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Treason in the Blood: H. St. John Philby, Kim Philby and the Spy Case of the Century
A dual biography of Kim Philby, the most remarkable double agent in recent history, and his mentor-father, an intellectual and adventurer who shaped his son's destiny
693 pages, Hardcover
First published October 27, 1994
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July 9, 2022
On 1 June 1979 when celebrating the 45th anniversary of his time as a spy, Kim Philby described, in a letter to a friend, that time as 'my career of dirty tricks'. After reading Anthony Cave Brown's excellent biography of Philby and his eccentric father, St John, there is no doubt that his description is totally accurate.
Anthony Cave Brown begins by exploring the Philby family background in which Harry St John Philby features strongly. He had great connections in the Middle East and eventually converted to Islam. He spent time in the Indian Civil Service before working, ostensibly at least, for the British Government in the Middle East. He became a close confidant of Ibn Saud, the King of Saudi Arabia, and this friendship allowed St John to achieve one of his life's ambitions to cross the Empty Quarter of Southern Arabia. Ibn Saud had refused permission repeatedly but eventually agreed to St John's passage and he became the first Occidental to cross the waterless, arid unpopulated region.
After government service he remained in the Middle East and undertook various commercial ventures such as being the middleman in the United States' acquisition of the Saudi oil concession, and it was distinctly possible that he did a certain amount of spying while there. This eventually led to him being considered disloyal and he spent some time in prison. Once released he continued his somewhat nefarious business and was later exiled from the country.
Meanwhile his son, Harry, known as Kim, was beginning his undercover business in England and at Trinity College, Cambridge, he was converted to communism. His career as a spy had begun. There were suspicions about him but this did not stop him advancing in the British Secret Service; at one point he was even under consideration for the top job.
He was posted to America and spent time there with Burgess and Maclean and indeed, it was he who warned the pair that they were about to be exposed as spies. The Americans had their suspicions about his loyalty because one or two Russian defectors reported a spy in the British Embassy camp but Philby was so glib that he always managed to pass it off and be regarded as one of the establishment. The American James Angleton of the CIA did have strong suspicions but once again Philby charmed Angleton and also every interrogator who tackled him and he continued with his espionage work.
Returning to England he continued to impress his superiors while acting as a double, or it was suggested even a triple, agent. Once Burgess and Maclean had fled to Russia, Kim came under even more suspicion and eventually he was ousted from the Secret Service and went to Beirut, ostensibly as a journalist. And it was while there that he was interrogated by a one-time good friend, Nicholas Elliott. And it was to Elliott that he finally confessed, but not until after he had assured Elliott that he had done nothing wrong and was not a spy; Elliott eventually wore him down.
Proceedings were to be taken against him but he overcame that possibility by secretly making his way to Russia where he finally emerged and became a hero of the Soviet Union, living either happily or otherwise, in a number of apartments and a dacha in and around Moscow. He was very much a lady's man and he remarried a Russian lady who supported him to the end.
This exhaustive biography of father and son contains scores of interviews with people involved with the pair and brings to light plenty of intimate detail hitherto unrecorded and as such it is an extraordinary story of two men whose lives were directly opposed to the establishment into which they were born and for which they were bred. All 600+ pages are utterly spell-binding and often unbelievable in that Kim was able to pull the wool over the eyes of people who were convinced of his duplicity.
Anthony Cave Brown begins by exploring the Philby family background in which Harry St John Philby features strongly. He had great connections in the Middle East and eventually converted to Islam. He spent time in the Indian Civil Service before working, ostensibly at least, for the British Government in the Middle East. He became a close confidant of Ibn Saud, the King of Saudi Arabia, and this friendship allowed St John to achieve one of his life's ambitions to cross the Empty Quarter of Southern Arabia. Ibn Saud had refused permission repeatedly but eventually agreed to St John's passage and he became the first Occidental to cross the waterless, arid unpopulated region.
After government service he remained in the Middle East and undertook various commercial ventures such as being the middleman in the United States' acquisition of the Saudi oil concession, and it was distinctly possible that he did a certain amount of spying while there. This eventually led to him being considered disloyal and he spent some time in prison. Once released he continued his somewhat nefarious business and was later exiled from the country.
Meanwhile his son, Harry, known as Kim, was beginning his undercover business in England and at Trinity College, Cambridge, he was converted to communism. His career as a spy had begun. There were suspicions about him but this did not stop him advancing in the British Secret Service; at one point he was even under consideration for the top job.
