John Percival Morton

John Percival Morton CMG OBE (1911–1985) was Assistant Undersecretary of State at the Ministry of Defence between 1968 and 1971.[1][2] He also had a distinguished career in the Indian Police where he was awarded the Indian Police Medal for gallantry in 1935, the Indian Bar 1940 and was made OBE in 1946.[3]

Life

John Percival Morton was born on 15 May 1911[4] and educated at Bedford Modern School.[3]

Morton started his career in the Indian Police and was awarded the Indian Police Medal for gallantry in 1935, the Indian Bar 1940 and was made OBE in 1946.[3] After Indian’s Independence in 1947 he was posted to London as ‘Principal, War Office’.[3] Leon Comber has stated that this position was a cover for MI5.[5] He was later Assistant Undersecretary of State at the Ministry of Defence between 1968 and 1971[3] Morton was made a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1965.[1] He was sent by the Director General MI5 to Sri Lanka in 1979 following a request by the Sri Lankan President to the Foreign Office for a British security expert to advice the Sri Lanka government on dealing with the Tamil militancy. Following Morton’s visit on his recommendation a team from the British SAS visited Sri Lanka in 1981 to train the new Commando Regiment in counter-terrorist operations.[6]

He married Leonora Margaret Sale in 1939 and they had a son and a daughter.[4] He died in 1985 in Wokingham, Berkshire.[4]

References

  1. 1 2 "MORTON, John Percival (1911 - 1985), Indian Police Medal for gallantry, 1935, Bar 1940; retired". oup.com. Retrieved 1 July 2015.
  2. ↑ "'Indian Episode': memoir by John Percival Morton (b 1911), on his life and work in the..." nationalarchives.gov.uk. Retrieved 1 July 2015.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Who’s Who, 1980, Published by A&C Black Limited, 1980
  4. 1 2 3 "Genealogy, Family Trees & Family History Records at Ancestry.co.uk". ancestry.co.uk. Retrieved 1 July 2015.
  5. ↑ Malaya’s Secret Police 1945-60-The Role of the Special Branch in the Malayan Emergency, Published by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies 2008
  6. ↑ Files on LTTE and MI5 in SL erased at UK Foreign Office
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.