Born in Bournemouth in 1907, Anthony Blunt is best known for being a Soviet spy.
The son of a vicar and a civil servant, Anthony had loose connections with the Royal Family (he was a third cousin to the late Queen Mother, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon).
When his father was sent to Paris with the British Embassy Chapel for several years, Anthony learned to speak French fluently, and also developed a love of art.
He went to Trinity College in Cambridge on a mathematics scholarship, completed his degree, then went on to teach French and study French art histroy as a post-graduate.
It was during this time that he joined a discussion group of 12 undergraduates, most of whom were homosexuals and Marxist. Several others in this group were also later accused of being spies.
It is unclear as to how Anthony Blunt was recruited by the Soviets, but in 1933 as a Cambridge don he made a trip to the Soviet Union, and during the following years in Cambridge he is likely to have been the recruiter of other spies, including Kim Philby and DOnald Maclean.
Joining the British Army in 1939 at the outbreak of WWII, Blunt was evacuated from Dunkirk and later recruited by MI5.
By the late 1940’s it was suspected that Blunt was passing information to the Soviets, but it was after Burgess and Maclean defected to Moscow in 1951 that he really came under suspicion. It was 1963 however before he was exposed by one of his recruits, and he confessed to being a spy on 23rd April 1964.
Anthony Blunt had been knighted in 1956, but was stripped of his honours in 1979 after a book, Climate Of Treason by Andrew Boyle made clear referrences to him.
His life ended in 1983 when he suffered a heart attack at his home in London, at the age of 75.
