Espionage
The Mysterious Death of MI6 Frogman, Lionel ‘Buster’ Crabb is Still a Puzzle
A Cold War tale that’s like a plot from a James Bond novel, the mystery lingers on
Portsmouth Harbour is a major UK naval base and has hosted many strange visitors and events. This is an area of secrecy and intrigue and has been since even before the days of King Henry VIII whose flagship, the Mary Rose, sunk just outside the harbour in 1545. Admiral Lord Nelson’s ‘HMS Victory’ is still moored there, as is ‘HMS Warrior’, the UK’s first iron warship (on which I once attended a wedding reception). I kept several of my boats there and sailed in and out through the narrow channel where the tide runs hard.
Fort Monckton, the MI6 training centre, is nearby in Gosport and HMS Dolphin, the submariners’ training school is right across the narrow harbour entrance.
The Sally Port Inn on Portsmouth High Street comprises two ancient buildings dating back to 1600 and has many tales to tell not least that of MI6 diver Buster Crabb.
On 20th April 1956 highly-decorated Lieutenant-Commander Lionel Crabb left the Inn and went with his MI6 handlers to start what would be his last dive. The mission was to examine the hull and underwater equipment of the Soviet…
