Talk:Anthony Blunt

Lead Section

Just a question. What on Earth does: Blunt was Professor of the History of Art at the University of London, director of the Courtauld Institute of Art, Surveyor of the King's Pictures and London. mean?

Older

Th article gives two reasons for his knighthood - Surveryor of the Queen's Pictures, and his work for MI5. Since no-one else at his rank in MI5 got knighted that I can think of (eg not Guy Liddel, not Tomas Harris, etc.) it was presumbaly the former cause. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.80.20.41 (talk) 17:53, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

His Soviet cryptonym was Johnson. C 08:43, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Homosexuality

It is mentioned in the article that Blunt was a homosexual, but it seems like an off the cuff comment. There is nothing else in the article to support this and I have not found any information to this end anywhere else. Could someone confirm this or delete the reference please?--Lorangriel 19:12, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Read the biographies. Go to the library, search for Anthony Blunt, lookup homosexuality in the index, read. Wikipedia is not the end-all.

The questioner said he hadn't found informati0n anywhere else, therefore they are not treating it as the end-all. The request remains unanswered. Meerta (talk) 02:39, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

Spartacus uses the Oxford DNB as a reference for his sexuality. William Avery (talk) 08:55, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

Peter Wright wrote extensively of Blunt's sexuality in Spycatcher, noting that he was homosexual but had also had love affairs with women. Hushpuckena (talk) 00:44, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

French WP

Very interested by your new paragraphs, because I am trying to add details to the French text. Yes, Blunt is a great art historian and it seems important to insist on it. Addacat 01:41, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Article is unbalanced

This article is unbalanced. There is much material on Blunt's no doubt excellent achievements as an art historian and administrator but much less on what he is best known for-his spying. For example, what information did he pass on, what damage did he do? Was he run as a double agent after his exposure? This would explain the secrecy rather than his upper-class connections. Such material must surely be available in the biographies. Xxanthippe (talk) 23:57, 9 February 2008 (UTC).

Blunt's life after being publicly revealed as a traitor by Andrew Boyle's book and Margaret Thatcher (1979)

Can anyone add some information on this topic which is not covered in the article? Did he simply retire from public life? What he shunned by all his friends and colleagues? Where did he live and what did he do? Please reply on my talk page if you can do this!Ivankinsman (talk) 11:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

See in the 'Memoirs' section. Cacadores (talk) 22:58, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Third/Fourth man

Small point, but British_honours_system#Refusal_or_forfeiture says he was the "Third Man" and this article has him as the Fourth. Does it matter which one he is? Jddriessen (talk) 12:24, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

He was the fourth of the 'Cambridge spy ring' to be publicly exposed, after Guy Burgess, Donald Maclean, and Harold "Kim" Philby. Cacadores (talk) 22:58, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Gangster

Surely the phrase "but Blunt never sang. " is more appropriate to an American prohibition-era gangster than a British subject? Could that be worded better? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.120.222.100 (talk) 08:28, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

done. But for future reference... 1) click "edit this page". 2) be bold!
jonathan riley (talk) 08:45, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Knighthood

In different parts of the article, it is claimed that his Knighthood was awarded for his work with MI5, and for his work as an art historian. What was it actually awarded for? A source should exist somewhere, but I'm not sure where to look. --RFBailey (talk) 16:12, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I just deleted the out-of-place reference to Blunt's KCVO under 'Suspicion and secret confession', because it's a random interpolation that doesn't belong there. The reference under 'Career as art historian' is correctly placed. The honour was awarded for Blunt's service as Surveyor of the King's (and later the Queen's) Pictures, a role in which it seems he did a good job. Of course you can argue that he got the job because of his recovery of certain royal letters from Germany in 1945 when he was in security work, but that in itself didn't warrant a KCVO. Membership of the Royal Victorian Order recognises service to the Sovereign. It is in the personal gift of the Sovereign, it is not ministerial or governmental, and for that reason, unlike most honours, it cannot be declined: you are not asked if you want it, you are just told you are getting it. The honour was withdrawn when Blunt's treachery became known to the Palace. Khamba Tendal (talk) 17:28, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

Moura Budberg and Anthony Blunt

There is a passing exchange in file KV 2/981 at The National Archives dealing with the above adventuress (in the 1951) context of the Philby-Maclean 'departures' that Blunt was a Communist and Keeper of the King's Pictures, on which MB's comment was 'Only in England could this happen.' Jackiespeel (talk) 22:57, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

Recent edits

There have been dozens of edits made recently by our anonymous friends which to the unskilled eye look tendentious and relatively unsourced. Expert attention needed. Xxanthippe (talk) 08:53, 12 October 2010 (UTC).

Copyright problem removed

One or more portions of this article duplicated other source(s). The material was copied from: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/SShollis.htm & http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/06/books/the-fourth-man.html?pagewanted=6 Infringing material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.) For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. Yoenit (talk) 09:17, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Bibliography is in shambles

Needs to be straightened out, for instance alpha oder. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 105.226.60.68 (talk) 14:34, 16 February 2013 (UTC)

Oder was?--Jack Upland (talk) 07:28, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Pedophilia?

