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PERSON FILE · 17 January 1922 – 1970

Konon Molody (Gordon Lonsdale)

Soviet intelligence officer who lived in London as the Canadian businessman 'Gordon Lonsdale', ran the Portland spy ring, was jailed in 1961 and was exchanged for Greville Wynne in 1964.

1922–1970

3 min read · 6 sources, 3 primary

Portrait: Konon Molody on a 1990 Soviet stamp honouring Soviet intelligence officers. USSR Post. Wikimedia Commons, Public domain.

"Gordon Lonsdale" was a real person: a boy born in Cobalt, Ontario, in 1924, who was taken to Finland by his mother in the 1930s and is believed to have died there during the war. The Soviets took his identity. The man who used it in London in the 1950s, and who ran the Portland spy ring, was a Soviet intelligence officer named Konon Molody.5

An American childhood

Molody was born in Moscow on 17 January 1922. As a boy in the 1930s he was sent to live with an aunt in California and attended school in Berkeley, returning to the Soviet Union in 1938 with fluent English and a feel for North American life that later made his cover plausible.5 His service record before the 1950s is known mainly from what he chose to tell. To the MI5 officer Charles Elwell in 1961 he said he had joined Soviet intelligence in 1940, fought with partisans behind German lines, been captured in 1944 and saved from execution by advancing Soviet troops, and in 1949 joined the "illegals" branch, where he rose to colonel.1

Lonsdale in London

Under the Lonsdale identity he went to Canada and then, after a visit to the United States, sailed for Britain, where he enrolled to study Chinese at the School of Oriental and African Studies. Accounts differ on the years: one has him in Canada in 1954 and Britain in 1955, another a year earlier for each.5,6 As cover he became a director of a business leasing jukeboxes and vending machines, which justified trips to the Continent.6 He was an illegal: an intelligence officer with no diplomatic cover and no immunity if caught.

His agents were Harry Houghton and Ethel Gee, two clerks at the Admiralty's underwater research establishment at Portland, who met him in London and handed over naval documents and film.1 He passed the material to Peter and Helen Kroger in Ruislip, really the American Soviet agents Morris and Lona Cohen, who sent it on to Moscow.2

Caught

MI5 traced Lonsdale in 1960 by following Houghton. On 5 September 1960 the contents of his bank safe-deposit box were examined and photographed; they included cameras and a hollowed lighter base holding one-time pads (see Concealment devices).6 He was arrested with Houghton and Gee near the Old Vic theatre on 7 January 1961.1,6 At the Old Bailey in March 1961 he and his co-defendants were tried for conspiracy under the Official Secrets Act 1911; he was sentenced to 25 years.4,6

Talking to MI5

In prison he gave Elwell a series of long interviews, now in the files released in 2019, in which he spoke "with surprising candour" about life as an illegal.2 MI5's account says he refused to name his other agents in Britain, fearing death on his return if he did, and was scathing about Houghton's competence. At one point he offered to work as a double agent in return for money, a new identity and permission to go back to Moscow; his terms were not met.1

Exchange and after

In April 1964 Molody was flown from prison to Germany and exchanged for Greville Wynne, the British businessman convicted in Moscow as courier for the GRU officer Oleg Penkovsky (see IRONBARK: the Penkovsky case). The National Archives catalogue records the swap in the description of his file.3,6

A memoir, Spy: Twenty Years of Secret Service, appeared under his name in 1965.5

He died of a stroke in the autumn of 1970, aged 48, while on a family outing; published accounts give dates in September and October.5,6 In 1990 the Soviet Union honored him on a postage stamp.1

His career connects several famous cases: Lonsdale had contact in the United States with the illegal later known as Rudolf Abel, and his release was the price of Wynne's freedom.6

Key dates

  1. 1954 Establishes himself in Canada under the identity of Gordon Arnold Lonsdale (some accounts say 1953).
  2. 1955 Settles in Britain and enrolls to study Chinese at the School of Oriental and African Studies (some accounts say 1954).
  3. 5 September 1960 MI5 secretly examines the contents of his bank safe-deposit box.
  4. 7 January 1961 Arrested near the Old Vic theatre with Harry Houghton and Ethel Gee.
  5. March 1961 Convicted at the Old Bailey and sentenced to 25 years.
  6. April 1964 Exchanged for the British businessman Greville Wynne.

Sources

  1. Official history Portland spy ring, MI5 (Security Service).
  2. Official history September 2019 release of historical MI5 files, MI5 (Security Service), archived by the Internet Archive (2019-09).
  3. Other KV 2/4429: Gordon Arnold LONSDALE alias Konon MOLODY (catalogue description), The National Archives (UK), Discovery catalogue (1960).
  4. Court record CRIM 1/3604: Defendant GEE, Ethel Elizabeth; LONSDALE, Gordon Arnold and others (catalogue description), The National Archives (UK), Discovery catalogue (1961-03-01).
  5. Wikipedia Konon Molody, Wikipedia.
  6. Wikipedia Portland spy ring, Wikipedia.
  7. Wikipedia English Wikipedia article (used for cross-checking).

Elsewhere in the files

Read next

1951 – 22 March 1961 The Portland spy ring A Soviet network that took naval secrets from the Admiralty's underwater research establishment at Portland, run by the KGB illegal 'Gordon Lonsdale' and broken up by MI5 in January 1961. 1920s–1980s Illegals and legends Soviet officers who lived abroad as private citizens under borrowed identities, with no diplomatic protection. The Abel and Portland court records show how their legends were built and how they came apart. 20 April 1961 – 22 October 1962 IRONBARK: the Penkovsky case How a disaffected GRU colonel, Oleg Penkovsky, fed the CIA and MI6 Soviet missile manuals in 1961–62, and how his IRONBARK material shaped US judgments in the Cuban Missile Crisis. 1917–1980s One-time pads The one cipher proven unbreakable if its key is random and never reused. Soviet intelligence relied on it, and a wartime printing shortcut that duplicated pages let US codebreakers read thousands of messages. 1940s–1980s Concealment devices Hollow coins, bolts, batteries and books: the everyday objects spies used to carry film and messages. Many now sit in FBI and CIA collections, and nearly all were found the same way, through an informant or an arrest.