Desmond Ellis Hubble was born on 4th February 1910 to Reginald
Hubble (1871-1950) and Agnes Maria (née Savell,
1878-1947), in Barnes, S London. He married Margaret
Elsie Seiflow (1907-1989) on 17th June 1931 in Pinner
Parish Church.
Desmond
was handsome, personable and ambitious, but liable to enthuse over people
and projects that were not always worthy of his attention. He was employed
by B J Hall & Co Ltd, later Hall Harding Ltd, London-based suppliers of
drawing-office equipment with whom there was a family connection. He joined
the Royal Artillery as a volunteer on 2 September 1939 and later was commissioned
as a Captain in the Intelligence Corps. A substantial part of his army career
remains a secret; but we do know a that he served in the Congo and elsewhere
in Africa in 1942-43,.and was successful enough to be awarded the Belgian
decorations of "Le Croix de Chevalier de l’Ordre Royal du Lion
avec Palme" and the "Croix de Guerre 1940 avec Palme". At the
beginning of 1944 he was recruited into the Special Operations Executive (SOE)
by Wing-Commander Yeo-Thomas.
On the day before D-Day (6th June1944), he was parachuted into France. He
had told me that he proposed wearing his officer's uniform in order that if
he was captured he might be treated as a prisoner of war rather than as a
spy. If so, it proved to be false assumption. He was captured about a month
after landing, was imprisoned, was no doubt badly treated, and was then taken
to Buchenwald concentration camp where he was beaten and
then executed by slow hanging, on 11th September 1944.
For his services in France he was posthumously "Mentioned in Despatches"
and awarded the French Resistance medal "Reconnaissance Française".
Desmond’s Belgian and French medals were later presented to his elder
son Michael by, respectively, the Belgian Ambassador to the
UK, and the then President of the French Republic, Vincent Auriol.
Desmond met Yeo-Thomas again in the prison
train on the way to Buchenwald. Two biographies of Yeo-Thomas
have been published, "The White Rabbit" (his code name) by Bruce
Marshall, and "The Bravest of the Brave" by Mark
Seaman; Desmond is described in both. His name also
occurs in "The Buchenwald Report" of 1945, as one of the group of
ten Allied intelligence officers who were executed in the camp by the SS,
an event that disturbed the other prisoners in spite of all the horrors that
surrounded them.
Desmond’s younger son Peter visited Buchenwald on 28th-30th
March 1995 accompanied by representatives of the London "Sunday Express".
An account of the visit was published in the issue of 9th April 1995, and
he also made a tape recording of his reactions.
The Hubble family history is being comprehensively investigated
by Doug Poulter of Palm City, Florida (Castlebrom@aol.com)