He was posted to America and spent time there with Burgess and Maclean and indeed, it was he who warned the pair that they were about to be exposed as spies. The Americans had their suspicions about his loyalty because one or two Russian defectors reported a spy in the British Embassy camp but Philby was so glib that he always managed to pass it off and be regarded as one of the establishment. The American James Angleton of the CIA did have strong suspicions but once again Philby charmed Angleton and also every interrogator who tackled him and he continued with his espionage work.
Returning to England he continued to impress his superiors while acting as a double, or it was suggested even a triple, agent. Once Burgess and Maclean had fled to Russia, Kim came under even more suspicion and eventually he was ousted from the Secret Service and went to Beirut, ostensibly as a journalist. And it was while there that he was interrogated by a one-time good friend, Nicholas Elliott. And it was to Elliott that he finally confessed, but not until after he had assured Elliott that he had done nothing wrong and was not a spy; Elliott eventually wore him down.
Proceedings were to be taken against him but he overcame that possibility by secretly making his way to Russia where he finally emerged and became a hero of the Soviet Union, living either happily or otherwise, in a number of apartments and a dacha in and around Moscow. He was very much a lady's man and he remarried a Russian lady who supported him to the end.
This exhaustive biography of father and son contains scores of interviews with people involved with the pair and brings to light plenty of intimate detail hitherto unrecorded and as such it is an extraordinary story of two men whose lives were directly opposed to the establishment into which they were born and for which they were bred. All 600+ pages are utterly spell-binding and often unbelievable in that Kim was able to pull the wool over the eyes of people who were convinced of his duplicity.
June 3, 2010
Fascinating dual biography of H.St.John Philby and his son H.A.R."Kim" Philby, father and son, both of whom betrayed Britain during the 20th century. Philby Senior, noted Arabist and convert to Islam, was middleman in selling the oil concession of Saudi Arabia to the United States, not his native Britain. Philby Junior, a secret member of the communist party at Cambridge in the 1930s, eventually was recruited into the British secret service and rose to betray secrets to the Soviet Union.
May 5, 2016
This is a sprawling and at times gossipy epic contextualising the lives of both the senior Philby, a civil servant who converted to Islam and became an advisor to the Saudi rulers, and the junior, who, of course, operated as a Soviet agent with a cover so well-crafted that the Russians were never quite sure if he was really theirs.
The cast of characters is lengthy, and at times the biography's two subjects disappear from view in what is in places a somewhat tangled and digressive narrative which moves between India, the Saudi court, posh English schools and Cambridge University, the world of journalism (where Philby Jnr got to know Malcolm Muggeridge), the intelligence war against the Nazis (which brings Graham Greene into the tale), the CIA, Beirut, and finally Moscow.
The book contains a good deal of research, although I note that some reviews claim there are inaccuracies. I noticed one minor botch, which is hardly surprising in such a wide-ranging tome: the Duke of Coburg is described as having been related to the British royal family through his grandfather, Prince Albert - but surely it would be more obvious then to note that his grandmother was Queen Victoria! In fact, the significant point of the story has been garbled - the Duke was an English aristocrat who was removed to Germany as a child in order to maintain British control over Prince Albert's historical title. It ended in tears, with the Duke being persona non grata in the UK after World War One, and his German title abolished anyway.
Some reviews I've seen scoff at the book's title, as if the author had really intended to suggest "bad blood" was the real reason Philby Jnr became a traitor. However, this isn't actually a serious thesis that is made in the book, although some similarities in personality between father and son are considered. I suspect some of these reviewers baulked at the length of the book and simply seized on the title as an easy way to make a criticism.
The cast of characters is lengthy, and at times the biography's two subjects disappear from view in what is in places a somewhat tangled and digressive narrative which moves between India, the Saudi court, posh English schools and Cambridge University, the world of journalism (where Philby Jnr got to know Malcolm Muggeridge), the intelligence war against the Nazis (which brings Graham Greene into the tale), the CIA, Beirut, and finally Moscow.
The book contains a good deal of research, although I note that some reviews claim there are inaccuracies. I noticed one minor botch, which is hardly surprising in such a wide-ranging tome: the Duke of Coburg is described as having been related to the British royal family through his grandfather, Prince Albert - but surely it would be more obvious then to note that his grandmother was Queen Victoria! In fact, the significant point of the story has been garbled - the Duke was an English aristocrat who was removed to Germany as a child in order to maintain British control over Prince Albert's historical title. It ended in tears, with the Duke being persona non grata in the UK after World War One, and his German title abolished anyway.
