Historical Dictionary of British Intelligence

FIELDING, XAN• 181

tine, he was tried and acquitted at a court-martial. Fergusson, later

Lord Ballantrae, was transferred to Germany to command a battalion

of his regiment, the Black Watch.

FERMOR, PATRICK LEIGH.SeeLEIGH FERMOR, SIR PAT-
RICK.

FIELD INTELLIGENCE DEPARTMENT.During theBoer War,a
Field Intelligence Department was established under Colonel David
Henderson to collect and distribute intelligence and supervise press
and postal censorship. Henderson, who had participated in the relief
of Ladysmith, introduced standard forms of intelligence reporting,
assessments of enemy strengths, and lists of suspected rebels and in-
stituted a centralized organization that communicated with a Pigeon
Service.

FIELDING, XAN.Xan Fielding was editing a newspaper in Cyprus
when World War II broke out and was recruited intoSpecial Opera-
tions Executive(SOE) in 1940. In December 1941 he was dropped
on a beach in the south ofCreteby HMSTorbayto joinMonty
Woodhouse. He remained on the island for the following nine
months, organizing a series of resistance cells in the White Moun-
tains. In August 1942 Fielding was evacuated to Beirut, but by No-
vember he had been decorated with a DSO and sent back to Crete on
a second mission, which lasted until February 1944.
Upon his return toCairo, Fielding obtained a transfer to SOE’sF
Section, and in August he was dropped from Algiers into a resistance
reseauin the south of France. Soon after his arrival Fielding was ar-
rested by the local French police but his freedom was subsequently
negotiated by a member of his network. He was released from prison
in Digne two days before that city’s liberation. Withdrawn from
France, Fielding was sent on a mission toGreeceand was one of
the first Englishmen to enter Athens after the German occupation. In
December Fielding returned briefly to Crete, and in the spring of
1945 was posted to the Far East prior to an assignment in Saigon.
After the Japanese surrender, Fielding joined theSecret Intelligence
Servicein Europe and operated in Germany underBritish Control
Commission for Germanycover.