Kenneth Benton

Kenneth Carter Benton, CMG (4 March 1909 – 14 October 1999) was an English MI6 officer and diplomat from 1937–68. Following retirement, Benton began a second career as writer of spy and crime thrillers.

Early life and education

Benton attended Wolverhampton School, and was first employed teaching French in an English prep school, then teaching English in Florence and Vienna. During this time, he earned a degree in French, German and Italian as an external student at London University. After the Annexation of Austria in 1938, Kenneth and Peggie (married in March of that year) were posted to Riga, he as acting vice consul; after the Soviet occupation of Latvia two years later, he returned to England and after briefing at Bletchley Park was subsequently posted to Madrid as head of MI6's Section V, dealing with intercepted intelligence traffic and identifying German spies travelling through Spain.

Benton's team identified 19 spies during his time in Madrid, including the Double Cross agents TREASURE, ARTIST, TRICYCLE and GARBO.

"what we wanted to do was to get them to England and turn them into double agents, not just to satisfy the Germans that they were getting a lot of spies into England, but of course for the great deception which was so effective in deceiving the Germans on D-Day [...] the great advantage of the ISOS double agents was that, as soon as the false messages had been sent to the German case officers, we knew by their reactions how they had been accepted, which was an enormous advantage."

Kim Philby

In 1941, Kim Philby was appointed head of the Iberian section, which dealt with both Spain and Portugal, and became Benton's boss. He later articulated the emotional effect of Philby's outing as a Soviet agent in 1963: "Philby betrayed us all [...] He had no loyalties, either to HMG or friends, or to the women he married. We had liked and admired him and were left feeling unclean." His sentiments were shared by his wife: "Years later, when Philby made his escape to Moscow, Peggie and I were having a drink with Footman, who was looking shattered. 'I know', said Peggie. 'We could work out a plan to leak information to the NKVD showing that Philby was a triple-cross, that Nicholas Eliot's last meeting with him in Beirut had really been to brief him on how to make touch with our Embassy in Moscow. I'll bet they'd swallow the story, if we did it craftily.' 'But the NKVD would shoot him', protested David, shocked to the core. 'Yes', said Peggie happily, 'and serve him bloody right.' "

1943 onwards Shortly after the Allied invasion of Italy in September 1943, Kenneth and Peggie were posted to Rome; Kenneth had been appointed head of the MI6 station attached to the new British Embassy, which as a result of rationing and ongoing disruption in Italy, was only opened in July 1944. Benton's later career included a further posting to Madrid in 1953, then to London from 1956–62 as head of recruitment for SIS. He was subsequently posted to Lima, Peru and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, as Deputy Director for Latin America (DDLA), and retired from the Service in 1968.

Post-MI6 Following retirement to Appledore, Kent, then to Chichester, West Sussex, Kenneth began a second career as a writer of spy, crime thrillers, and historical fiction, drawing on his experiences as intelligence officer and diplomat, and his extensive travels. He became president of the Crime Writers' Association in 1974-5, succeeding Dick Francis.

Fiction Benton published 11 novels across several genres, two of which were published under the pseudonym James Kirton. Those perhaps closest to his experiences in MI6, "though avoiding anything which could compromise or damage his former Service" are the six titles featuring a recurring hero, the police advisor and Counter-terrorism expert Peter Craig.