Some reviews I've seen scoff at the book's title, as if the author had really intended to suggest "bad blood" was the real reason Philby Jnr became a traitor. However, this isn't actually a serious thesis that is made in the book, although some similarities in personality between father and son are considered. I suspect some of these reviewers baulked at the length of the book and simply seized on the title as an easy way to make a criticism.
January 27, 2022
This is a great insight into escapist and fantasist psychology. Like his father, Philby saw himself as risen above earthly concerns - acting out insane desert adventures to upstage T.E. Lawrence for example. Seeking immortality and fame like some kind of Icarus who refuses to fall to earth.
He achieved immortality. We still want to read about him today. I believe his story tells us as much about us as it does about him. There is something disturbing about Philby.
Philby was Stalin's eyes and ears in MI6 before WW2, during the war, and at the outset of the Cold War. Philby was as important to 20th century history as Hitler, Roosevelt and Churchill. To understand his recruitment you need to read Orwell's 'Road to Wigan Pier'.
The top people at Cambridge with Philby were all young naive/idealistic communist/socialist sympathisers - all the major writers and playwrights for example - Orwell explains this very well. The key difference is that Philby was a 'closet' communist. His father suffered from the same anti-establishment personality also. Without Philby, the Cold War may have ended decades earlier and c.30,000 US troops would have survived the Korean War.
The Philbys were part of the same social and historical milieu. Like T.E. Lawrence before him, Orwell too was unhappy with colonialism so he left 'the service' to criticise it from the outside - undermining it from the inside and betraying it to a foreign power was beyond the pale for Orwell.
But for Philby it was Ok. The supreme irony is that, without Stalin scaring the hell out of the Americans during the Cold War - the USA would not have imposed the post-war international order and the 70 years of peace which followed. Without Philby + the atomic spies, Stalin would have been out-manouvered by the allies after WW2 & the Americans would have gone home. But they stayed - and they are still in Europe today.
He achieved immortality. We still want to read about him today. I believe his story tells us as much about us as it does about him. There is something disturbing about Philby.
Philby was Stalin's eyes and ears in MI6 before WW2, during the war, and at the outset of the Cold War. Philby was as important to 20th century history as Hitler, Roosevelt and Churchill. To understand his recruitment you need to read Orwell's 'Road to Wigan Pier'.
The top people at Cambridge with Philby were all young naive/idealistic communist/socialist sympathisers - all the major writers and playwrights for example - Orwell explains this very well. The key difference is that Philby was a 'closet' communist. His father suffered from the same anti-establishment personality also. Without Philby, the Cold War may have ended decades earlier and c.30,000 US troops would have survived the Korean War.
The Philbys were part of the same social and historical milieu. Like T.E. Lawrence before him, Orwell too was unhappy with colonialism so he left 'the service' to criticise it from the outside - undermining it from the inside and betraying it to a foreign power was beyond the pale for Orwell.
But for Philby it was Ok. The supreme irony is that, without Stalin scaring the hell out of the Americans during the Cold War - the USA would not have imposed the post-war international order and the 70 years of peace which followed. Without Philby + the atomic spies, Stalin would have been out-manouvered by the allies after WW2 & the Americans would have gone home. But they stayed - and they are still in Europe today.
August 19, 2008
For the Philby fascinated, this book offers a chronicle of the sins of the father. Nothing new here about the son, nothing big anyway.
I have read that A. Cave Brown's methods as a historian are in question, and he is not shy to bend the facts in order to better the yarn. If you're looking for a yarn, this is not a bad place to look and I suspect the the facts in general are, for the most part, correct and the larger facts are not in dispute.
I have read that A. Cave Brown's methods as a historian are in question, and he is not shy to bend the facts in order to better the yarn. If you're looking for a yarn, this is not a bad place to look and I suspect the the facts in general are, for the most part, correct and the larger facts are not in dispute.
February 22, 2018
This joint biography is further proof that truth is stranger than fiction. St John and Kim Philby were two generations of traitors. The father threw his lot in with the house of Saud, the son with the Soviet Union. The latter has inspired countless books, movies and novels and its Kim's story that provides the most compelling. Although St John's story is interesting as a concept (a British man converting to Islam would have raised eyebrows then as it would now) the actual details are not compelling and really slow the pace of the novel. I'd have preferred a summary of his life and then got into Kim. The reason the author gives is that he feels both men did what they did because of jealousy against the British network that held them back. However that theory doesn't convince, Kim was a fanatical communist who led a double life for thirty years, not hesitating to abandon or betray anyone at the expense of the cause. St John in contrast, clearly saw the Saudis as a meal ticket, with his change of religion a means to an end.
