counter espionage, counter subversion, and counter terrorism. In 1984, she and her husband John separated, with Stella retaining custody of their two daughters. In 1990, she was promoted to one of the Service's two Deputy Director-General positions, where she oversaw MI5's move to Thames House. In December 1991, she made a visit to Moscow to make the first friendly contact between the British intelligence services and their old enemies, now allies, the KGB. On her return from Russia, she was told she had been promoted to Director-General.

[edit] Director-General

In her first months as Director-General, Rimington was subject to a determined campaign by the British press to identify her. The New Statesman and The Independent had obtained and published covert photographs of her, despite which Rimington oversaw a (largely successful) public relations campaign to improve the openness of the Service and increase public transparency. On 16 July 1993, MI5 (with the reluctant approval of the British Government) published a 36-page booklet titled The Security Service, which revealed publicly, for the first time, details of MI5's activities, operations and duties, as well as the identity and even photographs of Rimington as Director-General.

Stella Rimington retired from MI5 in 1996. She was made a Dame Commander of Order of the Bath (DCB) in the New Year Honours List in 1996.

[edit] Post-MI5

Rimington's work after leaving MI5 has been as a non-executive director for companies such as Marks & Spencer and BG Group.

Rimington controversially continued her policy of openness about the Service by publishing full and frank memoirs after her retirement. In July 2004, her first novel, At Risk, about a female secret agent, was published. A second novel, Secret Asset, was published in August 2006. A third novel, Illegal Action was published in August, 2007.

In 2004, she continued her interest in archives, fostered by her early career, through involvement with the Archives Task Force, where she visited a number of archives through the country and contributed to the report for the future strategy of archives in the UK.[1]

In November, 2005 she spoke out against national ID cards. [2]


[edit] Publications

[edit] Autobiography

  • Rimington, Stella (2001). Open Secret: The Autobiography of the Former Director-General of MI5. London: Hutchinson. ISBN 0-09-179360-2. 

[edit] Fiction novels

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Government offices
Preceded by
Sir Patrick Walker		 Director-General of MI5
1992 - 1996		 Succeeded by
Sir Stephen Lander
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