Gertrude Blount Hiscox (later Houston; 23 August 1910 – 1969)''England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007'' was a British collaborator with

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. In 1941, she was convicted of an offence under the

Defence Regulations During the Second World War Defence Regulations were a fundamental aspect of everyday life in the United Kingdom. They were emergency regulations passed on the outbreak of war and during it to give the government emergency powers to prosecute the ...

and sentenced to five years' penal servitude.

Biography

Hiscox was born in

Hendon Hendon is an urban area in the Borough of Barnet, North-West London northwest of Charing Cross. Hendon was an ancient manor and parish in the county of Middlesex and a former borough, the Municipal Borough of Hendon; it has been part of Great ...

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, historic county in South East England, southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the Ceremonial counties of ...

to James Hiscox and Ethel Blount. Hiscox was heavily involved in the inter-war politics of the British far

Right Rights are law, legal, social, or ethics, ethical principles of Liberty, freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal system, social convent ...

. She joined the

British Union of Fascists The British Union of Fascists (BUF) was a British fascist political party formed in 1932 by Oswald Mosley. Mosley changed its name to the British Union of Fascists and National Socialists in 1936 and, in 1937, to the British Union. In 1939, fo ...

in 1934 and was the Organizer of the 8th London Area BUF. She was the girlfriend of the notorious BUF member Richard Alister "Jock" Houston, a prominent street activist and anti-Semitic agitator. The couple lived at 50 Thornton Road, Streatham. Hiscox was employed as a travel agent specialising in German holidays and visited Germany regularly from 1935. In July 1937, she was a founding member of the Link, an organisation to promote Anglo-German friendship. She was also a member of the

Right Club The Right Club was a small group of antisemitic and fascist sympathising renegades within the British establishment formed a few months before World War II by the Scottish Unionist MP Archibald Maule Ramsay. It was focused on opposition to war w ...

, a pro-German society founded by the right-wing extremist Captain

Archibald Maule Ramsay Archibald is a masculine given name, composed of the Germanic elements '' erchan'' (with an original meaning of "genuine" or "precious") and ''bald'' meaning "bold". Medieval forms include Old High German and Anglo-Saxon . Erkanbald, bishop o ...

, the MP for Peebles and Southern Midlothian. She wrote a letter to

Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...

on 31 August 1939 pledging her support to Germany in the event of conflict. Great Britain declared war on 3 September 1939 and the letter was intercepted by the wartime censor and returned to Hiscox.

Wartime activity

Hiscox was detained under

Defence Regulation 18B Defence Regulation 18B, often referred to as simply 18B, was one of the Defence Regulations used by the British Government during and before the Second World War. The complete name for the rule was Regulation 18B of the Defence (General) Regulati ...

in 1940 but by early 1941 she had been released and was living in

Chiswick Chiswick ( ) is a district of west London, England. It contains Hogarth's House, the former residence of the 18th-century English artist William Hogarth; Chiswick House, a neo-Palladian villa regarded as one of the finest in England; and Full ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, with her lodger, Norah Briscoe, a temporary shorthand typist at the

Ministry of Supply The Ministry of Supply (MoS) was a department of the UK government formed in 1939 to co-ordinate the supply of equipment to all three British armed forces, headed by the Minister of Supply. A separate ministry, however, was responsible for aircr ...

. The Ministry of Supply was an important wartime department set up in 1939 to co-ordinate the supply of equipment to the British armed forces and Briscoe was both a former member of the BUF and an active pro-German sympathiser. In March 1941 Hiscox invited a fellow-member of the Right Club to tea at her home, but unknown to her he was an

MI5 The Security Service, also known as MI5 ( Military Intelligence, Section 5), is the United Kingdom's domestic counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), Go ...

agent monitoring the activities of its membership. In conversation, Briscoe disclosed to the agent that she was working in a sensitive area of the Ministry, that she was keeping carbon copies of documents she thought would be useful to Germany and that she wanted to pass them on. These documents related to the sites of war factories, shortages of

strategic material Strategic material is any sort of raw material that is important to an individual's or organization's strategic plan and supply chain management. Lack of supply of strategic materials may leave an organization or government vulnerable to disru ...

s and the establishment of submarine bases in Northern Ireland.

Arrest

A meeting was set up by the agent and when the classified documents were handed over at the flat of a supposed German agent, 'Harald Kurtz', Hiscox and Briscoe were arrested. They subsequently appeared at

Bow Street Magistrates' Court Bow Street Magistrates' Court became one of the most famous magistrates' court in England. Over its 266-year existence it occupied various buildings on Bow Street in Central London, immediately north-east of Covent Garden. It closed in 2006 and ...

on 17 March 1941 and were remanded to

Holloway Prison HM Prison Holloway was a closed category prison for adult women and young offenders in Holloway, London, England, operated by His Majesty's Prison Service. It was the largest women's prison in western Europe, until its closure in 2016. Hist ...

Trial

On 16 June 1941, Hiscox and Briscoe were tried ''

in camera ''In camera'' (; Latin: "in a chamber"). is a legal term that means ''in private''. The same meaning is sometimes expressed in the English equivalent: ''in chambers''. Generally, ''in-camera'' describes court cases, parts of it, or process wh ...

'' at the

Old Bailey The Central Criminal Court of England and Wales, commonly referred to as the Old Bailey after the street on which it stands, is a criminal court building in central London, one of several that house the Crown Court of England and Wales. The s ...

where they both pleaded guilty to a charge under Defence Regulation 2A of intentionally communicating information which was likely to assist the enemy. The trial lasted less than an hour. Hiscox was sentenced to 5 years' penal servitude, as was Briscoe.

Subsequent life

On her release, Hiscox resumed her life with Jock Houston. She took his surname in November 1944 and confirmed the change by

deed poll A deed poll (plural: deeds poll) is a legal document binding on a single person or several persons acting jointly to express an intention or create an obligation. It is a deed, and not a contract because it binds only one party (law), party. Et ...

in May 1946. Gertrude Houston died in 1969 in

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line r ...

References