That said, when the focus is on Kim the book gets really interesting. There's some stylistic flourishes and esoteric references by the author which made it hard to read but there's a compelling level of detail that made the last third of the book a pleasure to read.
What emerges is the ugly underbelly of espionage. Double agents, triple agents and marriages of convenience contributed to an atmosphere of paranoia and suspicion which crackled with tension. Its a marathon read but the level of detail makes it worth it.
That said, when the focus is on Kim the book gets really interesting. There's some stylistic flourishes and esoteric references by the author which made it hard to read but there's a compelling level of detail that made the last third of the book a pleasure to read.
What emerges is the ugly underbelly of espionage. Double agents, triple agents and marriages of convenience contributed to an atmosphere of paranoia and suspicion which crackled with tension. Its a marathon read but the level of detail makes it worth it.
November 14, 2024
A very interesting subject, but overly cumbersome presentation. The author likes overwhelming the reader with facts and names, often without consequence, pointing to a thorough research, but making it a difficult read. String it on top of awkward use of idioms ("being in the pink", etc.) and passive voice, and you have this history. The quotations that the author used often read better than the narrative he himself wrote. I would have loved to read a better edited, better written version of this effort.
January 6, 2016
Great idea tying together this crazy father/son team - both deeply cynical while strangely idealistic. It's a tribute to man's capacity for compartmentalization within. Of course, the irony of the world-spanning British Empire endlessly forgiving these two as they betray it at the highest levels over a period of half a century is delicious.
The first half is fascinating. Kind of boring in the second half when we get to Kim - mostly because this is well-worn material that I already knew fairly well.
The first half is fascinating. Kind of boring in the second half when we get to Kim - mostly because this is well-worn material that I already knew fairly well.
February 18, 2014
This is the second time I have tried to read this book. I really enjoy the first part about H. St. John Philby and his role in shaping the oil concessions and future of the middle east. I feel like the book really slows down and becomes uninteresting when the topic shifts to his son.
April 8, 2017
A friend recently told me that he was writing the history of a small country and we ended up discussing how many personal names he could possibly include. I was reminded of our conversation while reading Treason in the Blood, which is the biography of St John Philby and his son Kim. It suffers from the usual disease of intelligence histories that there are simply too many names, too many incidents that may or may not have a direct bearing to the central theme. The fact that the book runs to over 600 pages doesn't help. I would argue that a good editor would whittle it down to 450 pages and, with fewer names and less unsubstantiated detail, it would be a much better book. Editing may also help with the sequence of events, which at times is quite difficult to follow, as we jump backwards and forwards in time.
There were moments when I thought that the book is perhaps not meant to be read through; it may be just for reference. For a reference book, however, the author should have decided with firmness how to tell apart father and son who bear the same surname. Although mostly Philby senior is called St John, there are many confusing pages where he is just 'Philby', as is his son.
What frustrated me most were quick references to potentially interesting or even important aspects that were inserted without any evidence. There is plenty of such unexplained detail. How does the author know that the son adored his father if they spent so little time together when Kim was little? Why did Trinity College give Kim £14 on graduation and how is it known that he spent the money on the works of Karl Marx? How did Kim acquire a motorcycle in Vienna? How did Philby senior pay the membership fee of the Athenaeum Club when he was in financial difficulties and didn't visit London for 6-7 years?
Looking forward to reading the 450-page version I've dreamt up. I might enjoy it more.
There were moments when I thought that the book is perhaps not meant to be read through; it may be just for reference. For a reference book, however, the author should have decided with firmness how to tell apart father and son who bear the same surname. Although mostly Philby senior is called St John, there are many confusing pages where he is just 'Philby', as is his son.
What frustrated me most were quick references to potentially interesting or even important aspects that were inserted without any evidence. There is plenty of such unexplained detail. How does the author know that the son adored his father if they spent so little time together when Kim was little? Why did Trinity College give Kim £14 on graduation and how is it known that he spent the money on the works of Karl Marx? How did Kim acquire a motorcycle in Vienna? How did Philby senior pay the membership fee of the Athenaeum Club when he was in financial difficulties and didn't visit London for 6-7 years?
Looking forward to reading the 450-page version I've dreamt up. I might enjoy it more.
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