The Forgotten Spy by Nick Barratt

started to sweep across the globe from August onwards. He survived, though this delayed his recovery for several weeks. For Oldham, the war was over.
    A medical board sat in judgment on Oldham’s injuries at 3rd London General Hospital, Wandsworth, on 14 November 1918, three days after the Armistice had been signed that ended hostilities. Given the minor nature of his injuries, he was passed fit to return to service. His period of absence wasclassified as leave and extended to 5 December 1918, at which point he was discharged from active service. He was entitled to wear his uniform for another month – just in case he needed time to buy civilian dress – and on ceremonial occasions thereafter. Although he was placed on the reserve list, where he would remain until December 1921 in case of military emergency, Oldham was instructed to return to civilian duties in the Foreign Office. He retained his Sam Browne belt and bayonet for his Lee-Enfield rifle and reputedly his service revolver – ‘just in case’. His experiences in the trenches had changed him forever, and according to his sisters he returned ‘shattered and broken’ by the Great War.

Chapter four
THE PARIS PEACE CONFERENCE (1918–1919)
    No matter how hard you try, you cannot imagine the shambles, the chaos, the incoherence, the ignorance here. Nobody knows anything because everything is happening behind the scenes
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    P AUL C AMBON , F RENCH A MBASSADOR TO B RITAIN , 1898 – 1920
    With the Armistice signed, thoughts of politicians and diplomats alike turned to the peace process – although the possible shape of the post-war world had been raised as long ago as September 1916, when the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Lord Robert Cecil, first circulated a ‘Memorandum on proposals for diminishing the occasion of future wars’. This was seen, albeit primarily by Cecil himself, as the first British articulation of the need for a global organisation that would ensure the maintenance of peace.
    In January 1918, US President Woodrow Wilson issued ‘Fourteen points’ that outlined the American view about how the world would operate after peace had been brokered. These included self-determination for smaller nations, free trade, open diplomatic processes, freedom of navigation on the high seas, disarmament to the lowest possible level, various territorial adjustments including the contentious issue of colonial claims and a general association of nations under specific covenants to safeguard the previous points (the League of Nations).
    Wilson’s ideas were based on an inquiry led by foreign policy advisor Edward House and a team of around 150 staff. From the British perspective, the Permanent Under-Secretary of State, Lord Hardinge, established the Political Intelligence Department within the Foreign Office in March 1918 to draw together as much information as possible on both Allied and enemy countries. This could be used when peace arrived. Under the direction of men such as William Tyrrell and James Headlam-Morley, 180 country guides were compiled by an army of technical experts and were crammed with every piece of information that was considered of potential use. Inside the Foreign Office, there was a growing confidence that the peace process would mark the moment when diplomacy would finally and rightfully be returned to the hands of the professionals rather than the politicians.
    Yet despite these meticulous preparations, the rapidity with which fighting ceased took many officials by surprise. Whilst Oldham was recuperating in hospital and undergoing his final medical examination by the doctors in Wandsworth, plans were hastily assembled by the Allies for a grand conference. Once Paris was confirmed as the venue over Geneva – despite initial opposition from Lloyd George, and US fears that Switzerland was ‘saturated with every kind of poisonous element and open to every hostile element in Europe’ – attention began to