Walter Fletcher (politician)

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Sir
Walter Fletcher
CBE MP
Member of Parliament
for Bury
In office
6 July 1945 – 23 February 1950
Majority110
Member of Parliament
for Bury and Radcliffe
In office
24 February 1950 – 26 May 1955
Majority1,891
Personal details
Born
Walter Fleischl von Marxow

(1892-04-08)8 April 1892
Shagbrooke, Reigate, Surrey, England
Died6 April 1956(1956-04-06) (aged 63)
London, England
Resting placeSacombe, near Ware, Hertfordshire
Political partyConservative
SpouseEsme Boyd (married 1928)
Parents
  • Paul Fleischl von Marxow (father)
  • Cecile Fleischl von Marxow (née Levis) (mother)
RelativesErnst von Fleischl-Marxow (uncle)
ResidenceLondon
Alma mater
Occupation
NicknameDr Dynamo[1]
Military service
Allegiance United Kingdom, allied forces
Branch/service British Army,
Special Operations Executive
Years of service1914-1918; 1940-1945
RankMajor
Unit
Battles/warsWorld War I

World War II

AwardsCommander of the Order of the British Empire

Sir Walter Fletcher CBE MP (8 April 1892 – 6 April 1956) was a British businessman, World War I veteran, Special Operations Executive's secret agent and smuggler, fine art artist and Conservative Party politician.[2][3]

Life and military career[edit]

Early life[edit]

Born Walter Fleischl von Marxow, he was the second son of Paul Fleischl von Marxow and his wife Cecile (née Levis)[4] of Shagbrooke, Reigate, Surrey.[3][5] His father was an Austrian-born woolbroker, brother of Ernst von Fleischl-Marxow, who became a naturalised British citizen in 1887.[6]

Following education at Charterhouse School and the University of Lausanne, he began training as a manager in the rubber industry.[3]

World War I[edit]

With the outbreak of World War I in 1914 he entered the British Army, obtaining a commission in the Army Ordnance Department. He served in East Africa, and by the end of the war in 1918 had reached the rank of major.[3]

Post-WWI[edit]

In September 1919 he changed his name by deed poll to Walter Fletcher.[7] He returned to Africa, where he managed a large number of rubber plantations. He returned to England, where he subsequently became chairman and managing director of Hecht, Levis and Kahn, a major rubber and commodities company. He held the position for thirty years.[3] In 1928 he married Esme Boyd.[3]

World War II[edit]

In late 1940, Fletcher approached the Special Operations Executive and offers them his speciality, he eventually assigned to the Force 136 and running an operation called Operation Remorse.[1] Originally it was hoped Fletcher could use his contacts to smuggle rubber out of Japanese-occupied Malaya and Indo-China through the Chinese black market. The operation was diversified to include the smuggling of foreign currency, diamonds and machinery to fund the SOE's activities.[8][9]

Colin Mackenzie, the head of Force 136 (SOE in the Far East), said of Fletcher, “He did it very well… even in the early days I had £20,000 of diamonds across my desk in one go. One estimate is that the net profit was worth £77 million.”[10] Mackenzie also commented:

Walter was gloriously fat. It was rumoured that he won the hundred yards at Charterhouse when he was nineteen stone. I didn’t believe it, but when I saw him running for a bus when he was still nineteen stone I began to believe it might be true.

In 1947 Fletcher was made Commander of the Order of the British Empire for his war service.[3]

Political career[edit]

Politically, Fletcher was a Conservative, and he was selected as the party's prospective parliamentary candidate for the Birkenhead East seat in 1930. However, with the formation of a National Government prior to the 1931 general election he stood aside to allow Henry Graham White, a Liberal member of the government to hold the seat.[3]

He was elected at the 1945 general election as Member of Parliament (MP) for Bury in Lancashire.[3][11] When that constituency was abolished for the 1950 election, he was returned for the new Bury and Radcliffe constituency,[2] and held the seat until he retired from the House of Commons at the 1955 general election.[3] In 1953 he was knighted.[3]

Other works[edit]

In addition to his business and political interests, Fletcher had extensive farms in Hertfordshire.[3] He was also an accomplished painter, exhibiting at the Royal Academy and in Bond Street galleries.[3]

Death[edit]

Fletcher died at his London home in April 1956 aged 63.[3] He was buried in Sacombe, near Ware, Hertfordshire.[12]

Honours[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d Jonathan Cole (29 May 2014). "Tales from the Special Operations Executive: Operation Remorse". The National Archives. Retrieved 20 May 2020.
  2. ^ a b Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "B" (part 6)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p "Obituary: Sir Walter Fletcher Former M.P. For Bury". The Times. 7 April 1956. p. 11.
  4. ^ "Death Notice: Ernst Fleischl-Marxow, 1891". Neue Freie Presse. Retrieved 18 November 2014.
  5. ^ Charterhouse Register, 1872-1910. Vol. 2. Charterhouse School. 1911. p. 771.
  6. ^ "No. 25669". The London Gazette. 1 February 1887. p. 535.
  7. ^ "No. 31593". The London Gazette. 10 October 1919. p. 12603.
  8. ^ Aldrich, Richard James (2000). Intelligence and the war against Japan: Britain, America and the politics of secret service. Cambridge University Press. p. 287. ISBN 978-0-521-64186-9. walter fletcher soe.
  9. ^ Wylie, Neville (2007). The politics and strategy of clandestine war: Special Operation Executive, 1940-1946. Taylor & Francis. p. 193. ISBN 978-0-415-39110-8.
  10. ^ Roderick Bailey, Forgotten Voices of the Secret War (Ebury Press, 2008), at page 278
  11. ^ Craig, F. W. S. (1983) [1969]. British parliamentary election results 1918–1949 (3rd ed.). Chichester: Parliamentary Research Services. p. 112. ISBN 0-900178-06-X.
  12. ^ "Funeral: Sir Walter Fletcher". The Times. 11 April 1956. p. 12.

External links[edit]

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Member of Parliament for Bury
1945–1950 		Constituency abolished
New constituency Member of Parliament for Bury and Radcliffe
1950–1955 		Succeeded by
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