The Security Services in South Wales During the First World War

Abstract

This article reveals the activity of British intelligence agents in south Wales during the Great War, and their involvement in the surveillance of those considered to be 'subversive' elements within the peace and labour movements.Within the context of south Wales, it considers the significant shift of the prime concern for the security agencies during the War, from German counter-espionage to domestic countersubversion.Reports by local agents of MI5, the Ministry of Munitions and the Admiralty are considered in order to assess the efficacy of anti-war and industrial militancy, and the success or failure of the Government's approach to the anti-war movement.The relationship between the aggressive approach of the Glamorgan Chief Constable, Captain Lionel Lindsay and MI5 and the Home Office's more cautious approach is assessed in the context of the centralising of authority over the security services, and the diminution of local police autonomy.Whilst Wales responded largely with enthusiasm to the call to arms at the beginning of the Great War, the country was also divided by endemic industrial conflict and a strain of political dissent, which undermined the image of a country fully dedicated to the war effort.Whilst Francis and Smith, 1 and Mor O'Brien 2 have highlighted the incidence of strikes and anti-war dissent within the South Wales Miners' Federation, others such as May 3 and Doyle 4 have featured the impact of pro-war jingoistic patriotism in Wales.This was exemplified by the Merthyr Boroughs by-election following Keir Hardie's death and the victory of the former miner's agent and quasisyndicalist Charles Butt Stanton over the official Labour candidate, the moderate ILP member and President of the South Wales Miners' Federation, James Winstone. 5 However, there has been little consideration of the response of the State to dissent and to the undermining of the war effort in south Wales, with the notable exception of Hopkin's study of archived Home Office papers describing attempts by the Glamorgan Constabulary to persecute key anti-war activists such as T.E.Nicholas. 6 This article lifts the veil on the response of the British intelligence services in Wales during the First World War, examines their concern for the region's threatening 1