Operation Mincemeat

Dan Snow tells the fascinating story of Operation Mincemeat which was a successful British deception plan during World War II. As part of the widespread deception plan Operation Barclay to cover the intended invasion of Italy from North Africa, Mincemeat helped to convince the German high command that the Allies planned to invade Greece and Sardinia in 1943 instead of Sicily, the actual objective. This was accomplished by persuading the Germans that they had, by accident, intercepted "top secret" documents giving details of Allied war plans. The documents were attached to a corpse deliberately left to wash up on a beach in Punta Umbría (Spain). The story was used as plot in Duff Cooper's 1950 novel Operation Heartbreak, but revealed as a true story in the 1953 book The Man Who Never Was. The man known as Major William Martin was buried in the Cemetery of Solitude in Huelva.