Captain Augustus Agar V C (2 results)

Hardcover. Condition: Near fine. Dust Jacket Condition: Good. 255 p. 21 cm. B&w illustrations. Blue cloth in dustjacket. Rear panel slightly soiled. Front flap price clipped. Light edge wear.

Hardcover. Condition: Fine. Dust Jacket Condition: Fine. 1st Edition. "Baltic Episode A Classic of Secret Service in Russian Waters", Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1963, first edition. Augustus Agar VC, DSO, RN (1890 1968) was a Royal Navy officer in both the First and the Second World Wars. He was a recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces, for sinking a Soviet cruiser during the Russian Civil War. He was asked in late 1918 to volunteer for a mission in the Baltic Sea, where CMBs were to be used to ferry British agents back and forth from Bolshevik Russia. The shallow draught and high speed of the CMB made it ideal for landing on enemy occupied shores and making a quick getaway. Agar set up a small base at Terijoki, just inside Finland and close to the Soviet frontier. From here he undertook a top secret and dangerous mission to retrieve Paul Dukes, a man he knew only by the MI6 codename ST-25, from the coast of the Bay of Petrograd. The last British agent left in Russia, Dukes had been infiltrating the Bolshevik government for some time and had made copies of top secret documents. A master of disguise, he was known as "The Man with A Hundred Faces", but his resources had run out by this time. In order to spirit Dukes away, Agar's boats had to cross Bolshevik minefields and pass by a number of forts and ships guarding the entrance to the Bolshevik naval base at Kronstadt and to Petrograd, now St. Petersburg. Now (in 1963) Agar has been given official permission to give his own account of what happened in the Baltic that eventful spring and summer. This book, 255 pages, is bound in blue cloth with gold lettering on the spine. The dramatic dust wrapper design is by Douglas Hall. The book has map endpapers and has maps and photographs with the text. The book is in fine condition as is the dust jacket now in a protective mylar wrap. A beautiful copy of a scarce book.