New Information about the Clowder Mission Led by George Fielding
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.51663/pnz.62.2.06Keywords:
Austria, Social Democrats, anti-Nazism, Free Austria Movement (FAM), Spanish Civil War, Special Operations Executive (SOE), Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), Department for the Protection of the People (OZNA), Carinthian Partisans, Allied missionsAbstract
Based on the studies published in recent years, the author brings attention to the true identity of a particular member of Fielding’s mission, identified in the documents of the Department for the Protection of the People (OZNA) as well as in the British literature by various names: as Georges Charles Banks, Albert Edward Parks, Joseph (Sepp) Innerhofer, or Jean Georgeau. In reality, these were the secret names that the British Special Operations Executive (SOE) and Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) assigned to Hubert Mayr from Tyrol, a Spanish fighter appointed by the SIS as a lieutenant in Fielding’s mission in August 1944. His task was to land in the region of Carnia near Tramonti, where the mission operated among the Italian Partisans, enter Austria, and attempt to incite an uprising against the Nazis, thus helping Austria regain its independence after the war. His efforts were unsuccessful, and unfortunately, his life and the lives of his collaborators or couriers Robert Moser and George Dereatti ended tragically after an interrogation by the OZNA at the headquarters of the IX Corps of the National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Slovenia in Gorenja Trebuša. No information about this has been uncovered so far. However, we can assume that they were executed due to the suspicion of spying for the British intelligence service they belonged to, as well as because of their conflicting views regarding the post-war system or the border between Austria and Yugoslavia, of which Slovenia was also a part. The other mission members returned to the SOE headquarters as early as the end of November 1944.
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