Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Five: Paymaster Lieutenant A. M. Rogers, Royal Navy, later Captain, Section ‘D’, Special Intelligence Service, and Special Operations Executive, who was captured and interrogated by the Gestapo, but survived the experience, his cover as a Consular Clerk holding up

1914-15 Star (Clk. A. McK. Rogers, R.N.); British War Medal 1914-20 (Papr. S. Lt. A. McK. Rogers. R.N.); Victory Medal 1914-19 (Payr. S. Lt. A. McK. Rogers. R.N.); 1939-45 Star; War Medal 1939-45, generally very fine ands better (5) £600-£800

Alan MacKenzie Rogers was born in Portsea, Hampshire, on 19 July 1896, the son of a Naval Officer, and entered the Royal Navy on 15 January 1914, at the age of 17, as a Clerk. He served during the Great War in the Light Cruiser H.M.S. Castor, ands was present at the Battle of Jutland, 31 May 1916, where his ship was damaged by German fire, suffering 10 casualties. Advanced Paymaster Lieutenant in 1919, he resigned his commission in February 1921, and subsequently found employment with the Vacuum Oil Company, which was to merge with Standard Oil of New York in 1931. His work took Rogers to Yugoslavia, and in 1940 he was recruited by Section ‘D’ of the Special Intelligence Service on a voluntary basis. In July of that year Section ‘D’ was merged with two other intelligence agencies to form the now famous Special Operations Executive (S.O.E.) which carried on its work in occupied and threatened territories.

Section ‘D’ (the 'D' standing for demolition) had been formed within S.I.S. in April 1938, with the purpose of creating disruption and fostering local resistance within territories that were, or were likely to be, occupied by Axis forces. Their primary responsibility was, as their name suggests, sabotage. At that stage Hitler had already occupied the Saarland and the Rhineland, and annexed Austria, and by the time that Section D received authorisation to commence operations, in March 1939, he had annexed the Sudetenland under the terms of the Munich Agreement. In that month, he contravened the agreement by annexing Bohemia and Moravia.

This process had been facilitated by the conciliatory policies of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, but from the chronology it is clear that S.I.S. did not share Chamberlain's indulgent view of Hitler. The personnel of Section ‘D’ went to (irregular) war with the Nazis five months before the official declaration of war between Britain and Germany. Their methods tended to involve encouraging and equipping local 'partners' to help them pursue the aims of sabotage and subversion, and such was the case in Yugoslavia, where their objectives included violent interference with traffic on the Danube (vital to the Germans for maintaining the supply of oil from the Balkans) and promoting the interests of local factions likely to resist an Axis invasion. Rogers became part of the effort, working under the cover of a consular clerk, and is described as forming a triumvirate with Trevor Glanville and Major Alexander Lawrenson, running the Croatian and Slovenian networks, at a time when considerable pressure was being exerted on them by the Axis powers - including the attempted murder and murder of two of their colleagues (Section ‘D’ for Destruction, by Malcolm Atkin refers).

Yugoslavia was finally invaded by the Axis on 6 April 1941, and four days later Rogers was arrested in Split on the Adriatic coast. Official documents make it clear that he had remained in place and was captured because of his work for S.O.E. The Gestapo held him at a concentration camp near Graz in Styria, on unspecified criminal charges. Correspondence indicates that he was regarded as being in serious danger and instructions were given that German consular officials captured in Iraq be detained by the Foreign Office as a form of security. The following month Rogers’ status was formalised by the granting of a Secret Commission as a Captain on the general list. His cover as a consular clerk held, and he was eventually transferred to a civilian detention camp in Poland (Lager Ilag 8), in December 1941. Liberated in May 1945, he resigned his commission with the honorary rank of Captain in 1949. Returning to the oil industry, he died in Palma in 1970.

Sold with copied research, including a photocopy of the recipient’s S.O.E. service file, and a photographic image of the recipient.