A line was added to the lead but not the body of the article. I have reverted it as the lead is intended to be a summary of the article, and because "Blunt may have been a visitor" is a bit thin for us to throw such allegations around; more solid information is needed, I feel. Britmax (talk) 21:10, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

You are correct. Reliable sources are needed for such material. Xxanthippe (talk) 03:10, 24 December 2014 (UTC).

Whitney Straight working for MI5?

There is some allegation (albeit mudslinging more than credible) that Rothschild was a spy, but not anything to support WP repeating the allegation. However there's no way that Whitney Straight could be said to work for MI5. This is a very unclear sentence. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:34, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Yes, could be misread. Let's spliit it. --Robert.Allen (talk) 19:55, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Personal life

This article needs a 'Personal life' section. It mentions in passing that Blunt was gay, but gives no information on who he had relationships with. Did he also have any relationships with women? I would like to see such detail added to the article. --Viennese Waltz 10:03, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

Letters from...?

King George VI asked Blunt... to conduct the Royal Librarian, Owen Morshead, to Friedrichshof in March 1945 to liberate letters to the Empress Victoria, a daughter of Queen Victoria, and mother to Kaiser Wilhelm.

We can't tell the significance. Who were these letters from? Valetude (talk) 22:35, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

There were also some other problems with this paragraph. I've tried to revise to make it clearer, based on Miranda Carter's biography. --Robert.Allen (talk) 01:37, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for that. But it still needs more research from somewhere. Yes, the Duke had Nazi sympathies, but he had long since been declared too indiscreet to be entrusted with sensitive information. And the Princess Vicky connection needs explaining. Valetude (talk) 09:22, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

I don't understand why the Princess Vicky connection needs more explaining. Queen Victoria was simply writing letters to her daughter. That seems natural enough. Carter spends about 5 pages on this episode. Her conclusion seems to be that it was partly what the official version says, preserving the letters, but perhaps more important, keeping them private. Apparently Queen Victoria had confided to her daughter a lot of negative opinions concerning German culture and history, and the English royals did not want those embarrassing opinions to be published, should the letters fall into the wrong hands. The purpose of the trip had very little, if anything at all, to do with the Duke of Windsor. That was at most tangential. Carter seems to think that subsequent authors have tried to transform the purpose of the trip into something more nefarious with little or no evidence. --Robert.Allen (talk) 09:56, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks again for the further enlightenment. Carter is quite right that people like to exaggerate the Duke’s importance as a spy. A word or two on why the Vicky letters were thought sensitive might be appropriate. But I’m grateful anyway. Valetude (talk) 11:42, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Victor Rothschild

User:Tony 1212 removed information that Victor Rothschild was under suspicion. Miranda Carter, whose book is cited, states: The Times speculated that Blunt might have converted Wittgenstein. Victor Rothschild was mentioned, along with one of Blunt's least favourite people, the former head of Sotheby's, Peter Wilson." Earlier in her book she writes: "Secretly Wright added the Rothschilds to his list of suspects." Perhaps this information should be reinstated. --Robert.Allen (talk) 03:27, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Robert.Allen. However AFAIK the suggestion that Victor Rothschild was a Soviet spy is not taken seriously by recent commentators: from Cambridge_Five#Alleged_additional_members (my third sentence recently added): "Baron Rothschild was named by Roland Perry in his book The Fifth Man.[12] According to Spycatcher, Rothschild had been friendly with Burgess as an undergraduate, and had originally owned the lease on a house off Welbeck Street, No. 5 Bentinck Street, where Blunt and Burgess both lived during the war.[13] This was supposedly confirmed by Yuri Modin, the alleged controller of the five, who—according to Perry—had claimed Cairncross was never part of the group.[14] However in reviewing Perry's book, commentator Sheila Kerr pointed out that as soon as the book came out, Modin denied Perry's version of their discussions (having already stated that the fifth man was Cairncross), and concluded that "Perry's case against Rothschild is unconvincing because of dubious sources and slack methods".[15]" I do not think that Wikipedia should be giving oxygen to speculations that appear to have no basis in fact (and are used to introduce the person in question) in its main narrative (big difference between allegations and anything proven or generally accepted). Just my opinion of course... Tony 1212 (talk) 09:04, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

Perry's allegation is repeated verbatim at Victor_Rothschild,_3rd_Baron_Rothschild#Thatcher_years_and_Spycatcher but again it is only his conclusion (argument) versus everyone else's...Tony 1212 (talk) 09:10, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

