The Eagle in the Mirror

The Eagle in the Mirror
by: Jesse Fink (Author)
Publisher:Citadel
Publication Date: May 21, 2024
Language:English
Print Length:352 pages
ISBN-10:080654368X
ISBN-13:9780806543680
Book Description
‘The Eagle in the Mirror immerses readers in spycraft and molehunts and emerges as a captivating biography. Acknowledging the challenges in reevaluating the life and work of the besmirched Ellis, Fink does a more than admirable job, ultimately offering a book capable of opening minds.’Booklist ‘Fink has clearly done his homework… The Eagle in the Mirror is well-written and holds the reader’s attention. It offers yet another look at the inner workings of MI6, and will take its rightful place on the bookshelf next to two other eminently readable and substantive books that cover some of the same ground: Ben Macintyre’s A Spy Among Friends, Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal (2014) and Jimmy Burns’ A Faithful Spy, The Life and Times of an MI6 and MI5 Officer (2023). This book will remind many veterans of a good CI study.’The Cipher Brief ‘A highly significant contribution to the literature of intelligence.’Antony Percy, author of Misdefending the RealmPart biography, part forensic jigsaw puzzle, part cold-case detective investigation, The Eagle in the Mirror is the astonishing untold story of Charles Howard “Dick” Ellis, the Australian-born British intelligence officer and master spy accused by some espionage experts of being the traitor of the century.The longest serving spy for the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), Ellis came to New York at the beginning of World War II as deputy to William Stephenson at British Security Coordination (BSC) and helped set up for William Donovan the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), what would eventually evolve into the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). At one point in the 1940s he was considered one of the top three secret agents in MI6, controlling its activities “for half the world.”Ellis allegedly received prior warning of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and, through the conduit of Stephenson, relayed that warning to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. After World War II, Ellis was awarded the the Legion of Merit by President Harry S. Truman.But in the 1980s espionage writer Chapman Pincher and retired Security Service (MI5) intelligence officer Peter Wright posthumously accused Ellis of having operated as a “triple agent” for Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.In 1965, while under interrogation in London, Ellis had allegedly made a confession that he had supplied information to the Nazis prior to the war. The scope of Ellis’s purported betrayal was considered even worse than notorious British traitor and double agent Kim Philby, who defected to the Soviet Union in 1963.However, Pincher’s and Wright’s accusations against Ellis have never been comprehensively proven. Was Ellis guilty or was an innocent man framed? Did he take the fall for someone else? Or had the intelligence agencies of the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia been fatally compromised by a “super-mole”?Internationally bestselling author Jesse Fink unravels a gripping real-life international whodunit in this long-overdue biography of the unheralded Dick Ellis, one of the most consequential figures in modern history.
About the Author
The Eagle in the Mirror immerses readers in spycraft and molehunts and emerges as a captivating biography. Acknowledging the challenges in reevaluating the life and work of the besmirched Ellis, Fink does a more than admirable job, ultimately offering a book capable of opening minds.’Booklist ‘Fink has clearly done his homework… The Eagle in the Mirror is well-written and holds the reader’s attention. It offers yet another look at the inner workings of MI6, and will take its rightful place on the bookshelf next to two other eminently readable and substantive books that cover some of the same ground: Ben Macintyre’s A Spy Among Friends, Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal (2014) and Jimmy Burns’ A Faithful Spy, The Life and Times of an MI6 and MI5 Officer (2023). This book will remind many veterans of a good CI study.’The Cipher Brief ‘A highly significant contribution to the literature of intelligence.’Antony Percy, author of Misdefending the RealmPart biography, part forensic jigsaw puzzle, part cold-case detective investigation, The Eagle in the Mirror is the astonishing untold story of Charles Howard “Dick” Ellis, the Australian-born British intelligence officer and master spy accused by some espionage experts of being the traitor of the century.The longest serving spy for the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), Ellis came to New York at the beginning of World War II as deputy to William Stephenson at British Security Coordination (BSC) and helped set up for William Donovan the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), what would eventually evolve into the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). At one point in the 1940s he was considered one of the top three secret agents in MI6, controlling its activities “for half the world.”Ellis allegedly received prior warning of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and, through the conduit of Stephenson, relayed that warning to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. After World War II, Ellis was awarded the the Legion of Merit by President Harry S. Truman.But in the 1980s espionage writer Chapman Pincher and retired Security Service (MI5) intelligence officer Peter Wright posthumously accused Ellis of having operated as a “triple agent” for Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.In 1965, while under interrogation in London, Ellis had allegedly made a confession that he had supplied information to the Nazis prior to the war. The scope of Ellis’s purported betrayal was considered even worse than notorious British traitor and double agent Kim Philby, who defected to the Soviet Union in 1963.However, Pincher’s and Wright’s accusations against Ellis have never been comprehensively proven. Was Ellis guilty or was an innocent man framed? Did he take the fall for someone else? Or had the intelligence agencies of the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia been fatally compromised by a “super-mole”?Internationally bestselling author Jesse Fink unravels a gripping real-life international whodunit in this long-overdue biography of the unheralded Dick Ellis, one of the most consequential figures in modern history. Read more