Prologue
MEMORANDUM
To: Professor Andrew Montrose
Research and Development
Department of Sciences
Cambridge University
Cambridgeshire
October 14th
Dear Professor Montrose,
Regarding the existing agreement between your Department and Department C19 of HM Government's Ministry of Defence, reference number JS/77546/cf.
As you know, C19 has, over the past few years, continued to subsidize a great number of individual projects and courses and co-sponsored a number of staff at your facility.
As per the above agreement, C19 requests four attachments to begin immediately at locations of our choosing. These simultaneous attachments are scheduled to run between twelve and twenty-four months.
The researchers we require are:
Richard Atkinson
Doctor James D. Griffin
Doctor Elizabeth Shaw
Cathryn Wildeman
Please inform the above that their attachments will be beginning on Monday 21st October. They will be collected by our representatives and taken to their place of work.
Please inform the attachees that to comply with the Civil Defence (Amended) Act (1964) they will be required to sign the Official Secrets Act (1963) before leaving Cambridge.
You can assure the attachees that they are not being seconded to work on any projects that they may find morally objectionable, including weapon-development programmes, military hardware design, or any related matters. Many thanks for your co-operation in this matter.
Yours faithfully,
Sir John Sudbury
Administrator
Department C19
Ministry of Defence
Sir Marmaduke Harrington-Smythe CBE
The Glasshouse
October 14th
Dear Sir Marmaduke,
Further to your requests stated in your letter of 23rd September, I write with two important points.
Firstly, the future of the private nursing facility known as The Glasshouse.
We are pleased to confirm that we have extended your existing contract for a further eighteen months, effective October 31st this year. Our payments to you for this service have been increased by 2. 3%, effective the same date.
You will, I'm sure, join with me in acknowledging that there have been teething problems; some while you were setting up this most essential service to our Ministry; others as we co-ordinated the necessary administration (specifically the use of the Official Secrets Act (1963)).
However, the Minister now joins other members of C19, myself included, in feeling that we have reached a satisfactory standard of care and convalescence for our servicemen with injuries unsuitable for traditional hospital treatment, and with suitable respect for the total confidentiality required by this Department.
The second point is the one raised in your letter of September 27th, concerning the Glasshouse's requirement of better scientific staff to work on the materials we provide. To this end, we are subsidizing your proposed redevelopment of the basement area into a laboratory, provided that only staff supplied by ourselves should be aware of its existence. In addition, four new members of staff will be supplied to you, paid for by this Department. The team will be headed by Doctor Peter Morley, with whom you may already be familiar through his work with the Department of Applied Sciences at Warwick University.