I share your concern and agree the information was poorly presented. However, that Rothschild came under suspicion seems to be historical fact, even if the suspicion was erroneous. It was my impression from Carter's book that she must have thought that to be the case, although it was not totally clear. Perhaps she was being noncommittal. It might be better to give this information later in the article, at the point in time when it occurred, and written in a way making clear that Rothschild was actually likely innocent. Or maybe this is adding too much detail? --Robert.Allen (talk) 19:29, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi Robert, my main concern was that the article previously stated (quote)"Amongst other members also later suspected of being part of the Cambridge spy ring were the American Michael Whitney Straight and Victor Rothschild.[12]", which is what I found gave undue weight to that suggestion and why I re-worded it. This is the first mention of Rothschild in the article, and (if anything) should give a fact or facts about what he was notable for (see lead paragraph for Victor Rothschild), not prominence to an apparently unfounded allegation of spying... My preference would be not to mention the latter in this article at all unless there is serious consideration of such a scenario being likely by current researchers (not just the author of a sensationalist book). But I have no more particular knowledge of this case. Regards Tony Tony 1212 (talk) 20:23, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

I have extended relevant text at [[1]], which previously presented Perry's claim that Rothschild was the "Fifth Man" virtually as fact, by adding 2 sourced rebuttals with relevant quotes. Hopefully this is an adequate reflection of current opinion on this issue. In any case, further discussion of this topic should probably take place there, since it is at one remove from the present Anthony Blunt page. Cheers - Tony Tony 1212 (talk) 05:31, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

Possible fragment -The king had good reason...

The king had good reason to worry. The senior American officers at Friedrichshof Castle, Kathleen Nash and Jack Durant, were later arrested for looting and put on trial

What is this line referring to? It seem tacked onto the end of a paragraph without any context. Slywriter (talk) 02:28, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

The king trusted Blunt and sent him on several trips to Germany to retrieve many items, including some quite valuables ones with no potential of embarrassing the royals. This was because the King was afraid they might fall into the wrong hands. The first trip, primarily to retrieve the letters, was to Friedrichshof Castle, as mentioned earlier in the section. The sentence shows that the king's stated justification for the trips was reasonable, i.e. there is no need to postulate a hidden agenda for which there is no evidence.--Robert.Allen (talk) 06:21, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

anthony blunt spied for Nazi Germany

on 27th April 2024, an article in the Daily telegraph revealed that anthony blunt had given military secrets to german intelligence. since the story as of the time im wriitng this is quite new, the article is the only source so far for this, and behind a paywall. free sources will most likely be relesaed soon, so whoever updates this page add blunts nazi ties Bird244 (talk) 17:46, 27 April 2024 (UTC)

Although the journalist Robert Verkaik is making this catchpenny claim to flog a dodgy book, it is obvious bunk and shouldn't be reported as fact in the article. Verkaik claims that Blunt was 'Josephine', a source cited by the German air attache in Stockholm, Karl Heinz Kramer, who was actually an Abwehr agent under diplomatic cover. But most of the information that Kramer's intercepted reports attributed to 'Josephine' was wrong, sometimes comically so, and in any case it is evident that Kramer used 'Josephine' to refer to information derived from a particular channel, not to an individual person. MI5 and MI6, having at one time thought 'Josephine' might be an Irish person on the secretarial staff of British minister Sir Stafford Cripps, eventually decided that Kramer in fact had no agent in London (he was a bit of a con man, living rather well on Abwehr funds disbursed for agent networks that did not exist) and that 'Josephine' really meant gossip reported by one or more persons in the Swedish diplomatic service. Despite regularly checking neutral diplomatic bags, they could not see how the 'Josephine' material reached Kramer, but the efficient British radio-monitoring service ruled out any unaccounted-for transmitter operating from England. The mystery was never definitively solved, but Swedish theory is the dominant one. (Hence all those wartime posters warning that 'Careless Talk Costs Lives' -- even blabbing something to a supposedly friendly Swedish diplomat could have consequences.) The Germans were predicting an Allied airborne operation in Holland, based on numerous sources, long before the 'Josephine' report of 17 September, and that report arrived too late to be of any use -- the Allied airborne troops had already begun landing. Blunt, meanwhile, like all of the Cambridge Five, was a passive traitor recruited and manipulated by Soviet intelligence. He reported to an NKVD handler in London and would have had no idea how to set up a clandestine communication link with Kramer in Stockholm, even had he wanted to -- which he wouldn't, because the Cambridge traitors were not brave men and betraying an Allied military operation to the Nazis would have had frightening noose-related implications. Khamba Tendal (talk) 18:47, 28 April 2024 (UTC)

Agree. The claim is being countered by Blunt biographers as not fitting known facts and lacking any evidence. In any case cannot be validated until the book is published in May and should be deleted pending that. Benbattle (talk) 08:40, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

Disagree, due to Wikipedia:Notability. If you have a reference for your claims then you can add it to the article. (Wikipedia:Neutral point of view) HudecEmil (talk) 14:45, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

sorry, thought it was credible. what do you mean by pasively manipulated? werent camebridge five members kim philby and guy burgess committed communists? Bird244 (talk) 21:00, 29 April 2024 (UTC)