Operation Mincemeat involved the acquisition and dressing up of a human cadaver as a "Major William Martin, R.M." and using the submarine to put it into the sea near
Huelva, Spain. Attached to the dead body was a briefcase containing fake letters falsely stating that the Allied attack would be against
Sardinia and
Greece rather than
Sicily, the actual point of invasion. When the body was found, the Spanish Intelligence Service passed copies of the papers to the
German Intelligence Service which passed them on to their High Command. The ruse was so successful that the Germans still believed that Sardinia and Greece were the intended objectives weeks after the landings in Sicily had begun. The exact identity of the "man who never was" has been the centre of controversy since the end of the war. On the one hand, certain accounts claim the true identity of "Major William Martin" was a homeless, alcoholic rat-catcher from
Aberbargoed, Wales,
Glyndwr Michael, who had died by self-administering a small dose of rat poison. However, in 2002, authors John and Noreen Steele published the non-fictional book
The Secrets of HMS Dasher.
HMS Dasher was an ill-fated
escort carrier that exploded and sank in the
Firth of Clyde around the time Operation Mincemeat had commenced. The Steeles argued that "Major Martin's" body was actually that of seaman John Melville, one of the ''Dasher's
casualties. Further, it has been reported that the accuracy of this claim was verified by the Royal Navy in late October 2004, and a memorial service was held for Melville, in which he was celebrated as one whose "memory lives on in the film The Man Who Never Was'' ... we are gathered here today to remember John Melville as a man who most certainly was." There is some circumstantial evidence that also supports the identity of the body used as being Melville's, attested to as recently as 2022. Alternatively, in 2010 professor Denis Smyth, a researcher at the
University of Toronto, counter-argued that Glyndwr Michael was indeed the real "Major Martin". To support his claims, Smyth published the contents of a secret memo and an official report, both authored by Ewen Montagu, confirming the Glyndwr Michael story. Regardless of the identity of Major Martin,
Nigel Balchin script stayed as close to the truth as was convenient, yet the film does fall back on some dramatisation. For example, the episode of the Irish spy, O'Reilly, is a complete fabrication. The
British Security Service controlled the German spy network in the UK with its
Double-Cross System, though this fact was still
secret at the time the film was made.
Ewen Montagu declared that he was happy with the fictitious incidents which, although they did not happen, might have happened. During filming, Montagu has a cameo role, that of a
Royal Air Force air vice-marshal who has doubts about the feasibility of the proposed plan. It was described by
Ben Macintyre as a "surreal" moment when the real Montagu addressed his fictional persona, played by Webb. The fictional character of Lt George Ayres was believed to have been based on
Charles Cholmondeley, one of the key players in the operation, whose identity was still a secret at the time of the film's making. ==Production==