322 • MAIN LINE
1948 he joinedMI5, rising to become the director of E Branch, re-
sponsible for liaison with Britain’s colonies, for more than a decade
until his retirement in 1968. During that period he supervised antiter-
rorist operations in Cyprus and, at the request ofSir Martin Furni-
val Jones, undertook a detailed investigation into the possibility that
his predecessor,Sir Roger Hollis, had been a Sovietmole. He also
played a key role in antiterrorist operations in Ulster.
After his retirement, he and his wife Maxine, an artist of some
note, started a successful pottery and he turned his hand to his family
history. His bookUmma-Moreis not merely the chronicle of an Irish
family from its pre-Celtic roots in County Westmeath to the present
day but also a fascinating account of Ireland’s rural history as seen
through the experiences of the descendents of Humphry Magan, a
landowner from Emoe in the parish of Ballymore—a place known in
ancient times as Umma-More. Although he now lives in Sussex,
Magan retains his strong Irish connections and several members of
his family still live in Eire.
Virtually nothing inUmma-Morewould lead the reader to suspect
that its author was a senior intelligence officer, and he states that it
was never his intention to take the narrative beyond his parents’ gen-
eration but, as he says, the evolving relationship between England
and Ireland ‘‘is in one of its acute phases,’’ so accordingly he added
some ‘‘current commentary’’ on recent events. This material is of
considerable significance because it is the only example of a Security
Service officer writing, in open literature, about the Provisional IRA.
Later Magan was to writeAn Irish BoyhoodandMiddle Eastern Ap-
proaches: The Recollections of an Intelligence Officer, 1939–1945
(2001).MAIN LINE. Secret Intelligence Servicecode name for the radio sta-
tion atWhaddon Hallestablished bySection VIIIin 1939 and des-
ignated Special Communications Unit (SCU) 1 to handle
prodrometraffic from British diplomatic missions overseas and
medalsignals from agents using clandestine transmitters. During
World War II,main lineprovidedBletchley Parkwith a direct and
instantaneous link to its satellites at Heliopolis, Egypt; Delhi, India;
and Kandy, Ceylon.