In a war of nations unprecedented in its sheer scale and volume of manpower,
when one actually takes the time to zoom in, there are simply thousands of small untold
stories that make you say, ‘that really happened?’. Well it really did happen,
and in yet another WW2 Story, we’re going to be talking about the General Montgomery look
alike and how his subtle acting skills changed the course of the entire war.
Born in Perth Western Australia in April of 1898, Meyrick Edward Clifton James or
for short possessed genetics that would destine him to an extremely important,
yet relatively unknown role in warfare, the body double. When World War 2 struck, Clifton James
was initially drafted as a lieutenant in the Royal Army’s pay corps office in Leicester. It quickly
dawned on him through the constant remarks of his peers, that he possessed an uncanny
resemblance to a one General Bernard Montgomery, who had been the source of many Nazi headaches.
This striking similarity didn’t go unnoticed however, and combined with 25 years of acting
experience, the British MI 5 knew they had struck gold. They called James to
London under the premise of undertaking a film test, however he quickly realised that it was
more than a mere film test, and he was about to undertake the greatest acting role of his life.
With allied forces amassing in England for an imminent invasion of Normandy,
British intelligence, through James’ acting skills and uncanny similarity to Montgomery,
hoped to hoodwink German High command by having them believe their best known
General was on a tour of North Africa. The ultimate goal of this deception was
to foster the false rumors that the allies were in fact planning to somewhere invade Southern
France rather than their true intended target of Normandy. The British needed every advantage
they could get and by tricking the Germans to divert troops to the South of France,
the allies would have a much needed respite in the initial landings.
With that all said, Clifton James fully understood the weight of his task, and began
studying Montgomery profusely. He assimilated all kinds of small details about Montgomery
from the way he walked, the gestures he made and his demeanor around troops. He studied photos,
newsreels and even acted as an aide for the real General to further study his subtle behaviours,
which could mean the difference between deception or exposure.
Understandably, Clifton James was absolutely terrified at screwing up his role. Being a
mere private in World War I, James still had a school-boy fear of senior officers
and wasn’t confident he could emulate the powerful aura carried by them,
and especially General Montgomery. Natural quite a timid person,
James wondered whether he would be able to imitate Montgomery’s unique personality and
would be able to radiate the feeling he gave of strength and quiet confidence.
Eventually, James met privately with the general to perfect his speech pattern, and just before
he left, the real General Montgomery said “You have a great responsibility you know,
do you feel confident?”. When James hesitated, Montgomery quickly added that everything would
be alright and he shouldn’t worry about it. In that moment, all James’ qualms vanished,
and he stated the ability of Montgomery to inspire confidence is what did it.
Just as well it did, because only a few days later did James step off a Military airplane
at Gibraltar outfitted in a full general’s battle-dress. Armed with his famous black beret
and Armoured Corps Badge, James was careful to remember all the subtleties of Monty’s character,
including his confident stride and Monty Salute. Everybody was fooled, including the spies.
Throughout the coming days dozens of spies were reporting back to the German’s of Montgomery’s
presence. Such was the power of the British intelligence, that at one point they instructed
Monty to encounter a pair of Spanish spies acting as business men and to slip out the words “Plan
303” in earshot of them. The Germans were soon urgently trying to figure out what this meant.
With so many spy reports corroborating the story that Bernard Montgomery was in North Africa,
the German’s bought it. With D-day a few days out, Clifton James was smuggled to Cairo
and kept under wraps until the invasion was underway. The scheme was brilliant,
and it turned out that the act had helped to mislead the enemy and divert precious
armoured divisions to useless parts of France, thus contributing to the success of D-day.
As another fun side-note, as German high-command caught wind of the supposed Monty travelling to
North Africa, they ordered his plane shot down, and if that plan failed,
for him to be assassinated somewhere on land. However at the last moment the Germans wanted
to make sure he really was Monty and when they satisfied themselves on this point, the Fuhrer
indirectly saved James’ life, saying Monty could only be killed when they knew where the invasion
would be launched, and partly thanks to James himself, they never did until the dawn of D-day.
Well guys, hope you enjoyed that one, another cool piece of history forgotten by most. If you
guys are enjoying these videos it would mean the world if you shared them with any friends
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