Key figures in the Foxley Report
Code name LB/X
The exact identity of LB/X, who drew up the Foxley Report, remains one of the mysteries surrounding the Special Operations Executive (SOE).
L/BX may have been a staff officer called Major HB Court - a name mentioned in SOE personnel lists. However, as his file no longer exists, we cannot prove definitively whether he existed or not.
However, a Major HD (Harold Darlington) Court, did exist, and was in SOE. Some of the Foxley documents carry the initials HDC, yet the authorship of Foxley has always been attributed to a Major HB Court. Was this a typing error? The answer may never be known. Nothing is known of Major HB Court, but here is what we know of Major HD Court.
Major HD Court of the SOE
According to the SOE files, Major Court was a civil engineer before World War One, and enlisted into the Divisional Engineers as a sapper. He moved into the Deal Battalion of the Royal Engineers, Royal Naval Division, in September 1914. He spent some time in the Devonshire regiment and the Army Cyclist Corps, based in Bulgaria. His duties involved mobile intelligence on topography.
He then transferred to the Field Survey Company of the Royal Engineers, in Bulgaria. Their function was to set up observation posts and look-outs for enemy fire. They would then chart and triangulate in on these and report their findings. Their position would be highly dangerous, as the enemy never likes to be rumbled.
Court had a good knowledge of topography, maps and their use, and a technical, mathematical approach to triangulating in on the enemy - all skills that could have stood him in good stead, years later, when called upon to formulate a plan to kill Hitler. He left the army after World War One with an MBE and MID (Mention in Despatches), and little is known of him until he showed up in X Section of SOE.
Published: 2003-04-01
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