The Dennis Wheatley 'Museum' - Dennis Wheatley and Ian Fleming

Meeting in World War Two...

DW first met Ian Fleming's elder brother Peter late in 1941, shortly before he (DW) went into uniform, and DW came to know Peter Fleming well when the latter was in charge of Far Eastern deception. As noted elsewhere in this Museum (click here), when Peter Fleming was in London, he had a habit of perching on the side on DW's desk, and smoking his (to DW) 'foul pipe' while he talked.

DW may have first come across Ian Fleming through this family connection, but if not, he would have come across the younger Fleming professionally, because, while DW worked for the London Controlling Section, Ian Fleming worked in Naval Intelligence. How well DW knew the younger Fleming in that capacity is uncertain as Ian Fleming is not mentioned in either the published or unpublished versions of DW's wartime memoirs. That DW knew Ian Fleming at that time is however certain, because we know that on a couple of occasions DW entertained Ian Fleming.

As can be seen from the attached page¹ from DW's list of those he entertained in World War Two, in addition to entertaining Peter Fleming on a number of occasions, DW had Ian Fleming to dinner on 10th November 1942, when his fellow guests were Colin Gubbins of SOE fame, DW's friend and one one-time mentor Roly Vintras, and Joan Bright. By this time, DW was a seasoned novelist and had published six Gregory Sallust novels.

Joan Bright, who had helped DW in his early days in uniform by typing-up some of his deception work, had started her career as a civil servant in the British Embassy in Mexico and had then worked for Gubbins. After that she worked for 'Pug' Ismay, Churchill's chief military assistant, and she helped organise many of the Allies' most top secret conferences. Joan was nicknamed 'The Cabinet Offices' Sweetheart', and is generally held to have been one of the inspirations for Miss Moneypenny in the James Bond books.

Joan had been dating Ian Fleming for a year-or-so at the time of the first invitation², so while it is possible that IF was invited to dinner because of the Naval Intelligence connection, it is also possible that he was invited because of the Joan Bright connection. Joan Bright herself was a regular recipient of hospitality from DW during the war, appearing in his lunch and dinner lists a dozen times between 1941 and 1944.

Ian Fleming was then invited, as was Joan Bright, to attend DW's New Year's party on 31st December 1942, where a number of the most senior officers responsible for the direction of the war were present. Fleming is also said to have entertained DW, but I am not aware of the evidence for this³.

Whether they just talked of pleasantries and the war, or whether they talked of books (of which DW had at that stage written many and Ian Fleming had written none) is of course unknown.

Addendum

One of Ian Fleming's colleagues in Room 39 in Naval Intelligence was Commander Ewen Montagu (of 'The Man Who Never Was'/'Operation Mincemeat' fame), and this may have had relevance to the later wartime Ian Fleming/Wheatley relationship. At first relations between the two (DW and Montagu) - and indeed between Montagu and the London Controlling Section as a whole - seem to have been cordial, because Montagu was a guest of DW's to lunch on 25th September 1942, a few weeks before DW invited Ian Fleming to dinner.

Shortly thereafter however, there was a serious, and permanent, falling out between Montagu and the LCS over the arrival in LCS of its only full-time naval member, Commander James Arbuthnott. LCS had apparently led Montagu to believe that he would be able to make use of some of Arbuthnott's time, but in the event that did not prove to be possible. According to an unpublished passage in DW's memoirs, this left Montagu extremely angry, and it is clear from private correspondence between LCS members that there was a mutual dislike between the two camps, and that LCS sometimes found Montagu to be less than supportive. DW* omitted this falling-out and made no disparaging remarks about Montagu in his memoirs, but he must nevertheless have been angered when Montagu wrote a particularly disparaging review of DW's early wartime memoirs, 'Stranger Than Fiction'.

Whether any of this frisson rubbed-off on Montagu's colleague Ian Fleming is a matter for conjecture. Ian's brother Peter and DW were certainly friends for the rest of their lives.

*Or his editor

Notes

¹ The list comprises 7 foolscap pages, and lists all of DW's lunches and dinners and the guests from 3 July 1941 to October 1944. It is currently in a private collection.

² Andrew Lycett 'Ian Fleming', Phoenix 1996, page 135.

³ Andrew Lycett refers on page 134 of his biography of Fleming to 'Dennis Wheatley, an occasional dinner guest who worked for the London Controlling Section...', suggesting that the entertainment was reciprocated.

References :	On DW's first meeting with Peter Fleming, see The Deception Planners p36. Peter Fleming also has many other mentions in the book, which are listed in the index
Provenance:	Private Collection