Frank Foley often risked his own life to help thousands of Jews escape from Nazi Germany, but he remains virtually unknown. This is largely because his job as Passport Control Officer in Berlin was a cover for his real role as MI6 head of the station in the German capital.
Foley was a British spy, but he had no diplomatic immunity and was liable to arrest at any time. Yet he not only went into the concentration camps to get Jews out, he hid them in his home, helped them to get forged passports and ignored the rules to provide them with visas for Palestine. Foley was also a brilliant intelligence officer, recruiting one of the best Soviet agents to West ever had, persuading German scientists to hand over the secrets of Hitler's rocket programme and playing a key role in the remarkable espionage coup that was the Double-Cross system. Small wonder that MI6 still regards him as one of its greatest ever officers.
