The LIFE magazine story of May 28, 1956, provides a detailed account of the days before and after Commander Crabb's disappearance. Many think this last dive was done at the behest of the foreign arm of British Secret Intelligence, a belief bolstered by the publication of Peter Wright's SPYCATCHER. Wright claimed that Crabb was sent down to observe the hull and propeller design of the Ordzhonikidze, the radically fast new Russian cruiser that brought Premier Krushchev to Great Britain on a diplomatic call.
However, as Wright was a member of MI5, the domestic arm of the Secret Intelligence Service, it is quite possible that he was not privy to the inmost workings of the foreign espionage group. If Crabb's mission was meant to be clandestine, it was spectacularly and publicly bungled on more than one occasion. If it was meant to be noticed, commented upon, and remembered, then it was wildly successful.
Furniture salesman, decorated war hero and diver, Lionel Crabb made a production of telling his Mother, his employer and friends that he had been called back for a special job, one that would last for a couple of days. Since he had to go down to Portsmouth for the job, he told his boss that he would stop in to see a customer, a certain "Mr. Smith," about a problem with his payment check, It seems that Mr. Smith had erroneously dated the check for 1955.
Subsequently, Crabb and Smith, a tall, bespectacled, blond gentleman, checked into the a Portsmouth hotel on April 18, 1956. The pair of them were seen out on the town that evening. The next morning, Crabb was photographed donning his diving suit and jumping into the harbor near the three Russian ships, the Ordzhonikidze and her destroyer escorts. Russian sailors reported seeing a diver surface briefly between the escort vessels and then submerge. "Crabb" was never seen or heard from again.
Mr. Smith checked them both out of their rooms at the Sallyport Inn and carried the Commander's luggage away with him. A few days later a woman with a foreign accent appeared at Crabb's place of business to pay Mr. Smith's bill, The invoice amount came to 4 pounds, 18 shillings and 6 pence, a number which mirrors the date Crabb and his companion checked into the hotel in Portsmouth. The woman ran away when reporters tried to question her.
This whole sequence of events niggles at me. The entire business with "Mr. Smith" appears to have been fabricated from the beginning, in part for the purpose of allowing much public ado to be made over the check date and the amount. We seem to be meant to take note of them, but why? Are we to deduce that the Crabb affair was the culmination of events set in motion a year before? And what is the connection of that event to the photograph, dated exactly one month earlier, that Mr. Twigsnapper has said is related to this story?
Before his disappearance, Commander Crabb wrote to his publisher saying that matters were in a state of "extreme chaos." Did that chaos effect Townsend Brown's life as well? Perhaps. He arrived home from that Paris trip in early April, stayed for the briefest of visits (leaving Dr. Sarbacher in the idling limousine while he passed out souvenir gifts to his family and Helen Tout), and then disappeared for the rest of that year. Where he went and what he did during that time have yet to come to light.
However, as Wright was a member of MI5, the domestic arm of the Secret Intelligence Service, it is quite possible that he was not privy to the inmost workings of the foreign espionage group. If Crabb's mission was meant to be clandestine, it was spectacularly and publicly bungled on more than one occasion. If it was meant to be noticed, commented upon, and remembered, then it was wildly successful.
Furniture salesman, decorated war hero and diver, Lionel Crabb made a production of telling his Mother, his employer and friends that he had been called back for a special job, one that would last for a couple of days. Since he had to go down to Portsmouth for the job, he told his boss that he would stop in to see a customer, a certain "Mr. Smith," about a problem with his payment check, It seems that Mr. Smith had erroneously dated the check for 1955.
Subsequently, Crabb and Smith, a tall, bespectacled, blond gentleman, checked into the a Portsmouth hotel on April 18, 1956. The pair of them were seen out on the town that evening. The next morning, Crabb was photographed donning his diving suit and jumping into the harbor near the three Russian ships, the Ordzhonikidze and her destroyer escorts. Russian sailors reported seeing a diver surface briefly between the escort vessels and then submerge. "Crabb" was never seen or heard from again.
Mr. Smith checked them both out of their rooms at the Sallyport Inn and carried the Commander's luggage away with him. A few days later a woman with a foreign accent appeared at Crabb's place of business to pay Mr. Smith's bill, The invoice amount came to 4 pounds, 18 shillings and 6 pence, a number which mirrors the date Crabb and his companion checked into the hotel in Portsmouth. The woman ran away when reporters tried to question her.
This whole sequence of events niggles at me. The entire business with "Mr. Smith" appears to have been fabricated from the beginning, in part for the purpose of allowing much public ado to be made over the check date and the amount. We seem to be meant to take note of them, but why? Are we to deduce that the Crabb affair was the culmination of events set in motion a year before? And what is the connection of that event to the photograph, dated exactly one month earlier, that Mr. Twigsnapper has said is related to this story?
Before his disappearance, Commander Crabb wrote to his publisher saying that matters were in a state of "extreme chaos." Did that chaos effect Townsend Brown's life as well? Perhaps. He arrived home from that Paris trip in early April, stayed for the briefest of visits (leaving Dr. Sarbacher in the idling limousine while he passed out souvenir gifts to his family and Helen Tout), and then disappeared for the rest of that year. Where he went and what he did during that time have yet to come to light.
No comments:
Post a Comment