Finding Hester
Erin Edwards

Operation Mincemeat is one of the stranger tales to come out of the Second World War. A corpse dressed as a British pilot was dropped in the ocean near Spain, with the forged documents he carried landing in the hands of the Germans to convince them to move their troops to the advantage of the allied forces.

To sell the ruse of the corpse, MI5 had to create a credible backstory for their fictitious pilot. They filled his briefcase with receipts, cigarettes, a photograph, and, importantly, two fabricated love letters. An interview with MI5 secretary Jean Leslie revealed the name of the woman behind those letters to be a ‘Hester Leggett’. This has been repeated ever since.

Hester Leggett does not exist.

The false identity was discovered by a group of fans of a West End musical about the operation. One misplaced vowel made all the difference and, with the correct spelling in hand, there was a huge amount of information out there to uncover. Tracking Hester Leggatt through her school days, her career, and her love life, the researchers restored the rightful identity of the author of two fictitious letters that helped change the course of the war.